Weeks after the British prime minister was in intensive care with a serious case of the coronavirus, Boris Johnson and his fiancée Carrie Symonds announced the birth of their baby son on Wednesday.
“The Prime Minister and Ms Symonds are delighted to announce the birth of a healthy baby boy at a London hospital earlier this morning and would like to thank the fantastic NHS maternity team,” a government spokesman said.
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Johnson, 55, suffered serious symptoms after being infected with COVID-19 last month. He left intensive care less than three weeks ago, thanking staff at the country’s publicly funded National Health Service “for saving my life.”
Symonds, 32, an environmental activist and former official in Johnson’s ruling Conservative Party, also suffered symptoms but was never tested.
Johnson has received heavy criticism for his handling of the crisis. Some experts say he waited too long to impose social restrictions and failed to adequately prepare the NHS and supply it with personal protective equipment.
The United Kingdom has seen more than 20,000 people die in hospitals with COVID-19 — giving it one of the highest death tolls in Europe — with many more believed to have died in nursing homes.
For years Johnson’s private life has been the subject of some speculation, fueled in part by his repeated refusal to say how many children he has.
He has been married twice before and fathered four children with his second wife. In 2013, when Johnson was mayor of London, appeal court judges ruled that the public had the right to know he had an extra-marital affair with a woman who gave birth to his daughter.
This is his first child with Symonds and their wedding will be the first of a sitting prime minister in some 250 years.
Reuters contributed.
