Mexico City – Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said he gave positive results to COVID-19, an announcement that comes at a time when his country has the highest levels of infections and deaths to date.
López Obrador, who was criticized for treating the pandemic in Mexico and for not giving an example of prevention in public, said on Sunday on his official Twitter account that his symptoms are mild and that he is under medical treatment.
“I regret to inform you that I am infected with COVID-19,” he wrote on Twitter. “The symptoms are mild, but they are already under medical treatment. As always, I am optimistic. We will all move on.”
José Luis Alomía Zegarra, Mexico’s director of epidemiology, said López Obrador, 67, had a “mild” case of COVID-19 and was “isolated at home.”
The President of Mexico has written that, while recovering, Interior Secretary Olga Sánchez Cordero will take over his daily press conferences, for which he usually speaks for two hours without breaks each week.
Despite his age and high blood pressure, López Obrador did not receive the vaccine, even though Mexico has already received a batch of doses of Pfizer-BioNTech. He said health workers would be the first to receive them. According to the government’s plan, people over the age of 60 will start being vaccinated in February.
López Obrador was rarely seen wearing a mask and continued to keep a busy travel schedule by taking commercial flights.
Ismael Rosas / Eyepix Group / Barcroft Media via Getty Images
He also resisted the economic downturn, noting the devastating effect it would have on many Mexicans living every day, even though the country has seen nearly 150,000 deaths from COVID-19 and more than 1.7 million infections. A new wave of infections has pushed the health system of the country’s capital close to saturation.
At the beginning of the pandemic, when asked how he protects Mexico, López Obrador took two religious amulets out of his wallet and proudly showed them.
The protective shield is “Follow me, Satan,” said López Obrador, reading the inscription on the amulet, adding, “Stop, enemy, for the Heart of Jesus is with me.
In November, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, head of the World Health Organization, urged Mexican leaders to be serious about the coronavirus and gave examples to its citizens, saying “Mexico is in a bad state” with the pandemic.
He did not call López Obrador, but said: “We would like to ask Mexico to be very serious.”
“I said it in general, wearing a mask is important, hygiene is important and physical distance is important and we expect leaders to be examples,” he added.
At the beginning of the pandemic, López Obrador was criticized for still bending over in crowds and hugging. The eternal champion, López Obrador’s political style has always been very practical and personal. As the pandemic grew, he began to limit participation in his events and keep his distance from supporters.
But on Friday, López Obrador posted a photo with him, Foreign Minister Marcelo Ebrard, a translator and former chief of staff Alfonso Romo, all gathered around a table for a phone call with new US President Joe Biden. None wore masks; the foreign relations department did not answer questions about whether Ebrard was tested.
López Obrador’s announcement came shortly after the news broke that he would talk to Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday about obtaining doses of Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine.
Mexican Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard said on Twitter that the two leaders would talk about the bilateral relationship and the provision of vaccine doses.
The vaccine has not been approved for use in Mexico, but the government is desperate to fill supply gaps for the Pfizer vaccine.
In addition to López Obrador, other Latin American leaders who have tested positive for coronavirus are Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, Alejandro Giammattei of Guatemala, Juan Orlando Hernández of Honduras and Bolivia’s interim president, Jeanine Ánéz. They all recovered.