*Will Smith and his family held an “emergency” family meeting on Red Table Talk this week to discuss the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Will, wife Jada Pinkett Smith, daughter Willow Smith, Jada’s mother Adrienne Banfield Norris and his son Trey Smith gathered around the table to talk about the misinformation being circulated online about the deadly virus, and what families can do to protect themselves amid the global health crisis.
Not present for the conversation was Will and Jada’s son Jaden, who is practicing social distancing out of concern for his grandmother, PEOPLE reports.
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Will also stressed the importance of social distancing by reminding people that many hospitals and medical centers are struggling to care for those affected by the virus.
“Imagine that our local hospital can handle 40 respiratory patients at one time. And under normal circumstances, 40 respiratory patients, for that hospital, is a lot. You know, they’ll be at 12 or 15, so they can handle it,” the actor said.
“The way the virus is moving and the reason why we need to practice social distancing and the idea of flattening the curve is if 50 people show up at that hospital at one time, to get 40 beds, right, now you have 10 people in critical condition that aren’t going to get help.”
“And your mortality rate shoots through the roof. That’s the idea of overwhelming the system,” Will continued. “So there is a certain amount of people that we can handle nationally to come in with critical respiratory issues at one moment.”
“So flattening the curve means not getting to 80 people at one time, we practice social distancing, the virus is going to move through humanity. But as it moves through, we want it to move through at 30 people at a time for our local hospital, not 60 people at a time for our local hospital, because then we have a real problem.”
We previously reported.. this is the first of a two-part special on COVID-19. Check out Jada’s Instagram story to see what she has to say about it.
Part two will be available on Facebook Watch Monday, March 23 at 9:00 a.m. PT / 12:00 p.m. ET, focusing on the massive mental health burden of the pandemic.
According to Johns Hopkins University, there are currently more than 201,000 confirmed cases and 8,000 deaths related to the coronavirus around the world.
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