President Donald Trump was right with his Independence Day claim that 99% of coronavirus cases are "totally harmless," his chief of staff, Mark Meadows, said Monday.
"I don't even know that it's a generalization," Meadows said on Fox News' "Fox and Friends." "When you start to look at the stats and look at all the numbers we have, the amount of testing that we have, the vast majority of people are safe from this."
Meadows said that when one looks at the deaths from coronavirus, "if you're over 80 years of age or if you have three of what they call co-morbidities: diabetes, hypertension, heart issues, then you need to be very, very careful."
But beyond that, "the risks are extremely low," said Meadows. "The president's right with that and the facts and statistics back us up."
Meanwhile, Meadows said that he thinks the decision over whether to mandate wearing face masks should "certainly" be a state-to-state decision, as "certainly a national mandate is not in order."
The Trump campaign is encouraging people attending the president's campaign rally in New Hampshire this weekend to wear a mask, even though the event will be outdoors, noted show host Steve Doocy.
"What we've seen is far too often we've said we're just going to shut everything down," said Meadows. "As we start to open up, if masks are appropriate and the president mentioned that he's willing to wear a mask if appropriate in tight quarters, I know a number of us have done the same."
However, shutting down the economy again is not an option, he stressed.
"I think the theme of this is that we have to adjust our personal lifestyle in a temporary basis because help is on the way," said Meadows.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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