Eamon, its jon fortt by my account its been about a week since the last gasp of real partisan that i saw when mcconnell and mccarthy were talking about the house bill calling it an ideological wish list and what not. I think the lawmakers pretty quickly started getting on the same page and getting too a different posture, but from where you sit at this point, is it clear where there might be any types of divides around what types of measures congress is willing to take . I know that payroll tax cut was on the table for a bit and then off the table, but beyond that, are there areas where democrats and republicans clearly differ at this point . You know, its unclear right now. You saw Chuck Schumer out earlier today and yesterday saying that what democrats want is a real focus on the workers, if theres going to be bailouts we want to make sure the focus here is on labor and the workers, the people who might get hurt and not just bailouts that would benefit executives. I think theres a split in terms of the attitude there. I think its slowly dawning on lawmakers the scale of the crisis that they face, the idea that the automakers shut down production entirely, cities going dark in terms of Economic Activity across the United States this is something we havent seen before and its talking lawmakers a while to adjust their mental aperture here to understand what it is theyre looking at and realize that previous waves of economic difficulty and National Challenge that weve seen have been different in terms of the type and also in terms of the scale. So whats going to be required here is entirely different, again, as well so all of that is being worked out right now. I know that democrats would like what they call a four corners negotiation with the top four leaders, two democrats and two republicans, negotiating the white houses approach has been to negotiate with Senate Republicans. You saw mnuchin and kudlow go and talk to Senate Republicans democrats want to be in on that conversation from the get go that hasnt really happened yet but youre seeing white house officials praising an thanking nancy pelosi, which is something we couldnt have imagined two weeks ago. I mean as we await the start of this Task Force Briefing and whats expected to be an announcement regarding the fda, in general when you look at some of the changes, some of the regulatory shifts that have taken place for the fda, for the cdc, our Health Care Sector to be able to move more quickly right now, is the conversation already building around maybe seeing some of the changes become more permanent . Well, thats a really good question, morgan one of the things that strikes me as you talk about the government simply writing checks to taxpayers, 250 billion in april, 250 billion in may s and the question becomes when you start doing that, when will you stop doing that . And then the decision to turn those checks off will be an immensely fraught political decision, presumably that cant just be a one month thing if all of these industry s are disrupted and millions losing their jobs all will need help and support turning off the checks once weve started writing them is going to be politically difficult to do. How much of the stuff that were doing right now and contemplating in this moment now is going to become permanent or semi permanent in some way were making huge changes to the American Economy and way of life and a lot will have residual impacts on the economy and our political system for a decade or more at least a decade well come back to you once we get better timing on the beginning of the briefing. Good morning if youre just joining us, 11 00 a. M. On the east coast youre watching squawk alley. An eventful market session within a pore limited range than were used to. Session low down 721 on the dow, up 244 at the high its been a remarkable overnight. More moves from the fed, money markets, the ecb, the bank of england and then well see what the white house says in a moment bring in Barry Bannister of stifel and keith parker of ubs thanks for the time and good to see you. Thank you thank you barry, covered your work for a long time and you are looking at levels that typical recessions have given us and then shorter shocks have given us and almost trying to split the difference cap you talk about it . Yeah. We said 2300 plus or minus 250 as a range yesterday we bounced off the 2300 midpoint ill tell you, carl, i think were very, very close to either low or a powerful counter trend rally. Some of the things that i look at are the resistance of the vix, the high yield spreads blowing out above the 2016 highs when a lot of Energy Companies did go broke as well as the defensives relative to cyclical sectors which have gone parabolic and look like theyre approaching levels that typically would indicate a peak. The gold to oil ratio measures near term deflationary pressure. Were having an enormous spike in that ratio. It tells us the pressures are huge but we will i think get a bounce very soon in the stock market. Keith, how about you . Tactically as barry was saying, whats your playbook yeah. Weve been seeing similar things where levels of s p about 2500 was pricing in a typical recession. I think the struggle for investor this is not typical and we just downgraded our q2 gdp forecast for the u. S. In negative 9. 