Serena Williams husband shares ‘surprising’ Lyme disease diagnosis

Tech billionaire had ‘no symptoms’ until scans revealed he had the condition

Alexis Ohanian, co-founder of Reddit and husband of tennis championSerena Williams, says he has lyme disease.

The 41-year-old billionaire shared the news in a series of posts on his X/Twitter account.

“Doing a full battery of health scans, tests, etc, and found out I have lyme disease,” he wrote. “Wild. No symptoms, thankfully, but gonna treat.”

He shared the results of his scans as he continued, “Good cholesterol is too low. Bad cholesterol is just OK. Gotta work on that. On the plus-side: 822 ng/dL total + 162 ng/dL free testosterone.”

The tech mogul recalled his previous interaction with the illness that the NHS describes as a “bacterial infection that can be spread to humans by infected ticks”.

“I’ve got a loved one who had it a few years back, showed tons [of] symptoms etc and just couldn’t figure it out until they tested him for it and then found it (treated it successfully, too),” he continued.

“I spend so little time in the wilderness/northeast this was quite a surprise.

“Anyway, gonna grab some antibiotics — can’t keep me down, tick!”

Williams and Ohanian at the ESPY Awards earlier this month (Getty Images)

Ohanian and Williams met in 2015, when they happened to sit next to each other during breakfast at a hotel in Rome. Williams noticed he had sat adjacent to them, in a room full of empty tables, and invited him to join. The couple married in 2017 and have two children together.

They recently attended the ESPY awards together, alongside their daughter Olympia.

The 42-year-old hosted the ceremony, which commemorates achievements in sports, and poked fun at her friends Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.

She delivered a lively opening monologue in which she also addressed the Kendrick Lamar and Drake rap beef, and hit out at NFL star Harrison Butker for his comments urging women to embrace a role as homemakers.

“Prince Harry and Meghan are here, let’s give it up for them,” said Williams as she opened her speech.

“But please, Harry and Meghan, try not to breathe too much tonight. Because this is my night and I don’t want to be overshadowed by accusations you guys are taking up too much oxygen.”

Harry and Meghan appeared to take the joke in good spirits as they clapped along and smiled. The dig appeared to be a reference to their ongoing absence from public and family events, amid reports that their presence would be distracting.