Popular Romani singer Bertík Girga posts emotional video from Czech hospital telling people COVID-19 is real

The popular singer Bertík Girga from the Romani community in the Czech Republic has contracted the novel coronavirus and had to be taken by ambulance to the hospital. He posted the information through a live broadcast on social media. 

“I am not doing this broadcast so people will feel sorry for me. Believe me, this could happen to you,” he warns in the video.

“There are still know-it-alls around who will claim there is no virus here or that it’s being exaggerated,” Girga says in the emotional video. “Friends, pals, be careful. This is no joke, you can’t imagine what it’s like. My entire body aches and I can’t breathe,” he says with difficulty.

“Don’t listen to those know-it-alls demonstrating against facemasks … You won’t believe what this is like until you have it, but by then it will be too late,” the singer says in the video.

Several famous figures from the Romani community have contracted the novel coronavirus during the pandemic, but some Romani people continue to share disinformation through social media and are downplaying the devastating effects of the virus. In October the famous Romani blogger Jozef Kmeťo died of COVID-19, the famous Romani journalist Jarmila Balážová has also gone through it, singer Igor Kmeťo was also hospitalized with it, and singer Monika Bagárová fortunately had just a light course of the disease.