By Terrance Turner
March 13, 2022
Former President Barack Obama has tested positive for COVID-19, he tweeted today. According to CNN, Obama had recently returned to Washington, DC, after spending much of the winter in Hawaii. He tested positive in DC, a person close to him said.
Mr. Obama delivered the news via his Twitter account at 2:35 pm this afternoon. “I’ve had a scratchy throat for a couple days, but am feeling fine otherwise,” he said. “Michelle and I are grateful to be vaccinated and boosted, and she has tested negative.”
“Michelle and I are grateful to be vaccinated and boosted,” the former President said in a Facebook post. “It’s a good reminder that, even as cases go down, you should get vaccinated and boosted if you haven’t already to help prevent more serious symptoms and giving COVID to others.”
Obama’s reminder comes at a potential turning point for COVID infections. The national positivity rate has fallen below 3%, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. According to ABC News, “On Thursday, for the first time since July, the number of hospitalized COVID-19 positive Americans fell below 30,000, according to federal data. This marks a more than 80% decline in the number of patients requiring care for the virus, since the nation’s peak, when 160,000 people were hospitalized about two months ago.”
The country’s death toll now stands at 965,000 lives lost. The U.S. national case total has also surpassed 79.4 million confirmed cases, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Health and Human Services. Hospitalization rates have also continued to decline steadily.
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