Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja with agency report
United States President Joe Biden’s health has improved considerably and his predominant symptom now is a sore throat, his physician said yesterday.
Biden’s cough and body aches have diminished since he tested positive for the coronavirus on Thursday and he is not experiencing any shortness of breath, the physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, added.
“His pulse, blood pressure, respiratory rate and temperature all remain normal,” the physician said in a memo released on Sunday. His predominant symptom now is a sore throat …. His voice remains a bit deep,” he noted.
Earlier, White House Covid-19 coordinator, Ashish Jha, said none of Biden’s 17 identified close contacts had so far tested positive for the coronavirus, a Reuters report said.
Biden, 79, had mild symptoms, according to the White House. His diagnosis came as a highly contagious subvariant of the coronavirus drives a new wave of cases in the United States.
It is coming even as the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) warned of a possible fifth wave of the virus in the country, disclosing that about 1,332 cases were recorded in one week.
“In the last eight weeks, the test positivity ratio has continued to increase,” the NCDC stressed at the weekend.
It was learnt that as of July 22, 2022, Nigeria had recorded about 260,339 confirmed cases. While 253,566 cases had been successfully discharged, 3,147 lost their lives to complications arising from the virus.
Also at the weekend, the World Health Organisation (WHO) reported that there were over 565 million cases globally, out of which over 6.3 million persons had lost their lives.
In addition, about 9,181,118 cases had however been confirmed in Africa, stressing that over 12 billion doses of vaccines of the virus, covering first, second and booster jabs, had been administered as of July 19.
On Sunday, Jha told CBS News that Biden had the BA.5 subvariant and that he had an upper respiratory infection.
The White House has sought to underscore Biden’s ability to work through his illness. On Thursday, it released a video of him reassuring Americans he was doing fine, and on Friday he participated in virtual meetings with White House staff.
The White House has not said where Biden contracted the virus. He recently returned from a trip to the Middle East and held public events before the trip in which he had close personal interactions with scores of people.
