Billionaire talk show host Oprah Winfrey wants the African American community to understand that the coronavirus is “taking us out.”
In her new special, Oprah Talks COVID-19 — The Deadly Impact On Black America, she wants to highlight how the pandemic is “ravaging our community.”
Speaking to Hoda Kotb on the Today Show, Oprah said “We need to understand for ourselves, that this is so serious. It’s taking us out.”
Having suffered pneumonia in September, Oprah told Kotb that her “lungs never really fully cleared.”
“So the moment I heard preexisting conditions, I’m like, ‘Lock the door, nobody coming in here,”’ she declared.
“It’s not only ravaging our community but people who have preexisting conditions, which I think people didn’t hear that,” Winfrey added.
“So if you are taking medication for your diabetes, if you’re taking medication because of hypertension, if you need an asthma inhaler for asthma, if you have any kind of lung disorder.”
“We as a people, as African Americans, have jobs that require us to be at work,” she said. “For so many African Americans, there isn’t this ability to telecommute.”
Early this month Oprah announced she was donating $10 million to assist Americans during the coronavirus pandemic.
“I am donating $10 million overall to help Americans during this pandemic in cities across the country and in areas where I grew up,” the media mogul tweeted.
Last month the TV legend revealed she was sleeping in separate houses to her long-time partner Stedman Graham (69) amid concerns over the coronavirus.
“There’s no Stedman in the kitchen,” she said.
“Stedman is in the guest house because you all know I had pneumonia late last year, and you could still hear the raspiness in my throat sometimes when I talk.
‘And I just got off antibiotics last week and so Stedman was late to the party.
“Stedman didn’t arrive from Chicago until Thursday and he was speaking in St. Louis on Saturday and he’s been on planes.’
‘He was like, ‘What’s the procedure for coming home?’ And I was like, ‘You ain’t coming in here and sleeping in my bed. It doesn’t work that way…
‘Social distancing doesn’t mean you can go sleep in a bed with someone after you got off American Airlines.’ We can not play those games.’
