President Trump should throw his weight and age around 

There are currently about 60 million Americans over age 65 and over 100 million American adults who have obesity. COVID-19 infections are most deadly if you are older, male, and have obesity – like President Trump. He is a 74-year-old man. At his last check-up with his physician, Dr. Sean Conley, his BMI was 30.4 kg/m² which meets the CDC definition for having Class I obesity.   

The pandemic and his own COVID-19 infection gave the president an opportunity to unite Americans by encouraging risk-reduction for everyone. This did not require that he change his views on opening up America or even acknowledge he is anything less than a superb specimen of humanity who was never really ill.

Even saying “definitely wear a mask when you are in a vulnerable group or near someone who is” would have been great. Instead, he has mostly mocked the use of masks and social distancing, against all scientific evidence. Calling his COVID-19 infection a “blessing from God” would only be appropriate if it had made him introspective and more aware of other Americans. It didn’t. He has just added to a long list of insults to American health care. 

President Trump squandered a great chance to help America face COVID-19 more effectively. This refutes any claim that we (he) are “doing everything we can” to fight the pandemic. His recovery from the virus is not contagious and he could have presented himself as fortunate and even strong without continuing to ignore well-established health benefits of masking and social distancing for both his supporters and detractors. It appears that common sense, honesty, and community interest are not required for his job and are certainly not his strengths. 

The Trump administration has also made efforts to essentially block the “less partisan than the White House” CDC from actually seeing COVID data. The administration ordered that “As of July 15, 2020, hospitals should no longer report the COVID-19 information in this document to the National Healthcare Safety Network site.” The National Healthcare Safety Network is the CDC’s system that gathers health data from over 25,000 medical centers in the U.S. These data are available to researchers within the CDC and outside of it. 

Instead, President Trump had a new system called the “COVID Tracking Project. The data for this project is collected from official reports by public-health authorities, news conferences, Twitter and other sources.

This approach isolated the Trump administration from the public and most scientific experts by controlling the dispersal of information about the pandemic. President Trump exacerbates this problem with claims that the increasing COVID-19 prevalence is entirely due to increased testing. More testing certainly increases the detection rate of asymptomatic and minimally symptomatic individuals. However, as the president said, “The total number of cases is not the full metric of success. Hospitalization capacity and mortality rates are far more instructive metrics.” Why isn’t he quoting the increasing numbers of COVID-related hospitalizations and deaths reported by the CDC? 

President Trump has, hopefully inadvertently, created and sustained an environment in which not wearing a mask is, for many, a badge of Trump’s support. Going bare-faced in crowded areas has become a statement of loyalty to President Trump at the expense of loyalty to your fellow citizens. He has not opposed ignoring PPE’s and social distancing at his rallies, nor has he fully acknowledged the consequences of the public not participating in the fight against the COVID-19 infection. 

A large number of Trump supporters, and staff, don’t wear a mask in public or when in public with the President. They not only place themselves at risk for COVID-19, but also everyone around them. By disregarding the risk to others, as evidenced by the frequency of infection among his family and staff and those of Vice-President Pence, in service of President Trump they are effectively placing loyalty to the politician over loyalty to America. This non-patriotic shift of allegiance was evident in changes made in the German loyalty oath soon after Hitler became chancellor in 1933. What had been “I swear loyalty to the constitution…” became “I swear I will be true and obedient to the Führer…” 

He does not have morbid obesity as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi claimed. He has occasionally even expressed sympathy to those who have lost loved ones. However, he has continued to minimize the seriousness of the pandemic despite over 300,000 COVID-related excess U.S. deaths (more than 3 times the number of American casualties in the Vietnam and Gulf Wars combined) since January of 2020.

He has supported large companies that make medicines that only he has received outside of FDA approval or research studies. He received these treatments on a compassionate use basis — supposedly meaning that he was seriously ill. He has to either acknowledge that he received levels of invasive (and questionable) care that are well beyond those available to the general public or that he is not superman.  

The president states that we are “rounding the turn” on COVID-19. This is true only because his administration is perpetually running around in circles with no finish line in sight. They are forever turning but not really getting anywhere. Given the number of people who are older, have obesity, or who have other COVID-risk factors it is shocking that he abandoned these people in service of self-aggrandizement. The election creates an opportunity for everyone to express their outrage or support regarding President Trump’s lack of concern. Most of us cannot guarantee that everyone who comes within six feet of us is COVID-19 immune. When the day comes that there is an effective COVID-19 vaccine or treatment, President Trump will no doubt claim that this was his doing, when in fact he has been one of the greatest obstacles to achieving it. 

Dr. Michael Rosenbaum is a professor of Pediatrics and Medicine at Columbia University Irving Medical Center. He has spent over 30 years studying obesity and health practices in adults and children. He has continued to see patients throughout the pandemic.