Fit For Office? A Brief History Of Leaders' Illness

Hillary Clinton can take heart from former presidents and PMs who didnt let health problems hold them back. JFK had Addisons disease, Franois Mitterrand had cancer and Winston Churchill had depression, a heart attack and a stroke

All humanoids suffer illness, but very few of us get sick merely two months before were due to go toe-to-toe with Donald Trump to decide who will become the most powerful person in the world. The news that Hillary Clinton is suffering from pneumonia points up a truth that recognises legislators from the rest of us: for them, illness is not a phenomenon that has to be treated only medically, but is also something that must be managed by squads of PR goons working round the clock so that their boss doesnt seem too feeble to hold the proverbial reins of power.

Trump, 70, has already questioned his 68 -year-old competitors physical and mental capabilities to become president. And she has retorted, with perhaps even greater justice, indicting his temperament for the job.

Clinton went on the late-night comedy reveal Jimmy Kimmel Live! in August to rubbish rumours about her health. Back in October[ 2015 ], National Enquirer said I would be dead in six months, she said. So with every breath I take, it feels like a new lease on life.

No wonder, given the wild supposition and huge risks to political capital involved, legislators have gone to unbelievable lengths to ensure any maladies they might suffer remain private. Here are some examples.

Ronald Reagan( 1911 -2 004)

The two-term American president, who served from 1981 to 1989, was diagnosed with Alzheimers in 1994. University of Arizona researchers found that subtle changes in speaking patterns connected with the onset of dementia were apparent years before physicians diagnosed his disease. President Reagan proved a significant reduction in the number of unique words over day and a significant increase in conversational fillers and non-specific nouns, wrote professors of speech and hearing science Visar Berisha and Julie Liss.

John F Kennedy( 1917 -1 963)

When JFK was elected US president in 1960, he seemed, at 43, healthy and vibrant. In reality, he suffered various problems controlled by doses of steroids and other drugs. Among those problems was Addisons disease or autoimmune polyendocrine disorder kind 2. During the 1960 presidential campaign, Kennedys adversaries claimed that he had the disease, but as the Los Angeles Times reports, a cunningly worded statement issued at the time by medical doctors asserted that Kennedy did not have Addisons disease caused by tuberculosis( which is the cause of the diseases in only 20% of sufferers ). As a result of this statement, the matter was fell. The truth was, though, that JFK did suffer from Addisons disease, but in his example it was autoimmune in origin. The illnes causes the adrenal glands( which produce adrenaline and other hormones) to wither and results in symptoms such as tirednes, dizziness, muscle weakness, weight loss, difficulty standing up, nausea, sweating, and changes in mood and personality. Kennedy collapsed twice, once during a congressional visit to Britain, as a result of Addisons disease.

JFKs medical record, examined posthumously by navy physician Lee R Mandel, revealed that the president was taking 500 mg of vitamin C twice daily; 10 mg of hydrocortisone daily; 2.5 mg of prednisone twice daily; 10 mg of methyltestosterone daily( to combat weight loss and gonadal atrophy associated with the steroids he was taking ); 25 mg of liothyronine( a synthetic thyroid hormone) twice daily; 0.1 mg fludrocortisone daily; and diphenoxylate hydrochloride and atropine sulfate, two tablets as needed.

Franklin D Roosevelt( 1882 -1 945)

In 1921, at the age of 38, Roosevelt suffered a severe attack of polio, which resulted in the total paralysis of both legs. The previous year he had operated as vice-president on Democratic candidate James M Coxs ticket. His illness seemed to threaten his future political career, but it did not. In 1928, he was elected governor of New York and in 1932 defeated Herbert Hoover to become president, in which office he served until his death in 1945 becoming thereby the last chairman to serve more than two four-year words in office. In 1944, hospital exams revealed that the president, a lifelong chain smoker, had high blood pressure, atherosclerosis, coronary heart disease causing angina pectoris and congestive heart failure, but his declining health was concealed from the public. During the 1944 election campaign, his personal physician, Admiral Ross McIntire, told reporters what he must have known to be untrue, namely: The chairwomen health is perfectly OK. There are absolutely no organic difficulties at all. There are even claims that he employed the office of censorship to quash reports of his declining health before the election, which he won only to die the following year, soon after experiencing a massive cerebral haemorrhage.

Franois Mitterrand( 1916 -1 996)

The French president died of prostate cancer in 1996, a year after the end of his two-term, 1981 -9 5 presidency. During those long years in the lyse Palace, he and medical doctors disguised his condition from the French populace. David Owen, in his volume In Sickness and in Power: Illness in Heads of Government During the Last 100 Years, uncovers the durations they went to to disguise his condition.

When Mitterrand had to be given regular intravenous oestrogen hormone therapy, the presidents personal physician hung the intravenous drip on a picture hook or a coat hanger so as not to have to hammer a nail into the wall of an embassy or another governments guest house.

