TV presenter's emotional breakdown during on-air interview

CNN’s Anderson Cooper has fought back tears as he interviewed a widow who recently lost her husband to the coronavirus.

Katie Coelho’s husband, Jonathan, 32, died after battling the coronavirus in hospital for weeks on April 22.

Mr Coelho leaves behind two children – Braedyn, 2, and Penelope, 10-months-old.

The heartbreaking story went viral when Ms Coelho shared a parting message written by Mr Coelho on his phone before he suffered cardiac arrest and died.

Speaking to Cooper in an emotional interview, Ms Coelho said her husband’s death will impact her children’s lives.

Ms Coelho said it hurt knowing there would be a point in time when she will have spent more time without her husband than the 10 years they spent together – a feeling Cooper empathised with.

“I’ve reached that point a couple of times in my life,” Cooper said as he choked up.

“It’s a very strange feeling and I’m sorry you’re going to experience that.”

Ms Coelho explained she met Mr Coelho in college. After starting out as good friends, the two would eventually go on double dates with friends the two had throughout college.

Mr Coelho became her “go-to person” and around 2011, the two questioned why they hadn’t been dating each other.

Cooper then remarked the couple had two beautiful children. Their son, Braedyn was born with “several medical complexities including cerebral palsy”, both parents did their best to support their son.

While Mr Coelho was getting better in the days leading up to his death, Ms Coelho spoke of how she got the call at 2am, knowing it was going to be bad news.

Cooper started choking up when he asked about the note Mr Coelho left on his phone for his wife to find when she picked up his possessions from the hospital.

The CNN host was able to recount part of the note which read “I love you guys with all my heart and you’ve given me the best life I could have ever asked for”, before choking up and apologising to Ms Coelho.

“That’s okay,” Ms Coelho laughed through her own tears.

“Jonathan’s good with his words.”

Ms Coelho revealed both her children have tested positive for coronavirus, and although she has not been tested, she was told it was safe to assume she also had the virus.

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People have been able to come in and help Ms Coelho, on the condition they wear masks and gloves.

Cooper then asked about how the children were doing, given they are so young and wouldn’t know what was going on, and Ms Coelho’s response clearly resonated with him.

She said it was a double-edge sword, because right now the children were happy and getting attention, but Ms Coelho was worried about how their father’s death would impact them in the future.

“They don’t know that they have lost the greatest human being and they’ll only ever know their dad through pictures and memories and videos,” she said tearfully.

“And to me, I think that’s the worst part in this. They won’t feel the love that I felt for the past 10 years with my husband.

“They’ll know about it, but they can’t say ‘I remember feeling that’.”

Ms Coelho said her husband wanted to see his children grow up, instead he died feeling scared.

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Cooper then took a deep breath before he told Ms Coelho his own father died when he was young.

“He really tried hard not to die, he didn’t want to leave my brother and I, and not have us know him,” he said.

“The only thing I can tell you is they will know him through you and the love you have for him, they will feel like they know him because I know you’ll tell stories about him as they grow up.”

The story of tho Coelho family has been widely reported, and a GoFundMe has been set up to help Ms Coelho and her two children.

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