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Dead, Ill, Recovered: Celebrities Hit By COVID-19

By Modupeoluwa Adekanye
17 April 2020   |   11:51 am
From world leaders and royals to sports stars and artists, the coronavirus has hit millions around the world, including the rich and famous. Here is a roundup of high-profile figures who have died, been infected by or cured of COVID-19. Deceased Best-selling exiled Chilean writer Luis Sepulveda, 70, has died at a hospital in Spain…

Coronavirus Photo: Getty Images

From world leaders and royals to sports stars and artists, the coronavirus has hit millions around the world, including the rich and famous.

Here is a roundup of high-profile figures who have died, been infected by or cured of COVID-19.

Deceased
Best-selling exiled Chilean writer Luis Sepulveda, 70, has died at a hospital in Spain some six weeks after testing positive, his publishers announced on Thursday.

Tim Brooke-Taylor, 79, a British comic actor best known for TV show The Goodies and radio show I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue, died on Sunday.

John Prine, 73, an American folk legend widely considered one of his generation’s most influential songwriters, died on April 8.

Jazz great Ellis Marsalis died on April 1 aged 85 after contracting the virus.

Senegal’s Pape Diouf, 68, ex-president of French football club Olympique de Marseille, died March 31 in Dakar.

Former Republic of Congo president Jacques Joaquim Yhombi Opango died in France on March 30, aged 81.

Veteran Afro-jazz star Manu Dibango, 86, and revered American playwright Terrence McNally, 81, both died on March 24, following coronavirus complications.

Former Real Madrid president Lorenzo Sanz died March 21, aged 76.

Undergoing treatment
Marianne Faithfull, 73, a 1960s icon and celebrated singer-songwriter, was hospitalised in London on April 4 after testing positive.

Infected
In Italy, Juventus announced on Wednesday that France’s 2018 World Cup winner Blaise Matuidi and Italian defender Daniele Rugani have recovered. It gave no news of Argentinian attacker Paulo Dybala, who also came down with the virus on March 21.

Michel Barnier, who leads the EU’s negotiations with Britain on Brexit, announced March 19 that he had the virus. He returned to work in Brussels on Tuesday. His British counterpart David Frost is also infected.

Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson, 55, was discharged from hospital on Sunday, where he spent a week, including three days in intensive care. He is continuing his recovery at Chequers, the country estate of British prime ministers.

Britain’s Prince Charles and Prince Albert II of Monaco, who both tested positive and showed mild symptoms, have now come out of quarantine.

Oscar-winning actor Tom Hanks and his wife, actress and singer Rita Wilson, have recovered and returned home to Los Angeles after being quarantined for two weeks in Australia.

Nobel laureate and former Finnish president Martti Ahtisaari, 82, is now recovered and out of quarantine.

British actor Idris Elba, who tested positive but was asymptomatic, announced the end of his isolation on March 31.

Spanish opera star Placido Domingo, 79 was released from the hospital on March 30.

Former AC Milan defender Paolo Maldini and his footballer son Daniel are also recovered, as is Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta.

Among the 14 NBA basketball players who have tested positive, Rudy Gobert, Donovan Mitchell, Christian Wood and Marcus Smart have since said they have recovered.

The Governor of Oyo State, Seyi Makinde, also recovered after some days.

– In isolation… just in case –
Botswanan President Mokgweetsi Masisi went into self-quarantine on April 9 for two more weeks, having recently come out of a first period of 14-day self-quarantine.

All of the country’s 63 MPs have also gone into quarantine after a nurse assigned to do a screening of the legislators tested positive.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, whose wife tested positive in March, said on April 6 he would try to keep working from home “as much as possible”. Sophie Gregoire Trudeau announced on March 28 that she had recovered.

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