U. S. Becomes the new battleground in the fight against Coronavirus Health workers struggle to contain the rise in infections and theyre running out of supplies so what needs to be done to prevent the crisis spiraling out of control this is inside story. Hello and welcome to the program. The World Health Organization has warned the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic could shift to the United States although italy spain and china have higher death tolls the u. S. Now has nearly 165000. 00 infections more than anywhere else in the world the state of new york has the biggest number of cases a u. S. Naval ship with 1000 hospital beds has arrived to provide relief to overwhelmed hospitals and Emergency Medical Centers have been set up across the country but Health Workers say theyre running out of supplies and testing kits new yorks Governor Andrew Cuomo is asking states with fewer cases to send volunteer doctors and nurses. If you dont have a Health Care Crisis in your community please come help us in new york now we need relief we need relief for nurses who are working 12 hour shifts one after the other after the other we need relief for doctors we need relief for attendants so if youre not busy come help us please and we will return the favor earlier this week the top u. S. Health official predicted there could be up to 200000 deaths in the u. S. The president has been criticized for downplaying the crisis donald trump says the number of cases there wont reach its peak for a while jalen jeanne times are ahead for the next 30 days. And this is a very vital 30 days were sort of putting it all in the mind this 30 day is so important because we have to get back so lets take a look at why scientists are so worried about whats happening in the u. S. The university of oxford has been tracking how long it takes for new infections to double in each country after the 1st 100. 00 cases china reported a doubling of every 2 days when the outbreak began 4 months ago the numbers are now steady after beijing imposed mass lock downs and travel bans italys infection rates are starting to double more slowly to every 4 days there are really signs in spain as well that the numbers may be stabilizing but in the u. S. The infection rate is still doubling every 2 days or so. All right lets bring in our panel joining us from washington d. C. Julie fisher associate Research Professor of microbiology and immunology at Georgetown UniversityMedical Center in oxford in the u. K. Dr peter drove cofounder and 1st executive director of the university of Global Health equity in rwanda and also in washington d. C. Adam goodman republican strategist and partner at balad partners welcome to you all julie let me start with you just how bad is the situation currently in new york specifically in the hospitals right now do your kids seeing cases of coded 1000 double every day so it is on a very high trajectory and the number of cases is growing more quickly than the Health Systems are able to accommodate there are already facing dramatic shortages of intensive care beds and dental it is for the people who are most severely ill and were still seeing the number of cases rise with the expected peak still about a week away so its a pretty severe situation right now adam president trampas expressed optimism about the federal governments ability to provide adequate coronavirus testing but thats very different than what were hearing from state governors right. It thats true you know the president is in a position where you could argue very persuasively has to balance realism and optimism because if he did if that gets out of whack i think this whole thing starts to become a much more difficult assignment for people across america to handle hes been criticized for that they were being maybe a little bit too optimistic i think thats actually the right tone to to to to to play and weve seen others across the country we just heard a pretty roll Governor Cuomo of things not a terrific job of really so really addressing this day to day with the people of new york putting what is most important on the table trying to take politics out of it but for the president you know has his nightly press conference which has become Must Watch Television across america i think its appropriate that he gives us a reason to look forward as opposed to the fear of looking at where we are today peter as a Public Health expert from your Vantage Point tell us about what youre seeing when it comes to the effectiveness of measures put in place in the u. S. Versus in other parts of the world. Well overall the u. S. Response has been certainly slow and really a lot of valuable time was lost or certainly when you compare it to other countries that active more quickly south korea had its 1st reported case on the same day as the u. S. January 20th they sprung into action they scaled up testing very widely in Contact Tracing and the usual sort of Public Health measures to address an epidemic and its really been able to contain there as there have been fewer than 150 deaths and actually declining in south korea weve seen obviously just the opposite in the u. S. And its you know as things continue to ramp up at 6 truly concerning one of the challenges has been really kind of a patchwork response across the u. S. Where in some places like seattle and San Francisco bay area some early social distancing measures appear to have paid off in terms of flattening the curve a little bit but obviously we see some other cities that appear to be just behind new york city like detroit and new orleans that appear to be you know next in line for really becoming overwhelmed really it looked to me like you were nodding along to some of what peter was saying did you want to jump in. Yes and i think its as peter was pointing out where communities have implemented some of these social distancing measures. Early and in a in a whole scale way so not a patchwork from location to Location Community to community theyre starting to see some of the benefits in terms of burden on the Health Care