Watch: Is Donald Trump struggling to breathe after catching coronavirus?

Web Desk

October 06, 2020

White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows (R) watches as US President Donald Trump walks off Marine One while arriving at Walter Reed Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland on October 2, 2020, after testing positive for COVID-19. Photo: AFP/File

A new viral video (see below) seemingly showing US President Donald Trump gasping for air and having difficulty breathing as he tries to suppress a cough has sparked new speculation regarding his health.

Having been discharged just four days after contracting the coronavirus, US President Donald Trump's doctors had explained the decision saying that he was doing "relatively better".

And, despite a wave of infections that have hit the White House four weeks before the US election, Trump had said that he felt "really good" as he was leaving the hospital.

However, a video shared by The Guardian columnist Owen Jones seemingly shows Trump gasping and experiencing labored breathing as he apparently tries to hold back a cough while preparing to address media at the White House – where he is also expected to receive rest of his virus treatment.

Trump had announced that he and First Lady Melania Trump have tested positive for coronavirus and are going into quarantine "immediately" on October 2, following which he was shifted to the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center within 24 hours since he was diagnosed.

Soon after getting discharged from the hospital, Trump was welcomed with a tirade of criticism as he was found removing his face mask during what many described as a "made-for-television spectacle" in which he descended from his Marine One helicopter.

He doubled down on what many criticised as a careless attitude with his decision to remove his mask after climbing the staircase to the White House South Portico and his insistence that Americans should not fear the disease horrified some physicians, according to a Reuters news report.

Trump, urging Americans not to be fearful of a disease that has killed over 290,000 in America so far, said: “Don’t let it dominate you. Don’t be afraid of it."

“I’m better, and maybe I’m immune — I don’t know,” he added. “Get out there. Be careful.”

Trump, 74, has repeatedly played down coronavirus, which has killed more than 1 million people worldwide and left his own country with the highest death toll in the world.

“I was aghast when he said COVID should not be feared,” said William Schaffner, a professor of preventive medicine and infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville.

“This is a disease that is killing around a thousand people a day, has torpedoed the economy, put people out of work. This is a virus that should be both respected and feared,” he added.