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President Donald Trump’s golf company posted a YouTube video of PGA player John Daly touting vodka as a “cure” for COVID-19 earlier this month.
After reports of the tweet appeared in the media, Daly said Monday that the video was done “in fun,” angrily adding: “Grow up, reporters.”
Trump Golf’s tweet sharing Daly’s video is still up. “John, thank you for the friendship. Everyone at Trump Golf loves you,” the golf company’s message reads. It ends with the hashtag “stay safe.”
Daly begins the video by plugging all the Trump golf courses and offering some words of encouragement before announcing: “I kinda got a cure” for COVID-19. He says he only drinks one drink a day, then holds up a full bottle of Belvedere Vodka — and a cup of McDonald’s Diet Coke to sip it with.
“And that’s the way you kill this coronavirus, I believe,” he adds. “Be safe, y’all.”
Daly lashed out after the video was first reported Sunday in Golfweek, which called the PGA player either “ignorant” or responsible for a “lame attempt at humor.”
Daly’s message, even if it was meant in jest, is a potentially dangerous one, with the added weight of being promoted by a brand owned by the president. The crackpot theory circulating on social media that liquor is a coronavirus cure has made the World Health Organization’s “myth-busters” site.
In fact, alcohol consumption can make people even more vulnerable to COVID-19 because it can weaken the immune system, experts have warned. “Consuming alcohol will not destroy the virus, and its consumption is likely to increase the health risks if a person becomes infected with the virus,” says a WHO fact sheet.
Twitter followers were stunned. One said she reported the tweet to Twitter for promoting a false coronavirus cure, and another quipped that Daly could soon be added to the president’s coronavirus “response team.”
Trump Golf could not immediately be reached for comment.
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