WABC anchor Bill Ritter has apologized after he mistakenly said a New Jersey man who recovered from the coronavirus had died.
Ritter, who is back at work after recovering from what he believes to have been a mild case of Covid-19, was reading copy about 26-year-old Jack Allard, who was placed in a medically induced coma after becoming sick.
“After spending time on a ventilator and five full weeks in the hospital, the governor announced that Jack has died,” Ritter said before tossing to a sound bite.
But in the sound bite, N.J. Gov. Phil Murphy said, “It was a long month, but slowly Jack rebounded.”
When the longtime WABC anchor realized his mistake, he immediately apologized for misreading the script.
“I feel horrible. Jack is very much alive. Jack, we love you,” the anchor remarked.
Ritter continued, “Jack is alive and back home. He has come home, not in the figurative sense, but in the quite literal sense.”