White House Responds to Media Furor Over Trump Disinfectant Comment: 'Out of Context'
The White House responded Friday morning to reports that President Donald Trump suggested injecting disinfectants to beat the coronavirus, saying that his comments were taken “out of context.”
“President Donald Trump has repeatedly said that Americans should consult with medical doctors regarding coronavirus treatment, a point that he emphasized again during yesterday’s briefing,” White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said in a statement, Fox News reported.
“Leave it to the media to irresponsibly take President Trump out of context and run with negative headlines.”
McEnany responded after numerous headlines criticized Trump for his comments about disinfectants during the White House coronavirus task force media briefing Thursday evening.
Bill Bryan, head of the Department of Homeland Security’s Science and Technology Directorate, had discussed the results of a study on the effects of sunlight, humidity and temperature on the coronavirus. He also talked about the effect that various disinfectants can have on the virus when it’s on surfaces.
“I asked Bill a question that probably some of you are thinking of, if you’re totally into that world, which I find to be very interesting,” Trump said in response.
“So, supposing we hit the body with a tremendous — whether it’s ultraviolet or just very powerful — light and I think you said that hasn’t been checked, but you’re going to test it.
“And then I said, supposing you brought the light inside the body, which you can do either through the skin or in some other way, and I think you said you’re going to test that, too.”
Trump then made the statement that establishment media outlets pounced on.
“And then I see the disinfectant where it knocks it out in a minute. One minute. And is there a way we can do something like that by injection inside or, or almost a cleaning? Because you see it gets on the lungs and it does a tremendous number on the lungs, so it will be interesting to check that. So you’re going to have to use medical doctors. But it sounds, it sounds interesting to me.” he said.
“But the whole concept of the light, the way it kills it in one minute, that’s, that’s pretty powerful.”
His comments prompted a statement from Reckitt Benckiser Group, the makers of Lysol, that said “under no circumstance should our disinfectant products be administered into the human body.”
Later in the briefing, a reporter asked a question to clarify the president’s comments because Trump had quickly changed the topic from light to disinfectants.
“The president mentioned the idea of cleaners, like bleach and isopropyl alcohol you mentioned. There’s no scenario that that could be injected into a person, is there?” the reporter asked.
“No, I’m here to talk about the findings that we had in the study. We won’t do that within that lab and our lab,” Bryan responded.
As of Friday morning, there were 880,112 cases of COVID-19 in the United States, according to data from Johns Hopkins.
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