Donald Trump leaves Walter Reed Medical Center, where he was being treated for COVID-19

United States President Donald Trump has left the Walter Reed Medical Center where he had been receiving treatment for COVID-19 for the past three days.

Mr Trump emerged from the hospital wearing a suit and mask and raised a fist and a thumbs up as he walked to his car.

He was then driven a few hundreds metres to the presidential helicopter, Marine 1, on Monday evening (local time) for the 15-minute flight back to the White House where he will continue his recovery.

Earlier, the President tweeted that he was “feeling really good” and flagged that he would be leaving the hospital.

“Don’t be afraid of COVID,” he said in the tweet.

“Don’t let it dominate your life. We have developed, under the Trump Administration, some really great drugs & knowledge. I feel better than I did 20 years ago!”

Mr Trump, 74, was taken to the hospital on Friday night after he announced via Twitter that he and first lady Melania had tested positive for coronavirus on Thursday.

Mr Trump was running a high fever and has received supplemental oxygen twice in recent days, according to his White House physician, Dr Sean Conley.

Mr Trump left the military hospital as the scale of the outbreak at the White House itself was still being uncovered.

Press secretary Kayleigh McEnany announced she had tested positive for the virus Monday morning (local time) and was entering quarantine.

Trump not ‘out of the woods yet’

Dr Conley said on Tuesday morning that Mr Trump “may not entirely be out of the woods yet” but indicated that the majority of his vital signs were good and that he “currently does not have any respiratory complaints”.

He added that the President would be surrounded by world-class medical care around the clock at the White House and had not had a fever in more than 72 hours.

Doctors have been treating him with a steroid, dexamethasone, that is normally used only in the most severe cases. He has also been given an experimental dual antibody treatment and the unproven COVID-19 drug remdesivir.

Dr Conley repeatedly declined to share results of medical scans of Mr Trump’s lungs, saying he was not at liberty to discuss the information because Mr Trump did not waive doctor-patient confidentiality on the subject.

 

COVID-19 has been known to cause significant damage to the lungs of some patients.

He also declined to share the date of Mr Trump’s most recent negative test for the virus — a critical data point for contact tracing and understanding where Mr Trump was in the course of the disease.

Dr Conley was also asked about the President’s motorcade appearance the previous day which drew angry reactions from some who feared Secret Service agents in the car with Mr Trump would have been exposed to COVID-19, but said they were wearing PPE.

“The President has been surrounded by medical and security staff for days wearing full PPE,” he said.

“Yesterday, the US Secret Service agents were in that same level of PPE for a very short period of time.

“We’ve worked with our infectious disease experts to make some recommendations for how to keep everything safe down at the White House for the President and those around him.”

Upon his return to the White House it remains unclear how long Mr Trump will remain in isolation for.

Dr Conley said that because of Mr Trump’s unusual level of treatment so early after discovery of his illness he was in “uncharted territory”. But he also was upbeat at an afternoon briefing and said the President could resume his normal schedule once “there is no evidence of live virus still present”.

According to the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, those with mild to moderate symptoms can be contagious for as many as 10 days and should isolate for that period.

Mr Trump was set to receive a fourth dose of the antiviral drug remdesivir Monday evening before leaving the hospital, Dr Conley said. He will receive the fifth and final dose at the White House.

So far, over 209,000 Americans have died from COVID-19, according to the Johns Hopkins University and over 7.4 million have been infected.

‘The patient from Hell’

US House of Representatives Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she hoped Mr Trump’s decision to return to the White House was not politically motivated and she expressed concern that he could become a “long hauler”, a term that refers to those who suffer COVID-19 complications over an extended period.

Mr Trump’s medical team said he had not placed any pressure on the doctors treating him.

The ABC’s medical expert Dr Norman Swan said that Mr Trump being given “unproven therapies” was interesting.

Dr Swan said this was because Mr Trump was either more seriously ill than the White House was saying or they had panicked and were, “just throwing everything at him”.

“The reality is though, if he’s going to fall off the cliff with this, it’s going to be Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday of this week,” he said. “So, he may well be returning to hospital.”

“I hope not and the signs that they are sending him home are good but I imagine that this is the patient from Hell.”

Biden still keen to debate

Moments before leaving the hospital, Mr Trump tweeted that he would be “back on the campaign trail soon”.

 

Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, who has tested negative for the disease several times since the debate, said on Monday he was willing to participate in next week’s scheduled presidential debate if health experts deemed it safe.

Vice-President Mike Pence and his wife, Karen Pence, tested negative again to coronavirus on Monday as did Mr Trump’s daughter, Ivanka Trump, son-in-law, Jared Kushner and and chief of staff, Mark Meadows, according to the administration.

Mr Pence is scheduled to debate Democratic vice presidential nominee Kamala Harris on Wednesday in Salt Lake City.

ABC/AP