5 . You know, mirrors of the financial crisis playbook for me looking for krir suts breakers. Number one, its all about the coronavirus thus far, tracking new cases. We put out a daily search tractor for symptoms and sentiment that could potentially lead that. And then also the announcement of the fda today about a potential treatment for seeing news about antiviral drugs that could potentially reduce the risk of mortality which is key for sentiment. Ill tell you number two on the policy side, monetary looking for rates volatility to settle down and real rates to stop rising, we talked about the fiscal and the key to me and my takeaway this is much more tilted to the consumer rather than the corporate so the consumers would be the one net saving in this and coming out then would probably be tilted towards consumer staples, discretionary, Even Health Care near term rather than capital goods which tend to lag as we get that profit hit. I want to go back to what you said i think you used the word typical actually its pretty incredible to think its been one month as of today since the s p 500 hit its last record highs were down nearly 30 on the average. Fastest bear market ever when you see things like issues around liquidity in the treasury market, the squeeze on the dollar getting a lot of attention, other moves, breaks in terms of correlation across Asset Classes does that still feel typical to you in the time of a bear market no. Its never been typical. I think we are seeing enormous strains on the market. Theres going to be a cost, a longterm cost, associated with double barreled fiscal and monetary stimulus, which is enormous an acceleration of deglobalization of supply chains unfortunately were going to see an increase in the role of government in Corporate Governance i actually think that 2020 to 2022 marks the end of a disinflation era with the cre shen da. Like 80 to 82 marked the end of a 20year inflationary era with a double dip recession and double dip stock market. Any counter trend rally we may see will struggle to get above where we were a month ago and were it to do so i would probably turn bearish because i think we see another downdraft when we realize that p e multiple compression dollar weakness, low total returns and possible growth to value rotation are on the horizon. That would be a long way up from here to get to where we were and you were talking about the Health Improvement as an impact on this i wonder, it seems to me that the longer this lasts in terms of the slowdown in Economic Activity, the partial quarantines, the more potential permanent damage to the economy and to a certain segment of the consumer is that the way youre looking at it, if we go well into april and beyond with this sort of restrained Economic Activity, the longer with were holding our breath, the more it hurts . I think so. I think one from a Human Element the longer this lasts, the more potential permanent changes to sentiment that those checks may not get sent second, the hits to corporate for every one week if you think 50 weeks roughly in the year, every week lost is 2 of the year so as you start getting four weeks, 8 , two months, 16 of the year, small and medium sized businesses, thats pretty tough to handle. I think the other part is the longer that it lasts, we have seen a change in mindset potentially politically amongst individuals and then corporate, i think if you use say the Energy Playbook of 2015 and 2016, a lot of thought we would have mass bankruptcies and we didnt because there was a belief amongst banks and Energy Companies that prices would recover, and so you got those loans to bridge that gap i think the longers this goes on the greater that risk of breaking down of trust and funding that profit shock cash flow shock across the economy. Just to close this out, i dont want to get too far ahead, were waiting for a briefing we need answers to the fire in the living room right now, but longer term to your point about deflationary and inflationary cycles, once we get to the new worry of inflation what happens to all the deflationary dynamics for years, technology an so forth, and what would a standard 60 40 port follow change into . I mentioned theres going to be a double barrelled fiscal and Monetary Policy. We had functional Monetary Policy for about ten years we had the sequester and then an enormous fiscal tightening ben bernanke did qe2 and 3 when donald trump cut taxes, the fed hiked rates and wound down the balance sheet. Were in double barreled fiscal and monetary and people are going to get used to that. The 2020 election will be pivotal. When that happens and you have all these reflation nary forces, currency weakness, as we close our rate and yield differentials with the world and our growth differential with the world, a low total return, but also the basement of a currency itself is one of the key elements of a reflation nary cycle, i think theyre throwing a dollar over the side of the boat in the long term right now theres a short squeeze. I think that will give way to a top keith and barry, thank you for the guidance today we appreciate it today jon and morgan before we hear from the briefing, reuters is running a headline citing the journal that president is expected to detail a range of new virus therapies that may help patients but were in the early stages of testing. Well see what we get. Going to be one to watch. A lot will be watching this very closely. Jon . Meanwhile, want to give you guys quickly a check on the major averages the dow has been making a run for the flat line right now. It is just about at break even the s p is also just about a break even the nasdaq which has been fairing better than the other two in most of todays session is higher by almost 2 meantime will u. S. Tech giants be open to sharing data in an effort to control this outbreak . Our deirdre bosa has that story. Hey, jon. As you well know tech is in a very unique position with all of that location data its huge user bases to monitor and control the outbreak the u. S. Government is said to be turning to some of the biggest names in the space like facebook and google for those efforts. But early indications suggest that this will not be easy yesterday five Democratic Senators sent letters pressing google and the white house over the security of a website google is developing to screen for coronavirus. They asked googles ceo sundar pa chi and Vice President mike pence how the efforts would be monitored and data kept out of hands of hackers pointing to cases in the past with other companies where that data has not been secure. Location data especially from google, facebook and others could be very useful