💡A tale of two premiers

Weighing up Xi and Johnson

A year ago, on March 3rd, more than a month after the World Health Organisation declared a public health emergency over the outbreak of a novel disease in China, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson declared he visited coronavirus patients:

I shook hands with everybody, you'll be pleased to know, and I continue to shake hands.

At the time, I was struck by the lackadaisical nature of Johnson’s response to this disease – clearly contagious and clearly in its growth phase.¹

As Laura Kuenssberg, a BBC journalist not known for being critical of Johnson’s government, wrote

The prime minister was even heard to say: “The best thing would be to ignore it.” And he repeatedly warned, several sources tell me, that an overreaction could do more harm than good.

There was even talk of ‘chicken pox parties’, where healthy people might be encouraged to gather to spread the disease. And while that was not considered a policy proposal, real consideration was given to whether suppressing Covid entirely could be c…