The President of the United States, Joe Biden, tested positive for Covid-19 and has "mild symptoms".
The announcement was made by the president and executive director of UnidosUS, Janet Murguía and, later, by the White House.
"After the first event in Las Vegas, President Biden tested positive for Covid-19. He is vaccinated and reinforced and has mild symptoms. He will return to Delaware, where he will isolate himself and continue to fully perform all his duties during this period. The House Branca will provide regular updates on the president's situation as he continues to perform all the duties of his office while in isolation," the statement read.
Biden was scheduled to speak at the UnidosUS conference in Las Vegas on Wednesday afternoon as part of an effort to rally Hispanic voters ahead of the November elections.
"I was on the phone with President Biden, he shared his deep disappointment at not being able to join us this afternoon. The president has been to many events, as we all know, and he has just tested positive for Covid-19," said Murguía to participants, an hour and a half after the time Biden's speech was supposed to begin.
In a first reaction, quoted by the France-Presse agency, Biden simply said: "I'm fine." Afterwards, he boarded Air Force One, heading to his vacation home in the state of Delaware.
In the White House statement, Biden's doctor, Kevin O'Connor, revealed that the American president "presented upper respiratory symptoms this afternoon, including rhinorrhea (runny nose) and dry cough, with general malaise."
"He felt well for the first event of the day, but, as he was not feeling better, a Covid-19 test was carried out on site and the result was positive. Therefore, the president will self-isolate in accordance with the guidelines for symptomatic individuals. Confirmatory PCR testing is pending", the note reads.
It added that Biden's symptoms "remain mild", with a "normal" respiratory rate, at 16 breaths per minute, and a body temperature of 97.8 degrees Fahrenheit (roughly 36.5 degrees Celsius).
Pulse oximetry, in turn, is "normal", at 97%.
"The president received the first dose of Paxlovid. He will be in self-isolation at his home in Rehoboth", the letter concludes.
The president had already been to the Original Lindo Michoacan restaurant in Las Vegas, where he greeted customers and had an interview scheduled with Univision.
The pressure on Biden to renounce his candidacy and abandon his aspirations for re-election has grown since the face-to-face debate at the end of June with his Republican rival, former President Donald Trump, from which he left with a badly damaged image.
Joe Biden stated in an interview with BET News, published today, that he would reconsider his decision to continue campaigning for the November elections if a doctor diagnosed him with a serious health problem.
When asked about the circumstances that would lead him to reconsider staying in the electoral race, Biden replied: "If a medical condition arose, if the doctors came to tell me that I have this or that problem."
This is the first time that Biden has left the door open to the possibility of resigning from his presidential candidacy in the face of the growing pressure he has faced within the party to do so, to which he has so far responded defiantly.
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