A personal valet to President Trump has tested positive for COVID-19

A member of the US Navy detailed to the White House who serves a personal valet to President Donald Trump has tested positive for COVID-19, CNN reported on Thursday.

The White House confirmed to CNN that the service member had tested positive and both Trump and Vice President Mike Pence had been tested again as a precaution, with both testing negative.

CNN reported that Trump was "upset" when he learned of the valet testing positive, and that both he and Pence are tested weekly with Abbott rapid result test devices. 

With the spread of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) causing significant global disruption in 2020, the U.K. has escalated its response by announcing strict country-wide measures aimed at slowing the spread of the virus. After ordering pubs, bars, restaurants, theatres, gyms and leisure centres across the country to close indefinitely, Prime Minister Boris Johnson addressed the public on March 23; outlining strict exercise and shopping limits, ordering all shops other than food stores and pharmacies to close, and implementing a ban on public gatherings of two or more people.

First Secretary of State Dominic Raab, while deputising for Prime Minister Boris Johnson as he recovered from coronavirus (COVID-19), announced on April 16 that the U.K. lockdown would continue for at least another three weeks. The government is also delivering an unprecedented economic relief package aimed at businesses and individuals hit by the pandemic, which is estimated to cost over £400 billion.

The White House confirmed to CNN that the service member had tested positive and both Trump and Vice President Mike Pence had been tested again as a precaution, with both testing negative.

"We were recently notified by the White House Medical Unit that a member of the United States Military, who works on the White House campus, has tested positive for Coronavirus," deputy White House press secretary Hogan Gidley said in a statement to CNN. "The President and the Vice President have since tested negative for the virus and they remain in great health."

CNN reported that Trump was "upset" when he learned of the valet testing positive, and that both he and Pence are tested weekly with Abbott rapid result test devices.

Also on Thursday, the Associated Press reported that Trump refuses to wear a mask or other face covering in public, which the CDC recommends to limit the spread of the novel coronavirus, because he fears it would make him look "ridiculous" and even risk his re-election chances.

Throughout the coronavirus crisis, Pence has also frequently disregarded his own task force's and administration's guidance that Americans wear face coverings in public, receiving an avalanche of criticism for flouting the Mayo Clinic's requirement that all visitors wear masks in an April 28 visit to the clinic's Minnesota headquarters.

In April, The New York Times reported that Pence felt he didn't need to wear a mask because he had been tested and was showing no symptoms. But as the newspaper noted, Pence could still contract the highly contagious novel coronavirus even though he's tested negative, or have a false negative test.

"When the face-covering guidelines were developed, it was with the intention to not only protect yourself, but primarily to protect others from asymptomatic spread," Katie Miller, Pence's spokeswoman, told The Times. "Vice President Pence is negative for Covid-19 and is therefore not asymptomatic."

Pence later stated that he should have worn a mask at the clinic, and he wore a mask at a subsequent tour of a GE factory producing ventilators in his home state of Indiana. dJ

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