Taylor Swift wants her fans to step up and stop being social.
The singer on Sunday night urged her massive following to engage in extreme caution and cancel plans amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“Guys - I follow you online and I love you guys so much and need to express my concern that things aren’t being taken seriously enough right now,” she said on her Instagram stories.
“I’m seeing lots of get togethers and hangs and parties still happening. This is the time to cancel plans,” Swift wrote, adding, “Don’t assume that because you don’t feel sick that you aren’t possibly passing something on to someone elderly or vulnerable to this.”
“It’s a really scary time but we need to make social sacrifices right now,” she said.
Swift’s message came on the heels of Ariana Grande lambasting those who dismissed the seriousness of the global pandemic. Grande also reminded followers that while they might not be the ones getting sick, they could be passing it along to others who are older or otherwise more vulnerable.
“Please don’t turn a blind eye,” Grande said. “It is incredibly dangerous and selfish to take this situation that lightly.”
“The ‘we will be fine because we’re young’ mindset is putting people who aren’t young and/or healthy in a lot of danger. You sound stupid and privileged and you need to care more about others. Like now,” she added.
Also on Sunday, actor Hilary Duff issued a somewhat blunter plea: “To all you young millennial assholes that keep going out and partying: Go home. Stop killing old people please.”
Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Sunday advised against attending gatherings of 50 or more people for the next eight weeks. And after a weekend of parades and packed bars and gatherings, governors across the country began to announce the closures of restaurants, bars, movie theaters and gyms as cases of COVID-19, the illness caused by the coronavirus, skyrocketed.