Suraiya Faroqhi, The Ottoman Empire and the World Around It, Sam Byers Perfidious Albion

Lockdown reading. The situation in the UK seems to be getting worse and wore, as the death count rises each day and Boris Johnson has been rushed to hospital.  The UK Government's response to the outbreak has been appalling, they've not taken it seriously enough, given out mixed messages -  'stay in!' 'it's ok to go out for exercise', and our PM was only a few weeks ago boasting about shaking hands with everyone in a hospital. It looks like it will hit harder in the UK than anywhere else in Europe because of a) our government's wrong headed response and b) the deliberate underfunding of our health and social infrastructure for the previous decades. Despite this, Johnson appears to have record levels of approval, is eulogised in the press and has people all over the country praying for him.