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By Robin Foster and E.J. Mundell<\/b>
HealthDay Reporters<\/i><\/p>\n
MONDAY, Oct. 5, 2020<\/p>\n
President Donald Trump’s doctors delivered an update of his condition on Sunday that suggested he might have more than just a mild case of COVID-19<\/a>.<\/p>\n Based on the doctors’ accounts, Trump’s symptoms quickly escalated after he announced early Friday morning that he had tested positive for the coronavirus, The New York Times<\/i> reported. He was taken to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center Friday evening.<\/p>\n Trump experienced a “high fever<\/a>” on Friday, and there were two occasions when his blood oxygen levels dropped, on Friday and again on Saturday, the Times<\/i> reported. Trump’s oxygen saturation level was 93% at one point, his doctors said. Ninety-five percent is considered the lower limit of the normal range.<\/p>\n Many medical experts consider patients to have severe COVID-19<\/a> if their oxygen levels drop below 94%, the Times<\/i> reported. The president’s physicians said he was given supplemental oxygen at the White House on Friday; they were not clear about whether it was administered again on Saturday, or whether his blood oxygen levels had fallen below 90% at some point, the Times<\/i> reported.<\/p>\n In addition to being given an experimental antibody cocktail on Friday, Dr. Sean Conley said Trump was also given the steroid dexamethasone<\/a> on Saturday and is being treated with remdesivir, an antiviral drug. Dexamethasone has been shown to help patients who are severely ill with COVID-19<\/a>, but it is typically not used in mild or moderate cases, the Times<\/i> reported.<\/p>\n Confusion<\/a> about the seriousness of Trump’s illness continued Sunday when he emerged from Walter Reed in a motorcade that drove around the hospital as Trump waved to supporters while wearing a mask. He then returned to the hospital, the Times<\/i> reported. His medical team also suggested that he might be released as early as Monday if his condition continues to improve.<\/p>\n Hence, it was not clear whether the doctors had given Trump dexamethasone too quickly, or whether the president was far sicker than has been publicly acknowledged, experts in infectious disease and emergency medicine<\/a> said on Sunday.<\/p>\n “The dexamethasone is the most mystifying of the drugs<\/a> we’re seeing him being given at this point,” Dr. Thomas McGinn, the physician-in-chief at Northwell Health, the largest health care provider in New York state, told the Times<\/i>. The drug is normally not used unless the patient’s condition seems to be deteriorating, he added.<\/p>\n “Suddenly, they’re throwing the kitchen sink at him,” McGinn said. “It raises the question: Is he sicker than we’re hearing<\/a>, or are they being overly aggressive because he is the president, in a way that could be potentially harmful?”<\/p>\n On Friday, Vice President Mike Pence and his wife, Karen, along with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, all announced that they had tested negative for the new coronavirus. Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, who debated Trump on Tuesday, has also said that he has continued to test negative for the virus. During that debate, the two never got within six feet<\/a> of each other, the Times<\/i> reported.<\/p>\n While Trump’s age, weight and gender automatically put him in a high-risk category, he will have the best medical care available, the Times<\/i> said.<\/p>\n Infections surge in Midwest<\/b><\/p>\n Meanwhile, coronavirus infections are surging in the American heartland, with Wisconsin bearing the brunt of COVID-19<\/a>‘s relentless spread.<\/p>\n Many Midwestern states are seeing some of the nation’s highest per capita rates of infection, and while federal health officials have again urged some governors in the region to require masks statewide, some Republican governors have resisted, the Associated Press<\/i> reported.<\/p>\n Wisconsin appeared to be in the worst shape: A record number of people with COVID-19<\/a> have been hospitalized in that state, the AP<\/i> reported.<\/p>\n “Over the course of the past two to three weeks we have noticed a marked rise in COVID patients coming into our hospitals in Green Bay,” said Dr. Paul Casey, medical director of the emergency department at Bellin Hospital in Wisconsin, told CNN<\/i>. “And this comes in the wake of what we thought we were doing well.”<\/p>\n “For the first time in 17 years that I’ve been here, we’ve had to put patients in hallway beds,” Casey told CNN<\/i>. “I never envisioned having to do that in a small community like Green Bay.”<\/p>\n In North Dakota, hospitals are adding extra space amid worries about capacity, the AP<\/i> reported. About 700 COVID-19<\/a> infections per 100,000 people have been diagnosed over the past two weeks, leading the country for new cases per capita, according to the COVID Tracking Project.<\/p>\n The surge has been seen throughout the Midwest. Iowa also reported a spike in people hospitalized with the virus, the AP<\/i> reported. Last week, the state had the nation’s sixth-highest rate of coronavirus infections per 100,000 people, according to a recent White House coronavirus task force report. It again recommended Iowa require masks statewide, which Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds has said is unnecessary.<\/p>\n Similarly, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, a Republican, has said he won’t impose such a requirement. The task force report found his state is among the worst in the United States for positive coronavirus tests per 100,000 people, up 15% from a week ago.<\/p>\n The Midwest has now overtaken the South for the country’s highest seven-day average of new daily cases per 1 million residents, CNN<\/i> reported.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n Global COVID death toll passes 1 million<\/b><\/p>\n The global coronavirus pandemic reached a grim new milestone last week: One million dead.<\/p>\n
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