Joe Biden’s Covid-19 symptoms have improved, White House physician says
- The US president tested positive for the coronavirus on Thursday, though his symptoms were mild.
- ‘I anticipate that he will respond favourably’ to treatment, including the antiviral Paxlovid, Kevin O’Connor, Biden’s doctor, says
US President Joe Biden’s condition was improving on Friday, a day after he tested positive for Covid-19, his physician, Kevin O’Connor, said.
In a memo, O’Connor wrote that Biden’s symptoms – a runny nose, fatigue, and a cough – had improved by Friday morning, following a full day’s use of Paxlovid, an antiviral drug. A rise in Biden’s temperature on Thursday evening to 99.4 degrees Fahrenheit (37.4 degrees Celsius) had “responded favourably” to acetaminophen.
Biden’s oxygen levels, blood pressure, respiratory rate and pulse remained “entirely normal”, O’Connor said.
“As I stated previously, the president is fully vaccinated and twice-boosted, so I anticipate that he will respond favourably [to treatment], as most maximally protected patients do,” O’Connor wrote.
“There has been nothing in the course of his illness thus far which gives me cause to alter that initial expectation.”
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US President Joe Biden tests positive for Covid-19
While on his course of Paxlovid, Biden has had to halt his regular intake of other medication to avoid drug interaction. Those include apixaban, blood thinning heart medication, and rosuvastatin, a cholesterol drug.
O’Connor said that Biden had begun taking a low dose of aspirin as an alternative blood thinner.
At a briefing Friday afternoon, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said that the White House had identified 17 individuals considered “close contacts” of Biden, including members of Biden’s senior staff and a number of lawmakers.
Vice-President Kamala Harris was identified as a close contact on Thursday, but said she had tested negative for Covid-19.
None of the White House staff members considered close contacts had since tested positive for Covid-19, Jean-Pierre said.
The updates came as the White House faces scrutiny over the clarity and transparency of the information it has provided about the sequence of events before Biden’s positive tests – one antigen and one PCR – on Thursday morning.
White House officials on Thursday could not provide a definitive answer about whether Biden had begun immediately isolating once he began experiencing symptoms, as government guidelines advise.
They also rejected requests to bring O’Connor to the briefing room to answer reporters’ questions directly.
Also on Friday, White House Covid-19 response coordinator Ashish Jha declined to weigh in on footage showing Harris on Friday unmasking and hugging another individual at a conference in Washington.
That appeared in contravention of guidelines from the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), which recommends that close contacts wear masks around others for 10 days.
Biden continued to conduct official work while in isolation, and took part virtually in a discussion about decreasing gas prices.
“Let me start by apologising for my voice,” Biden said after coughing at the opening of that event. “I’m feeling much better than I sound.”
It remains unclear whether Biden’s diagnosis will have any impact on the timing of expected talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping, who on Friday sent a message to Biden wishing him a speedy recovery.
Jean-Pierre said on Friday she did not “have anything to share” on plans for those discussions, but described communications between Washington and Beijing generally as “open”.
Biden is the second US president to contract Covid-19. His predecessor, Donald Trump, was hospitalised with the virus in October 2020, before vaccines were available.
Chinese President Xi wishes Joe Biden a speedy recovery from Covid-19
Biden has made bringing the coronavirus under control a core promise of his presidency; his aides have argued that his diagnosis represents the reality that the majority of Americans will contract the virus but are likely to avoid severe illness if they are vaccinated.
Only around two-thirds of Americans are fully vaccinated, though, a lower rate than most other developed nations. Of those, only around half have received a booster shot.
That comes as the highly contagious BA. 5 strain, a subvariant of Omicron, continues to spread across the US, now averaging around 126,000 new infections and 350 deaths daily, according to CDC data.
