Daniel Dae Kim knows that everyone is wondering why celebrities seem to be able to get tested at will for COVID-19, but decided to share the account of his recent diagnosis anyway in the name of spreading awareness about the necessity of everyone taking precautionary measures. Honestly, he did a great job, and despite the apology for his allegedly unkept appearance, this is basically a quarantine-style thirst trap. The actor says he was filming an arc on the show New Amsterdam in New York when production was shut down for coronavirus concerns, and then started feeling sick on the plane back home to Hawaii. He self-isolated for a few days upon returning, but then took himself to a drive-through testing facility in Honolulu after his symptoms — body aches, chest pain, fever — became worse. A few days later he got his positive results back and went into quarantine in a separate part of his house from his family, taking prescribed medication to address symptoms and doing the routine of rest and water. Kim says he wanted to share all this to urge people to heed the calls for social distancing, telling everyone out there who would rather choose liberty (or something like that), “If you treat this without care you are potentially endangering the lives of millions of people.â€
Kim also took time in his ten-minute video to plead for universal health care and an end to anti-Asian-American violence, which has increased since the White House started adding racism to the discourse by calling COVID-19 the “Chinese virus,†and he also thanks everyone performing vital service jobs — doctors, grocery-story workers, transportation workers, and the like — and putting themselves at risk during the pandemic crisis. So, maybe a little less singing John Lennon songs in mansions (JoJo, your song is good), and a little more of what Daniel Dae Kim does in the video below — including his “letting it all go†look.