A hair-loss drug President Donald Trump quietly relied on for years has vanished from his medical paperwork — and the White House won’t say why. The omission, surfacing in a three-page summary that landed in reporters’ inboxes shortly before 11 p.m. on June 5, 2026, has touched off a fresh round of questions about what the 79-year-old president, who turns 80 on June 14, may not be telling the public about his health.
Finasteride, the generic name for Propecia, prevents male-pattern baldness and is taken orally by millions of American men each year. Three of Trump’s previous physicians have confirmed he used the medication both before and during his first term in the White House. Yet the drug has not appeared on a single medical report since his January 2025 inauguration, including the latest, signed by Navy Capt. Sean Barbabella.
Trump’s aides have declined to say why the medication does not feature on the list or whether its absence means the president, known for his meticulously manicured mane, has stopped taking it. Side effects of finasteride can include depression, sexual dysfunction and, less commonly, enlarged breasts.
“The current report reflects all medications deemed clinically relevant to disclose at this time,” the White House said in a statement. “No additional undisclosed conditions or procedures materially affecting his health status were omitted from this report.”
Experts Question What Else Is Missing
The medication that did make the cut: rosuvastatin and ezetimibe to manage high cholesterol, plus aspirin for heart health. The report acknowledges persistent bruising on Trump’s hands, which the White House has chalked up to the aspirin regimen, but declines to specify the dosage. A rash on the president’s neck, flagged by his own physicians in March 2026, went unmentioned entirely.
Robert Klitzman, a psychiatrist who leads Columbia University’s master’s program in bioethics, told reporters that the administration’s silence is itself the story. “It raises significant questions of what else is possibly not being revealed,” he said. Klitzman pointed to finasteride’s documented link to depression and warned the condition could affect Trump’s ability to execute the duties of his office.
Steve Joffe, a physician and bioethicist at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine, said the reticence is hard to justify given the low stakes of disclosing treatment for a cosmetic condition. There isn’t much downside, he argued, to confirming the continued use of hair-loss drugs — and there is real public interest in knowing.
A Long Pattern of Selective Disclosure
Trump has long faced criticism for being less than forthcoming on the question of his health. His former physician, Dr. Harold Bornstein, wrote a now-infamous 2015 note declaring Trump would be the “healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency.” Bornstein revealed in 2018 that Trump had dictated the entire letter himself.
In 2020, Trump came under fire for downplaying the severity of his COVID-19 infection. He later spent three days at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, where doctors monitored his “dangerously low” blood oxygen levels.
The pattern has repeated. Trump has made at least three trips to Walter Reed since retaking the White House — the most recent culminating in the June 5 report. In October 2025, the president told reporters one check-up had included an MRI but declined to say which body part doctors examined, volunteering only that it wasn’t his brain. “It wasn’t the brain because I took a cognitive test and I aced it,” he said. His physicians waited until December 2025 to clarify the MRI was performed on his heart and abdomen, both reportedly free of abnormalities.
Trump has since repeatedly boasted about “acing” the cognitive screening, known as the Montreal Cognitive Assessment, a test designed to detect signs of impairment rather than genius. He has taken it three times. Dr. John Gartner told The Daily Beast that repeated administration of the screening suggests medical professionals may in fact be monitoring dementia, not merely screening for it.
Visible Signs and Public Doubts
The glowing assessments stand in tension with what Americans can see for themselves: swollen ankles, visible bruising and rashes, frequent on-camera naps and increasingly erratic public appearances marked by memory lapses, confusion, tiredness and aggression.
CNN medical analyst Dr. Jonathan Reiner said in May 2026 that the president suffers from severe daytime somnolence, falling asleep in the Oval Office and the Cabinet Room while others are speaking to him. Reiner warned that chronic insomnia in older patients can elevate the risk of dementia and erode cognitive function.
The public appears to share the concern. In an Ipsos poll released in May 2026, roughly 59% of respondents said they do not believe Trump has the mental acuity to serve effectively, while about 55% questioned his physical health.
The White House has pushed back hard against the medical commentary. Spokesperson Davis Ingle has previously dismissed the criticism as armchair diagnosis, and spokesperson Steven Cheung accused outside physicians of recklessness. Several doctors, however, have warned that the three-page summary contains scant data to support the conclusion that Trump remains in excellent health — and that the missing drug, whatever its cosmetic purpose, may be the smallest of the things left unsaid.