Shortly before his death, Mitterrand had an intimate farewell supper with friends. Each diner was presented with a sizzling roasted ortolan, a sparrow-like bird the size of a lemon. He and his guests placed napkins over their heads. Then each bent over their dish, inhaled its delicate smokes, took the bird by its nose and sucked out the innards, including bones, through its rectum. In portion because hunting the songbird was illegal in France, this supper just like Mitterrands cancer remained a secret until after his death.

Harold Wilson( 1916 -1 995)

During the British prime ministers second term of office from 1974 -7 6, he suffered symptoms that were later diagnosed as colon cancer. He may also have suffered from Alzheimers while in office( like Reagan ). Neurologist Dr Peter Garrard analysed Wilsons changing speech patterns at the dispatch box, just as he had those of novelist Iris Murdoch, and found evidence that the prime minister might well have been suffering from Alzheimers without knowing it. Garrard said: Speech is known to be vulnerable to the earliest stages of Alzheimers disease, and the findings of the earlier Iris Murdoch project confirmed that linguistic changes can seem even before the symptoms are recognised by either the patient or their closest associates.

If such changes are apparent during the effortful and relatively controlled process of creative penning, then the cognitive demands of spontaneous speech production make it even more likely for them to be detectable in spoken output. Garrard argued that such effortful cognitive demands may have prompted Wilson to retire from office.

Winston Churchill( 1874 -1 965)

In his 1966 memoir, Churchills personal physician Charles Wilson, the first Baron Moran, revealed that Black Dog was the name Churchill devoted to the prolonged fits of depression from which he suffered. The assert that Britains wartime leader was clinically depressed has ever since remained controversial, though Churchill acknowledged in his volume Painting as a Pastime that he was prey to the worry and mental overstrain[ experienced] by persons who, over prolonged periods, have to bear exceptional responsibilities and discharge duties upon a very large scale. To combat such fret and overstrain, Lord Moran reported, Churchill was prone to take solace in whisky and cigars, especially during the darkest days of the second world war. He suffered a heart attack at the White House in 1941 and contracted pneumonia a few years later.

During his second term as prime minister from 1951 to 1955, Churchill was, in the words of his biographer Roy Jenkins, gloriously unfit for office. Ageing and increasingly unwell, he often conducted business from his bedside. He had suffered a stroke while on holiday in 1949 and, while in office in 1953, suffered another. Despite being paralysed down one side and doctors fearing he might not survive the weekend, he conducted a cabinet meeting without, it is claimed, anyone noticing his indisposition. News of this stroke was maintained from parliament and the public, who were told that he was suffering simply from exhaustion. He left office in 1955. A year after his retirement, he suffered another stroke.

Tony Blair( 1953 -)

In 2004, the then prime minister was rushed to Hammersmith hospital in west London for emergency treatment after he complained of chest pain and an irregular heartbeat. The Guardian reported at the time: No 10 immediately played down the incident, but the image of the youthful prime minister struck down by a heart condition sent shockwaves through the government. He was found to be suffering from supraventricular tachycardia, and the following year was treated for a heart fluttering. Its not particularly alarming but its something that you should get fixed its a routine procedure, he said afterwards. Ive had it for the last couple of months and its not obstructed me doing my work and feeling fine, but it is as well to get it done. At the time, Blair placed a great deal of emphasis on being fit and healthy. He told interviewers that, at 51, he weighed about 83 kg( 13 st ), less than he did a decade before. In part, this was due to his healthy lifestyle playing tennis regularly and insisting his aides ensure day for for workouts in his daily diary.

Gordon Brown( 1951 -)

In 2009, on Andrew Marrs Sunday morning BBC TV depict, “ministers ” Gordon Brown dedicated details of his difficulties with his eyesight. He lost the sight in one eye after a teenage rugby accident and has a retinal detachment in his other eye, leaving him with the same fear that he will entirely lose his sight. He told Marr: Although I have problems with my eyes and it has been very difficult over the years, I suppose people understand that you can do a job and you can work hard. And I think it would be a terrible indictment of our political system if you thought that because someone had this medical issue, they couldnt do the job. I feel that I have done everything to show people that I can do the job even with the disability that Ive had as a result of a rugby injury.

Konstantin Chernenko( 1911 -1 985)

Read more: www.theguardian.com

Fit For Office? A Brief History Of Leaders' Illness
Fit For Office? A Brief History Of Leaders' Illness
Fit For Office? A Brief History Of Leaders' Illness
Fit For Office? A Brief History Of Leaders' Illness
Fit For Office? A Brief History Of Leaders' Illness

Fit For Office? A Brief History Of Leaders' Illness

Fit For Office? A Brief History Of Leaders' Illness