You are strawmanning he didn't in any way say COVID wasn't serious. He was saying the hysteria of fear that surrounded him and his friends and family turned out to be unwarranted and counter productive.

However he also says that he did and continues to get all the vaccines, took the covid restrictions seriously and isn't advocating against any of that.

So really a more honest analogy to racism is "racism is bad and kills millions of people, action is needed to combat it. That said we should not be so paralysed by fear of racism that it stops us being able to live our lives and take the actions we need to take to make the world a better place."