for Public Health agencies in mapping and tracking the outbreak, but even if that was anonymous and aggregated consumers may feel uncomfortable giving that up to big corporations and to the government yesterday Facebook Ceo Mark Zuckerberg told reporters that his conversations with authorities have not focused on using peoples personal information, digital information. We spoke to sara friar, ceo of nextdoor, a neighborhood hub that has seen its engagement and postings from public agencies simply surge over the last few weeks. She said the government authorities have not reached out to her either. In china the government did tap the countrys biggest tech giants from alibaba to tencent and others for the efforts to track the outbreak, but, of course, the relationship with big tech and the Chinese Government is very different than it is here as are consumers, adjustment and comfortable with privacy so guys, it would be a very different story here we are tracking these developments and we do know that big tech is working with the white house, but the extent of those efforts remain to be seen. Back to you. I think its really key to point out those differences as well deirdre bosa thank you for joining us that. To Bertha Coombs who joins us with a special guest, ceo steven coleis thanks very much. Plays a key role in the u. S. Pharmaceutical supply chain getting drugs to pharmacies and hospitals and acute medical Care Products like iv fluids and medicines like cancer drugs. Steve, thank you so much for joining us at what i know is a very busy time tell us what youre seeing when it comes to pharmaceutical supplies right now hi, bertha. Thank you so much for having me. Im honored to talk about our role and the role that our industry is playing in getting critical medications out into the market into patients without anyone compromising any sort of access to medication very proud to be here today. And talk about our efforts what are you seeing there have been concerns because of the shutdown in china we might see a backlog when it comes to generic drugs china, of course, a center for essential ingredients that go into a lot of generic drugs. What are we seeing right now in terms of the supply chain and for how long we will continue to see supplies flowing well, you know, at the moment we really are very well prepared we have long lead times and Amerisource Bergen would gary 40 billion in inventory we have resources to bring to bear in early march when we started seeing the situation changing here in the u. S. , we immediately upped some of our inventory levels for iv fluids, generic medications, some products that we anticipated our customers might be having more demand for and we run the whole gamut of customers from veterinarians to Community Oncology to Community Pharmacy to Large Health Systems like jefferson around the corner from where i am. Of course all of them are going to be impacted differently by the crisis less electric surgeries but more people that are concerned about having their diabetic test strips or their heart medication they may want 90 day supplies versus 30 days they usually have weve justed working with manufacturers and adjusted and the situation with china with api, thats a medium to longterm issue. Congress is looking at that. Well work with all industry participants to make sure that we create the right longterm solutions that come out of this crisis and for the moment, our focus is on frontline operations steven, ive so many questions over the past day or so on how much, if at all, the tariffs between the u. S. And china have had an impact on being able to get medical supplies and components into the u. S. Has that been an issue at all . Would it help if there were tariffrelated adjustments so, you know, again, i think that falls in the longterm category we have not we have not had any problem accessing supplies you know, i think that were worrying more six to nine months out at the end of the summer if anything could happen, but i believe with the help of our manufacturers and with the real strength and diversity of the u. S. Supply chain, including the broad sourcing, global capabilities that Companies Like ours have, we will manage through this we also have an excellent relationship, our sourcing teams have excellent relationships with the global manufacturers we work with. The u. S. Market is obviously very essential to their core sales, their profitability, and i believe that our industry will overcome any supply obstacles well see and change to other products, deal with other dimensions in a supply chain by working collaboratively as an industry with the manufacturers we serve and the patients we are all working together to seamlessly protect this is morgan. As we await this coronavirus Task Force Briefing thats supposed to start at the white house at any moment now, the expectation is that were going to get an fda announcement, maybe around some potential antivirals that could be in early stages of testing. Given some of the changes, some of the shifts weve seen in recent days around guidelines and regulations within this emergency situation where the fda or cdc or other Health Care Entities are concerned, how likely to you think it is we will see some of those changes to a varying extent become more permanent . You know, its just less than two weeks ago that i was at a conference and, you know, its amazing how the world has changed. Somebody there was with involved in the Clinical Trial, one of the other ceos was involved in the Clinical Trial area and were talking about the 12 companies that are involved in doing Clinical Trials on the ground in china and other global hot spots. You know, nine of those 12 companies or ten of them were u. S. Based and the amount of innovation we have, i feel in the long run our industry is going to do great, make great efforts and will come up with tremendous innovations to deal with this crisis if any drugs, any test kits, any antidotes are approved, as long as the products are