DON’T follow the COVID-19 Leaders!

President Donald J Trump (the J obviously stands for genius), is not the first world leader to come a Coronavirus cropper. After months of downplaying the threat of COVID-19, Karma paid the Orange Man in the White House a visit. Both he and his sultry First Lady, have been diagnosed with the virus. Which is kinda ironic just as COVID-19 clocked up 1 million deaths, worldwide. 

Donald’s brush with the COVID Reaper couldn’t have come at a better or worse time, depending on how the Washington spin doctors decide to spin it. With the President behind Joe Biden in every poll, the U.S. Presidential Election is less than a month away. Trump’s America not only finds itself in the grip of a deadly pandemic but is experiencing economic and racial meltdown. To say nothing of the daily Sitcom playing out in the Supreme Court. 

Will Trump emerge from his hospital bed weaker or stronger in the eyes of the American people? A tough guy, smack bang in the middle of the cross-hairs of a deadly killer. Over 70 and obese, yet able to beat a virus that’s tried its best to add him and other world leaders to its impressive body count. 

With over 34 million people infected worldwide, one thing you can’t level at COVID-19 is that it’s fussy. Young, old, rich or poor, this nasty strain of Coronavirus will take anyone, literally. Donald Trump might consider himself to be ‘the best’ at everything but he’s certainly not the first global figure to succumb to COVID-19’s downward spiral of symptoms. 

Back in March, Donald’s ‘Brother-From-Another-Mother’, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson tested positive. For a while it was touch and go if bumbling Boris was going to make it. Earlier, he like Trump had tried to downplay the deadliness of COVID-19, even advocating ‘herd immunity’, instead of implementing restrictions that might harm his precious economy. In fact, perennial tree-hugger, Boney Prince Charlie nearly missed his turn on the throne of England due to a right Royal encounter with Coronavirus. 

The list of COVID Prime Ministers doesn’t begin and end with Boris either, with the PMs of both Brazil and Russia, also contracted it. In fact, Mikhail Mishustin had to stand down from overseeing Moscow’s response to the virus, due to the fact he actually had it. His Brazilian counterpart, Jair Bolsonaro ignored the advice of his own health ministry and promptly came down with it. Even following in Trump’s footsteps by using the controversial antimalarial drug hydroxychloroquine, (which I wrote about in another blogpost: https://darezawill.blogspot.com/2020/05/orange-guinea-pig-on-hydroxychloroquine.html). 

From Prime Ministers to Presidents, the former President of India, Pranab Mukherjee sadly succumbed to COVID-19 in August. While the former President of Berundi, just about survived the current President, who had vehemently denied the potency of COVID-19, then promptly died from it, becoming the first head of State to be taken by Coronavirus. 

The final horrific word on Coronavirus comes from the French Finance Minister, who fell ill with COVID-19 in September. He gave the French people a terrifying first-hand account of what it’s like to actually have the virus. ‘COVID-19 attacks your lungs, which gives you a feeling of tightness which is very painful, sometimes even scary’. He went on to add ‘I’m 50 years old, in good physical shape…and even so this was violent.’ ¡Dios nos salve de COVID-19!