Reba McEntire Shares an Update on Her Recovery From COVID-19

Reba McEntire recently revealed to fans that she and boyfriend Rex Linn had both been diagnosed with COVID-19, and she shared an update on her recovery in a new interview with Variety. McEntire told the magazine that she is "feeling great," revealing that she was diagnosed last month after having been vaccinated.

"I got it in July, around the 17th, and I had been vaccinated, and thank God, because I only was laying on the couch for two or three days, maybe four," she recalled. "I thought I had a sinus infection, because I wasn't down for the count, in the hospital. I just laid around and watched all my favorite shows on Netflix and Prime Video and Hulu." The singer added that when she lost her sense of smell, she realized that she might have COVID.

"So I tested and sure enough, I did," she said. "It was a shock to me, because my good friend Red Steagall, in December he got it, and he was in the hospital."

You know what, last night I smelled something and I went, 'Oh my gosh.' What you take for granted all the time, with your sense of taste and smell. Thank God I didn't lose my sense of taste, because I'm a foodie. Oh, I love to eat. And I didn't lose it — maybe a touch, a little bit. Things are not as vibrant taste-wise. But boy, smell… We have a French bulldog, and he has little folds in his nose that catch that food. And if you don't clean that out a lot, it gets to stinking. And so I couldn't even smell that, and I said, 'Oh, I know I've lost my sense of smell.' [Laughs.] Riddler's my buddy, my pal. I love him."

The Oklahoma native originally announced her and Linn's diagnoses on TikTok, encouraging fans to do their best to stay safe. "I know with a lot of people, their family members have died from this," she said. "So that's why I (sent) the heartfelt message on the TikTok event that we did last week to say, 'Please get vaccinated. Stay safe. Wear masks, if not for you, for your best friend or your grandma or your niece and nephew.' Oh my gosh, I was just told that there was two children here in Nashville that have died, 6 and 8 years old. This thing's not playing around. It's very serious."