“I wholeheartedly disagree,” Jean-Pierre said of comparison. The former president contracted COVID-19 in the fall of 2020, before vaccines were available, and was hospitalized at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center for three nights. Klain, who said he hoped the president’s testing positive a “teachable moment” for the country, said the White House wasn’t aware of any positive COVID results that were linked to the president’s case.ĭuring her briefing, Jean-Pierre bristled at suggestions the Biden administration wasn’t being much more forthcoming with information about the president’s illness than that of his predecessor, Donald Trump. Michael Osterholm, director of the Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said it’s important for Americans to know they must remain careful about the virus, which continues to kill hundreds of people daily.Ī White House official confirmed that Vice President Kamala Harris was also in close contact with Biden, and Klain said he was too. Jha declined to speculate on some aspects of the president’s prognosis, characterizing the questions as hypotheticals. Ashish Jha didn’t fully answer questions about whether Biden began isolating as soon as he started experiencing symptoms on Wednesday night, as federal guidelines suggest, or did so following his positive test the next day.
Jean-Pierre and White House COVID-19 Response Coordinator Dr. And when pressed about where Biden might have contracted the virus, she responded, “I don’t think that that matters, right? I think what matters is we prepared for this moment.”
But she parried with reporters over specifics. In a lengthy briefing with reporters, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said repeatedly that the White House had been as transparent as possible about the president’s health. It’s going to be OK.”Ĭonveying that sentiment on Day 1 of Biden’s coronavirus experience virus wasn’t always easy, though. And, in the meantime, thanks for your concern. On Thursday, the White House gave repeated assurances that Biden was hard at work while isolating in the residential areas of the White House with “very mild symptoms” including a runny nose, dry cough and fatigue.īiden, in a blazer and Oxford shirt, recorded a video from the White House balcony telling people: “I’m doing well, getting a lot of work done. Biden still has symptoms including a runny nose, fatigue and a cough, he said. O’Connor said Biden was “tolerating treatment well.” The president is taking Paxlovid, an anti-viral drug aimed at reducing severity of the disease. The letter also said Biden had a normal pulse, blood pressure, respiratory rate and oxygen saturation, but it did not provide specific metrics.
Kevin O’Connor, saying Biden’s temperature had registered 99.4 F on Thursday but his fever responded to acetaminophen and has been normal since then. On Friday, the White House released a new letter from Biden’s physician, Dr. Biden experiencing ‘very mild symptoms’ after testing positive for COVID-19