Biden tests positive for COVID-19
President has ‘very mild symptoms’
WASHINGTON » President Joe Biden tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday and is experiencing “very mild symptoms,” the White House said, as new variants of the highly contagious virus challenge the nation’s efforts to get back to normal after two and a half years of pandemic disruptions.
White House Press Secretary Karine JeanPierre said Biden has begun taking Paxlovid, an antiviral drug designed to reduce the severity of the disease. He was isolating at the White House and “continuing to carry out all of his duties fully,” she said.
Biden’s physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, said in a letter that Biden had a runny nose and “fatigue, with an occasional dry cough, which started yesterday evening.”
“I really appreciate your inquiries and concerns,” Biden said in a video posted on Twitter. “But I’m doing well, getting a lot of work done.”
Biden, 79, is fully vaccinated, after getting two doses of the Pfizer coronavirus vaccine shortly before taking office, a first booster shot in September and an additional dose March 30.
Jean-Pierre described the president’s symptoms as “very mild” and said Biden had been in contact with members of the White House staff by phone and would participate in his planned meetings “via phone and Zoom from the residence.”
The White House took steps to show that the president was busy working despite his diagnosis, with Biden tweeting out a picture of himself making calls from the treaty room of the White House.
The president spoke by phone to lawmakers in Pennsylvania to apologize for having to can
cel his planned trip Thursday to the city of WilkesBarre to promote his crime prevention plans. Biden also called South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn to wish him a happy birthday and congratulate him on receiving an award from the NAACP.
O’Connor wrote in his letter about the president’s treatment plan: “I anticipate that he will respond favorably” to Paxlovid “as most maximally protected patients do.”
Jean-Pierre said Biden had tested negative on Tuesday and would stay isolated until he tests negative again.
White House chief of staff Ron Klain said in a letter obtained by The Associated Press that “all close contacts of the president” will be informed of Biden’s positive test “per standard protocol.”
“We have said for some time that there was a substantial possibility that the president – like anyone else – could get COVID, and we have prepared for this possibility,” Klain wrote to White House staff. “We are now executing on our plan so that the president can continue to work seamlessly from the Residence.”
First lady Jill Biden, speaking to reporters as she arrived for a school visit in Detroit, said she’d just gotten off the phone with her husband.
“He’s doing fine,” she said. “He’s feeling good.”
The first lady, who was wearing a mask, said she tested negative earlier in the day. She will keep her full schedule in Michigan and Georgia on Thursday, though she will be following guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on masking and distancing, said Michael LaRosa, her spokesperson.
The president spent much of last week in Israel and Saudi Arabia. White House officials told reporters that Biden planned to minimize contact during the trip, yet as soon as he exited Air Force One on July 13, the president was fist-bumping, handshaking and even was seen in the occasional hug. The CDC says symptoms can appear two to 14 days after exposure to the virus.
Biden has had a minimal public schedule after returning from Saudi Arabia late on Saturday night, attending church the next day and helping to welcome Ukraine’s first lady Olena Zelenska to the White House on Tuesday. The president traveled to Massachusetts on Wednesday to promote efforts to combat climate change.
Dr. Graham Snyder, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Pittsburgh, said in an interview that it wasn’t surprising that Biden tested positive given the extent of his activities and interactions with people. He said Biden appears
to be pursuing a treatment that should enable him to recover without facing even worse health risks.
“He’s put himself in a place to have the best possible outcome, which is the lowest probability of being sick enough to get in the hospital or heaven forbid in intensive care or dying,” Snyder said.
Up to this point, Biden’s ability to avoid the virus seemed to defy the odds, even with the testing procedures in place for those expected to be in close contact with him. Prior waves of the virus swept through Washington’s political class, infecting Vice President Kamala Harris, Cabinet members, White House staffers and lawmakers. Biden has increasingly stepped up his travel schedule and resumed holding large indoor events where not everyone is tested.
A White House official said Harris tested negative for COVID-19. She was last with the president on Tuesday and spoke with him on the phone Thursday morning. Harris planned to remain masked on the guidance of the White House medical team.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she hoped that Biden’s positive test for the virus would cause more Americans to get vaccinated and boosted because “none of us is immune from it, including the president of the United States, and we really have to be careful.”