Lord Sugar asks "Who's dead? I'm not" as he calls for end to lockdown

By Neil Wilkes, Editor-in-chief

Published: June 18 2020 | 13:40

Last updated: June 18 2020 | 15:43

Lord Sugar goes on a bizarre rant calling for the UK to come out of coronavirus lockdown, asking: "Who's dead? I'm not!"

Lord Sugar has called for the UK to come out of coronavirus lockdown in a bizarre rant in which he asked: "Who's dead?"

The UK has been in a state of lockdown since March 23 in an effort to curb the spread of the killer disease, although restrictions on social and commercial activity are now gradually being lifted by the government.

The Apprentice host Sugar, 73, has been at his home in Florida with his wife for the last six months and thinks that the shutdown has now gone on too long.

"Look, I'm not a doctor and I don't want to be giving medical advice and all that stuff," he said during an appearance on today's The Jeremy Vine Show. "The only thing I can say is that I have been here in Florida for six months and so I have lived through the crisis, the shortage of ventilators, the no masks available, the no body wear available, the hospital beds being full up, blah blah blah, blah blah blah, blah blah blah.

"And I have now seen the transition of restaurants opening, tennis courts for example opening, golf clubs opening, restaurants opening 50% capacity... shops have been open all of the time, quite honestly and this has been going on now for six weeks, and so I just logically say, well hold on, six weeks, we've come out of this so called lockdown.

"Who's dead? I'm not. I'm still alive. My wife, thank God, is still alive. So's everybody else I know. No-one else has caught anything."

The self-made billionaire continued: "Maybe it's time for us to follow the example of America, or indeed France that have opened up or indeed Spain. I think Prime Minister Johnson unfortunately had a problem himself and I think he's being a little bit too cautious if you ask me, just slightly."

More than 450,000 people globally have now died from coronavirus, including over 42,000 in the UK and almost 120,000 in the US.