Published Mar 18, 2020

Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson Send One-Week COVID-19 Update From Australia: ‘Flatten the Curve’

Now out of the hospital, the couple will self-quarantine at home in Australia. Hanks reports, "No fever, but the blahs..." adding "We're all in this together."

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Constance Costas

“Hey folks. Good news: One week after testing Positive, in self-isolation, the symptoms are much the same,” is actor Tom Hanks’ latest Instagram update on his Coronavirus….the post came along with a photo of one of his collectible typewriters — appropriately, a Corona.

Hanks and his wife, actor Rita Wilson, a breast-cancer survivor tested positive for COVID-19 a week ago. They were released from a hospital in Queensland, Australia and are now quarantined in their home there, a representative for Hanks told CNN.

“No fever but the blahs. Folding the laundry and doing the dishes leads to a nap on the couch.” The “bad news,” he added, “My wife @ritawilson has won 6 straight hands of Gin Rummy and leads by 201 points … I travelled here with a typewriter, one I used to love. We are all in this together. Flatten the curve. Hanx”

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#Repost @tomhanks with @get_repost ・・・ Hey folks. Good News: One week after testing Positive, in self-isolation, the symptoms are much the same. No fever but the blahs. Folding the laundry and doing the dishes leads to a nap on the couch. Bad news: My wife @ritawilson has won 6 straight hands of Gin Rummy and leads by 201 points. But I have learned not to spread my Vegemite so thick. I travelled here with a typewriter, one I used to love. We are all in this together. Flatten the curve. Hanx

A post shared by Rita Wilson (@ritawilson) on Mar 17, 2020 at 4:23pm PDT

How to Flatten the Curve

What does it mean to, as Hanks says, flatten the curve? “Public health officials now talk about slowing and spreading out the inevitable infections so that the healthcare system isn’t overwhelmed with patients,” says Dr. Marc Braunstein, MD, PhD, Member, NYU Langone’s Perlmutter Cancer Center; Assistant Professor of Medicine NYU Long Island School of Medicine. “They have a name for this: Flattening the curve.” The recent recommendations to stay home and practice social-distancing contribute toward that goal.

Dr. Ann Partridge is an oncologist at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the founder and director of the Program for Young Women with Breast Cancer.

Hanks and Wilson’s symptoms have remained relatively mild, according to their own updates on social media. “We felt a bit tired, like we had colds, and some body aches. Rita had some chills that came and went. Slight fevers too,” Hanks reported on Instagram.

“To play things right, as is needed in the world right now, we were tested for the Coronavirus, and were found to be positive.”

But for Wilson — and anyone who has been treated for cancer — there’s concern that the immune system may be more vulnerable. According to Dr. Braunstein, a hematologist, patients with blood cancers like leukemia, lymphoma, and multiple myeloma fall

into the highest-risk category. But for all cancer survivors, Braunstein notes, “some chemotherapies can have a prolonged immunosuppressant effect, typically beyond two years,” he notes, adding, “If you’ve been off treatment for six months or more and not on maintenance therapy,” says Dr. Braunstein, “it’s reasonable to assume that your immune system has been revitalized. That’s not a scientific pinpoint number, but it’s an average.”

Borrowing a line from his 1992 movie, “A League of their Own,” Hanks summed up the couple’s predicament with his trademark upbeat tone: “Remember,” he told concerned fans, “there’s no crying in baseball.”

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Constance Costas is a writer for SurvivorNet.