Did Meat Loaf regret anti-vax stance? Howard Stern says family should make amends

Meat Loaf had openly protested against Covid mandates but later said that he made a mistake, shortly before his demise

PUBLISHED JAN 27, 2022

American rock star Meatloaf, real name Marvin Lee Aday, holds his hand to his ear in a theatrical pose during a live concert (Photo by Keystone/Getty Images)

Howard Stern recently made it known that he wants Meat Loaf's family to speak up about Covid safety awareness protocols and encourage the use of Covid-19 vaccine. This statement came from Stern after he said that he believed the singer got stuck in some 'cult'. The Bat Out Of Hell singer, whose birth name is Michael Lee Aday, passed away earlier in January, reportedly due to Covid. The singer was 74 years old at the time of death.

The late legend did not agree with the masking and vaccine protocols and openly spoke against the government's Covid-related mandates. In an interview last summer, Meat Loaf stated that masks were "useless." He added, "They don’t do anything. They don’t stop you from getting COVID. They’re just a nuisance and make your nose itch and make it so you can’t breathe. If I die, I die, but I’m not going to be controlled."

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American rock singer Meat Loaf performing, circa 1977. (Photo by Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

After Aday's sudden demise, Stern voiced a few thoughts of his own. “Poor Meat Loaf got sucked into some weird f–king cult. And somehow really believed that — he made a statement, ‘I’d rather die a free man than take that vaccine.’ And now he’s dead! I wish the family would come forward and say, ‘Ya know, when Meat Loaf was laying there in the hospital and he couldn’t breathe, he said, ‘I made a mistake,'” Stern told Uproxx.

In a statement issued by Meat Loaf's widow Deborah Gillespie, she spoke about his passing and how his death was "gut wrenching." However, she did not talk about how or why the rock legend had died. Meat Loaf had been working on the filming of a TV show before his death about which he had also posted on his Facebook account.

Meat Loaf is not the first person whose opinions on the Covid vaccine and masking mandates have been criticized by Howard Stern. The self-proclaimed 'King Of All Media' has bashed several celebrities who are anti-vaxxers. Earlier in January, Stern talked about the controversial tennis champion Novak Djokovic who was thrown out of Australia after petitioning for the exemption of the countries vaccination requirements for noncitizens. “That f–k-nut … Djokovic. The Joker, I call him the Joker. What a f–king a–hole.”, Stern said about Djokovik.