President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump Test Positive for COVID-19
After one of President Donald Trump’s top aides, Hope Hicks, tested positive for COVID-19 after traveling this week with the President and First Lady, President Trump announced they were getting tested.
The results are in and confirmed from the President that he and his wife both have tested positive for the coronavirus.
UPDATE:
Yesterday, President Trump greeted supporters outside Walter Reed National Military Medical Center from his motorcade. His doctors gave him the okay to leave his hospital suite to make a “surprise” visit.
Deputy White House press secretary Judd Deere said, ”President Trump took a short, last-minute motorcade ride to wave to his supporters outside and has now returned to the Presidential Suite inside Walter Reed.”
Deere also said that“appropriate precautions were taken in the execution of this movement to protect the President and all those supporting it, including PPE. The movement was cleared by the medical team as safe to do.”
Patients who test positive for COVID-19 are typically required to self-isolate for 10 days from the time symptoms appeared to avoid infecting others.
But Trump appeared motivated to express his appreciation to supporters who have gathered across the street from Walter Reed.
He also showed his appreciation by having hundreds of pizzas delivered to the crowds. Pizzas were showing up every 15 minutes.
Trump has been at Walter Reed since Friday. He was taken to the hospital after requiring supplemental oxygen. Doctors said Trump is on the steroid dexamethasone in response to the low oxygen levels. The president has also been given the antiviral drug remdesivir and an experimental antibody therapy from Regeneron.
In a video from Walter Reed, Trump have an update on the First Lady:
“Our first lady is doing very well. We’re both doing well. Melania is really handling it very nicely. As you’ve probably read, she’s slightly younger than me, just a little tiny bit.Therefore, we know the disease. We know the situation. Age versus younger people. Melania’s handling it statistically like it’s supposed to be handled.” ( She’s 50, he’s 74)
Trump said that he has “learned a lot” about the virus while in the hospital: ”I learned about it by really going to school. This isn’t the ‘let’s read the book’ school. And I get, and I understand it, and it’s a very interesting thing.”
Doctors said the President may be released from the hospital today.
Dr. Sean Dooley, a pulmonologist at Walter Reed, said the president has remained without a fever since Friday morning and his cardiac, kidney and liver functions are all still normal. He said Trump has not shown signs of shortness of breath and was walking around his medical unit without limitation or disability.
