Recovered COVID-19 patients who met with Trump speak out
Michigan State Rep. Karen Whitsett and former NFL player Mark Campbell discuss their symptoms, treatment with hydroxychloroquine and uniting behind the White House on 'Fox & Friends.'
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Michigan Democrat State Rep. Karen Whitsett called for an end to the partisan attacks on President Trump, saying she believes politics needs to be "put aside" in a pandemic.
"You know, we have a president that is in the White House -- not a Republican president. We have a president that is in the White House," she asserted Wednesday on "Fox & Friends."
"And, at this time right now, everyone needs to get behind the president of the United States and the vice president of the United States and we need to simply unite together."
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"We have people that are in our United States, which is united, that we need to be working to save and that takes all of us," Whitsett concluded. "So, whatever your party is, that is neither here nor there at this time. Right now we are human beings in the United States of America and we need to unite."
Appearing with host Steve Doocy, Whitsett and former NFL player Mark Campbell described how they recovered from the virus, one day after a roundtable discussion with President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence at the White House. Both credited hydroxychloroquine -- an anti-malaria drug -- for helping them get better.
"Well, I had been on hydroxychloroquine in the past for Lyme disease, but that was many, many years ago back in 2014. But, it would not have been made readily available to me if it was not for the president making his comments," Whitsett remarked.
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"This was something that the day that I actually had hit rock bottom, the governor of the state of Michigan had placed an executive order in place that was very confusing for the doctors in our state and I was not able to get it from the doctor who actually wrote the prescription for my husband Jason and I to actually go and get tested for the COVID virus," she continued. "So, you can imagine the frustration, the scariness, and it sickened me to my stomach to have to use my name as a state representative in order to be able to even get tested and go through this entire process."
For Campbell, the highly infectious disease affected him differently.
"For me, it was a gradual increase or decrease of lung capacity with pneumonia-like symptoms. So, over the course of 17 days it was a struggle," he explained. "And, also 30 days of quarantine without being able to hug and kiss your wife, your kids -- that's not easy."
Just four days after he took the first dose of hydroxychloroquine, he started to feel better.
"And, quite honestly, at that time I had a hard time pronouncing the name and I just knew it as the malaria drug. So, I asked the doctor about it and she said, 'You know what? We are actually going to administer that today,'" he stated. "And that was a turning point for me."
"You feel you could have lost your life without taking it, right?" Doocy asked Whitsett.
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"Oh absolutely," she replied. "And, if you have a choice between taking that medicating and a ventilator, you tell me what your choice would be. I mean, I definitely would take the medication."
The drug recently made headlines when it was touted as a possible treatment for COVID-19. But the effectiveness of hydroxychloroquine has been a source of debate within the medical community, with some warning it’s too soon to know if it’s an efficacious option in treating patients with the novel virus.
“The drug has demonstrated antiviral activity, an ability to modify the activity of the immune system, and has an established safety profile at appropriate doses, leading to the hypothesis that it may also be useful in the treatment of COVID-19,” the National Institute of Health (NIH) said last week after announcing a human clinical trial of the drug.
“The drug is not without risks," the NIH warned. "As even short term use can cause cardiac arrhythmias, seizures, dermatological reactions, and hypoglycemia."
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