approved they will get them into market as will our industry we are tremendously adept at getting fda approved products into the marketplace well work hand in hand with manufactures and the fda and the agency, the d. A. , anybody we have to work with, to make sure that approved products where theres appropriate supply will get allocated fairly and efficiently. That is our game i tell you theres no one better at it than our industry. Steve, one of the things that President Trump has moved to do is essentially have some sort of broad control potentially over the nations supply chain, whether that is trying to ramp up production of n 95 markets or ventilators, but potentially also, some of the products that were seeing potentially there might be some price controls how will the industry deal with that if we do see a move to price controls and in an Election Year when people are very concerned about drug prices, do you feel that there is going to be some longterm ramifications to that . You know, thats an excellent question i think that our industry, you know, ive been in this business 26 years, so we have experienced, you know, short products now i think whats in our advantage is we have a highly c credentialed system. Our industry has over 90 market share in the u. S everything that our industry distributes is purchased directly from the manufacturer and is a very safe with tremendous reporting requirements back to statement and government or agencies i think that really helps. By concentrating the supply chain into very well credentialed and well financed and well resourced Enterprise Companies we could manage through that working with the federal government and there are tremendous efforts by private Sector Companies as a big Health Systems group, another Corporate Group i belong to, we are all talking about how can we help. Theres a lot of friends that i have in the industry directly involved with the white house. Of course weve known alex azar for years as a colleague and supplier to us and as a former regulator, so we are absolutely available to help with the quick distribution and access of these products in the long term, i think our industry will find the right pricing. We may have to think in the long term about pricing and what is the right pricing for some of the critical medications that are so important to patient safety, none more so than in these critical times youre talking about test kits, such an important point. I wonder how you would great the fda and all the emergency authorizations weve seen this week, the ability of the roches of the world to get half a million test kits out in a hurry, but this journal piece in which they looked at an email from the cdc telling them that they thought Testing Capacity was adequate, how damaging was that yeah. So, you know, we are as a matter of course, im not going to comment on public policy, but we think that the fda is in a difficult position, right, obviously as a businessman i have to say that they have to be careful of Public Safety and i understand that they are maintaining their standards but doing very advanced testing in a very accelerated environment with real live environments, you know, with patients that are covid19 positive. We are supportive of the efforts and as i said as products get approved we will be the first to be in the line to help get them out into the marketplace you know, more than that, more than that, i can tell you i think our industry works very well i think the providers we have in this field, bes the front line workers, the pharmacists or the health care ticks or the radiology ticks at hospitals, the manufacturers, everybody is stepping up. Youll see that many of the unheralded heros will be the Health Care Workers that amerisourcebergen are proud to support. We literally think that some of the workers in our distribution centers, the nurses that are doing patient education, in canada we have, you know, hundreds of nurses that do infusions, we do Clinical Trials around the world and we actually are doing them more for social distancing purposes in patients homes, so the resources that private Companies Like, you know, nongovernment Companies Like ours can bring to bear are tremendous and a real incredible resource to the infrastructure of this country and, indeed, the globe as we deal with the crisis. As this goes on for a lot of providers, for example, some of those nurses, they could be shifted to other types of duties are you able to help meet the demand as, you know, First Responders and health care have to be all hands on decks at hospitals or other facilities for them to be able to pick up the slack . Well, you know, we dont employ pharmacists we employ a lot of nurses in canada and the u. S. And certainly i think that its very possible that they could have to ship from elective procedures or educational functions they do, even reimbursement crisis to clinically focused operations. In a time like that we would be guided by the professional guidelines that say the nurses associations and the state and federal governments would direct and we would absolutely do our part to make sure that theres ongoing access to health care. And i think that our customers would do their part. Again, we have, you know our customers like walgreens and kaiser that have tremendous employee populations, professional staff and i think we will do whatever we can i know that amerisource bergp will be united in our responsibility to create healthier futures. We would use that purpose to guide us in how we approach any response to this crisis. All right our thanks to Bertha Coombs and to steve colli circumstance of Amerisource Bergen thank you for that interview. Time for a virus update. Sue herera has that for us at hq. I do, morgan. Thank you. Heres whats happening, everybody. The state department is reportedly preparing urgent new advisories applying to all International Travel politico says level four travel advisories are set to be announced instructing all americans abroad to