Trump would be the oldest person to be president. He does not share health information

WASHINGTON (AP) – If he wins next month’s election, Donald Trump he would be the oldest person in American history to be elected president. However, the 78-year-old Republican candidate refuses to reveal new details about his physical or mental health, breaking a decades-old precedent.

There have been few photos of Trump’s health in the past year. After he survived yes attempted murder In July, Texas Rep. Ronny Jacksona strong supporter who served as his White House physician, wrote an invitation to explain the gunshot wound to Trump’s right ear. And last November, Trump’s personal physician, Dr. Bruce Aronwald, wrote a letter describing him as “healthy” with “special” psychological tests. He noted that “cardiovascular studies were normal and tests for cancer” were negative. Trump had also “lost weight.”

But those interviews did not address important questions about Trump’s health, including his blood pressure, weight or whether he continues to take prescribed cholesterol medication. high – or even the tests he did. His campaign also has not disclosed whether Trump was diagnosed with any illnesses or received any mental health care after the assassination attempt.

That gives his political opponents, including the Democratic challenger Kamala Harristhe opportunity to ask questions about his age and ability to fulfill the duties of the president until his 80s.

“It makes you wonder: Why does his staff want him to hide?” Harris recently questioned Trump for refusing medical records, opting out of another debate and skipping an interview with CBS’ “60 Minutes.” “One has to wonder: Are they afraid that people will see that he is too weak and too unstable to lead America? Is that what is happening?”

Trump’s doctors have long been clueless about his health, even as his White House team downplayed the seriousness of his 2020 hospitalization for COVID-19.

His representatives declined multiple requests from The Associated Press for full details on his status for this story.

Making a difference with Trump

In an effort to make a difference with Trump, Harris released a a letter from his doctor on Saturday that provided extensive information about his medical history, including a list of tests and results. The letter said he had no heart, lung or nerve disease, a low risk of heart disease and a recent cancer diagnosis. He takes medicine for allergies and hives. He wears contact lenses, and his only surgery was at age 3, when his appendix was removed during a bowel procedure.

Although the letter did not specify his weight, the 59-year-old vice president was declared to be in “good health” and to have the “physical and mental fitness” required to serve as president. .

Seeing an opportunity to put Trump on the defensive, the Harris campaign on Monday released a letter from more than 250 doctors and other medical professionals asking Trump to release his medical records.

However, it is not clear that age will be a factor for patients. Polls found that voters were less concerned about Trump’s mental health and physical health than they were about President Joe Biden while he was still in the race. Since Harris replaced Biden on the ticket, Trump’s advantage on the issue has shrunk.

So far, the Lincoln Project is among several anti-Trump groups spending money on ads targeting Trump’s age. The ad, titled “The Lonely Old Man,” describes Trump as “weak, weak, forgetful, and rapidly declining.”

Such messages are designed to anger Trump as much as sway voters against him, said Lincoln Project co-founder Rick Wilson.

“We’re doing these ads because Trump hates them,” Wilson said.

This comes as a surprise to Trump, who has spent years attacking the 81-year-old Biden’s years, showing him as weak and unable to deal with the challenges of the presidency. After a poor debate performance in June, Biden’s fellow Democrats began to openly raise the same concernseventually decided to withdraw from the race and return to Harris.

There is no requirement for candidates to provide health information. But presidential candidates routinely disclose medical records voluntarily given job requirements, especially if there are concerns about their age.

In 2008, the Republican candidate John McCain has opened more than 1,000 pages of medical documents to the public for review. At age 72, he would be the oldest president to be elected to a first term. Facing scrutiny over his aging in 2019, the 77-year-old Biden released a book. three page text from his doctor.

Dr. Eric Lenze of Washington University in St. a psychiatrist who examines cognition in adults.

