Washington D.C., Mar 21, 2020 / 15:07 pm
A Franciscan friar is the first person known to have died as a result of coronavirus (COVID-19) in the District of Columbia.
Brother John-Sebastian Laird-Hammond, OFM, was hospitalized with the virus last week, and died Friday, the Washington Post reported.
The friar, who also was a permanent deacon, had been in residence at the Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land in America from the 1980s until September 2019, Father Larry Dunham, superior of the monastery, told CNA March 22.
Laird-Hammond, 59, had been battling leukemia for years, Dunham said, and had been temporarily living alone to better concentrate on his cancer treatments.