either return to the u. S. Or prepare to shelter in place new york city now considering converting entire hotels to be used for hospital beds this would be for patients without coronavirus, according to the citys Emergency Management commissioner and the wall street journal. Those hotels would house patients in need of minor care and could become vital as the city needs more hospital beds to treat covid19 patients. Gavin newsom says new estimates show 60,000 Homeless People in that state could become ill with the coronavirus over the next eight weeks. Newsom has approved 100 million in aid for cities and counties to help Homeless People affected by the outbreak and the state has acquired 1300 trailers to use as temporary housing and indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi urging his country to limit contact with others to help curb the spread of the coronavirus calling for a day of selfcurfew this sunday and asking indians to avoid hoarding essential goods. You can always get more on the coronavirus coverage heading to cnbc. Com jon, ill send it back to you. All right sue, thank you want to give you a quick check on the markets all the major averages are higher the dow is up about 370 points 1. 9 the s p higher by about the same percentage the nasdaq up 3. 7 theyve been rallying since just before 10 00 a. M moving on as Companies Continue to send employees home to work remotely, our next guest has recommendations on how to keep your connection secure got some insight into how Small Business is weathering this as well ceo and shark tank investor Robert Herjavec joins us. Good morning, guys. You know, i want to ask you first about the security of these home connections i was talking to one cio a couple days ago about whether theres increased risk with so many people working at home. He feels that their security is set up is such that theyve taken that into account. But you think that maybe everybody is not in so fortunate a position what do people need to be checking now yeah. Its an interesting point. I saw that interview and i think some of the Larger Enterprises may have been prepared for a certain amount of the workforce to work from home, but make no mistake, this is a historic the world has changed forever situation that were living in there is no company that is prepared to have every single employee working from home whether theyre large enterprise, small enterprise, i mean, one of the things that weve seen is, Global Internet traffic every five days is increasing by 30 . Everything is moving online and so people have remote access, people have security, but no one had predicted every employee finance purchasing, i. T. , everything work from home and whats happening now is got to interrupt you here, robert weve got the virus task force at the white house and the president is taking the lectern. Very important conference and ill get to that toward the middle but i have a few things to report. I want to thank you all for being here and i have to say i think with social distancing that the media has been much nicer. I dont know what it is. All these empty these in between chairs we probably shouldnt have anybody sitting behind you but i love it. Its so much nicer but i shouldnt say that because youll get me now. Thank you all for being here we continue our relentless effort to defeat the chinese virus. Before i begin i want to start by announcing that today we are bringing home another american citizen. It is a big thing, very big. He is on his way back to the United States after being imprisoned in lebanon since september of 2019. Hes battling late stage cancer. Mr. Faqari will be able to receive the much needed care and treatment in the United States weve been working very hard to get him freed. And hes finally able to have his entire family at his side. Im very grateful to the lebanese government. They worked with us. We are very proud of his family. They stood by him so strongly. And they are thrilled. The United States has no higher prior priority than the selfand well being of our citizens. I think were 420 Robert Obrien as you know was our chief negotiator for a large part of it did so well now we have him in a different position so i want to thank and congratulate robert and his team and i want to let everyone know that recovering americans held captive and imprisoned abroad continues to be a top priority for my administration. We have one young gentleman austin tice and were working very hard with syria to get him out. We hope the Syrian Government will do that we are counting on them to do that weve witten a letter just recently hes been there a long time. He was captured long ago austin tice, his mother is probably watching and shes a great lady and were doing the best we can. Syria, please work with us and we would appreciate you letting him out. If you think about what weve done, weve gotten rid of the isis caliphate in syria, done as lot for syria. We have to see are they going to do this. It would be very much appreciated if they would let austin tice out immediately. As you know, my administration is working every day to protect the American People and the American Economy from the virus. Yesterday i signed into law a critical support for american workers, families and Small Businesses its a big thing were providing sick leave and family medical leave to those affected by the virus and more help is on the way as we speak our entire team headed by secretary mnuchin is on the hill were working with democrats and republicans and theres a lot of goodwill going on. This was something that happened that was some people would say an act of god. I dont view it as an act of god. I would view it as something that just surprised the whole world and if people would have known about it, it could have been stopped in place. It could have been stopped where it came from, china. If we would have known about it and they would have known about it now the whole world almost is inflicted with this horrible virus and its too