Joe Biden will be masking up indoors again after first lady Jill Biden, who is double vaccinated and twice boosted, tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday.
“President Biden tested negative last night for COVID-19 and tested negative again today,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said on Tuesday.
“He’s not experiencing any symptoms,” she said, adding that Joe Biden will now be masking up while indoors as a preventive measure.
The announcement comes after a study from the Cochrane Library found masks make “little or no difference to the outcome of influenza-like illness (ILI)/COVID-19-like illness compared to not wearing masks.”
Authors of the study said they are “very uncertain on the effects of N95/P2 respirators compared with medical/surgical masks on the outcome of clinical respiratory illness”.
They added that the “use of a N95/P2 respirators compared to medical/surgical masks probably makes little or no difference for the objective and more precise outcome of laboratory‐confirmed influenza infection.”
“As far as the steps he is taking since the President was with the First Lady yesterday, he will be masking while indoors and around people in alignment with CDC guidance,” Jean-Pierre said.
“And as has been the practice in the past, the President will remove his mask when sufficiently distanced from others indoors and while outside as well,” she added.
TRENDING: Triple Vaxxed and Boosted Whoopi Goldberg Contracts COVID-19 For Third Time
During a CNN town hall event in July 2021, Biden claimed, “you’re not going to get COVID if you have these vaccinations.”
Biden then claimed months later that vaccinated individuals do not spread the illness.
Last week, former White House chief medical adviser Anthony Fauci voiced ‘concern’ that Americans will not comply with mask recommendations amid reports of ‘rising COVID cases.’
“I would hope that if we get to the point that the volume of cases is such and organizations like the CDC recommends — CDC does not mandate anything — recommends that people wear masks, I would hope that people abide by that recommendation and take into account the risks to themselves and their families,” Fauci told CNN.
Fauci also called into question a Cochrane study from January 2023, which found masking ineffective.
“When you’re talking about the effect on the pandemic as a whole, the data is less strong,” Fauci said.
“But when you talk about an individual basis of someone protecting themselves … there’s no doubt that there are many studies that show that there is an advantage [to masks].”
