‘WE’RE FINE’ NOW

Virus survivor Hanks: ‘Let’s all do our part’

Tom Hanks and wife Rita Wilson had completely different sets of symptoms when they contracted COVID-19 in Australia back in March.

It was while filming the Baz Luhrmann Elvis Presley film that the couple became “the celebrity canaries in the coal mine of all things COVID-19,” the Oscar-winning actor told The Guardian in a recent interview.

He and Wilson announced in mid-March that they had been diagnosed and were being hospitalized.

From there, though, their experiences diverged, and he said hers was tougher. They took about two weeks to recuperate, they said at the time.

Now it is well in the rearview mirror.

“We’re fine,” he told The Guardian. “Our discomfort because of the virus was pretty much done in two weeks, and we had very different reactions, and that was odd. My wife lost her sense of taste and smell, she had severe nausea, she had a much higher fever than I did. I just had crippling body aches, I was very fatigued all the time and I couldn’t concentrate on anything for more than about 12 minutes.”

Both of them have underlying conditions — diabetes and heart issues for him, prior cancer for her — that could have made them extra vulnerable to severe illness. As it happened, they were each in the hospital for three days.

“When we were in the hospital, I said: ‘I’m 63, I have Type 2 diabetes, I had a stent in my heart — am I a red-flag case?’ ” Hanks said.

“But as long as our temperatures did not spike, and our lungs did not fill up with something that looked like pneumonia, they were not worried. I’m not one who wakes up in the morning wondering if I’m going to see the end of the day or not. I’m pretty calm about that.”

Given what the two of them went through, and with cases spiking across the U.S., Hanks said he did not understand the controversy about wearing a mask, as well as the official guidance being given.

He has “nothing but question marks” when it comes to attitudes, from the White House on down to people’s obsession with what they see as individual choice.

“Well, I must say, I grew up looking to our leaders for calm and informed guidance, and I don’t think we’ve got that,” Hanks told The Guardian.

“There’s really only three things everyone needs to do: Wear a mask, social distance, wash your hands. I know societally it’s been politicized, but I don’t get it, Man. I don’t understand how anyone can put their foot down and say, ‘I don’t have to do my part.’ ”

In doing publicity for his new movie, “Greyhound” — which coronavirus has sent straight to streaming, instead of the big-screen debut that would have done the cinematography justice — he spoke of masks and World War II.

“Here we are. And let’s just all do our part, eh?” Hanks said. “Can we not all just wear a mask and social distance and wash our hands? It sounds pretty simple to me.”

His and Wilson’s diagnosis was a wakeup call of sorts, as they were the first celebrities to be diagnosed with COVID-19.

It is part of what made them go public — both to quell rumors about why film production was halted, and to inform the public by becoming a living public service announcement of sorts.

“Why hide from the facts?” he told The Associated Press. “These were the facts.”