WASHINGTON – He put the “secret” in “secretary.”
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin went to great lengths to keep quiet about his Jan. 1 medical emergency that put him in the hospital for two weeks, and an aide asked 911 operators to have an ambulance pick up the 70-year-old man. years without turning on the lights and sirens.
“Can I ask? “Can’t the ambulance show up with lights and sirens?” the employee said in the recording, first obtained by The Daily Beast, adding, “Um, we’re trying to be a little subtle.”
The dispatcher agreed to relay the message, noting that “usually when they get into a residential neighborhood, they turn them off.”
However, the operator added that the law in Virginia, where Austin lives, requires paramedics to use lights and sirens on main streets and major thoroughfares.
An assistant to Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin asked that the ambulance taking him to the hospital not have lights or sirens on, according to the 911 call. REUTERS/Violeta Santos Moura/File Photo
It was that same focus on subtlety that got the deeply secretive Austin into trouble on January 5, when it was revealed that the secretary did not notify his colleagues at the Pentagon – nor his boss in the White House – of his hospitalization.
After Austin was rushed to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, in severe pain due to a urinary tract infection (a complication of a prostatectomy he had undergone on December 22), he was transferred quietly his authority to Undersecretary Kathleen Hicks on January 1. 2, without telling her or any of her other Pentagon colleagues the reason behind it.
Austin also did not tell the White House that he had transferred his authorities to Hicks, and then did so when he finally notified President Biden of his hospitalization on January 4.
But the full story didn’t come to light until January 9, when Austin’s Walter Reed doctors issued a statement revealing his prostate cancer diagnosis and previous surgery, making news to both the Pentagon and the White House. .
His secrecy frustrated many in Washington, leading Republican and Democratic lawmakers to call for his resignation. Biden has said he intends to keep Austin as defense secretary.
Austin remained in the hospital until Monday, working for most of his 15-day stay, including participating in planning an airstrike against Houthi forces in Yemen who were attacking Red Sea shipping, according to the Pentagon.
Austin was taken to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center due to a complication from a prostatectomy he had undergone on December 22. AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File
He is now working from home and receiving physical therapy until he fully recovers, the Pentagon said Monday.
Prostate cancer is highly survivable, affecting one in eight American men during his lifetime, according to the American Cancer Society. In a statement Monday, Austin doctors said “his strength is returning.”
“Secretary Austin’s prostate cancer was treated early and effectively, and his prognosis is excellent,” his doctors said. “He has no additional treatment planned for his cancer other than regular post-prostatectomy surveillance.”
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Source: vtt.edu.vn