Lana Marks, the SA-born handbag designer who is the US ambassador to the country, on Monday revealed that she had contracted Covid-19 and was so ill she spent 10 days in an intensive care unit (ICU).
Marks said she started having symptoms on December 26 and was eventually admitted to hospital a few days later on the advice of the medical team at the embassy. She spent 10 days in ICU and a further three days in the Covid-19 unit of a hospital she didn’t name. She was discharged late last week and is receiving care at home, she said in a statement.
“My condition is improving and the doctors are confident that I will eventually make a full recovery,” she said.
Marks was approached by US President Donald Trump for the position in November 2016, but was officially nominated only in October 2018 and confirmed by the Senate in September 2019. She began her term just four months before SA went into a hard lockdown.
News of her illness comes as the country battles a new wave of Covid infections, which has prompted President Cyril Ramaphosa to tighten restrictions in December, including the reimposition of a ban on the sale of alcohol.
Full of praise
Minister in the presidency Jackson Mthembu became the latest cabinet member to contract Covid-19, the government confirmed on Monday.
By Sunday, SA had recorded 1.23-million cases of Covid-19 and has been recording about 20,000 new cases a day, more than the peak recorded in the first wave in winter.
Governments across the world have been tightening restrictions, with major economies in Europe in lockdown. In the US, where Trump has sought to downplay the crisis, more than 370,000 people have succumbed to the virus. The UK has recorded more than 80,000 deaths, and specialists there are telling the public to brace for the worst and avoid all unnecessary contact.
Marks was full of praise for the care she got from SA health workers. “Having seen them on the front lines of this battle for nearly a year, and now having had my own life in their hands, I will always remember their heroism and dedication.”
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