Labour MP says Johnson's Covid condition was exaggerated

A Labour MP has triggered a political row by suggesting that Boris Johnson's Covid-19 condition was exaggerated by No 10.

Valerie Vaz said the prime minister was “not quite at death’s door as we were led to believe” when he was put in intensive care in April last year.

Johnson spent three nights in intensive care, in London’s St Thomas’ Hospital, because of “persistent” coronavirus symptoms. When Johnson was out of action for several weeks during the recovery, Dominic Raab, the foreign secretary, was put in charge of running the government.

During his time in the hospital, it is believed that the prime minister was given oxygen and was not placed on a ventilator. After leaving the hospital, he posted a video message on Twitter and thanked the NHS.

On BBC’s Politics Live programme, she backtracked a bit and said: “Honestly I don’t know – I’m not his doctor."

Simon Clarke, a Conservative MP, has shot back: “That’s an extraordinary thing to say. Are you impugning the prime minister’s integrity?

“It is genuinely wrong to question how sick the prime minister was, he was in intensive care and very, very ill. We shouldn’t allow that to pass without comment.”

However, later in a statement, Vaz has said: “I wish to clarify my remarks and apologise if any offence was caused. I never intended to give the suggestion that the prime minister was not seriously ill.”