WASHINGTON (AFP, BLOOMBERG)US Vice-President Mike Pence is not in quarantine and has tested negative to Covid-19, his spokesman said on Sunday (May 10), after a close aide was confirmed to have been infected.
Pence would go to work at the White House on Monday, spokesman Devin O’Malley said in a statement following some US media reports that Pence would be self-isolating.
“Vice-President Pence will continue to follow the advice of the White House Medical Unit and is not in quarantine,” O’Malley said.
“Vice-President Pence has tested negative every single day and plans to be at the White House tomorrow.”
Pence’s spokeswoman Katie Miller tested positive, it was revealed on Friday, while President Donald Trump’s valet also tested positive the previous week.
Top US infectious diseases expert Anthony Fauci – who has become the trusted face of the government’s virus response – told CNN he would undergo a “modified quarantine” after testing negative and having not been in close proximity to Miller.
Trump, 73, Pence, 60, and several others at the White House are tested daily. However, Trump and Pence often defy the medical experts’ guidance about wearing protective masks.
The US, which has recorded 79,500 deaths in the coronavirus outbreak, has also suffered its steepest job losses in history, with 20.5 million jobs lost in April.
It was earlier reported that Pence was self-isolating away from the White House following his press secretary's diagnosis of Covid-19 on Friday (May 8).
The VP didn't attend a meeting on Saturday with President Donald Trump and top military officials.
Pence tested negative for coronavirus infection on Sunday, one of the people said. He and Trump have been tested regularly.
He is staying at his home at the US Naval Observatory in Washington out of an abundance of caution, said people familiar with the situation, who asked not to be identified.
Pence travelled to Iowa on Friday after Miller's positive test, a trip that was delayed for more than hour so that six members of the VP's staff who'd been in contact with Miller could disembark from Air Force Two.
Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds, who visited the White House on Wednesday and spent time near Miller, is considering self-isolating, according to two people familiar with the matter.
The state's health director, Caitlin Pedati, accompanied Reynolds on the trip and is planning to self-isolate, one of the people said.
Reynolds and Pence were in each other's company for extended periods during his Iowa trip, practising social distancing. Neither official, though, wore a mask at meetings with state faith leaders and food industry executives.
Miller's diagnosis followed a positive test result earlier in the week for a member of the military who works as a valet to Trump. Miller is married to one of Trump's closest aides, Stephen Miller.
This weekend three top US health officials who are task force members announced they would take isolation measures.
The heads of the Food and Drug Administration and the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention said they would self-quarantine, while Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said he would practice what he called a "modified" quarantine.