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Since Donald Trump first emerged on the scene of American politics in 2015, he has refused to provide a glimpse into his medical records.
If Trump, 78, succeeds in November, he will become the oldest person ever to serve as president, ousting the current record-holder, Joe Biden. When his potential second term ends, he will be 82 years old.
Despite his advanced age, Trump has refused to provide any glimpse into his records. When asked about his health in 2015, he provided a four-paragraph letter from his doctor, who claimed he would be the “healthiest person ever elected to the presidency.”
Age has already played a major role in the 2024 presidential election; concerns over Biden’s cognitive health culminated with his decision to step away from the race, clearing the path for Vice President Kamala Harris to step up to carry the Democratic banner in November.
But Biden’s decision came after his party colleagues collectively expressed their concerns over his health; there are few — if any — calls from prominent Republican leaders asking if Trump has the ability to lead as he approaches 80, and it’s unclear if those calls would deter the former president anyway.
What little is known of Trump’s health comes from the 2018 White House physician Ronny Jackson. That year, he provided a glimpse into Trump’s cardiac health, the New York Times reports.
According to the doctor, Trump’s blood pressure and an ultrasound of his heart were normal, but he noted concerns that his cholesterol was too high and that he was only 0.1 points below the threshold for medical obesity.
According to Jackson’s report, Trump’s cholesterol was 143, despite the fact that he was reportedly taking a drug used to lower high cholesterol levels. At 143, cardiologists openly worried that he might be at risk for a stroke or a heart attack.
A year after that report, Trump’s weight increased from 239 to 243, making him medically obese based on his height. His cholesterol fell to 122, which was an improvement but still too high to be considered healthy. The following spring the White House claimed Trump’s LDL had fallen to below 100.
Last year, Trump’s weight was listed as 215 when he was booked at the Fulton County jail in Atlanta, but that was a number given by his aides, not an official weight taken from a scale.
The last official statement on Trump’s health came in a three-paragraph letter from his new personal doctor, Dr Bruce Aronwald. That letter was sent in November 2023, and praised the former president’s weight reduction, but did not actually state his weight or provide any further details about what medications he takes or if he had taken any tests. It simply said that his blood work was “well within normal range,” and that his health was both “excellent” and “exceptional.”
Perhaps more troubling that his physical health is his cognitive health. Trump’s father suffered from Alzheimer’s, which can be passed down through genetics. Trump previously claimed he had “aced” cognitive tests and regularly attacked Biden based on his cognitive performance.
While Biden was often criticized for his verbal slips, Trump has shown some of the same issues; he has frequently referred to both Hillary Clinton and Biden as the “Obama administration,” and makes frequent mistakes about people and places. At rallies, he frequently speaks in bizarre non-sequiturs to the point that he has come up with a term he uses to describe his ostensibly intentionally disjointed speaking style, calling it “the weave.”
“If there’s one area that needs to be 100 per cent in a chief executive — especially chief executive of the United States — it’s cognitive function,” Anand Kumar, a geriatric psychiatry expert at the University of Chicago, told the Times.
Trump received a CT scan after a failed assassination attempt in July left him with a wounded ear, but the results of that test were never made public.
It’s not just Trump who has been cagey about his health; Harris has not released any of her basic health information, and Biden regularly brushed off concerns about his health while he was still running for president.
