Polish President Andrzej Duda has tested positive for COVID-19 as his country records numbers of new infections.
Duda’s spokesman, Blazej Spychalski, announced the 48-year-old leader’s diagnosis over Twitter. The news comes a day after Duda visited Warsaw’s National Stadium, which is being transformed into a field hospital due to the severity of the pandemic.
“[Duda] yesterday was tested for the presence of coronavirus,” Spychalski said on Saturday. “The result turned out to be positive. The president is fine. We are in constant contact with the relevant medical services.”
Duda also met with Iga Swiatek on Friday. Swiatek, a 19-year-old Polish tennis star who won this year’s French Open, also confirmed that she was in quarantine after meeting with the president.
“Neither I nor members of my team have symptoms of coronavirus. We carry out tests regularly. We will quarantine ourselves in accordance with current procedures,” she said, according to the BBC.
Poland has seen an explosion of the coronavirus in recent days, with the country counting more than 13,600 new cases of the illness, a record number of infections that is sharply higher than when the virus initially began to spread around Europe earlier this spring.
As more Polish people contract COVID-19, hospital beds have been quickly filling up. About 60% of hospital beds across the country are now filled, a figure that increased by 6.5% on Friday alone. New coronavirus restrictions forbid gatherings of more than five people in an effort to combat the illness.
President Trump is the highest-profile world leader to test positive for COVID-19, but Duda is also joined by the likes of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who tested positive for COVID-19 over the summer, and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who recovered after a hospital stint. President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus and Monaco’s ruler Prince Albert II also had the virus.
Worldwide, the pandemic has resulted in the deaths of more than 1.1 million people.
