Tuesday, May 20`, 2025
Year : 2, Issue: 38
AFP: US President Donald Trump fueled speculation Monday that Joe Biden’s cancer diagnosis was covered up, saying he was “surprised” the public was not told about his predecessor’s condition earlier.
Republican Trump’s extraordinary claim came just a day after it emerged that his bitter Democratic political rival, 82, had an aggressive form of prostate cancer.
Trump also tried to tie the issue into a wider political row — sparked by a new book released this week — about whether Biden’s White House covered up evidence of his cognitive decline while in office.
Biden had earlier Monday expressed gratitude for an outpouring of “love and support” following his shock diagnosis.
“I’m surprised that the public wasn’t notified a long time ago,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked for his reaction to Biden’s cancer.
“It takes a long time to get to that situation, to get to a stage nine,” he added, apparently referring to the announcement by Biden’s office that his cancer had “a Gleason score of 9 (Grade Group 5).”
Prostate cancer that looks “very abnormal” is assigned the highest rating, Grade 5, according to the American Cancer Society. The Gleason Score goes up to 10, indicating the seriousness of Biden’s disease.
Oncologists that AFP spoke with, however, said that screening limitations could very well have left Biden’s condition undetected until now, and that late identification of an advanced cancer would not be unheard of, even for a former president receiving top-of-the-line medical care.