bad its too bad because we never had an economy as good as the economy we had just a few weeks ago. But well be back. I actually think well be back stronger than ever before because we learned a lot during this period of time. I also just invoked the defense production act to help facilitate distribution of essential supplies if necessary. Were working with congress to provide major additional relief to the workers, Small Businesses and the hardest hit Industry Industries we want to make sure everybody is able to continue on, when we recover all of the companies and all of these great businesses both very, very small and very, very large, theyre not going to be broken up and you would have to put them back together. That would take a long time. We really believe in i believe in the vcurve i believe its going to go when this is defeated, i think were going to go up very rapidly. Our economy. And get back to where it was and beyond today i want to share with you exciting progress that the fda is making with the private sector as we slash red tape like nobody has ever done it before somebody was with on yesterday on one of the networks and said that theres never been a president even close thats been able to do what ive done in slashing all of the red tape and everything to get very important things to the market in medical. We slashed red tape to develop vaccines and therapies as fast as it can possibly be done long before anybody else was even thinking about doing this as you know earlier this week we began the fir clinichin first Clinical Trial of a vaccine canned launched in record time, in just a few weeks. As we race to develop a vaccine, were also pursuing antiviral therapies and thats what really were going to be talking to you about today, the purpose of being up here today, and to me thats more important. The vaccine by its nature you have to have long tests because you have to make sure what goes into somebodys body is not going to do destruction, do bad things, so you need long tests theyre doing great with the vaccines, but theres still a long process the therapies are something we can move on much faster potentially. The treatments that well be able to reduce the severity or duration of the symptoms and make People Better, essentially looking at things to make People Better or at the very earliest stages they wouldnt even know they had it. And thats where i believe its going to work even the best. The fda commissioner steven hawn is with us, hes fantastic and he is working 24 hours a day, he has hes worked probably like as hard or harder than anybody in the group other than maybe mike pence or me. And what the fda is doing is incredible theyve done things in times that were not even thinkable and ive directed the fda to eliminate outdated rules and bureaucracy so this work can proceed rapidly, quickly and i mean fast. We have to remove every barrier. There were a lot of barriers that were unnecessary. And theyve done that to get the Rapid Deployment of safe, effective treatments and we think we have some good answers. Well find out very, very soon Clinical Trials are already under way for many new therapies and were working on scaling these to allow many more americans to access different drugs that have shown really good promise weve had some really good promise. We will do so in a way that lets us continue to collect good data to know which medicines are safe and which medicines are working the best we have a couple were in really good shape on. Thats for immediate delivery. Immediate. Like as fast as we can get it. The fda has also approved compassionate use for a significant number of patients you know what that means were also reviewing drugs that are approved abroad or drugs approved here for other uses and you know one of the things that im most proud of that i got was right to try thats where somebody who is ill, somebody who is very sick, terminally usually, a year and a half ago, you wouldnt be able to even think about getting any of the drugs that may be showing great promise and theyve been trying for many decades to get this approved and sounds simple, but its not because theres liability involved i was able to get it approved with congress. This is beyond right to try, what were talking about today right to try has been, by the way, a tremendous success. People are living that had no chance of living where we take treatments, things that would have to go through years of a process and if somebody was terminally ill, and i would say why wouldnt they be able to try this they would go to asia or europe or all over the world to ri and find something, some people had no money, would go home to die they would go home to die. They had no hope right to try has been an incredible success but this is beyond right to try. It if treatment is known to be safe in europe, japan or other nations effective against the virus, well use that information to protect the health and safety of American People nothing will stand in our way as we pursue any avenue to find what best works against this horrible virus now, a drug called coloraquinn, some people would add to it hydroxy color ra quinn, now this is a comma hair ya drug. Its also a drug used for strong arthritis. If somebody has pretty serious arthritis also uses this in a somewhat different form. But it is known as a malaria drug and its been around for a long time and its very powerful but the nice part is, its been around for a long time so we know that if it if things dont go as planned its not going to kill anybody. When you go with a brand new drug, you dont know if thats going to happen. This has been used in different forms. Very powerful drugs in different forms. Its shown very encouraging, very, very encouraging early results. And were going to be able to make that drug available almost immediately. Thats where the fda has been so great. Theyve gone through the approval process its been approved and they did it, they took it down from many, many months to immediate were going