Trump’s positive test comes just hours after the White House announced that Senior Aide Hope Hicks contracted the virus after traveling with the president several times this week. Trump is 74 years old, putting him at higher risk for serious complications from a virus that has now killed more than 200,000 people across the country.
Trump announced Thursday night that he and first lady Melania Trump were beginning a “quarantine process” after Hicks contracted the virus, although it was unclear what that entailed. A test can take days to detect an infection.
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The diagnosis marks a major blow for a president who has been desperately trying to convince the American public that the worst of the pandemic is behind us, even as cases continue to rise with less than four months to go on Election Day. And it stands as the most serious known public health scare any sitting American president has faced in recent history.
Daily testing
Trump continued to shake hands with visitors long after public health officials warned about him and initially resisted being examined. He has been reluctant to put his own administration’s social distancing guidelines into practice for fear of appearing weak, even refusing in almost all circumstances to wear a mask in public.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson spent a week in hospital, including three nights in intensive care, where medical workers administered oxygen and monitored him 24 hours a day.
The White House had its first COVID-19 scare in early March when at least three people who later tested positive approached the president at his private Florida club.
In mid-March, as the virus continued to spread across the country, the White House began taking the temperature of everyone who entered the White House compound and, in April, began administering rapid COVID-19 tests to everyone. . . . those who were close to the president, with the staff examined once a week. Frequent testing gave some staff the false impression that the complex was safe from the virus and, as a result, few followed recommended security protocols, including wearing masks.
While there is currently no evidence that Trump is seriously ill, the positive test also raises questions about what would happen if he became incapacitated due to illness. Amendment 25 to the Constitution details the procedures under which a president can declare himself “incapable of fulfilling the powers and duties” of the presidency.
The vice president and the majority of the cabinet or other statutory body may also declare the president incapable of fulfilling the powers and duties of his office, in which case Pence “will immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as interim president.” until Trump can provide a written statement to the contrary.
