Celebrities with publicised EKC infections while in the public eye include Sportscaster Bob Costas ( 2014) and actress Karen Allen ( 1978).
Allen made her major film debut in 1978, in National Lampoon’s Animal House. Shortly after the completion of the film, Allen was diagnosed with epidemic keratoconjunctivitis, a viral infection that caused vision loss. She recovered after a short period, but the disease left her with scarred corneas and imperfect vision. Not letting illness hold her back, Allen rallied and managed to land significant roles in The Wanderers, in 1979, and A Small Circle of Friends in 1980, where she played one of three radical college students during the 1960s. She also appeared, as a guest star, in the 1979 pilot episode of the long-running CBS series Knots Landing and played Annie Fairgate, the daughter of Don Murray’s character Sid Fairgate and Sid’s first wife Susan Philby.
Her career-changing role came with the blockbuster hit Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981), directed by Steven Spielberg, in which she played the feisty heroine Marion Ravenwood, love interest of Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford). Allen won a Saturn Award for Best Actress for her performance. After a few minor films, including leading roles in the dramatic thriller Split Image (1982), directed by Ted Kotcheff and the Paris-set romantic drama Until September (1984), directed by Richard Marquand as well as other stage appearances, she co-starred with Jeff Bridges in the science fiction film Starman (1984).
Allen debuted on Broadway in the 1982 production The Monday After The Miracle. In 1983, she played the lead in the off-Broadway play Extremities, a physically demanding role about a would-be rape victim who turns the tables on her attacker. She often took breaks from movie roles to concentrate on stage acting; Allen appeared as Laura in the Paul Newman-directed film version of the Tennessee Williams play The Glass Menagerie, with John Malkovich and Joanne Woodward, in 1987.
In 1988, Allen returned to the big screen as Bill Murray’s long-lost love, Claire, in the Christmas comedy Scrooged. In 1990, she portrayed the doomed crew member Christa McAuliffe in the television movie Challenger, based on the 1986 Space Shuttle Challenger disaster. Subsequently, she appeared in Spike Lee’s Malcolm X (1992), in a small supporting role in The Perfect Storm (2000) and In the Bedroom (2001). She made guest appearances on television’s Law & Order (1996) and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (2001). She also starred in the short-lived series The Road Home (1994) and portrayed Dr. Clare Burton in the video game Ripper (1996).
Allen reprised her best-known role as Marion Ravenwood for the 2008 sequel Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, in which she renews her relationship with Indiana Jones and reveals to him that they have a son named Henry Jones III, who named himself Mutt Williams, played by Shia LaBeouf.
Allen starred in the American premiere of Jon Fosse’s A Summer Day at the Cherry Lane Theater in New York City, which opened in October 2012.
Allen has a long-standing relationship with the Berkshire Theater Group. It began in 1981, when she appeared in the play Two for the Seesaw at the Berkshire Theater Festival in Stockbridge, Massachusetts. She has also appeared in summer production of the nearby Williamstown Theater Festival. In August 2015, Allen began appearing in Terrence McNally’s Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune for the Berkshire Theater Group.
Courtesy of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karen_Allen
Courtesy of https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Costas