to be able to make that drug available by prescription or states i spoke with Governor Cuomo about it at great length last night and he wants to be right on the he wants to be if first in line i think thats a tremendous theres tremendous promise based on the results and other tests normally the fda would take a long time to approve Something Like that and its it was approved very, very quickly and its now approved. By prescription. Individual states will handle it they can handle it doctors will handle it and i think its going to be i think its going to be great then were quickly studying this drug and while were continuing to study it, but the studying is going to be also done in as given out to large groups of people, perhaps in new york and other places, well study it there. There are a promising therapies produced by gilead and thats remdesivaar and thats a drug used for other purposes thats been out its had very good results for other purposes but it seems to have a very good result having to do with this virus. And that drug also has been approved or very close to approved in that case by the fda and i cant tell you how much we appreciate the fda, these people are incredible patriots and the job that steven hawn is doing, dr. Hahn, one of the most respected doctors in the country by the way, i said are you sure you want to do this . We didnt know this was going to be in the play list what happened here, but he really has stepped up to the plate. Wherever you are where is he . You really have. I would shake his hand but im not supposed to do that. Getting a lot of trouble if i did that but hes been fantastic. I thank you, doctor. Hes going to speak after im finished its a company that has done fantastically well as i understand with ebola and some other things great company. And theyre looking at some very promising events also. So you have recommeremdesvar aq, approved for prescribed use and i think its going to be exciting and it could be a game changer. And maybe not. But i think it could be, based on what i see, a game changer. Very powerful. Theyre very powerful. So i want every american to know that were doing everything we can and these actions are important next steps for the fda to act the way they acted with this kind of speed is an incredible thing. Normally they would say well, we can have it by next year or we can have it by in two years from now you understand, this is the way normally its like years and years and years. They had it immediately. Based on the fact that its been used for other things totally unrelated things we believe these therapeutics and others under evaluation right now will be able to provide relief to Many Americans. We really hope thats going to be this could be a tremendous breakthrough, tremendous breakthrough and we will work towards ap much needed vaccine in the future as i said and what were doing with the fda is so exciting and so many other fields. So many things are happening its a very exciting time for medicine and we appreciate that the American Public has pulled together theyre really staying home and i think theres tremendous spirit in this country right now. A spirit like a lot of people have not seen. People have not seen anything like it for a long time. That means democrat, republican, theyre pulling together i hope everything is going good on the hill. Maybe i shouldnt say this until i check out weight going on because you never know i think theres a great spirit where the democrats, the republicans, and everybody else are getting together and theyre trying to get things done. Most importantly theAmerican Public has been incredible we took the best economy weve ever had and we said stop, you cant work you have to stay home. You know, theres never been a case like this normally you pay a lot of money to get things going. Heres a case where were paying a lot of money to stop things because we dont want people to be together so that this virus doesnt continue onward. Theres never been anything like this in history. Theres never been nobody has ever seen anything like this. Were doing the right thing. We have to get rid of our big war is not a financial war, its a war, its a medical war. We have to win this war. Its very important. With that i would like to just introduce dr. Steven hohn and e he, again, w thank you. I want to thank you for your leadership and thank you for the kind words about the fda staff we have 10,000 scientist, doctors and others and more than that working around the clock to aid the American People in this fight against the coronavirus. Those words are very much appreciated, sir thank you before the president nominated me and i was confirmed and commissioner of food and drugs, i was a cancer doctor ive sat across from countless number of patients and had to talk to them about their diagnosis and treatment and one thing that was really important is to provide hope i have great hope for how were going to come out of this situation. Whats also important is not to provide false hope but to provide hope as a doctor, thats the way i come to this im speaking now to the American People as commissioner of food and drugs that that part of me has not left look at the way the American People have responded to our calls for mitigation for social distancing American People have great resiliency im so incredibly proud of how the American People have responded. As the president mentioned, he asked us to be aggressive, to break down barriers to innovation and accelerate the development of life saving treatments were doing that at the fda. The fda is committed to continuing to provide regulatory flexibility and guidance but let me make one thing clear, fdas responsibility to the American People is to ensure that products are safe and effective and yet we are continuing to do that our folks and their tremendous professionals are working day and night to do this just cant even imagine how much theyre working to provide support for the American People. I thank them since early january, long