Presidential Health

President Trump's campaign stop in Florida Monday marked the first time he'd left the White House after checking into Walter Reed National Military Medical Center ten days earlier. The president announced his positive covid-19 test result on October 2nd. Thereafter, his doctors provided cherrypicked details about the president's condition that painted a picture of the 74-year old president triumphing over a disease that has killed more than 210,000 Americans.

Missing were key details like when the president had last received a negative test result or whether his lungs suffered damage.

President Trump is far from the only president to endure a health scare in office. He's also not the first to conceal important details about it. 

John F. Kennedy denied having Addison's disease...even though he did. During the 1944 campaign, Franklin Delano Roosevelt's doctor wrote his health was so poor, he would be unlikely to complete another term. The memo was kept secret. Roosevelt died the next year, 5 months after being re-elected. Grover Cleveland went as far as to schedule a fake fishing expedition so he could have oral surgery on board the boat and hide it from the American people.

Major Garrett examines presidential health and secrecy. What is the proper balance between patient privacy, national security, politics and the public's right to know about the wellbeing of its elected leader?

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