Yahoo Finance The View Apologizes to Ana Navarro and Sunny Hostin for Disclosing False Positive COVID Tests
The View is back after a chaotic Friday show.
Last week, frequent guest co-host Ana Navarro and panelist Sunny Hostin were asked to leave the ABC talk show's set while live on the air after testing positive for COVID-19. Hostin, 52, and Navarro, 49, who are both fully vaccinated, were informed of their results while preparing to bring Vice President Kamala Harris on stage for an interview.
On Monday, however, co-host Joy Behar informed the audience that both tests were false positives and that all four of the panelists, including Sara Haines, had been confirmed negative for the virus. (Moderator Whoopi Goldberg was out on both Friday and Monday.)
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"This is the update: We were all given numerous, numerous COVID tests," began Behar, 78, while Haines, 44, quipped, "My nostrils are so sensitive."
"I am thrilled to report that Sunny and Ana's Friday results turned out to be false positives, and everyone is safe, healthy and COVID-free," Behar continued. "No one's got it. It was a mistake of some sort."
The View
Behar then turned to executive producer Brian Teta, who apologized to Navarro and Hostin for the situation.
"It was just an unbelievable set of circumstances, and we found out moments before we came back on the air," he said. "And in that moment, all I could think of was that we had to keep the hosts safe, and we had to keep the vice president safe — she could not walk out no matter what."
"And that led to some really awkward television that I'd like to have back if I could, but I really want to acknowledge and apologize to Sunny and Ana, because in the midst of all this chaos, they were put in this position where they had this information put out on television," Teta added.
"It was unfortunate that mistakes were made, but I can confidently say that we have very vigorous safety protocols, that everyone is regularly tested, and I'm just so relieved that you guys are healthy, that everyone is healthy and nobody was ever in danger," he concluded.
CO-HOSTS ADDRESS FALSE POSITIVE COVID-19 RESULTS: After now testing negative multiple times, they look back on the events that played out on live television Friday when @sunny and @ananavarro received false positive COVID-19 results ahead of an interview with Vice Pres. Harris. pic.twitter.com/pH8G2As6CV
— The View (@TheView) September 27, 2021
RELATED: Ana Navarro Breaks Her Silence After Testing Positive for COVID on The View — 'It Was Just Surreal'
Next, Hostin and Navarro recapped what the experience was like for them. Hostin thanked viewers for the "outpouring of love and support," but also noted that the situation was "uncomfortable" for her.
"It was really uncomfortable for my results to be released publicly before I even knew what was going on, before they were verified, before I was tested again and again. And there were real life ramifications when things like that happen," she said, explaining that her surgeon husband Emmanuel had to be pulled out of surgery, her children were notified at school and her parents had to be rushed to get tested themselves.
Hostin, who confirmed that Emmanuel also tested negative and wanted his patients to know that, also thanked Navarro for being by her side through it all.
"I was relieved, to say the least, to find out that I was COVID-negative. And I always was assured by the fact that I am fully vaccinated. And so, if even if I were COVID-positive, I was convinced that I would likely be okay," she said. "And if this type of thing were to happen to me, Ana Navarro is the best person to have it happen with you, because her charm and her wits and her sense of humor really got me through it. I won't tell you the types of things that she was saying in Spanish, but it was pretty terrific."
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Navarro, meanwhile, said the ordeal left her "flabbergasted."
"Frankly, my first thought was, 'Oh my God' — because I had just spent the day with Kamala Harris' sister, niece and brother-in-law, so I'm thinking I'm Typhoid Mary and I'm going to wipe out the entire Harris family in one week," she said. "So I had to call them [and] immediately call [my] family because you don't want them to find out from TV — of course they had, and it shows you just how instant, these days, news travels."
"Also [I] was overwhelmed by the love, mostly love [we received]," she added, going on to clarify that her and Hostin being pulled off stage was not an orchestrated "conspiracy."
"I will tell my Latino and Black Twitter: Pipe down folks, this is not a conspiracy that they brought out Sunny and me. Because you know the Latinos are like, 'Wait, where are our girls going?'" she said.
RELATED: Watch the Moment Sunny Hostin and Ana Navarro Are Asked to Leave The View After Positive COVID Tests
The panel concluded the segment by issuing a plea to Harris, 56, to return to The View for a proper interview with all of the co-hosts (the vice president appeared on Friday's show from a remote location after the false positive tests and briefly spoke with Haines and Behar).
"The last thing I want to say is, I really can't tell you how grateful I am to the vice president's team that they rolled with the punches, that they went along with it," Navarro said. "I don't know that I wouldn't have, you know, left. ... Kamala, baby, come back please. We will bubble wrap ourselves."
"I would like the opportunity to ask some more questions," Hostin agreed, while Behar added, "We would really like you to come back, Madam Vice President."
