On his 60th birthday, Antonio Banderas announces he has Covid-19

Monday should have been a day of celebration for Spanish actor Antonio Banderas, but the coronavirus pandemic that has changed the world has got in the way. The Hollywood star chose the day of his 60th birthday to publicly announce that he has tested positive for Covid-19 and that he is currently in quarantine. The actor conveyed the news via his Twitter and Instagram accounts, together with an image from his childhood. “I want to make public that today, August 10, I am being forced to celebrate my 60th birthday in quarantine after having tested positive for the Covid-19 disease, caused by the coronavirus,” he wrote.

The calm statement has caused concern among the admirers of the actor, given that he is in a risk group having already suffered a heart attack in January 2017. Banderas himself later announced that the condition was benign and had not “left behind any damage.” He explained at the time that he underwent surgery to implant three stents in his coronary arteries, as well as undergoing a thermoablation to reverse the arrhythmias that he had been suffering for some time.

The actor played down his health problems at the time, and said that they had “not been as dramatic as people have written.” He used the same tone of calm in the Instagram post in which he described how the coronavirus is affecting him. “I’d like to add that I am relatively well, just a bit more tired than usual and sure that I will recover as soon as possible following medical advice, which I hope will allow me to overcome the infectious process that I am suffering and that is affecting so many people all over the world.”

His message continued: “I will take advantage of this isolation to read, write, rest and to continue to make plans to begin to bring meaning to my recently reached 60 years, which I am arriving at full of enthusiasm and hope.”

Banderas, who won the Best Actor gong at Spain’s Goya Awards for his role in Pedro Almodóvar’s Pain and Glory, spent the coronavirus lockdown in Málaga, without his current partner Nicole Kimpel, who he was able to see four months later. The businesswoman was in Geneva with her family during the worst of the Covid-19 crisis.

Banderas has been active during recent months, and has been one of the celebrities who has donated medical material to hospitals in Málaga via the foundation Lágrimas y Favores, over which he presides.

English version by Simon Hunter.