Did he catch Covid-19 during his recent trips to the Middle East or to the White House?
In any case, US President Joe Biden, 79, “tested positive for Covid-19” on Thursday and presents “very mild symptoms”, his spokeswoman Karine Jean-Pierre announced in a press release.
The Democrat, who so far had never tested positive, “started taking Paxlovid”, Pfizer’s anti-Covid pill, and will isolate himself at the White House until he is in new negative, she said.
The president, fully vaccinated and who has received two booster doses, “will continue to assume his full duties” during this time, according to the press release.
Joe Biden's last negative test, returning from a tour last week in Israel and Saudi Arabia, dated back to Tuesday, said Karine Jean-Pierre.
The president had originally planned a trip to Pennsylvania on Thursday and another to Florida next Monday.
Read alsoPopularity at its lowest and serial blunders: Joe Biden in a bad patch
The White House has promised to communicate “every day” on the state of health of Joe Biden, the oldest president ever elected in the United States and whom a medical examination last November found “robust” and “fit” to exercise its functions.
This announcement, however, comes at a time when the advanced age of Joe Biden continues to be invoked at each of these blunders, in particular by his opponents, to justify his supposed inability to exercise his mandate.
130,000 new cases of Covid-19 every day in the United States
Paxlovid, which Joe Biden takes, is an antiviral treatment that works by decreasing the ability of the virus to replicate, thus slowing the progression of the disease.
It must be taken within the first few days after symptoms appear to be effective.
It is recommended in the United States for people at risk of developing a severe case of the disease, a category into which the American president falls due to his age.
The United States is currently seeing about 130,000 new Covid-19 cases a day, an otherwise underestimated figure according to experts, and the number of hospitalizations is also on the rise.
The highly contagious BA.5 subvariant of Omicron is dominant in the country, where it accounts for about 80% of cases.
