Rabobank: “There Is Really Only One Headline Today – That PM Boris Johnson Is In Intensive Care”
ICU
There is really only one headline today – that UK PM Boris Johnson is in intensive care. Indeed, as several medical experts have attested, given the critical shortage of ICU beds he is likely to be on a ventilator very soon.
Of course, he isn’t the first world leader to get the disease, and we have already seen Prince Charles and UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock fully recovery, for example. Nonetheless, the sudden deterioration in his condition comes as a major shock: last week he was clapping on the door step to praise the NHS and was still leading cabinet meetings online; yesterday afternoon we were told he was only staying at home because of an annoyingly persistent temperature; then it was a cough too – but that he was still actively Prime Minister; then he was going to hospital (by car) for some tests; and then he was in an ICU and, apparently, struggling to breathe.
For the UK, this obviously hits confidence and raises questions over leadership given Boris is going to be out of it for some time, even in the best case. (And naturally everyone wishes him a full and speedy recovery.) Yet there are also key global implications here.
Equity markets rallied again yesterday, partly on a short squeeze, but partly on hopes that we are indeed flattening our virus curves and we can all go back to normal soon. Crucially, however, this bullishness presupposes that we have a strategy for once the curve has been flattened – do we, post-Boris?
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