Marianne Faithfull says she almost died after battling COVID-19

Marianne Faithfull has revealed that she almost died after contracting COVID-19 last year.

The 73-year-old artist was hospitalised back in March after developing coronavirus symptoms. She was discharged from hospital after 22 days of treatment, and returned to her London home in April.

She later wrote in a Facebook post: “I would like to say to all the people who cared for me and thought of me, who sent me love, people I know, people I have never met, thank you for helping me to get better.

“I want to thank the doctors and nurses who were so good and basically saved my life!”

Faithfull has now elaborated further on that worrying period, revealing that she she almost died during her hospitalisation and that she continues to suffer from the long-term effects of COVID.

“All I know is that I was in a very dark place – presumably, it was death,” she told The Guardian, adding that once she recovered she read her medical notes and found the phrase “palliative care only”.

“She wasn’t actually meant to make it through,” her recent musical collaborator Warren Ellis (of The Bad Seeds) added. “That she survived it – it’s insane.”

Marianne Faithfull (Picture: Getty)

Faithfull continued: “Three things: the memory, fatigue and my lungs are still not OK – I have to have oxygen and all that stuff. The side-effects are so strange.

“Some people come back from it but they can’t walk or speak. Awful.”

Faithfull and Ellis, meanwhile, have joined forces for her new album ‘She Walks In Beauty’.

The new collection of poetry and music is set for release on April 30 via BMG, and was recorded shortly before and during the first coronavirus lockdown in the UK.

Featuring contributions from the likes of Nick Cave, Brian Eno and cellist Vincent Segal, the record draws on Faithfull’s love of the English Romantic poets, which she initially developed during her A-Level studies in the 1960s.

Describing the record, she hailed the efforts of manager Francois Ravard in making it a reality.

“It was Francois who put it together and made it happen,” she said. “And it was him who persuaded Warren to commit, which was really difficult because Warren’s doing so many things.”

The record itself sees Faithfull delivering her take on classic poems including Lord Byron’s titular poem, as well as John Keats’ Ode To A Nightingale and Lord Alfred Tennyson’s The Lady of Shallot.