Boris Johnson says he never offered to be injected with coronavirus on television at the start of the pandemic
- Edward Udny-Lister said Mr Johnson wanted ‘to be injected with Covid-19 on TV’
Boris Johnson has denied offering to be injected with Covid on live TV at the start of the pandemic.
The former prime minister’s chief of staff, Edward Udny-Lister told the Covid Inquiry last month that the PM wanted ‘to be injected with Covid-19 on television’ in March 2020 to ‘demonstrate to the public that it did not pose a threat’.
But in a written statement to the inquiry, which was published after his two-day appearance at the inquiry, Mr Johnson said: ‘Neither on January 29, 2020 nor on February 5, 2020 was I asked a single question about Covid during Prime Minister’s Questions.
Boris Johnson has denied offering to be injected with Covid on live TV during the pandemic
Boris Johnson wanted to be injected with Covid live on TV ‘to show it did not pose a threat’, the Covid-19 inquiry heard from Lord Edward Udny-Lister, Mr Johnson’s former chief of staff
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‘I am asked whether at this stage I compared the disease to swine flu or said it was just a scare story.
‘I certainly may have drawn parallels with previous public health threats… But I could see enough –just from the reporting from China, let alone Italy – that this could be a very serious threat.
Equally, the later suggestion that, in around March 2020, I volunteered to be injected with the virus on live TV; I reject and attach little credence to the source of that account.’
Mr Johnson also denied claims made by his former chief adviser, Dominic Cummings, that he said he would rather ‘let the bodies pile high’ than impose another lockdown in September 2020.
He said: ‘I did not say this. What makes this especially absurd is that I am supposed to have said it on October 31, 2020, when the decision to lock down had in fact already been taken.’
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