PM speaks on brush with death

Britain Army veteran’s 100th birthday celebrated

LONDON, May 4, (AP): Prime Minister Boris Johnson has offered more insight into his hospitalization for coronavirus, telling a British newspaper that he knew doctors were preparing for the worst.

The 55-year-old Johnson, who spent three nights in intensive care during his week of treatment in a London hospital after falling ill with COVID-19, told The Sun newspaper he was aware that doctors were discussing his fate.

“It was a tough old moment, I won’t deny it,’’ he said. “They had a strategy to deal with a ‘death of Stalin’-type scenario.’’

Johnson couldn’t believe how quickly his health had deteriorated and had difficulty understanding why he wasn’t getting better. Medical workers gave him “liters and liters of oxygen’’ but he said the “indicators kept going in the wrong direction.’

“But the bad moment came when it was 50-50 whether they were going to have to put a tube down my windpipe,’’ he told the newspaper. “That was when it got a bit ... they were starting to think about how to handle it presentationally.”

The remarks were Johnson’s most candid yet on his brush with death, though he acknowledged when he left the hospital that his fight to survive “could have gone either way, as he paid tribute to the two nurses who never left his bedside for 48 hours.

Jenny McGee from New Zealand and Luis Pitarma from Portugal, he said, embodied the caring and sacrifice of National Health Service staff on the front lines of the pandemic, which has already killed 28,131 people in Britain.

Reflected

Johnson’s close call is reflected in the name that he and fiancée Carrie Symonds gave to their newborn son. Wilfred Lawrie Nicholas Johnson was named after Johnson and Symonds’ grandfathers and after Dr. Nick Price and Dr. Nick Hart – the two doctors who saved the prime minister’s life.

Johnson’s actions since leaving the hospital suggest the NHS has a powerful new advocate as it seeks to reverse a decade of austerity that has left Britain’s doctors and nurses struggling to treat the flood of coronavirus patients with inadequate supplies of protective gear. Dozens of NHS workers have died in the outbreak.

The interview follows an emotional video made by Johnson after being released from the hospital on April 12.

Johnson called the NHS “unconquerable” and “the beating heart of this country” after seeing its response to the outbreak first-hand. He also lauded the courage of everyone from doctors to cooks.

The prime minister returned to work on April 27.

Meanwhile, a British army veteran shuffled the length of his garden 100 times – and walked away with the hearts of a nation.

Capt. Tom Moore celebrated his 100th birthday on Thursday, having raised some 30 million pounds ($37 million) for the National Health Service after completing a challenge to mark the milestone, one garden lap at a time. His sunny attitude in a dark moment brought smiles to a country locked down amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Tired

“My legs may be tired, but my mind is racing and I’m hoping to be back very soon with other ways in which I can help people, help others,’’ he said. “Please always remember, ‘Tomorrow Will Be A Good Day.’”

Moore’s family used social media to seek donations to support health care workers as a way to thank the doctors and nurses who took care of him when he broke his hip. But as he walked, the public watched and just kept donating.

Moore, who uses a walker while putting in his paces, completed 100 laps of his 25-meter garden earlier this month.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson described him as a “point of light.’’

“You have touched our hearts, lifted our spirits and enabled millions to show their support for the wonderful men and women of our unique NHS,’’ Johnson said. ”Because of their extraordinary courage and dedication our country will get through this difficult time and, in doing so, fulfil your optimism that tomorrow will indeed be a better day.”

As his birthday arrived, Capt. Moore celebrated his appointment as the first Honorary Colonel of the Army Foundation College, Harrogate, Queen Elizabeth II sent a card.

And in the sky, the Royal Air Force organized World War II-inspired flypasts featuring a Spitfire and a Hurricane - which he observed while sheltering under a red plaid blanket in the garden. He waved as they thundered past.

“I’m one of the few people here who’ve seen Hurricanes and Spitfires flying past in anger,’’ he told the BBC. “Fortunately today they’re all flying peacefully.”

Moore, who had planned to raise a far humbler sum of 1,000 pounds, thanked the public for their generosity - and said that they had done a wonderful thing for him.

“I felt a little frustrated and disappointed after I broke my hip and it knocked my confidence,’’ he said. “However, the past three weeks have put a spring back in my step.