Mexican Billionaire With Covid Says We’ll All Get It in Time
Mexican Billionaire With Covid Says We’ll All Get It Eventually
(Bloomberg) -- Ricardo Salinas Pliego, the head of Grupo Salinas and Latin America’s seventh-richest man, took to Twitter on Wednesday to confirm his Covid-19 diagnosis and say that everyone will get the infection eventually.
The billionaire -- who had previously called Mexico’s measures to contain the virus “authoritarian” and said they would wreck the economy -- accompanied the post with a picture of his treatment plan.
“Take care of yourselves and do not be afraid,” Salinas, who turns 65 next week, said in his tweet. “We’ll all have to get it, and we will be fine.”
Salinas finished his tweet with a smiling face emoji.
Almost 85,000 people have died of the coronavirus in Mexico, the fourth-worst death toll in the world, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. Mexico’s confirmed cases rose to 829,396 on Wednesday.
Salinas’ business interests range from appliance dealer Grupo Elektra SAB to the country’s second-largest television network TV Azteca SAB de CV. The mogul has been a vocal proponent of keeping the economy open for business even as the nation’s cases skyrocketed.
In a separate tweet on Thursday, Salinas thanked well-wishers and doctors, and said he’s feeling very well.
President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador publicly called out Elektra as being among several companies violating the early lockdown rules, which prohibited non-essential businesses from operating. Despite the lockdown measures, Bloomberg News visits and calls to Elektra locations revealed that shoppers could still buy any items -- from toasters to televisions -- in a number of stores.
On May 29, Elektra said that the stores remained open to provide essential products and services to customers.
“The damage caused by indiscriminate shutdown policies will have much more serious and lasting effects on health than the virus,” Grupo Salinas spokesman Luciano Pascoe said in a statement. “The virus is one more challenge that life puts in front of us and, like all other risks in life, we must face them with courage and confidence that we will succeed.”
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