Elon Musk may have COVID-19, and of course, he has a theory

Elon Musk may have contracted COVID-19. 

The Tesla and SpaceX CEO shared the news on Twitter, saying he’s got “symptoms of a typical cold.” He also said he was tested four times in the same day, with two tests coming back negative, and two positive. 

“Something extremely bogus is going on. Was tested for covid four times today. Two tests came back negative, two came back positive. Same machine, same test, same nurse. Rapid antigen test from BD,” he tweeted. 

Musk said he’s “getting PCR results from separate labs,” and that the results of those will take about 24 hours. “If it’s happening to me, it’s happening to others,” he tweeted in response to another user asking whether this may be why we’ve seen “such a major spike” in cases. 

Another user commented on revenues from tests being “not bogus & very consistent,” to which Musk tweeted “Exactly.”

Musk’s expressed controversial views on the coronavirus pandemic before, and sometimes he’s just been plain wrong — at one occasion, he said that kids are “essentially immune” to the virus, and on another, he predicted that there would be “close to zero new cases in US (…) by the end of April.”

With his latest comments — especially the “extremely bogus” bit — he’s once again stirring up conspiracy theories, one of which claims that the numbers of COVID-19 patients are exaggerated. 

In reality, the rapid antigen tests that Musk has apparently taken are known not to be entirely accurate, which is why they’re often used for initial screening on whether a person has COVID-19 or not. For a much greater degree of certainty, the polymerase chain reaction (PCR) tests must be used. There’s nothing particularly unusual (let alone “extremely bogus”) about someone getting conflicting results from antigen tests. 

In any case, we wish Musk a speedy recovery. If he does, in fact, have it.