Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 04012020 20240713

Discusses the Coronavirus Response. House5 am, daniel ober discusses how the u. S. Power grid is responding to the pandemic. Host good morning, it is wednesday, april 1, 2020. President trump in the task force released new estimates projecting the deadly virus 100,000240,000 americans even under the current efforts. He warns those numbers could be much higher if they dont follow the guidelines aimed at keeping the virus from spreading. This morning onwashington journal we get reaction to the projections. Also, you could send us a text this morning. You do, please include your name and where you are from. On social media and twitter it is cspanwj. Very good wednesday morning to you. You could start calling in now. Some of the front pages coming off of president Trumps Coronavirus Task force briefing yesterday. This is Washington Post. Dire, thetoll is front page of the new york and this from the front page of the Washington Times. I want everymp american to be prepared for the hard days that lies ahead. We will go through a tough two weeks. Arefully as the experts predicting, as a lot of us are predicting after having studied it so hard we will start seeing some real light at the end of the tunnel. This will be a very painful two weeks. Nightou look and see at the kind of death that has been ,aused by this invisible enemy it is incredible. I was watching last night, governor murphy of new jersey say 29 people died today, meaning yesterday. Others talking about numbers far greater. I know new jersey so well. 29 people. Hundreds another location. We face a difficult few weeks. It is going to be like a burst of light. Strength will be tested and endurance will be tried. America will answer with love and courage. All is the time for americans to come together and do our part. Trumpthat was president yesterday evening at his white house Coronavirus Task force briefing. Getting your reactions in the wake of those latest projections from the white house. 100,000200 40,000 americans could die from coronavirus in the coming weeks and months. Taking your calls on the phone lines. We were just talking about the projected numbers. Here are numbers as they stand today. The total confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States from the Johns Hopkins university 189,632rus dashboard, confirmed cases. Total deaths just over 4000. Yesterday at this time that number was just over 3000. The number on the far right is the good number, 7136 is the number recovered from the coronavirus in the United States. That is the latest from Johns Hopkins university. Up first. Good morning. Caller thank you for taking my call. Know, is wilbert ross is still sec. Of commerce . Who is . From the seen anybody secretary of commerce. Host why do you want to hear from the secretary of commerce . Caller isnt he one of the big economic guys . Anyway, if the 2 death rate, and we expect 100,000 deaths, that means 5 Million People will get this virus. How many percentage of those people need to go on a respirator . Even if it is 10 that means you need 500,000 respirators. I dont get the math on a lot of these things. Nobody is considering the math. I dont know of cspan knows but there was a statement that america only has 160,000 ventilators for 300 Million People. That seems awful low. Is that percentage the same worldwide . Host for a couple of your , his last wilbur ross appearance we aired on cspan was march 5 testifying on the president s 2021 budget. ,ou could watch all the videos over 40 videos with the secretary of commerce on our website at cspan. Org. Wanting toking about hear from the secretary of commerce at this time. Do you feel like Steven Mnuchin has been somebody who has given you confidence in the Economic Situation . Patrick. Wanda is up next in california, good morning. Caller good morning. As far as the numbers go, they cannot put a number on it because they do not know what the number is going to be. Knower thing, how do they where this virus came from . You have americans over there in china. How do to know americans didnt bring it to china . What kind of proof to have that it came from china . He says it like he is definite. Like he knows for sure. What proved us he have . Host on the numbers issued you think it makes sense to prepare americans for that potential . It makes sense that they cannot put a number on it because they do not know. Host this is dr. Anthony fauci speaking with reporters again about that number in these projections. Should americans be prepared for the likelihood that there will be 100,000 americans die . Ayak who yes. Auci the answer is a sobering of a number as it is, we should prepare for it. Will be that much . I hope not. The more we push on the mitigation the less likely it would be that number. Being realistic, we need to prepare ourselves that this is a possibility. Reporter can the country handle such a short period of time . Dr. Fauci it would be difficult. Nobody is denying the fact that we are going through a difficult time right now. We are seeing what is happening in new york. That is really tough. If you extrapolate that to the nation, that would be really tough. That is what it is. We will have to be compared to that. That is based and heavily laden by the data that has come in from new york, new jersey, and connecticut. Peakcan skew to a higher and more significant mortality. If all of the other states and metro areas are able to hold , then it number