Broadcaster Doris Burke had the coronavirus, and told ESPN — her employer — that she had symptoms dating back to March 11, the final night on the NBA calendar. She was working a Mavericks-Nuggets game that was ultimately the last game to be completed after the NBA suspended its season.
“On March 11, I remember sitting at lunch with my broadcast crew for that evening … ‘Man, I am so tired right now and my head is pounding.’ And looking back, those were my symptoms.”
Burke detailed her experience with the virus on Adrian Wojnarowski’s podcast. Three days later, Burke said she was so tired that “I could not be out of bed for five minutes.”
Burke said that she didn’t have any of the better-known symptoms of a dry cough, high fever or shortness of breath, but after three days of being nearly unable to do anything, she thought she should get tested. She went to a “local city hospital” in Philadelphia to get tested on Tuesday, March 17.
To his credit, Wojnarowski asked Burke about getting tested while the nation was short on test kits. Burke called it a “moral dilemma,” and said that combination of her symptoms, her daughter’s fiance’s mother’s concern (who works in health care) and extensive travel the month before led her to go to the hospital.
It took Burke eight days to receive her test result for the virus, and in that period, she says that her symptoms have abated. (The U.S. has expanded testing, but is still experiencing a serious results backlog.) In that time, Burke says she was “alone in her bedroom for two weeks” while her daughter cooked for her.
Burke said that she called and texted every broadcaster, producer and staffer that she worked closely with in the weeks leading up to her positive test to let them know she was positive for the virus.
Burke barely tweets about anything other than Providence sports. (She was a legendary guard at the school.) But on Monday, she tweeted “Where is Dr Fauci” when the doctor was absent for a White House briefing. It’s become increasingly clear that Donald Trump is sidelining Fauci, the nation’s leading infectious disease expert, in his response to the coronavirus.
“I want him up there speaking facts to me, I want him up there telling me the truth,” Burke said. She’d like an answer on if she should donate blood now that she’s tested positive and come out healthy on the other side, something some experts say could help with studying the virus.
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