Whoopi Goldberg Reveals Health Scare That Left Her Very Close to Leaving the Earth

Whoopi Goldberg returned to The View via a video message on Friday to reveal that she is OK after battling a life-threatening illness.

The 63-year-old EGOT winner and veteran The View panelist has been absent from the show since early February after contracting pneumonia, which a rep for the show previously confirmed.

“Yes, it’s me,” Goldberg said in her video message. “I am here, I am up and moving around—not as fast as I’d like to be, but I am OK, I’m not dead. So here’s what happened. I had pneumonia and I was septic. Pneumonia in both lungs, which meant there was fluid, there was all kinds of stuff going on and yes, I came very, very close to leaving the Earth. Good news—I didn’t.”

“Thank you for all of your good wishes, all of the wonderful things that people have been saying, even people who are not like huge fans of mine have actually said nice things about. We all know that’s gonna change when I get back, but for right now, it’s brilliant,” she said.

She added, “Thank you for everything, and ladies, I cannot wait to see ya’ll. This has been, uh, interesting and I’ll tell you about it when we’re all at the table.”