down is a very different picture. Dataave to predict on the you have, which is heavily skewed to new york and new jersey. That is an important slide. The cluster of other cities that are not new york and not new jersey, if we can suppress that from a spike, the numbers could be significantly lower than what we are talking about. My plea at the end of my remarks here that now is the time to put your foot on the accelerator. Dr. Anthony fauci along with dr. Deborah birx, the Coronavirus Task force coordinator. Speaking alongside the president yesterday. Thoseg your reaction to numbers released yesterday that the president spoke about. Theres one more quote from the president. This could be a hell of a bad two weeks, is their headline. Caller good morning, thank you for for taking our call. I think donald trump has given us good numbers. Wife had some kind of virus real bad and it went on for probably about a month. We fought it, before it really ever came out. Wondering if that was what we had. They were doing tests for antibodies that people can donate blood to help other people. We have a friend that his daughter worked in a nursing home. There something about those antibodies . Also, i wanted to remind people that they can go to www. Shepperdschapel. Com and go to church. Toes chapter five tells you use the prayer. Scott is up next out of california. Good morning. Know if anyone realizes this or even thought about it, it should be obvious to most of us that destructive donald doesnt want any real covid19 testing. He is only showing limited help to hide his actual intention. That may sound like a strong statement. The best thing for his reelection would be a steep curve in cases. Although it would result in more deaths, it would peak the virus earlier than the flatten the curve. A flattened curve would drag on for months. Trump doesnt want to take a chance on it. If you look at the graphs they often show on tv, a steep curve benefits trump in two ways, it gives the people the pandemic over much more quickly. Toesnt help anyone come out and talk about numbers like that . Is that a benefit of any sort of electoral benefit . We are talking about 100,0002 earn 40,000 people dying. The more overall deaths could actually benefit trump. Will be able to say look deaths pandemic, 200,000 and i conquered it. No president has conquered a pandemic as big as i have. Got your point. Keith is in richmond, virginia. Caller good morning and im glad you allowed me to talk to you all in the nation this morning. About the dead right now. We have to realize that we just need to realize there are a lot of people that are hurting out there. A lot of people, a lot of going through things because a loved one has been taken away. It doesnt matter if they are democrat or republican. They deserve respect and dignity. But we are doing as a nation is we are dividing ourselves further. You and yourto ask producers to give us information , about 10 seconds for a moment of silence. So we could remember the dead for a moment. Would you just allow 10 seconds of silence for a moment have a blessed day everybody. Host you dont have to ask, i will give you that 10 seconds. Don is in michigan, good morning. Morning. Ood we have to Work Together as republicans and democrats. Republicans are doing just the opposite. Bill to poison the year air more. Insident obama put standards, trump will destroy them. He is putting judges in the have vowed to destroy health care. That last caller talking about trump,bers, waiting for it could lose for trump if the red states death toll is greater than blue states. Trouble use the higher death rates among the red states and blamed blue states for taking health care. Trump is a divider, a hater, he is destroying this country. Aboutcould you talk michigan and the impact of coronavirus there . Caller about a month ago, sandy patti came to do a concert and she helped spread the virus in particular there. It is a strong evangelical community which voted strongly for trump. Trump is at war and the republicans against michigan. He has told Governor Whitmer you have to find your own stuff because you disrespected me or didnt talk nice to me. Three weeks ago, frontpage infiltratingere michigan teachers union. Host we will stick to the numbers and projections that came out of the white house yesterday. 100,000240,000 deaths. White house warning those numbers could jump up higher if the mitigation and the distancing did not happen. From other models out there, this from the New York Times. At the devised university of washington predicted coronavirus deaths nationwide would soar to almost 60,000 in the month of april. The study suggest the devastation would slow with a total of about 84,000 deaths by august. Lets talk about those numbers today and with those numbers coming out of the white house from yesterdays task force briefing. Just want to get your thoughts. Caller how are you doing . I live in santa maria, california, Santa Barbara county. They tell us they dont have enough people to go around and check what businesses are working that shouldnt. We have a legal vendors and candy trucks going around while we are quarantined in our homes. A lot of people cant work and go to therapy. We need all hands on deck. We need a system that will support us. Together toto pull get this thing straight. People are running around like there is no problem. Host can you tell me more about the illegal food vendors . Caller they have illegal food carts here that sell corn and whatever to