Chris Hipkins reckons he'll be fighting fit and ready to re-enter the campaign arena post-covid.
But the scrapping's well and truly started without him.
In isolation, he's dealing with distractions from within his caucus.
Outside there's allegations of a leadership coup, porkies and calls of chicken: both sides are all in.
National's calling Labour dirty and desperate; Labour says National's ducking for cover.
Here's our deputy political editor Craig McCulloch.
