Opinion: I’ve reported on the health of every president since Reagan. Here’s what I think about Trump and Biden
The leading chronicler of presidents and health ponders the question: How old is too old for the White House?
When I interviewed Ronald Reagan about his health in 1980, he was 69 and poised to become the oldest person to be elected president. During our conversation, Reagan was mentally sharp. In a light moment he feigned a wrenched back and asked what I (a physician) would do for it.
I asked him about his mother’s health, and he told me that his mother had symptoms suggestive of dementia before she died. I asked what he would do if, as president, he developed the same ailment, and how he would know he had it. His doctors would follow him, he said, and he would resign if they found evidence of cognitive decline. Years later, those remarks would seem particularly noteworthy.
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