(States Newsroom) — President Joe Biden is physically fit to serve as president, his doctor said Wednesday in a report released by the White House after an annual physical.
“President Biden is a healthy, active, robust 81-year-old male who remains fit to successfully execute the duties of the Presidency,” Dr. Kevin C. O’Connor wrote in the six-page report.
The most notable change in Biden’s medical profile since his last physical a year ago was the introduction of positive airway pressure, or PAP, to help with symptoms of obstructive sleep apnea, O’Connor wrote.
Other health issues Biden deals with include an irregular heartbeat, elevated lipid levels, a stiffened gait and seasonal allergies.
All the conditions are stable and, except the PAP therapy, are unchanged from last year.
“The President feels well and this year’s physical identified no new concerns,” he said.
A host of specialists also examined Biden and agreed with O’Connor’s findings, the president’s doctor wrote.
A dermatologist was among the specialists consulted for routine skin cancer surveillance. After spending a lot of time in the sun as a youth, Biden had non-melanoma skin cancers surgically removed before his presidency. A total body skin exam revealed no issues.
Biden doesn’t drink or use tobacco and exercises five times a week, O’Connor wrote.
Routine testing, including a comprehensive metabolic panel, was normal.
The physical exam was “essentially unchanged from baseline,” O’Connor wrote.
No cognitive issues raised
O’Connor, who is also an associate professor at George Washington University’s medical school, did not raise concerns about Biden’s mental acuity.
Polls have shown Biden’s age and mental fitness are major concerns for voters, spiking in recent weeks as the president has misidentified world leaders in public appearances — including in a speech rebutting an investigation that cleared him of wrongdoing on the grounds that he was “a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
But aging experts in a panel discussion earlier this month said both Biden and his likely November opponent, former President Donald Trump, 77, are up to the task of governing.
People don’t age at the same rate and, for both Biden and Trump, abstinence from alcohol and tobacco and family histories of long life indicate neither have major health risks that would preclude them from another four years as president, the aging experts said.
Biden and Trump set the record for the oldest major party candidates in 2020.
Biden has recently pivoted to address the concerns about his age more directly, including in an appearance on “Late Night with Seth Meyers” on Tuesday. In that appearance, he noted that he and Trump are close to the same age and said the election would be “about how old your ideas are.”
