The Guardian reports:

An Irish prime minister, a French film director and a Hungarian MEP are among the public figures who are resurrecting their medical careers to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

They are part of a small, growing group of people in politics, the arts and sports who are becoming doctors again to help health care systems under unprecedented strain.

Leo Varadkar, Ireland’s taoiseach, has offered to work one day a week as a doctor as his country braces for a surge in the number of infections, it emerged this week. “Many of his family and friends are working in the health service. He wanted to help out even in a small way,” said a spokesperson.

Varadkar, 41, worked as a junior doctor in Dublin and qualified as a GP in 2010 before quitting medicine to become a full-time politician, and later becoming premier.

His return to medicine adds him to an eclectic group of public figures who have dusted off credentials to work as nurses and doctors in Europe’s battle against the pandemic. [Continue reading…]