BELOVED American actor and director Alan Alda, who played Hawkeye Pierce in the iconic long-running war TV series M*A*S*H, has revealed he has Parkinson’s disease.

I was diagnosed three and a half years ago. And I’ve had a full life since then. I’ve acted, I’ve given talks, I help at the Alda Center for Communicating Science at Stony Brook. I started this new podcast. And I noticed that — I had been on television a lot in the last couple of weeks talking about the new podcast — and I could see my thumb twitch in some shots and I thought, it’s probably only a matter of time before somebody does a story about this from a sad point of view, but that’s not where I am.”

Alda has remained active since his diagnosis, writing on Twitter: “I take boxing lessons 3 days a week, play singles tennis twice a week. He hopes that his announcement will “encourage others to take action … If you get a diagnosis, keep moving!”