President Donald Trump on Tuesday indicated that he didn’t know what the “19” in COVID-19 stands for.
In the middle of a riff in which he also made racist jokes about the coronavirus, Trump said he wondered about the infection’s official name.
“COVID-19, COVID, I said what’s the 19?” he asked at an event in Arizona. “COVID-19, some people can’t explain the 19.”
That 19 refers to 2019, the year the specific coronavirus behind the current pandemic was identified. But Trump isn’t the only one in his administration confused by the moniker.
In April, counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway slammed the World Health Organization’s response to the pandemic and suggested it should have been better prepared because of all the previous COVIDs.
“This is COVID-19 ― not COVID-1, folks,” Conway said. “And so you would think the people charged with the World Health Organization would be on top of that.”
Trump’s out-loud musings about the “19” part of the illness’s name received the treatment on Twitter:
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