The last complete report on Trump’s health came in 2019, while he was still president. The test classified him as obese at 243 kilograms and a body mass index of 30.4, which puts him at risk for heart disease, diabetes and other problems. The report also revealed increased prescriptions for high cholesterol. While Trump doesn’t drink or smoke, he has long avoided exercise other than golf and loves fast food.

Regarding his family history, his father had Alzheimer’s disease recently, which is a possible risk factor.

Trump’s allies point to his active social life as evidence that he is not slowing down.

Trump is a frequent golfer and a busy host during public engagements. He takes questions from the media more often than Harris. He often speaks for more than 90 minutes at his meetings, standing the entire time and often ignoring the teleprompter.

Trump is often shaky about his public appearances

However, Trump’s public appearances are often marked by ridicule. He always confuses times, events and people.

At a town hall meeting in Fayetteville, North Carolina, Trump appeared to have no recollection of meeting the wounded veteran and his family. The soldier’s wife noted that “you visited him many times” and “just saw him this summer.”

Trump has also upset his Republican opponent Nikki Haley and former Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. He confused the location of the main military base. He mistakenly said that the Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orbán, is leading Turkey.

During a the chaos of the news it is full false and misleading statements in August, Trump recalled riding as a guest in a chopper with former San Francisco mayor Willie Brown when he was forced to make an emergency landing.

Brown later he said he never shared a helicopter with Trump. Instead, it may have been the Los Angeles city councilman, who is also Black, who boarded a helicopter with Trump decades earlier.

Recently, at a conference in Wisconsin, he seemed to ignore the teleprompters as he moved from topic to topic. He described the country as a “third world hellhole.” He then told his audience, “Remember, there’s a hat that sells like crazy,” before interrupting to talk about a fly.

“Oh there is a fly, I wonder where the fly came from. See, two years ago, I wouldn’t have had a fly up here. He’s changing fast,” Trump said.

She has begun to brag about her “beautiful body” and describes her frequent speech impediments as “flawless.”

Trump regularly receives questions about his age and health during public appearances. On Sunday in Arizona, Trump mocked critics who said he was “absurd” because he “misspoke.”

“They said, He has no sense!” Trump joked. “No, I will let you know when I will be.” I will be there someday – we all will be there someday. I will be the first to let you know.”

The AP spoke to several medical experts, but none could comment specifically on Trump’s health or mental capacity without examining him or obtaining recent records. of medicine.

John R. Beard, director of the International Longevity Center at Columbia University, flagged what could be red flags for mental issues in old age, including unusual speech patterns and gambling.

“People can jump from one idea to another without making a connection between them, and they tend to move on without ever meeting an important argument,” Beard said. But some people may show such patterns for years, so the questions are whether they are getting worse or hindering the process, he added.

Earlier this year, the scientific news organization STAT asked a few aging experts to analyze aspects of Trump’s speeches. They reported several troubling changes since 2017, including an increase in confused word order, repetition and so-called “all or nothing thinking.”

Lenze and Beard encouraged every presidential candidate, regardless of age, to submit a full medical report to clarify their health.

Lenze said after a certain age, perhaps 70 or 75, that should include a full neuropsychological evaluation, something that takes several hours. It’s much more powerful than quick snapshot-in-time tests, such as the Montreal Cognitive Assessment or MoCA, which Trump often bragged about in 2018.

“One can get a perfect score on MoCA and still be handicapped,” Lenze said. “The intellectual level and ability to run the presidency, I think, is greater than what is needed to complete the MoCA.”

Without more information, a simple life expectancy of the average American man shows that Trump has about a 79% chance of living four years, said aging researcher S. Jay Olshansky of The University of Illinois at Chicago, which studies the health of the president and agrees to call the candidate’s medical records. The younger Harris has about a 97 percent chance of surviving his first term in office, he said.

When it comes to the presidency, “it’s not about age, it’s about performance,” Olshansky warned.

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People are reporting from New York. Associated Press writer Michelle L. Price in New York contributed to this report.