Just heard that Trump has Covid. Some quick thoughts.

1. Did the President give Covid to Biden? Probably not because the debate was 3 days ago and he must be tested daily. But it is a possibility.

2. Will his positive diagnosis make his followers take Covid more seriously and be positive for the development of the pandemic in the USA? Probably but it depends on the severity of his symptoms, if he goes mildly asymptomatic he will double down with his Covid denial messaging and many more will die, but if he has symptoms more common of overweight men in their mid 70s, paradoxically, Trump’s Covid will save a lot of lives.

3. Will he get convalescent plasma or the Regeneron antibody cocktail treatment? Probably and it is also possible that this plasma or cocktail with anti Sars Cov 2 antibodies will slow the spread of Covid throughout his organs. Few people have been given antibodies so early on after infection. In this case he will tout that there is a cure for Covid.

4. What impact will Trump’s Covid have on the elections? One obvious consequence is that there will be no more in person debates which should help Biden as according to polls he won the only debate that took place. But also depending on the severity of his symptoms how will the election night look like? It is only 5 weeks away. What impact would we see in the voting if on November 3rd Trump is hospitalized or in ICU?

5. At Trump’s age and weight he has around 3% chance of dying, around 20% chance of being hospitalized, around 40% chance of having severe symptoms, around 40% chance of going asymptomatic or with mild symptoms. By October 10th we will know which way the illness is going for Trump. The first week tends not to be very significant in the prognosis of Covid.

6. Considering how reckless Trump has been the question now is who else in the administration will get Covid and what are the political consequences of this.

7. In terms of the effect of the diagnosis on the election the question is this. Is an ill Trump a positive or negative for his chances of winning the election? I believe that it is a positive for Trump. There will be either a pity vote factor if he does poorly or an admiration vote factor if he comes out well. Those who are hesitant, undecided are not the kind of people who will be happy that Trump is ill.

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President Trump is positive for Covid, some thoughts first appeared on Martin Varsavsky | English.