During an interview that aired on Greenville radio Q-94’s “The Kyle and Dave Show” on Wednesday, Greenville Mayor Dexter McLendon revealed he and his wife Janice McLendon had been diagnosed with coronavirus earlier in the week.
McLendon explained how he came to the decision to get tested for the virus and his experiences thus far in dealing with it.
“Since last Wednesday, I haven’t felt real good and Janice started feeling bad on Monday before, and so I had got her a Z-pack because we thought we had a sinus infection,” he said. “We really thought we would get something to take and, of course, Dr. Hood and Pam and all of them are good friends. So we appreciate everything they’ve done for us. Anyhow, we decided on Monday morning we would get tested after a discussion with health officials telling me what we needed to do — not me deciding what to do, or this being about us.”
“We did a test, and we got a call last night at 6:30 from Pam, and the ER at the clinic, and she said Janice and I both are positive,” McLendon continued. “That was not a shock to either of us. I would not wish this on my worst enemy, OK? Anybody who thinks this is easy — it is not. But at the same time, we’re OK. We’re not looking at all the stuff you heard about in New York or anything like. We don’t feel good. We don’t feel good at all. We have a fever — not a high, high fever but a fever. Some days are better than others. Some hours are better than others. It goes from extreme to the other.”
McLendon said his physician felt he had a “light case.”
“If this is a light case, I am sure glad I didn’t have a heavy case,” he added. “To give you an idea, appetite does not exist. I’ve lost over seven pounds in about six days.”
He also expressed his frustrations with some of Greenville’s resident in not taking the virus threat as seriously as they were advised.
“[I] will say this — and this is probably not politically correct, OK — we had things happen here in this town, and things, what people are doing,” McLendon explained. “You know, I’ve always loved just saying I’m from Greenville, OK? And I’ve loved saying I was the mayor of Greenville because I was so proud of what we stand for and we do. But in the last few weeks, I have been extremely disappointed in a lot of people. I’ve just been disappointed people would have birthday parties and invite everybody knowing you’re not supposed to get together, having poker games with people playing cards and everything and getting sick.”
“Am I a little ticked off?” he continued. “Yeah, I’m ticked off. Did they give this to me? No, they didn’t. But they gave it to a lot of other people. If you have 50 people in a card game and the information I get is 15 of them caught the virus. I mean, you are supposed to get ticked off.”
McLendon also decried the rhetoric on social media threatening legal action “while people are sick.”
@Jeff_Poor is a graduate of Auburn University and the University of South Alabama, the editor of Breitbart TV, a columnist for Mobile’s Lagniappe Weekly and host of Huntsville’s “The Jeff Poor Show” from 2-5 p.m. on WVNN.
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