President Trump said Monday that he would leave Walter Reed National Military Medical Center later in the day, after spending three days there battling COVID-19.
“I will be leaving the great Walter Reed Medical Center today at 6:30 P.M.” he said on Twitter. “Feeling really good! Don’t be afraid of Covid. Don’t let it dominate your life. We have developed, under the Trump Administration, some really great drugs & knowledge. I feel better than I did 20 years ago!”
At a press conference, Trump’s physician Sean Conley said that “he may not be entirely out of the woods yet,” but that he was cleared to return to the White House.
Conley declined to say when the president had last tested negative, or to share results of his lung scans, citing HIPAA, the federal patient privacy law.
The announcement comes as a growing circle of Trump advisers have tested positive. On Monday morning, Kayleigh McEnany, the White House press secretary, announced that she had tested positive. CNN reported that two of McEnany’s aides had also tested positive.
Trump’s blood oxygen levels dropped twice over the course of his treatment, Conley said at a press conference on Sunday. He was given supplemental oxygen, as well as a variety of drug treatments, including Remdesivir, dexomethosone and an experimental Regeneron antibody cocktail.
Trump released a video on Sunday thanking the staff at Walter Reed and saying that he had “learned a lot” about COVID.
“I learned it by really going to school,” he said. “This is the real school. This isn’t the ‘let’s read the books’ school. And I get it. And I understand it. And it’s a very interesting thing and I’m going to be letting you know about it.”
Trump took an SUV tour outside the facility on Sunday afternoon to wave at supporters who had gathered there, drawing criticism for needlessly exposing Secret Service agents to the virus.