COVID-19 survivors Tom Hanks, Rita Wilson to donate blood for coronavirus vaccine research

Hollywood couple Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, who recently recovered from coronavirus, are doing their bit to help in the fight against the deadly disease.  The actors have volunteered to donate blood and plasma for COVID-19 research, Hanks revealed on NPR's "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me!" podcast via MSN.

"A lot of the questions (are) what now? What do we do now? Is there something we can do? And, in fact, we just found out that we do carry the antibodies," he said.

"We have not only been approached, we have said, 'Do you want our blood? Can we give plasma?' And, in fact, we will be giving it now to the places that hope to work on what I would like to call the 'Hank-ccine'," the actor quipped.

COVID-19: Tom Hanks' wife Rita Wilson reveals extreme side-effects of chloroquine intake

Tom Hanks caught the virus in Australia

Tom Hanks and wife Rita Wilson caught the Coronavirus in Australia (on March 11) where the actor was shooting for a film based on the life of Elvis Presley. Hanks stars as Elvis' manager, Colonel Tom Parker. The actors had taken to Instagram to break the news of his diagnosis to his followers. He had written in the caption for the post that they had a bit of fever and felt tired and decided to be sure about their health. Have a look at the post here. They returned home to Los Angeles at the end of March after quarantining and recovering from their symptoms. 

'100% surety that India has sufficient HCQ drug stock for now & future': Health Ministry

 

 

 

 

View this post on Instagram

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hello, folks. @ritawilson and I are down here in Australia. We felt a bit tired, like we had colds, and some body aches. Rita had some chills that came and went. Slight fevers too. To play things right, as is needed in the world right now, we were tested for the Coronavirus, and were found to be positive. Well, now. What to do next? The Medical Officials have protocols that must be followed. We Hanks’ will be tested, observed, and isolated for as long as public health and safety requires. Not much more to it than a one-day-at-a-time approach, no? We’ll keep the world posted and updated. Take care of yourselves! Hanx!

A post shared by Tom Hanks (@tomhanks) on Mar 11, 2020 at 6:08pm PDT

(PTI inputs)