WHO’s Director-General Thanks BTOB’s Minhyuk For Sharing His Experience With Covid-19

[broadcities.livejournal.com]

Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the Director-General of the World Health Organization (WHO), personally thanked BTOB’s Minhyuk for opening up about his experience with COVID-19!

On July 30, after spending two weeks in the hospital due to COVID-19, Minhyuk held an Instagram Live broadcast to share that he had finally been discharged. During the broadcast, he spoke candidly about his experience and urged fans to be careful, pointing out that he had fallen ill and suffered a great deal even though he was normally a very healthy person.

The following day, Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus took to Twitter to applaud Minhyuk for speaking up.

Retweeting Soompi’s article (see below) about Minhyuk’s broadcast, he wrote, “I’m glad that you’ve been discharged from the hospital, Minhyuk! Wishing you a speedy and full recovery. Thank you for sharing your experience & reminding BTOB fans MELODY to take good care of themselves and how to prevent the spread of COVID-19.”

I’m glad that you’ve been discharged from the hospital, @btob2mh! Wishing you a speedy and full recovery.
Thank you for sharing your experience & reminding @OFFICIALBTOB fans MELODY to take good care of themselves & how to prevent the spread of #COVID19.https://t.co/Y9Up6HStJV

— Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus (@DrTedros) July 31, 2021

BTOB’s Minhyuk Opens Up About Being Hospitalized With COVID-19 + Urges Fans To Be Careful

After spending two weeks in the hospital due to COVID-19, BTOB’s Minhyuk opened up about his experience and recovery.

On July 30, Minhyuk held an Instagram Live broadcast to share the happy news that he had finally been discharged from the hospital.

Earlier this month, Minhyuk went into self-quarantine as a precautionary measure after his vocal teacher tested positive for COVID-19. While Minhyuk initially tested negative for the virus, he was diagnosed with COVID-19 just three days later, and he ended up being hospitalized on July 17 after developing a cough and high fever.

Despite being in good spirits, Minhyuk noticeably kept coughing throughout his broadcast—and would often break off in the middle of a sentence to cough before returning to speaking.

“I was discharged from the hospital today,” he announced. “People are saying [in the comments] that I lost a lot of weight, and that’s true… I weighed myself today after leaving the hospital, and I weighed less than 58 kilograms [approximately 128 pounds]. I lost four to five kilograms [approximately 9 to 11 pounds] while I was in the hospital, and I think I lost a lot of muscle mass because I couldn’t work out during that time.”

However, he reassured fans, “I’ve gotten better now, and that’s why I was discharged.”

Describing how he wound up in the hospital, Minhyuk explained, “Since I was a symptomatic COVID-19 patient, I was contacted about whether I should go to a community treatment center or a hospital. But my temperature kept rising from 39 to 40 degrees Celsius [approximately 102 to 104 degrees Fahrenheit], so on Saturday, two weeks ago, an ambulance came in the wee hours of the morning, and I ended up being hospitalized. For about a week, I barely knew what was going on.

“For about seven to eight days, starting from the day my symptoms first appeared, my temperature stayed 39 degrees for that entire week. They kept giving me fever reducers at the hospital, but even with the fever reducers, the lowest my temperature ever got was 38.3 degrees or 38.5 degrees Celsius [approximately 101 degrees Fahrenheit].”

Minhyuk went on to urge his fans to be careful, commenting, “These days, I see that there are a lot of COVID-19 patients who are asymptomatic or who only have mild symptoms. But even though I was fortunate enough not to become a severe case, I want to tell you this, as someone who suffered a lot before being discharged [from the hospital]: I want to urge you to please be careful, really. I started this live broadcast because I wanted to tell you that you should make sure to be careful.”

He added, “In my case, my fever, headache, and cough were really severe. At the beginning, my cough was so severe that I couldn’t breathe because I was coughing so hard. Because my fever would go up to 40 degrees Celsius [104 degrees Fahrenheit] in the middle of the night and my coughing was so severe, I was basically out of my mind for about a week. My head hurt so much that it really felt like it would shatter. Since my headache was so severe, I really didn’t even know what was happening in the first week that I was [in the hospital]. I went through a really, really, really hard time because I was so sick.”

“There’s been a resurgence in [COVID-19] cases recently, and I really hope you’ll make sure to be careful,” he repeated. “What I want to say is this. When someone gets COVID-19, it’d be a relief if they were able to recover without any symptoms or after experiencing only mild symptoms. But you never know what might happen.”

“Honestly, I was someone who was very healthy, but I still suffered a lot [because of the virus],” he pointed out. “In order to not get sick, the top priority is not getting COVID-19 at all. So please take good care of yourselves, and I hope you won’t get sick.”

When his fans continued to express their worries about his health in the comments, Minhyuk remarked, “I’m coughing a little now, and I think MELODY [BTOB’s fans] are worried because of it. I do have a bit of a cough left, because I had pneumonia while I was sick. That’s why I still have a bit of a cough, but I was treated successfully at the hospital, and they discharged me because I’ve gotten better.”

