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| Photo by Alicia Sangiuliano |
Gail Jarrow is the author of the new young adult book White House Secrets: Medical Lies and Cover-Ups. Her other books include Ambushed!. She lives in Ithaca, New York.
Q: What inspired you to write White House Secrets, and how did you choose the presidents to include in the book?
A: Since I was 11, I’ve enjoyed reading about the presidents. While studying medical history as I wrote previous books, I discovered that presidential health is often overlooked. Yet when the chief executive dies or is out of commission for weeks with an illness, it is a medical fiasco that poses a risk for the nation.
To decide which presidents to include in my book about cover-ups, I identified those chief executives who deliberately kept their medical conditions secret. I only chose the cases for which there was solid, well-documented evidence of deception––medical records, court testimony, first-person accounts, autobiographies.
I didn’t include alleged cases of deception that were based on rumors, political animus, or personal opinion, because those are difficult to confirm.
Q: Of the various secrets you write about in the book, are there some that especially surprised you?
A: My book includes nine presidents from James Garfield (1881) to Joe Biden. Here are three of the more shocking stories.
Grover Cleveland (1885–1889, 1893–1897) was diagnosed with oral cancer in 1893. He and his closest aides devised an elaborate scheme to keep the situation secret. They arranged for a risky operation on a floating yacht, far away from nosy reporters. The surgery was a success, and Cleveland got away with the cover-up. The secret surgery wasn’t confirmed for 24 years, long after Cleveland’s death.
In 1919, Woodrow Wilson (1913–1921) suffered a devastating stroke. His left side was paralyzed and, at least temporarily, he was mentally incapacitated. His condition was covered up by his wife, his doctor, and his secretary. They didn’t inform even the vice president and secretary of state, who were next in the line of succession. Wilson's wife screened correspondence, making decisions in Wilson’s name and essentially taking control of the presidency.
John Kennedy (1961–1963) cultivated the image of a young, vigorous president. Yet he had a life-threatening ailment for which he required regular medication. Kennedy and his doctor repeatedly denied that he had the disease. While in the White House, he was treated with addictive painkillers and amphetamines. That was kept hush-hush, too.
Q: The Kirkus Review of the book says, “This work, a strong choice for young readers and adults alike, raises the question: What’s the best way to balance presidents’ right to medical privacy with their responsibility to govern the nation?” What do you think of that description, and how would you answer that question?
A: That’s the tough question at the heart of my book. As I point out, presidents have had various motives for concealing an illness.
Some coverups were for noble reasons, such as discouraging foreign adversaries from taking advantage of a president’s physical weakness. But many of the secrets have been for selfish reasons, such as maintaining personal power or winning an election.
Does the public need to know every health detail, however embarrassing? Probably not. Some conditions have nothing to do with whether the president can perform duties now or within the term of office.
If the president’s health potentially affects the nation, however, I think the public deserves the information. The press is in the position––and has the responsibility––to get those facts. Too often in the past, reporters hid critical evidence or failed to investigate obvious signs of a president’s declining health.
Q: What do you hope readers take away from the book, especially given the current political climate?
A: I hope the book helps readers appreciate how far medical care has progressed since the middle of the 19th century. The stories also reveal a pattern of presidential deception about health.
A common theme in all of my books is to show what happens when we aren’t sufficiently skeptical. Whether the subject is history, science, medicine, or politics, I encourage readers to question and analyze what they see and hear.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: When I was doing research for White House Secrets, I learned about other presidents who suffered life-threatening conditions but didn’t cover up their ailments. I decided another book was necessary to tell the complete story of significant presidential illnesses.
The President Is Ailing: Tales of Medical Crises in the White House will be published in Spring 2027. This is the fifth book in my Medical Fiascoes series. Besides White House Secrets, the others are Blood and Germs (about Civil War medicine); Ambushed! (about the assassination and slow death of President James Garfield); and American Murderer (about the South’s hookworm epidemic).
--Interview with Deborah Kalb. Here's a previous Q&A with Gail Jarrow.
