One study says an average person can recognize 5000 people’s faces. I don’t know if we recognize more people by face or by name, but let’s assume it’s the same. That means an average person recognize 1 in 1.5 million people of the world. Or if that’s 5000 people in the US, that’s still one in 65,000. So 65,000 Americans might die before anyone you recognize dies. Right now the death toll is around 30,000 worldwide and 2200 Americans.
Of course the rich & famous are getting infected at a higher rate than the average population, because they meet more people & travel more. But they are probably tested early, and some may still die.
I’m not sure there will be a “Rock Hudson” of this pandemic - not because I think famous and wealthy people won’t die , but because I don’t think “fame” is what it used to be. Rock Hudson died in 1985 and even people who had never seen one of his movies would have heard of him from his TV show in a time where there were basically three networks, not hundreds of cable stations. I mean, looking at that list one of the notable people is someone who won “Top Chef Masters” - has anyone who is not a fan of that show ever heard of him? I don’t know - but lots of people who never watched Julia Child on TV had heard of her in 1985.
There are plenty of people who are famous. Again, nobody really famous has died yet because very few people have died so far. By the time Rock Hudson died of HIV/AIDS, over 10,000 Americans had died of it. (He died in October 1985; cumulative death toll by end of 1985 was 13,278 according to this page). COVID-19 has “only” killed ~2200 Americans so far.
Rock Hudson was a totally different thing because it was about the revelation that he was gay. It was a shock to people that they couldn’t just tell themselves “only perverts and weirdos can get it, so it has nothing to do with me.” Rock Hudson was part of a huge shift in how we thought about AIDS and how we thought about gayness.
By that measure, the answer to this question is Tom Hanks.
He didn’t die, but his announcement that he had CORVID-19 made a lot of people realize “oh shit, this is real” and “this could impact me and people I love”.
As a sports fan, the count among the athletes that I recognize (at least by team or club) is pretty high, perhaps even approaching triple figures. Admittedly, these are mostly athletes that are young and in incredible shape, which certainly helps their chances. But we are also hearing of numerous young people with no pre-existing conditions perishing from COVID.
Effectively, the lies from the right-wing bullshit machine, including Fox News likely killed this guy, and probably will kill a few others in his church.