Maynard James Keenan Reveals He Contracted Covid-19 For The Second Time
Tool, A Perfect Circle, and Puscifer frontman Maynard James Keenan has revealed that he contracted Covid-19 for the second time late last year, ending up in the emergency room as he couldn’t breathe.
Maynard originally caught coronavirus back in February 2020, which caused him lung damage. At the time the frontman also unitentionally played two shows with Covid, while on tour in New Zealand. Detailing the lasting effects of the virus, Maynard said back in October that he took “some major medications to undo the residual effects.” Explaining further that he was “Still coughing. There’s still lung damage.”
Unforutently the musician has now revealed he contracted the disease again in mid-November, and this time “ended up in the ER on December 1”.
Talking STROMBO on Apple Music Hits, Keenan said “Ugly, ugly. Couldn’t breathe. I could barely put two words together without going into a coughing fit that, you know? It ended up kind of also progressing into pneumonia.”
“So, if I stayed in the hospital, they said, ​‘Okay, we can keep you here, but you’re fighting 12 other people for a bed and a ventilator we don’t have, so what do you want to do?’”
“I’m like, ​‘Well, I need to breathe and I need to sleep.’ So, you’re just treating symptoms at that point. There’s nothing you can do other than treat the symptom, so for a real cough medicine, not the crap over-the-counter and then like an inhaler, and some antibiotics to fight the pneumonia and strap the fuck in.”
Talking in an interview with Consequence Of Sound back in November, Keenan pushed the fact political leaders depicted mask-wearing as a political act, publicly downplayed the risks of the virus. “There’s logic attached to just looking out for each other,” he said. “I have a lot more questions than answers, honestly. Is this thing like a flame on a candle? If you stand in the corner far enough away from somebody, does the flame burn the candle down, and then it can no longer light your candle? Or is it not like that at all, and it’s going to live on beyond its own cycle within you? I have no idea, but the idea of temporarily isolating and really adhering to the isolation, it seems like that would’ve worked.”
Adding “But we tend to be fairly arrogant. I knew what I went through and I know what I’m still going through, so I would recommend that you take this seriously, but I feel like that’s just going to fall on deaf ears. It’s just going to be a polarized, politicized statement, so it’s pointless. In that case, I’m just going to worry about keeping my family safe and keeping my friends safe.”