Prince Charles says he feels ‘lucky' after coronavirus recovery

Britain's Prince Charles opened up on Thursday about his COVID-19 diagnosis and said he felt “lucky” to have suffered only mild symptoms of the coronavirus as he launched a new “Great Reset” agenda for the environment.

The 71-year-old heir to the British throne, who tested positive for coronavirus at the end of March before going into self-isolation at his Birkhall home on Queen Elizabeth II's Scotland estate, said his illness had made him even more determined to “push and shout” for a rebuild of the planet.

“I was lucky in my case and got away with it quite lightly,” he told ‘Sky News'.

“But I've had it, and I can so understand what other people have gone through… But in order to prevent this happening to so many more people, I'm so determined to find a way out of this,” he said.

Addressing an online conference with the World Economic Forum, the royal launched a five-point plan to avoid future disasters, including “capturing the imagination and will of humanity” to change, then use the global economic recovery to “set us on a new trajectory of sustainable employment, of livelihoods and economic growth”.

Further, he called for a redesign of systems and pathways to advance “net zero transitions globally” and “reinvigorate science, technology and innovation” to find solutions.

Finally, he said “we must rebalance investment”, with the private sector at the “heart of the key to how we do this in a better and more sustainable way”.

“Unless we take the action necessary and build again in a greener, more sustainable, more inclusive way, then we will end up having more and more pandemics and more disasters from ever-accelerating global warming and climate change,” he told the conference.

"We have a golden opportunity to seize something good from this crisis. Its unprecedented shockwaves may well make people more receptive to big visions of change, and global crises like pandemics and climate change know no borders, and highlight just how interdependent we are as one people sharing one planet,” he said.

Charles, the Prince of Wales, has been an advocate on environmental issues for many years. In ‘After The Pandemic: Our New World' for ‘Sky News', he explains how his own illness has provided a further momentum to his campaign.

“I can't tell you how much I sympathise with the way that everyone has had to endure with this unbelievably testing and challenging time… we have to find a way this time to put nature back at the centre," he said.