Top 5 Presidents with Major Health Problems

#1. Ronald Reagan

Ronald Reagan was  already seventy years old when he took office. Many felt he was too old to run. At the time, he was the oldest man to have run for the presidency. Old age predisposes us to more diseases, just as a natural matter, but Reagan was an unusually healthy man for his age. Unlike JFK, he had had a childhood virtually free of illness, enjoying the best of health throughout most of his adult life.  Reagan finished two full terms in office, despite an assassination attempt and despite the creeping effects of advanced old age.

In order to downplay public concerns about his health, Reagan promised that he would resign the presidency, if he were to become unfit to carry out the duties of his office.

Reagan was shot on March 30, 1981. The .22 caliber bullet ricocheted off his limousine and went into his lung. The seventy year old president suffered a collapsed lung. The wound was much more life-threatening than those of Presidents McKinley and Garfield. But due to the advances in modern medicine since their time, and also due to Reagan’s positive attitude and overall resilience, Reagan was able to make a complete recovery, though it did take him six months to regain the full measure of his health.

In comparison to this episode of being shot, Ronald Reagan’s other medical issues while in office seem mild. They consisted mostly of vigilance against the development of disease: the removal of benign colon polyps, the treatment of a urinary tract infection with antibiotics, the removal of a precancerous tumor from the colon, the fitting of a hearing aid due to loss of hearing in one ear. If it were not for the high-tech expedients of colonoscopy and the availability of modern medicine, in all likelihood these things that Reagan was being treated for would have gone unnoticed and untreated. While he also suffered from Alzheimer’s, historians differ as to whether or not his facilities were

Did Ronald Reagan’s age or health disqualify him from serving as president? Certainly not. Should Hillary’s advanced age or age-related illnesses preclude her from running for office? Certainly not. She’s younger than Reagan was.

However, the public does have the right to look into the health of a candidate. Transparency in sharing health issues is important. So if we see that a candidate for presidency is much more ill than she lets on, we might be on our guard against another presidential spouse ruling in White House, when not elected. We don’t want Bill Clinton to follow in the footsteps of Edith Wilson.