“I have been exposed to people in recent days who have subsequently tested positive and I had fever, chills, and shortness of breath,” Chris Cuomo said in a Twitter post on Tuesday, adding that he was hopeful he had not passed on the illness to his wife and children. He joked that “the rest of the family seem pleased” by his isolation in their basement, writing, “We will all beat this by being smart and tough and united!”

Governor Cuomo was in the midst of a nationally televised coronavirus briefing when news of his brother’s diagnosis became public. The governor said that he had learned of Chris Cuomo’s illness on Tuesday morning, and that his brother “is going to be fine.”

“He’s young, in good shape, strong — not as strong as he thinks — but he will be fine,” the governor said, wryly. (The Cuomos often engage in on-air brotherly teasing.)

But Governor Cuomo continued at length about the more serious implications of his brother’s diagnosis, including his relief that their 88-year-old mother, Matilda Cuomo, had not moved into Chris Cuomo’s home. The governor said he had told his brother that such a move would be “a mistake."

“You bring her to your house, you expose her to a lot of things,” the governor said. “She would have been doing what she wanted to do, he would have been doing what he wanted to do; it would have seemed great and harmless. But now we have a much different situation. Because if he was exposed, chances are she may very well have been exposed, and then we would be looking at a different situation than just my brother sitting in his basement for two weeks.”