Donald Trump has revealed he and First Lady Melania have tested positive for coronavirus and will begin quarantining in the White House immediately.
The couple apparently received their test results late on Thursday after White House aide Hope Hicks began to show symptoms and tested positive herself, reportedly on Wednesday.
“Tonight, @FLOTUS and I tested positive for COVID-19. We will begin our quarantine and recovery process immediately. We will get through this TOGETHER!” Mr Trump tweeted in the early hours of Friday morning.
In response, world leaders including Boris Johnson and Angela Merkel wished the president and his wife a speedy recovery.
The bombshell development, just weeks before November’s election, immediately threw the race for the presidency into chaos, and sparked a frenzied reaction from critics and supporters alike both in the US and globally.
“He failed to protect the country,” tweeted George Conway, a prominent Trump critic and the husband of former White House adviser Kellyanne Conway. “He couldn’t even protect himself.”
Brian Klaas, an associate professor in global politics at University College London, pointed out how Mr Trump mocked then-presidential rival Hillary Clinton over contracting pneumonia in 2016.
Piers Morgan, a prominent UK journalist who has at times been supportive of the US president, tweeted the front pages of two US tabloids.
“This is such a huge story with massive potential ramifications for America and the World,” Mr Morgan tweeted, amid suggestions a bad case of the illness could potentially force Mr Trump out of the presidential running.
Political leaders also reacted to the news, with Russian president Vladimir Putin sending his “sincere support in this difficult moment”.
“I hope that your inherent vitality, good spirits and optimism will help you cope with the dangerous virus,” Mr Putin added in a telegram sent to the US president, according to a statement from the Kremlin.
Media figures have suggested White House officials, and even Mr Trump himself, could have broken coronavirus rules amid reports Ms Hicks tested positive the day before the US president on Thursday travelled to New Jersey for a fundraiser.
Experts have warned of the heightened risk of coronavirus to Mr Trump, who at 74 and clinically obese is considered more vulnerable to the virus.
