LONDON, Nov 2: Prince William tested positive for coronavirus in April last but kept it private lest it would create an alarm in the country, the BBC reported. He is second-in-line to the British throne. In March, his father Prince Charles, Prince of Wales, had tested positive and had gone into isolation. He had only mild symptoms. The 71-year-old said he had "got away with it quite lightly."

The Sun reported that Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge, took a seven-day break from calls and video messages from April 9 to April 16. The Press Association reported that Kensington Palace, William's residence and office, when contacted on Sunday, did not deny the news.

The paper said Prince William, 38, kept his diagnosis private to avoid alarming the nation. He was treated by palace doctors and followed Government guidelines by isolating at the family home Anmer Hall, in Norfolk.

"The more we erode the natural world, the more we destroy what's called biodiversity -- which is the immense diversity of life, plant life, tree life, everything else, marine life -- the more we expose ourselves to this kind of danger. We've had these other disasters with SARS and Ebola and goodness knows what else, all of these things are related to the loss of biodiversity," Charles said.

Earlier, Prime Minister Boris Johnson was also struck by the virus and had been in the ICU for several days on oxygen support.

The Prime Minister has said England is going to have another lockdown as there is a recrudescence of infections in what is called a second wave of coronavirus sweeping Europe. Wales and Scotland have separate healthcae policies.

The UK is one of the worst affected countries in Europe with the total cases counting 10,11,660 and the death toll reaching 46,555.