According to his Chief of Staff Mark Meadows’s statement on Saturday morning, President Donald Trump is said to be facing a “critical” next 2 days, which will determine his recovery from COVID-19. On Saturday evening, President Trump appeared in an optimistic video from the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, where he is currently being treated. He said he was hoping to “be back soon” since he was already feeling much better in the video.
President Trump lauded his entire medical team and praised how he was being treated, calling them “miracles coming down from God.” He went ahead with vigor to defend his decision to continue his Presidential campaign and attend large events amidst the pandemic. “I had no choice… I had to be out front… As a leader, you have to confront problems.” President Trump said in the hospital video.
President Trump is 74 years old and clinically obese. This puts him at a very high risk of developing critical complications from the COVID-19 virus. With continuous monitoring and state-of-the-art treatment, his medical care is far sophisticated than what an average American would receive.
Latest updates
The President’s team has been providing inconsistent updates about his condition since his diagnosis came to light. Earlier on Friday morning, Meadows stated that the President was exhibiting only “mild symptoms” and did not require oxygen support. Later in the day, to further normalize the situation, the Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said, “President Trump remains in good spirits, has mild symptoms and has been working throughout the day.”
Meadows subsequently contradicted this on Saturday morning, stating that President Trump’s situation became “very concerning” on Friday. He said:
“We’re still not on a clear path yet to a full recovery.”
Not only was this a sharp contrast to what the President’s medical team had declared moments before, but this statement from the Chief of Staff was what led to the President hurriedly coming up with the hospital video to prove his vitality.
Led by Navy Commander Dr. Sean Conley, the medical team had met the press moments before Meadows’ statement, to brief about the President’s condition. During this press brief, the medical team informed that President Trump had started to exhibit “clinical indications” of the virus by Thursday afternoon. Conley seemed to strategically avoid questions about how high President Trump’s fever had run before he started recovering or that if he ever required oxygen support.
Conley said President’s symptoms were mild and those “are now resolving and improving.” He even shared that President Trump had no fever in the past 24 hours, and blood oxygen level was 96%, even though it could be attributed to the aspirin and a five-day course of Remdesivir he is taking.
“Thursday, no oxygen. None at this moment. And yesterday with the team, while we were all here, he was not on oxygen,” Conley said.
However, an anonymous source aware of President Trump’s situation stated that he had been receiving oxygen support at the White House since Friday morning before he was flown to the military hospital.
Late in the evening on Saturday, Conley stated that the developments were promising but opined that the President was “not yet out of the woods.”
Meanwhile, First Lady Melania Trump stayed at the White House in her path to recovery from the infectious virus. President Trump updated her status in his hospital video, stating that she was “really handling it very nicely,” reasoning that she was “just a little tiny bit younger.”
The White House, apart from refusing to divulge proper details on the President’s health diagnosis and treatment, has also been reluctant to change its major protocols. Even something as essential as wearing a mask and maintaining physical distancing has not been implemented yet, despite many people in the administration contracting the disease.
The White House is now said to be concentrating on tracing the new infections that could have resulted from the Sep 26th White House event of introducing President Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, Judge Amy Coney Barrett. More than 150 people had attended the event, which had no precautionary measures to prevent the virus’s possible spread.
With the lack of transparency that the White House has shown regarding the President’s health condition, this is a decisive moment for the US Elections. The way this situation is being handled shows the administration’s reliability in a poor light to the American citizens. Not only the US, but the President’s health situation is being monitored by countries worldwide, directly or indirectly affected by this administration’s policies. It is also unclear how many days President Trump would be required to stay in the hospital to achieve full recovery.
