One can only wish Donald Trump (and first lady Melania Trump) a full recovery from COVID-19. In the meantime, the president’s illness could save many lives. To date, his focus has been on manipulating the truth about how this deadly disease is prevented — through wearing masks and social distancing — so as to minimize its effect on his reelection bid. Ironically, his illness exposes his lies to the surprisingly large minority of the population who believed him. Let’s hope they don’t continue to go maskless in public and thus follow Trump to the edge of the COVID-19 precipice.
May the president’s and first lady’s illness be a wake-up call to our country that when it comes to our nation’s health, science trumps politics.
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Dr. Deborah Bershel
Somerville
“Nothing ever becomes real till experienced,” wrote John Keats. And after nine months of downplaying, contradicting, and ignoring the recommendations of scientists, Donald Trump has been infected with COVID-19. While I wish our president and the first lady a speedy recovery, it is disturbing to imagine how many people the commander in chief already may have exposed at his campaign rallies, fund-raisers, on Air Force One, and at the White House. Now the 74-year-old Trump, who mocked Joe Biden at the first debate for wearing “the biggest mask” he’s “ever seen,” will have his own immune system tested — a body touted by White House physician Ronny Jackson for its “excellent health” and “incredible genes.”
Will Trump demand to be treated with hydroxychloroquine, or will he leave it up to his doctors to prescribe the best model of care? Will he go on experiencing the “mild symptoms" reported Friday, or will his condition grow far worse?
For someone who has so blatantly attacked and discarded science as “fake news,” his own viability now depends on it.
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Andrew Ginsburg
Southport, Conn.
Donald Trump is not the victim of a conspiracy.
It’s as simple as this: Presidents before Trump recognized the danger of pandemics and developed increasingly proficient organizations to deal with them. Trump inherited a superb organization from three presidents that could have guided him and us through this from the beginning and saved thousands of lives, But he dismantled it.
We and Trump are the victims of Trump.
Bradley Leland
Braintree