kids, anybody. They go around all the time. The mayor of santa maria knows about it. , and the of Police Health department knows about this illegal food sale. It is a bad habit. Wouldnt even take our calls if we see it. Here we are quarantined looking out the window at it. Host when people are worried about the food supply, are there efforts to try to make that legal . Caller this has been going on before that. People in a treat for the neighborhood. There are plenty of stores here. There are stores all around here. The kids are getting food from the school. They are giving out food for the people. They are starting to get towels and toilet paper. We have to have people support us. Going to quarantine down and maintain it we have to have the support from the police and the health department. We will just say it is a bad habit. Host we will be talking more , u. S. The u. S. Food supply agriculture industry coming up at our 8 00 a. M. Eastern our. We will be joined by Philip Brasher for that discussion. Stick around for that conversation coming up in about 40 minutes. Sean is next, gilbert arizona. I want to talk about these masks. The n95 masks. The numbers basically our worst case scenario. That is all i have to say about that. Host what the white house was saying yesterday was that the numbers are projected to be 100,000200 and 40,000, even with the mitigation efforts. We certainly hope those numbers are high. The worst case an area they are saying without mitigation and then those numbers get into the millions. Caller true but they are doing the mitigation right now. They are basing what you are talking about on how affected new yorks and other places close to new york. That is correct. Spoke to thatrx yesterday. Finish your comment. Caller in regards to the n95 masks, they will protect you. They will protect anyone from getting this virus. Only good the surgical masks will do is they will prevent you from giving the virus to someone else. There is a serious misunderstanding in regards to that. The n95 masks as long as they are properly fitted and you dont have a beard or anything cause you to have some type of opening where the virus could get to you, the n95 mask is the only mask that will protect you from getting the virus. On the surgical masks, are you saying you think it is worthless for people to have those . Todaysn entire page of New York Times on how surgical stepbysteph instructions and the schematics on what that surgical mask should look like. Caller they have their uses. The uses are if youre wearing it to prevent yourself from infecting someone else. Fromwill not protect you getting coronavirus. The droplets are big. If they are big, they are only protect your only protection will be the n95 mask. Host thank you for the call. To the numbers you are speaking about and the projections, what they are being based on, want to show dr. Deborah birx of the Coronavirus Task force talking about the new yorknew jersey anders and the projections what those numbers could mean for the rest of the United States. Birx this light is all 50 states and the district of columbia. It shows a stark reality the difference between new york and new jersey and other states with similar populations and urban areas. Our goal over the next 30 days is to ensure the 48 across the bottom maintain this lower level of new cases. With the hope that we dont have significant outbreaks in other states and other metro areas. As the Community Comes together to Work Together and ensure the Health Care Providers around the globe and in the United States are strengthened by our resolve to continue to mitigate community by community. This is done community by community. We all know people are in states and in communities. We are very dependent on each person in the United States doing the same thing. Following the president ial guidelines to a t. I know it is a lot to ask. If you can show the next slide, please. This is what gives us a lot of hope. This is the case finding in italy. Are beginningthey to turn the corner in new cases. They are entering their fourth week of full mitigation. They are showing what is possible when we Work Together as a community, as a country, to change the course of this pandemic together. Is this graphic and the graphic of many of the states that give us hope of what is possible with continuing for another 30 days. I must say that like we warned about detroit and chicago, we start to see changes in massachusetts area new orleans continues to be a problem of new cases. It really shows the depth of dedication of the American People of the Health Care Providers. You could see the strain this puts on it. Together toking stem this tide of unrelenting sick people coming to their doors. Yesterdaydeborah birx at the white house talking about projected numbers, 100,0002 hundred 40,000 u. S. Coronavirus coming out of the task force briefing. That is what we are talking about to you on the phone lines. You can keep calling in, we will get back to your phone calls in just a second. Want to bring in congresswoman shalala. The time this morning. Your reaction to those numbers yesterday out of the white house . Guest i think the numbers are still horrifying. We dont have a treatment. Even though the projections are that we can study this down over a period of time, what we are basically trying to do is to starve the virus by staying at home. Transmission the is not coming from people who have fullblown coronavirus but people that arent showing the symptoms right now. