Anna Kendrick Jokes About Having a Face-Touching ‘Fetish’ Amid US Coronavirus Woes

Anna Kendrick weighed in on the Coronavirus precautions on Wednesday, trying to make light of a stressful situation. The actress remarked on the advice for people to not touch their own faces, saying that it was becoming a “new fetish” for her. Fans were amused, in spite of the rising anxiety around the virus.

Kendrick had been absent from Twitter for nearly a month when she decided to weigh in on the Coronavirus threat on Wednesday. The actress referred to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention’s recommendation that people “Avoid touching your eyes, nose, and mouth with unwashed hands.”

“Authority figures talking about how face touching is so dangerous and unclean. Like, are you TRYING to make it my new fetish?” she wrote.

Kendrick’s followers laughed at the post, replying with GIFs of Kendrick making suggesting expressions or hand gestures. Many also joked about how long it has been since she tweeted, asking if she had just recently “remembered [her] password.”

Kendrick’s last tweet was in early February, in promotion of her new show Dummy, coming to Quibi next month. Other than promotional posts, however, her last tweet was on Dec. 1, so her followers have been missing her for a while.

If anything can to bring lapsed Twitter stars like Kendrick out of retirement, however, it’s the Coronavirus, or COVID-19. The virus is threatening to become a global pandemic, with many authorities warning that it is more a question of “when,” not “if” it will reach that level.

At the time of this writing, the latest statistics from the World Health Organization show that the there have been 95,265 reported cases of the Coronavirus worldwide, and 3,281 have resulted in death. The WHO’s director-general, Tedros Adhanom, urged leaders to work together to prevent panic as well as the spread of the disease.

“This epidemic can be pushed back, but only with a collective, coordinated and comprehensive approach that engages the entire machinery of government,” he said. “We are calling on every country to act with speed, scale and clear-minded determination.”

“We’re concerned that some countries have either not taken this seriously enough, or have decided there’s nothing they can do,” he added. “We are concerned that in some countries the level of political commitment and the actions that demonstrate that commitment do not match the level of the threat we all face.”

For a full list of personal preventative measures, see the recommendations on the CDC’s website.