The coronavirus is a danger to Trump’s political health

Editorial: Polling suggests the president’s complacent response to Covid-19 already appals many of the swing voters he will need to win when the election arrives in November

It’s time for the US leader to start trusting the experts (Getty)

Could the president of the United States be the biggest casualty of the coronavirus outbreak?

Not, probably, in the clinical sense of the term “casualty”. Despite evidence that Donald Trump has come into contact with people who have self-quarantined over Covid-19, it is not so infectious that it can be automatically assumed to have set about attacking the leader of the free world. Besides, the famously germophobic Mr Trump is never far away from a hand sanitiser.

His unusual diligence about personal hygiene is, to be fair to him, an example to the world in current conditions. Mr Trump’s presumably still relatively robust health and close medical supervision should enable him to survive any likely illness. Assuming, that is, that he doesn’t simply deny there is anything wrong with him, and that any sniffles are merely fake news, as is his habit.