Trump plans to attend global health conference

President Donald Trump is planning to attend a global health conference in Orlando on Monday — if the event isn’t canceled due to coronavirus fears. Trump, who was already scheduled to be in Central Florida that night for a fundraiser, will attend the HIMSS20 Global Health Conference & Exhibition at the Orange County Convention Center, a conference spokeswoman said. The visit was first reported by Bloomberg News.

The conference, its website states, will bring together 45,000 health-information technology professionals and others from 90 countries, and calls itself “the can’t-miss health information and technology event of the year, where professionals throughout the global health ecosystem connect for the education, innovation and collaboration they need to reimagine health and wellness for everyone, everywhere.”

The five-day conference was still scheduled as of Monday, HIMSS spokeswoman Karen Groppe said, despite some exhibitors pulling out due to corporate travel policies amid the coronavirus outbreak.

“We all work in health care, we know what we’re facing,” Groppe said. “But we really do want to come to Orlando. And Orlando wants us to come to Orlando.”

So far in Orlando, a Workday event at an unspecified location originally scheduled for this week was the only major conference to have been canceled. The planned visit comes as the Trump administration is dealing with outbreaks of coronavirus in states ranging from Washington to Rhode Island, and a day after Florida announced its first two confirmed cases of coronavirus.

Trump, who called the outbreak a “hoax” at a rally in South Carolina last week, just before the first person in the U.S. died of the virus in Washington state, named Vice President Pence as the point person for coronavirus in his administration.

Trump also has a $100,000-per-couple fundraiser scheduled Monday in the Orlando area. The campaign event is listed as being hosted by Diane and Bob Dello Russo of Longwood, along with Lee Chira, Mary Demetree, Bill Heavener, Allan Keene, Mark Modarres and Lori Sommers.

The Dello Russos were listed as hosts for a July 2018 Ron DeSantis campaign fundraiser at the Alaqua Country Club in Longwood headlined by Donald Trump Jr. and Fox News host Jeanine Pirro. That event also listed indicted Rudy Giuliani associate Lev Parnas as a host. DeSantis later turned over Parnas’ and Igor Fruman’s $50,000 contribution to the federal government.

Bob Dello Russo is the founder of Del-Air Heating & Air Conditioning & Refrigeration, Chira is the owner of LCA Development, Demetree is the owner of Demetree Real Estate Services, Heavener is co-chairman and CEO of Full Sail University, Keene is the owner of the Keewin Real Property Company, and Modarres is CEO of MMM Capital.