First lady Melania Trump has tested negative for the coronavirus, President Donald Trump announced Monday at the daily task force briefing.
"Yes, she's great; she's fine," Trump told reporters. "Negative, yes. OK? Negative."
Trump and Vice President Mike Pence and his wife have also been cleared of the coronavirus through precautionary testing. None have experienced symptoms.
Most Americans who have been tested for the coronavirus have been cleared from the virus, according to data from The Covid Tracking Project.
More than 294,056 Americans have been evaluated for the coronavirus and 43,469 cases have been confirmed through testing, according to Worldometer. That renders a 14.8% positive rate among those who have been tested to date, presumably most with flu-like symptoms or known contacts to confirmed cases of COVID-19.
It is not known how many of those tested have been symptomatic, however.
Coronavirus task force health experts have stressed the tests be conserved for medical health professionals treating the global pandemic or those who require hospitalization for very serious illnesses.
COVID-19 is attacking nearly 1 of every 1,000 persons in the New York metro area of New Jersey, New York City and parts of Long Island, according to Deborah Birx, coordinator of the U.S. coronavirus response. That is five times what other areas are seeing.
She said 28% of the specimens from the New York metro area are testing positive, compared with less than 8% in the rest of the country. New York officials are asking that only people with severe symptoms get tested.
Birx, the State Department physician tapped to advise Pence on the government's coronavirus response, said she tested negative for the disease over the weekend after experiencing "a little low grade fever" Saturday.
"Probably a G.I. thing," she said at a White House news conference Monday.
President Donald Trump, standing next to her on the stage in the White House briefing room, pretended to move away from her and jokingly exclaimed "whew" after she said she tested negative.
Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.
Eric Mack ✉
Eric Mack has been a writer and editor at Newsmax since 2016. He is a 1998 Syracuse University journalism graduate and a New York Press Association award-winning writer.
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