One of Georgia’s top infectious disease doctors on Friday said President Donald Trump’s diagnosis with coronavirus presents an “extraordinary moment” of presidential leadership — one in which Trump should tell everyone in the nation to wear face masks to stop the spread of the disease.
“It would be an extraordinary moment,” said Dr. Carlos del Rio, a professor of medicine at Emory University School of Medicine and the executive associate dean of Emory at Grady Health System.
Del Rio was among the panelists who joined Political Rewind on Friday after the news broke overnight that Trump and the first lady tested positive for COVID-19. The president's diagnosis came hours after the White House announced that presidential aide Hope Hicks had tested positive for coronavirus.
“My biggest concern is that we know the mortality in this disease increases and the severity of the disease increases significantly the older you get,” del Rio said. “At the age of 74, the president has a significant risk of having severe disease.”
“It’s very different being 31, like his aide is, than being 74, like the president is.”
If the president does fall ill, del Rio said, those symptoms should emerge in coming days. “We will know within five to seven days what the repercussion is,” he said.
If Trump is asymptomatic, the president could be back on the road campaigning in about 10 days, del Rio said.
Trump was in Atlanta last Friday in a packed, closed environment in which most of his supporters did not wear masks. In Tuesday’s debate with Joe Biden, Trump mocked the Democratic presidential hopeful for his mask-wearing habits. “I don’t wear face masks like him,” Trump said. “Every time you see him, he’s got a mask. He could be speaking 200 feet away … he shows up with the biggest mask I’ve ever seen.”
Del Rio said he hopes Trump now changes his messaging on masks: “I really think leadership is critical in addressing a pandemic, and the fact you can have a leader seize this moment to really address the nation and say, ‘Look, I haven’t been taking this seriously but it can affect anybody, including me and my wife, and you have to protect yourself.'”
Also on Political Rewind, we discussed the political ramifications of the president's positive coronavirus test with our panel of political experts and insiders.
Panelists:
Jim Galloway — Lead Political Writer, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Karen Owen — Professor of Political Science, University of West Georgia
Dr. Carlos del Rio — Associate Dean, Emory School of Medicine and Professor of Medicine, Infectious Disease Division, at Emory
Amy Steigerwalt — Professor of Political Science, Georgia State University
