I didn’t need a medical license to know nothing good follows, “Do you want to pull over,” when my oncologist called.

I wasn’t surprised I had cancer. I had all the classic prostate symptoms: elevated PSA numbers, frequency and urgency of urination, erratic stream, etc., etc. What I didn’t expect was “aggressive.” Three times in 90 seconds my doctor dropped the A-word on me. Suddenly, I had graduated from PSA numbers to the “Gleason scale,” which goes from 0 to 10. Mine was 9.

Last week, former President Joe Biden announced he has prostate cancer, also aggressive, also a 9 on the Gleason scale. Sadly for Mr. Biden, his cancer has escaped the capsule, allowing it to invade his bones, rendering it incurable. But given Biden’s advanced age and dramatic improvements in treatments, it’s entirely possible our 46th president may die with prostate cancer but not from it. Still, any cancer diagnosis is bad news.

Fellas, get tested!

Joe Biden has received good wishes across the political spectrum, including a shout out from President Donald Trump and first lady Melania. But flying wingman to sympathy is speculation, an inevitable consequence of being ill in public life. “Did Biden just find out he has cancer or is this another secret kept from the voting public?” asks Don Jr. and millions of others.

President Biden’s dramatic physical and mental decline, obvious to anyone paying attention despite the best efforts of his family, advisors and complicit media, has now been detailed in “Original Sin,” a new book by CNN anchor Jake Tapper.

Team Biden is not happy. Neither are Democrats and media types who find themselves in the “What did you know and when did you know it?” hotseat.

Biden’s cancer diagnosis, announced on the eve of the “Original Sin” publication date, has only increased the chatter. How could Joe Biden, as vice president for 8 years and president for a full term, not have received a PSA test for over a decade?

Given the secrecy surrounding Biden’s health, the timing of his prostate cancer announcement could be an attempt to mute the fallout from Tapper’s book. Jimmy Kimmel canceled an appearance by Tapper on his show, as did others. Biden’s intimates would hardly be the first to try and control the narrative of a president’s ailments.

From George Washington to Donald Trump, presidential health has been a constant source of political fodder. The most famous coverups are undoubtedly FDR’s paralysis and Woodrow Wilson’s stroke in 1919, both open secrets in Washington, but carefully redacted by reporters and even political opponents.

In 1789, only months after taking office, George Washington had a tumor (described by physicians as “the size of two fists”) removed from his thigh. Few knew of this crisis at the time. Enduring barbaric surgery performed without anesthesia, Washington’s life hung in the balance. So too did the life of the new Republic. As the “indispensable man” the country may have died along with Washington without his unifying presence. To avoid panic, the president’s condition was carefully stage-managed. Rightly or wrongly, the precedent for hiding presidential ill health had been established.

Thomas Jefferson suffered from chronic, immobilizing migraines, forcing him to retreat to his darkened bed chamber for days at a time. Andrew Jackson was plagued by chronic hemorrhoids, dental pain and ulcers. (Not to mention a bullet in his chest from a duel.) Franklin Pearce was morbidly depressed after the death of his son in a train wreck on his way to his father’s inauguration, so too Abraham Lincoln and Calvin Coolidge, both of whom lost children while in office. Grover Cleveland underwent jaw surgery on a ship in New York Harbor to keep his mouth cancer a secret, while JFK’s Addison’s disease was hushed up along with a back injury from World War II requiring a brace that may have contributed to his death in Dallas, holding him upright after Oswald’s first shot hit him in the neck.

In the post-Watergate world, the media (and opposition parties) are far less inclined to sit on a big story like presidential infirmity, but that doesn’t mean handlers and sympathetic media figures won’t try.

The big question remains, how much transparency are “We the People” entitled to when it comes to a president’s health?

I’m an absolutist. If you ask the American people for the power to tax us, jail us, send our sons and daughters to war, nothing should be off the table: not your health records, not your tax returns, not your investment portfolio. Cognitive tests should be mandatory. A civics test wouldn’t hurt either.

Presidents should be prohibited from having their personal physicians attend them while in office. HIPAA ends when you toss your hat in the ring, especially when we are asked to choose between elderly candidates who are decidedly off warranty.

In the interest of full disclosure, my doctor says I have a 65% chance my cancer will never return. While that’s a good number, it still leaves a significant chance someday I could get another call asking if I would, “like to pull over.”

Living with this possibility has amped up my gratitude for every negligible PSA test I have received since my surgery last July, and heightened my empathy for everyone diagnosed with this awful disease, even politicians, who not only have to deal with the physical and emotional consequences of serious illness but the public fallout from the public disclosure of their infirmities.

The rest of us enjoy the gift of privacy.

Doug McIntyre’s column appears on Sundays when he can think of something worth saying. His novel, “Frank’s Shadow”, is available at Amazon.com. Doug@DougMcIntyre.com.