IRON MAIDEN singer Bruce Dickinson, who tested positive for COVID-19 last month after being fully vaccinated, discussed his battle with the disease in a new interview with Gregg Stone of the 103.5 The Fox radio station. "The delta variant is the dominant strain in America, and has been the dominant strain in the U.K. and Europe for a while now," he said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET). "But people who have gotten vaccinated are just not dying from it — not really. Something like 98 percent of people in hospitals haven't had a vaccine shot. "I don't believe that people should be forced to have vaccines," he continued. "Maybe in hospitals and stuff like that — people who work there. But honestly, it's a personal decision. But I just think people are nuts not to take protective action against something that really could kill them. "It's not a nice bug," Bruce added. "It's not the flu — trust me. I've had it, and I had two vaccines, and I'm really glad I had the two vaccines. And I'm kind of glad I had [COVID-19] as well 'cause now I've got more antibodies and all the rest of it. But it is not a nice bug. And I know a lot of people who have had it and who've still got long COVID — like, 22, 23 [years old]. Fit people — none of this, 'Oh, yeah, he died 'cause he was 85 and he was sick anyway.' Well, yeah, there is that. But there's a lot of people getting it. It's not a nice bug. And it's not the flu — it's way more contagious than that." Long COVID is described as symptoms continuing for more than 12 weeks after an infection — severe or mild — which can't be explained by another cause. Dickinson previously told Rolling Stone magazine that he doesn't personally believe that fans attending concerts should be required to get vaccinated, calling it "a personal choice," However, he said that he hopes everyone will get the shot. "Personally, I think people are just very badly advised if they don't go and get themselves double jabbed as quickly as possible, not for the reasons of going into concerts, but for their own health," he said. "Having said that, even if you've had a double jab, you can still get COVID, and therefore you can spread it to other people who might not have been vaccinated and they might get very sick and die. Now you cannot legislate against mortality. There are many things in this world that kill people and they're not illegal but are unfortunate. Cancer kills a lot of people. Heart attacks kill a lot of people. Obesity kills a lot of people. Malaria kills a shitload of people every year… So at some point, we have to just go, 'We're probably going to have to live with this. And if we're going to live with it, then you have your vaccination.'" IRON MAIDEN's new album, "Senjutsu", was released on September 3 via BMG. It was recorded in Paris with longstanding producer Kevin Shirley and co-produced by bassist Steve Harris. The video for the LP's first single, "The Writing On The Wall", was made by BlinkInk based on a concept by Dickinson with two former Pixar executives. It followed a month-long teaser campaign and global "treasure hunt" for clues about the track title and concept.
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