System the whole quite of the social distancing measures is to use the only tool we have right now in the absence of an effective treatment in effect absence of a back scene that we can use today what we have as a tool are the social distancing measures that can help slow down transmission at the Community Level and the outcome of that is that we can spread out the number of cases as people are starting to learn is a watchword flatten the curve so that the number of new cases occurs more slowly and our Health Care Services can provide enough intensive care beds and enough intensive care nurses to take care of the people who might be ill in a community. With it spread out over a longer time rather than everyone becoming ill at once and really overcoming the Health Care System adam given the lack of testing kids do we have an accurate understanding a realistic idea of the numbers at play when it comes to crown a virus infections in the us right now. We certainly dont i dont think anyone in any major country around the around the globe has it answered outline and of course as we hear from dr fox you i think this will date me a little bit he minds be of dot will be to famous. For Television Dr who always made you feel good even the most even in the most group of circumstance. When dr fallon geo addresses that he still is uncertain and hes keeps saying and hes right as is dr burke said a lot of other Public Health professionals that we need more data to truly understand just how big this could get what it means when you hit it apex is it is single wave texas of multiple 8 that says in terms of the curve you know weve now weve now come to follow the covert 900 her more religiously people have a certainly in this country than the Dow Jones Industrial average as a sign of our you might say collective health so i what im trying to say is that the more we know which means data the more information we get the better were going to be and more equipped were going to be maybe not to be perfect because clearly were not going to be in a hamley wave one but i think were going to be ready for whats ahead peter more and more the past few days we are seeing medical workers in different parts of the u. S. Utilize social media to showcase these horrific conditions that patients in the u. S. And Health Care Workers in the u. S. Are now confronted with these are striking and very sad scenes and im curious about how this is playing out in the rest of the world i mean how remarkable is it that people are seeing these kinds of scenes take place in the u. S. In the richest country in the world you know its tragic and its shameful frankly that that our lack of preparedness put us in a situation and it raises a greater danger not only that our Health Workers the heroes on the frontline who are sacrificing themselves are taking risks too to save lives and protect the rest of us are not themselves getting adequate protection but one thing that we saw in italy as the Health System was over well was that hospitals themselves became epicenters of transmission because they werent able to implement effective Infection ControlHealth Workers might have been infecting other patients who were in the hospital for other reasons and you started to actually see that even social distancing measures and the team unity were compromised by transmission that was happening in hospitals themselves and so this is something that really needs to be urgently address in for the rest of the u. S. They need to look to your and realize that they dont have much time to get ready julie how big of a challenge is it right now that the Health Care System in the u. S. Doesnt operate in a coordinated manner. Its a tremendous challenge and i think one of the biggest obstacles for the us as opposed to some other Health Systems worldwide is that our Health System is very decentralized its. Not a single unit but a combination of many systems ranging from large Hospital Networks down to small Health Facilities operated by a single nonprofit or private Sector Organization and theyre not used to working in concert in any coordinated way for the procurement and movement of medical supplies which is right now what is one of the Biggest Challenges making sure that we have enough ventilators and enough personal protective equipment for our Health Care Providers to care for those who are severely ill and to do so in a way as just mentioned that does not put themselves at risk and prevents them from becoming a source of infection for others so were really struggling in the u. S. Right now with the the structural limitations of our system were not used to managing medical supplies on a nationwide basis and were not used to trying to project across an entire Health System using mathematical models what the burden might look like the epidemics in individual communities across the country emergence lately different time scales out of it looked to me like you may have wanted to jump in but let me also ask you from your perspective how well are americans at hearing to social distancing guidelines. Theyre getting there you know i think in new york it was a omas and overnight wake up call that got everyone kind of pulling together understanding this was not in an optional suggestion but a mandate that everyone had to follow and theres a sense that this is owing to a lot of the communication coming not just from the administration but from governors across the country that everyones in this that if anyone comes off the line so to speak theyre endangering somebody else i think that singles getting getting through but remember were in a americas a country built on freedom and on the ability to decide what you want to do when you want to do it how you want to do it this is a habit that this is a habit we have to kind of break right now and be a half in in the name of the common good so i think were were adjusting i think were getting there but when you when you hear of the governor of new york and also reinforced by blasio in new york city st we cant handle this thats about the only time