“You don’t need to worry about me, and I’ll take good care of myself so that I don’t have any lingering after-effects,” he went on. “I’ll keep taking the medicine I was prescribed and make sure to diligently eat good meals, so you don’t need to worry.”

Minhyuk added with a laugh, “Actually, the reason I started this live broadcast was because there’s been no news about me for about two weeks, and I wanted to reassure the MELODY who must have worried about me and missed me. But it seems like you all are worrying even more because I’m coughing a bit. You don’t need to worry about me at all. If I were still sick and in danger, the hospital wouldn’t have discharged me. I’m a lot better now.”

Source: @DrTedros twt, Soompi 1, 2

The second article is a pretty long read but I thought it was impressive how candidly he spoke of his hospitalization and how he stressed that the virus is not to be taken lightly. Hope he recovers fully soon, and stay safe everyone!

Comments

[lightframes.livejournal.com]

Thank you OP! I was going to make a post about this when I saw it.

Reading about his experience was so scary - having that high fever for a week is no joke. I think people assume if you're young and healthy you won't have any symptoms, but it isn't necessarily true. Low risk means the risk is still there, it isn't zero.

I'm glad he's doing better now. I hope the vaccine rollout keeps speeding up in Korea.

[broadcities.livejournal.com]

agree with everything you said! he even got pneumonia too — so scary. i really hope everyone remains careful, whether the vaccine rollout in one's own country is going well or not and whether one's fully vaccinated or not. it's not over yet

[lightframes.livejournal.com]

Honestly! I live in the U.S. and I hate how so much conversation here is focused on how we can start living "normally" here individually (even though the last couple of weeks have shown us we're really not there yet) when we really need to focus on helping the rest of the world vaccinated. We live on a planet with other people, the pandemic is not over.

[sinnamon roll (from livejournal.com)]

Both my mom and brother had. 104F fever for five days, it completely exhausted them

[broadcities.livejournal.com]

hope they're recovering well!

[lightframes.livejournal.com]

That's awful, I hope they're doing better now.

[em-cavey.livejournal.com]

Wow it kicked his ass :( I'm pretty sure that I unknowingly had covid back before most of us even knew what it was and it was probably the most physically miserable I've ever been in my life, I wouldn't wish it on anyone. I hope he gets back to full health soon, he looks so gaunt

And good for him for publicizing all this. Deaths in Korea are really rare and most well-known cases have been low-key or asymptomatic, I feel like people here need a reminder that this whole pandemic is a deadly disease and not just a prolonged inconvenience and they should take it more seriously.

[babycheeses1.livejournal.com]

Someone had the audacity to tell me I was taking the pandemic too seriously, a whole-ass pandemic too seriously lol! I mean that whole sentence sounds like an oxymoron. That was a week ago and I'm still so mad about it.

[broadcities.livejournal.com]

i can imagine!

[em-cavey.livejournal.com]

Oh come on it’s only killed a conservative estimate of 4.2 million people worldwide in two years and caused countless more people longterm health issues, half of which experts don’t even properly understand yet. So, like, chill 🙄

[lolknope.livejournal.com]

I would be too! I’m the only one in the office that still wears a mask and the one day it took it off I got sick lol. We should all be more careful regardless!!

[in-noctem.livejournal.com]

i had pneumonia when i was younger and recovering from the cough was the worst part. and years on i still get breathless so easily. i really hope he takes a good, long break ❤️

[sinnamon roll (from livejournal.com)]

His story is quite similar to mine and my family's. Recovery also takes a long time, it's been three months for me and I'm still suffering from some symptoms. Hope he feels better soon

Everyone be careful, especially from the new variant

[broadcities.livejournal.com]

hoping you and your family will recover soon <3

[myungung.livejournal.com]

it sounds terrible and it really shows how we should not make light of it. I hope he recovers well in time and suffer no to minimal side effects. also 58kg is pretty light, even if he's not very tall, so it must have taken quite a toll on him

[babyjenkski.livejournal.com]

Thanks for sharing this. Its been 2 more than 2 yrs already but so.e are still not taking this pandemic seriously. I always pray for everbody's good health.

I hope Minhyuk recovers well.

[gathyou.livejournal.com]

Oh shit I didn't know he had to be hospitalized! His hospitalisation sounds really scary. I'm glad he's better now, I hope he recovers well, he still has a long road ahead. I also hope that him sharing his story so publicly will help and convince people to be careful...

[1100003.livejournal.com]

Terrifying. High fever for that long is mind numbing and can cause other long term harm, and then he had mono on top??? Scary. It's good that he's sharing and I hope he makes a complete recovery.

[dantethetaco.livejournal.com]

I didn't know hetested positive and had to be hospitalized. So scary. I'm glad he's alright now, and I hope he doesn't get any long term harm from this.