before the first domestic case, fda began working in collaboration with cdc we stood up at command group and have been focused on the coronavirus since the very beginning of this Public Health emergency. An important part of that work is expanding the potential Therapeutic Options associated with coronavirus we have learn fed from our colleagues across the globe about this i was a Cancer Research before all of this. One thing i know about this great country of ours is we have unbelievable innovators. We have people who every day, its their job to develop treatments for all sorts of diseases we are incredibly blessed as a country to have this as is true in any, these Great American innovator, they have engaged us about the best possible Treatment Options we are looking at everything thats coming across our desks as possible Treatment Options for coronavirus. Were extremely encouraged by the interest and the promise that we have seen from these Great American innovators. Again, we need to look at it, we need the data and information to make the best decisions for the American People but i want to assure you we have over 17,000 people at fda who are doing this every day. We need to make sure the sea of new treatments will get the right drug to the right patient at the right dosage at the right time as an example, we may have the right drug but it may not be an appropriate dosage form now. That may do more harm than good. Those are the things thats our job to look at and thats why its important we have these dedicated professionals looking at these aspects at the same time were working through different mechanisms to get drugs into the hands of providers and patients one of the mechanisms is called compassionate use. If theres an experimental drug thats available, a doctor could ask for the drug to be used in patient. We have criteria for that. The important thing about compassion use and thats what is the president meant, thisis beyond right to try is we get to collect the information about that because one of the things promise the American People is we will collect the data and right the right decisions based upon those data about the safety of the treatments. We are working to make sure these products are safe and effective as they can be let me tell you about a few things were working on. This is a plan that was developed with many of the people at this table, our Infectious Disease experts were looking at drugs approved for other indications. They are already approved for other diseases Many Americans have read studies and heard media reports about an antimalaria drug. Its already approved for the treatment of malaria as well as an arthritis condition thats a drug the president has directed us to take a closer look at whether an expanded approach use can be done to see if it benefits patients. We want to do that in a setting of a large Clinical Trial to gather that information and answer the question that needs to be answered and asked and answered theres a cross Agency Effort about something called convalescence. If youve been exposed to coronavirus and youre better, you dont have the virus in your blood. We could collect the blood this is a possible its not proven. Collect the blood, concentrate that and have the ability once its pathogen free, thats virus free, give that to other patients the immune ru responesponse cou provide a benefit tofacie patie. Thats in the sort of more meaning short term that will be a bridge to other therapies that will take us through to six months to develop. This is a continuous process theres no beginning and end to each of this this is were pushing this through. The other great thing about the great innovators of america, some of them tell us its taken us years to develop theirrapies were trying to provide them the regulatory flexibility but the same time the scientific oversight to make sure that gets done in the best way possible for the American People. The president mentioned theres a vaccine trial being performed. Its a phase one trial its the earliest study. We expect that to take 12 months to get to completion this is record time for the development of a vaccine the fda abt ility fto facility s focusing on timely progress. We want to assure the American People that fda is all hands on deck as the president mentioned. These efforts continue to work to help expedite the work. We remain steadfast in helping to foster the development of safe and effective therapies for covid19thank you mike. Thank you, mr. President. The white house Coronavirus Task force met this morning and on this very first day of spring. We continue to make steady progress toward President Trumps objective not only to marshal the resources of the federal government, every state government, every local Health Official but also to harness the power of the American Private sector and activities over the last they reflect all of those priorities. Last night as you heard the president site the first coronavirus act. It provides paid sick leave and food stassistance for the needy and today as the president indicated, we expect the senate will begin work on an Economic Relief package later today, the president and i will meet again in a teleconference with the nations governors. Outline President Trumps decision to have fema take the lead in our National Coronavirus response our nations response through fema will be locally executed, state managed and federally supported. On testing, we want the American People know that Testing Available in all 50 states its becoming increasingly available, literally every hour of the day because of the Public Private partnership that the president initiated several weeks ago with major commercial labs im pleased to receive a report that tens of thousands of tests are being performed every day. With the passage of last nights legislation, a state and private labs are now required by law to report all coronavirus testing directly to the cdc which will give the American Public and give our researchers