Washington, July 26
In a virtual address to reporters, US President Joe Biden, who tested positive for Covid-19 on July 21, said that he is anticipating returning to work in person by the end of this week.
During the address on Monday, the President said he was "feeling great" as he continues to recover from the infection while isolating at the White House, reports Xinhua news agency.
"I've had two full nights of sleep, all the way through," he continued. "I hope I'm back to work in person by the end of this week."
This was the first time that Biden, 79, had interacted with the press since the White House announced his Covid-19 diagnosis.
His symptoms for Covid-19 had "now almost completely resolved", according to the latest memo from White House physician Dr. Kevin O'Connor.
"When questioned, at this point he only notes some residual nasal congestion and minimal hoarseness," O'Connor wrote on Monday.
Fully vaccinated and twice boosted, Biden has been taking Paxlovid, an antiviral therapy produced by Pfizer and given to patients with Covid-19.
He will continue to take low dose aspirin as "an alternative type of blood thinner", O'Connor noted in the memo.
None of Biden's 17 close contacts have tested positive for the virus as of Monday, according to White House Covid-19 response coordinator Ashish Jha.
The causative agent for the President's Covid-19 infection is most likely the BA.5 Omicron variant, preliminary sequencing results showed.
Biden has been working despite suggestions from some American public health pundits that he should take more rest.
In virtual remarks delivered to a conference being held in Florida on Monday, Biden weighed in on the findings from the recent hearings held by the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot.
A long list of Biden administration officials and US lawmakers have contracted Covid-19 over the past few months.
On Monday, US Senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska announced that they had been infected with the virus.
Covid-19 cases, deaths, and hospitalizations are on the rise in the US, and the BA.5 sub-variant is currently the predominant variant in the country, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The total number of Covid-19 cases in the US has exceeded 90 million, with over 1 million deaths, reveals the latest data from Johns Hopkins University.
Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on Monday that "high quality" and "well fitted" masks were effective at preventing Covid-19 transmission and acquisition.
The US is currently in a "BA.5 mode", Fauci, also Biden's chief medical advisor, told a media outlet.
"There's always the possibility that you're going to have the evolution of another variant and hopefully if that occurs it will vary off from the BA.5 only slightly in the sense of being a sub-sub-lineage of it and not something entirely different," he said.
