Johnson’s hospital carers tipped for honours

‘Covid heroes’ set to be recognised in Queen’s Birthday honours, along with TV cook Mary Berry

THE doctors and nurses who cared for Boris Johnson when he was struck down by coronavirus are tipped to be among hundreds of front-line health workers to receive honours from the Queen this week.

The team of medics at St Thomas’ Hospital in central London were praised by the Prime Minister in April for the “exemplary” care he received, saying: “I owe them my life.”

The group of half a dozen doctors and nurses are set to be among 200 socalled ‘ Covid heroes’ who are likely to be given the awards in the Queen’s Birthday honours on Saturday. Mary Berry, the television cook and former judge on The Great British Bake Off, is tipped to be given a damehood.

The honours were due to be announced as is customary in June, but their publication was delayed to allow time for the contributions of front-line health workers, volunteers and fundraisers to be recognised. No 10 sources have said that honours would also go to fundraisers – following the knighthood for centenarian Capt Sir Tom Moore – who have been “outstanding examples’ of contributions made across the UK.

During the lockdown, Mr Johnson often led the nation in the weekly clap for NHS carers.

Mr Johnson said last month that he was delighted to have “an opportunity to recognise those who have given so much to this country already”.

He added: “The dedication, courage and compassion seen from these recipients, be it responding on the front line or out in their communities providing support to the most vulnerable, is an inspiration to us all.

“We owe them a debt of gratitude and the 2020 Queen’s Birthday honours will be the first of many occasions where we can thank them as a nation.”

In May, Mr Johnson and his fiancée Carrie Symonds named their newborn son Wilfred Lawrie Nicholas after their grandfathers, and the NHS doctors who helped save the Prime Minister’s life as he battled coronavirus. Miss Symonds said at the time that he was named, “Wilfred after Boris’s grandfather, Lawrie after my grandfather, Nicholas after Dr Nick Price and Dr Nick Hart – the two doctors that saved Boris’s life”.

Ms Berry, 85, is in line for her honour after six decades of cookery writing and broadcasting. She has written more than 70 cookery books.

More recently, she was a judge on the BBC’S Best Home Cook and presented Mary Berry’s Simple Comforts. The damehood will follow a CBE for services to culinary arts, which she received eight years ago.

Ms Berry, who trained at Le Cordon Bleu, once said that the “greatest memory” of her career was being invited to Buckingham Palace for dinner with the Queen. “I had a phone call saying the Queen would like me to go to the Palace for dinner,” she told Cambridge University students in 2017.

“When I first got the call to invite me I had thought it was a joke. Thomas [her son] answered the phone and said, ‘It’s Buckingham Palace for you’.

“Well, I just assumed he was ‘taking the Michael’ out of his mother.”

“Then I took the call and they said, ‘It’s Buckingham Palace here. Her Majesty would like you to come for lunch.’ Gosh, I thought, how lovely.”

She was later pictured engaged in conversation with the monarch at the Chelsea Flower Show.