President Donald Trump on Saturday evening released a video on his health after he was diagnosed with COVID-19 this week.
Presumably speaking from Walter Reed Medical Center near the District of Columbia, Trump posted a video where he thanked the staff of Walter Reed.
The president said, “We still have steps to go ... and finish that job,” adding that he is looking to work on therapeutics to defeat the virus.
“I’m starting to feel good ... I just want to be thankful for the support I’ve seen,” he said, adding that he is “most appreciative” of the well-wishes from the “American people.”
Trump said that he was given the option to “stay in the White House” and “lock yourself in,” adding that “I can’t do that.”
“As a leader, you have to confront problems. There’s never been a great leader that would have done that. So that’s where it is,” he said.
The president also added that the first lady, Melania Trump, is “also doing well” after the first lady “asked [him] to say something” about her health.
“So I just want to tell you that I’m starting to feel good. You don’t know over the next period of a few days, I guess that’s the real test, so we'll be seeing what happens over those next couple of days,” he said, adding: “We have things happening that look like they’re miracles coming down from God.”
Earlier on Saturday, White House doctor Sean P. Conley told reporters outside the military facility that Trump had not experienced difficulty breathing, and was not given oxygen at Walter Reed.
“The team and I are extremely happy with the progress the president has made,” Conley said. He declined to give a timetable for Trump’s possible release from the facility.
The White House has said Trump will work in a special suite at the medical center for the next few days as a precautionary measure. He had no public events scheduled on Saturday.
Conley said Trump had received a first dose of a five-day course of Remdesivir, an intravenous antiviral drug sold by Gilead Sciences Inc. that has been shown to shorten hospital stays for CCP virus patients. He is also taking an experimental treatment, Regeneron’s REGN-COV2—one of several experimental COVID-19 drugs known as monoclonal antibodies—as well as zinc, Vitamin D, famotidine, melatonin, and aspirin, Conley has said.
I want to begin by thanking all of the incredible medical professionals, the doctors, the nurses, everybody, at Walter Reed Medical Centre, I think it’s the finest in the world for the incredible job they’ve been doing.
I came here, wasn’t feeling so well, I feel much better now, we’re working hard to get me all the way back. I have to be back because we still have to ‘Make America Great Again.’ We’ve done an awfully good job of that but we still have steps to go and we have to finish that job. And I‘ll be back. I think I’ll be back soon and I look forward to finishing up the campaign the way it was started in the way we’ve been doing, and the kind of numbers we’ve been doing, we’ve been so proud of it.
But this was something that happened and it’s happened to millions of people of the world. And I’m fighting for them, not just in the U.S., I’m fighting for them all over the world. We’re going to beat this coronavirus or whatever you want to call it and we’re going to beat it soundly.
So many things have happened. If you look at the therapeutics, which I’m taking right now, some of them, and others are coming out soon that are looking like ... frankly, they’re miracles, if you want to know the truth, they’re miracles. People criticize me when I say that, but we have things happening that look like they’re miracles coming down from God.
So I just want to tell you that I’m starting to feel good. You don’t know over the next period of a few days, I guess that’s the real test, so we'll be seeing what happens over those next couple of days. I just want to be so thankful for all of the support I’ve seen, whether it’s on television or reading about it. I most of all appreciate what’s been said by the American people, by almost a bipartisan consensus of American people. It’s a beautiful thing to see and I very much appreciate it and I won’t forget it. I promise you that.
I also want to thank the leaders of the world for their condolences. And they know what we’re going, they know as your leader what I have to go through. But I had no choice because I just didn’t want to stay in the White House. I was given that alternative. Stay in the White House, lock yourself in, don’t ever leave, don’t even go to the Oval Office, just stay upstairs and enjoy it. Don’t see people, don’t talk to people, and just be done with it. And I can’t do that.
I had to be out front. This is America, this is the United States. This is the greatest country in the world, this is the most powerful country in the world. I can’t be locked up in a room upstairs and totally safe and just say, ‘Hey, whatever happens, happens.’ I can’t do that.
We have to confront problems. As a leader, you have to confront problems. There’s never been a great leader that would have done that. So that’s where it is.
I’m doing well. I want to thank everybody. Our first lady is doing very well. Melania asked me to say something as to the respect that she has for our country, the love that she has for our country. And we’re both doing well. Melania is really handling it very nicely.
As you’ve probably read, she’s slightly younger than me—just a little tiny bit. And therefore, we know the disease, we know the situation with age vs. younger people. And Melania’s handling it statistically like it’s supposed to be handled and that makes me very happy and it makes the country very happy.
But I’m also doing well and I think we’re going to have a very good result. Again, over the next few days, we’re going to probably know for sure. So I just want to thank everybody out there, everybody all over the world, specifically the United States, the outpouring of love has been incredible. I will never forget.