i can remember a message coming from new york city in particular that said up to this task alone we need help and that says also that structurally to get into what julian peter was saying and suggesting structurally i think whats going to happen in america im sure will happen in other countries around the world were now going to make this city public help a major league priority and i think were going to have to find a way to to create a government system that can rapidly and affectively move to tamp down threats as we start to move into the future peter you mentioned a moment ago italy by way of comparison with whats going on in the United States i was reporting out of italy at the end of february about the corona Virus Outbreak and it was shocking to see how quickly the virus spread across the country despite the efforts of quarantine and lock down im curious from your point of view if what youre seeing in the u. S. Mirrors to some extent what happened in italy and also if you believe that the u. S. Will further toughen Movement Restrictions to try and curb the spread. U. S. Is unfortunately very much following italys footsteps and many of us saw this coming several weeks ago and unfortunately the actions taken was not really enough to prevent that so were certainly seeing that in new york right now and of course the risk is that we may over the next several weeks begin to see multiple different epicenters like new york or like lombardo across the u. S. In the weeks to come i do think that the restrictions will need to be strengthened and also broadens right so there has been a National Call around social distancing but it is still a bit how its working youre seeing this being done much more aggressively in some states and localities over others i would favor at this point there are so Much Community transmission across the us right now its really high times assert thinking about nationalizing this response and having stricter social distancing guidelines that that are implemented and hopefully enforce everywhere in the country as well as better coordination to build up our Health System all right i want to step back for a moment and take a look at another dimension of all this so the coronavirus pandemic has become a political issue in the u. S. Lets take a listen to the 2 main candidates for the democratic nomination for this here is president ial election i hope very much going out of this terrible terrible tragedy we do from fundamental rethinking about the nature of emergence of our moral. It means. What our priorities are and if we can do that then at least it will be something good. So many of us are experiencing right now look the coronavirus is not the president s fault but the slow response the failure to get going right away the inability to do the things that need to be done quickly they are things that are should they cant continue we have were going to go through another phase of this and we have to be ahead of the curve not behind a curve like we were last time adam you heard joe biden and Bernie Sanders there talk about the ramifications of this crisis obviously political candidates are saying they dont want to politicize this but politics will be a factor in all of this so im curious to know do you think that health care will become more of an immediate issue now when it comes to the president ial election. Well theres no question i think health care was always a top 3 top 4 issue i think its there is no other is that it comes close to it right now its interesting when youre playing these clips. When you could we put them on the role of politics now in American Life which obviously has been far less and because of the crisis at hand but there are 2 things that are obvious already number one is that this is become a referendum this how pandemic has become a referendum on the present the United States if donald trump handles it is perceived to have handled it well decently well or better he stands obviously a great chance of not only reelection but maybe in a big way if he doesnt handle it well i think everything is suddenly up in the air the 2nd thing thats happening here is with joe biden in particular the presumptive both lets say hes the Presumptive Democratic nominee even though Bernie Sanders does not want to concede his problem joe bidens problem beyond the obvious is he has an interparty in an intra Party Challenge the intraParty Challenge is with Bernie Sanders that the field has not been cleared and theres more and more suggestions that people like Governor Andrew Cuomo perhaps Governor Newsom in california governor whitman or in michigan could be considered as a potential nominees because of the increasing public roles theyre playing but he also has an interparty problem here in terms of being able to prosecute this case without having those kinds of suggestions that kind of tearing down the inevitability of joe biden as the nominee coming at him every day hes trying as best he can with this is this very frequent you know pronouncements coming from his well it movie studio now study but i think he is less relevant now what is relevant to all of us. Is whether or not this administration is going to be able to handle this pandemic in a way we need and we expect and that is the politics of the moment julie how much worse is this expected to get in the u. S. And and also can the Health Care System being what it is right now cope with this its expected to to get worse in the u. S. I mean to put it frankly we are were still a good 2 weeks away from the peak of the epidemic in the u. S. Based on all the data we have now. The cases across the u. S. Are are. Increasing basically threefold every day it is obviously very patchy across communities and the outbreak in the u. S. Began on the coast the east coast and the west coast that have the most travel and the most travelers arriving from the initially affected regions the outbreak is spreading and we have because we were late out of the gate on getting testing into place we dont have a really good handle on how many communities are