Washington (AFP)
Just days after being released from the hospital where he received experimental treatment against Covid-19 and oxygen, Donald Trump said he was impatient to go back to the countryside.
But his opponents and some experts are worried about a perhaps too hasty decision by the American president.
- Every patient is different -
There are big differences in how long people recover from coronavirus, recalls Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease specialist and teacher at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.
“Some patients can resume daily activity very quickly. For others it will take several weeks,” he says.
In general, "for a septuagenarian contaminated with Covid-19 disease and who has been hospitalized, it generally takes a few weeks to return to normal activity", explains the doctor.
"But being the president, he has a lot of people around to help him. He probably doesn't shop or drive a car," he adds.
Donald Trump, 74, spent three nights in hospital before returning on October 5 to the White House, where he has a medical unit.
Mangala Narasimhan, director of intensive care at Northwell Health hospital group in New York, said patients of Mr. Trump's age put on oxygen to treat pneumonia continued to suffer from severe fatigue and muscle pain for some time.
The two doctors stress that it is very difficult to know the exact state of his convalescence because the medical team and the president's entourage have provided vague and sometimes contradictory information.
- A risky return -
The most common risk of hyperactivity after illness is a weakened immune system.
"He needs his immune system to fight the virus, that's why you are told to rest and drink a lot (after hospitalization) because your immune system needs to be at its best," Ms. Narasimhan.
This is especially important in the case of elderly patients, who are more likely to have a relapse with symptoms like fever and chills.
The details of his medical history and state of health are also unknown, at most we know that he suffers from a mild form of cardiovascular disease, says Adalja.
Mr. Trump's doctors have also not made public the results of his tests at the hospital which could give more information, adds Dr. Narasimhan.
Like “inflammation markers,” which would indicate how he is recovering from the inflammatory phase of the disease, or blood tests to find out the risk of developing clots.
“Patients tend to produce blood clots and, depending on some tests, they need to be followed for 30 days” and possibly take medication to prevent it, says Ms Narasimhan.
"There are a lot of other symptoms and side effects of this virus that we are starting to understand," she says.
In particular, a small proportion of patients continue to suffer from fatigue and shortness of breath for months.
- Still contagious?
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The White House doctor, Sean Conley, said he expected "that the president can resume his public activities" Saturday "without risk", explaining that his positive test would date back to 10 days.
But the time frame that matters is the number of days without symptoms, and that number has not been released.
The US Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC) recommends for patients who have suffered from a mild or moderate form of Covid-19, isolation and precautions for ten days after the symptoms disappear and no fever for 24 hours.
For more severe cases, the CDC recommends a 20-day isolation period.
But, in Mr. Trump's case, "it is not known whether it was moderate or severe," says Dr. Narasimhan.
© 2020 AFP