Dr. Vin Gupta, a medical analyst for MS NOW, this week pointed to what he described as a “trend line” suggesting that Donald Trump’s cognitive faculties may be deteriorating.
The physician’s comments came as more medical professionals and former Trump officials have come forward to flag what they believe is a worrying spiral by the president.
Speaking in an interview with MeidasTouch’s Ben Meiselas, Gupta referenced Trump’s family history of age-related dementia and said there appeared to be a “symmetry” between the president’s recent behaviour and early warning signs of the disease.
Watch the interview on YouTube.
Gupta stressed he was basing his comments solely on publicly observable behaviour and had not reviewed Trump’s medical data.
Scrutiny is “fair,” given that Trump is president, he said.
Trump appears to be experiencing “word-finding difficulties,” Gupta noted. “He loses his train of thought. Everyone is describing these speeches as meandering — covering 30 different topics in the course of, say, two minutes.”
The president’s difficulty with finishing a sentence, along with apparent memory lapses — such as repeatedly confusing Iceland with Greenland during a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos this week — were of “significant concern,” he continued.
Gupta acknowledged that Trump has long spoken “off the cuff” and that supporters would argue that it’s simply his style.
However, the physician noted how “very serious people” on both sides of the aisle were recently appalled by Trump’s recent letter to Norwegian Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre in which he blamed Norway for not awarding him the Nobel Peace Prize, even though it has no role in the accolade.
“The fact that he would even put a letter like that out there into the public domain has caused a lot of alarm,” Gupta said.
“Who does that?” Gupta continued. “That is not even behaviour for him that would meet a standard of decorum or proper behavior.” Many observers believe the letter “crossed a line of proper adult behavior,” he explained, and had prompted calls for “a more thorough, transparent, public assessment of his neurological fitness.”