ready might have local transmission with a great number of asymptomatic cases and wildly septa that it cases that are masking the extent of the outbreak so there are going to be hospitals in communities across the u. S. That simply do not have enough intensive care beds and intensive care nurses or enough equipment to care for the the the coming caseload of the estimate again this is a model that the estimate is that on the at the peak of infection in about 2 weeks were going to have in the u. S. A shortage of intensive care beds of more than 13000 beds and more than 26000 ventilators and thats a shortage that right now. Health care systems across the country understand is coming and are scrambling to try to accommodate but again that those decisions and the ability to get them into place as has had to happen with state and local leadership and we have seen i think the great news is we have seen some very strong state and local leadership and Decision Making on how best to make sure that those in greatest need have access to resources and that we protect our Health Workers but the truth is that globally supply chains have been under stress and trying to address the shortcomings in the middle of the crisis is a challenge and a scramble. And its a place where you know the federal government can provide guidance technical guidance risk analysis Risk Communications and clear leadership but ultimate. Lay for Public Health the state and local Decision Makers the ones who are making sure that they understand the situation into calories and providing the leadership for social distancing and for supporting the Health Care System said Health Care Professionals peter i saw you nodding along to a lot of what really was saying to to want to make a point yeah i think thats exactly right its you know unfortunate because i think a lot of this was was preventable but the worst is yet to come weve seen weve weve seen estimates that you know deaths could number in the in the hundreds of thousands and you know possibly even further under a worst Case Scenario i think well be able to avoid that worst Case Scenario but theres a lot of work to be john and so social distancing now can buy us time to do all of the things that julie was talking about do everything we can to reinforce the Health Care System to acquire the p. P. Thats necessary to ramp up testing which is ultimately whats also going to help us get out of this as well we can all stay on lockdown forever and once we get past the peak we need to be able to think about how were going to be able to safely start to ease some of those restrictions and get society and the economy working again will only be able to do that if we have the intelligence that comes from widespread testing its all of these things need to be happening at the same son adam we dont have a whole lot of time left to let me ask you quickly the United States of course has been so polarized socially and politically these past few years that yours is this pandemic from your perspective going to pull people closer together or will it drive them further apart. Thats a great question the bottom line is we dont know yet i mean this country has really been ridden by not just partisan differences but geographic demographic ideological differences for a long time its got its gotten worse you would think this is the moment that america would pull together for and for in common interest for all the right reasons i hope that happens im concerned about one more thing a big a very fast its not just a whole 10 democrat facing its also an emotional psychological pandemic were about to face because if we stay on virtual lockdown for another couple weeks couple months theres going to be another wave of reaction to all this and thats where the did this and miss america really concerns me and a lot of us all right well we were have run out of times were going to have to leave it there thanks so much to all of our guests julie fisher dr peter drawback and adam goodman and thank you too for watching you can see the program again any time by visiting our website aljazeera dot com and for further discussion go to our Facebook Page thats facebook dot com forward slash a. J. Inside story you can also join the conversation on twitter our handle is at a. J. Inside story for me and the whole team here bye for now. I. Before any official investigation into the tragedy of flight m h 17 is complete the website of one citizen journalist claims to have connected the dots in real identity a lot of the man was removed by the Investigations Team at the ballot count has identified the 2nd sunday in as citizen journalism investigations trust is generated through transparent dont believe me heres the evidence. Reading trying to true friend approaches truth well coming soon on 00. A story of Popular Resistance political intrigue. And betrayal. A sons quest for justice or sometimes i feel like the following i mean are you looking for under the illusion. Aljazeera world goes in search of the truth about the 2 new zealand independence fighter less harshly. On aljazeera. Aljazeera. Where ever you. All i worked as state with most outstanding my wife the rest internment and mass indoctrination all we were children are now in a process of reeducation or chinese assimilation forced labor and the use of high tech surveillance were being complicit in the human rights abuses that are trying an australian investigation into china systematic repression of the weakest tell the world on aljazeera. The truth that ive been covering all of that narrative for most of my career but no country has done like it my job to shed light on how and why. This is aljazeera. Hello im a clown this is the news are live from doha coming up in the next 60 minutes latest figures show that more people have now died in the United States from the virus than china has reported number of fatalities. A grim day for europe as france and spain record their highs coronavirus death toll in a single day with hundreds of fatalities in the past 24 hours. A mere launch of the search for