CNN’s Chris Cuomo has tested positive for the novel coronavirus and will film his show Prime Time remotely while recovering, the host disclosed Tuesday.
“I have been exposed to people in recent days who have subsequently tested positive and I had fever, chills and shortness of breath,” Cuomo wrote in a note shared on his social media accounts.
“I am quarantined in my basement,” the host added. “I will do my shows from here. We will all beat this by being smart and tough and united!” CNN declined to comment further on the show’s production schedule.
In March, Chris Cuomo Prime Time has been averaging 2 million viewers per night, up significantly from an average of 920,000 in February, but trailing MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show and Fox’s Hannity in the same 9 pm ET hour.
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The CNN host shared his diagnosis the day after he interviewed his older brother, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, during his hourlong show from his basement.
“It moves very fast in New York because we’re a very dense area,” the politician said on CNN on Monday. “We’re very intense, we’re on top of one another so the virus moves fast. We are still on our way up the mountain of the curve, we haven’t hit the curve.”
CNN’s Cuomo later replied to his older brother during the interview: “I’ll tell you what, be careful, not just cause you look like you’ve been burning a lot of hours, but you show up in a lot of places and I know it gives comfort to people. But if you get sick, God forbid, there’s only one of you right now. And if you get sick, it’s a problem.”
The CNN host has devoted much of his airtime to covering the novel coronavirus over the past month as the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases has grown to 165,874 in the United States, per John Hopkins University’s case tracker.
On March 20, Gov. Cuomo signed a “New York State on Pause” executive order that ordered nonessential businesses — news media is considered essential under the order — to close in-office work as well as limited “all nonessential gatherings of individuals of any size for any reason.”
During his SiriusXM show Let’s Get After It on Tuesday, the CNN host elaborated on his condition, saying, “I don’t have compromised lungs. We’ll see how the days go and hopefully I’m further into it than not into it, and the symptoms don’t get any worse. And if they do, I’ll change it, but as long as you can hear me, then everything’s gotta be fine.”
