Rita Wilson says she had 'extreme side effects' during coronavirus treatment

Rita Wilson has shared new details about battling coronavirus, alongside her husband Tom Hanks, in her first TV interview since contracting the disease.

Speaking with CBS This Morning’s Gayle King, the 63-year-old actress and singer said she’s now feeling “great” more than a month after testing positive in early March.

But at the time of her illness, she started feeling “very tired ... extremely achy, uncomfortable [and] didn't want to be touched.” As those symptoms persisted, she also developed a fever, which rose to 38.8, and “chills like I’ve never had before.” She also lost her sense of taste and smell, but didn’t realise it until later.

Rita, who was treated in Gold Coast hospital alongside husband Tom, also said on day nine she was given the controversial drug chloroquine - one of two anti-malaria drugs hyped by US President Donald Trump.

“I know people have been talking about this drug, but I can only tell you that I don’t know if the drug worked or it was just time for the fever to break,” she said. “My fever did break, but the chloroquine had such extreme side effects. I was completely nauseous. I had vertigo. I could not walk and my muscles felt very weak.”

She stressed after her own experience she thought it was better to be “very considerate” about the drug.

Rita said Tom had milder symptoms — his fever wasn’t as high, he did not lose his sense of taste or smell.

“But it still took us the same time to get through it,” she added.

The now healthy couple returned home to LA in late March.

As for how they got it, doctors told the couple, who have pre-existing conditions (she is a breast cancer survivor and Tom has type 2 diabetes), that they were “both exposed ... at the same time,” she said.

“We don’t know when that could have been or where. All I can say is that all of our close contacts — family, people on our work team — no one has tested positive,” Rita added.

Rita also said she and Tom have since donated their blood for a study about the disease, which will hopefully lead to a vaccine being developed. They’re also waiting to hear back if they can donate plasma to people currently fighting COVID-19.

Rita also spoke about teaming up with Naughty by Nature for a remix of the group’s hit, "Hip Hop Hooray." She said she first learned the hip-hop song for the 2019 film Boy Genius and posted herself singing it on Instagram as a brain exercise to see if she could remember all the words.

It went viral and she recorded the remix with the group. Each time the remix is streamed, money goes toward MusiCares COVID-19 Relief Fund.

Rita said she and Tom, whom she married in 1988, now both feel back to “normal” after the scare.

And Tom has been back to work as well. While the film he was working on in Australia in on pause, he hosted Saturday Night Live over the weekend — from his kitchen.

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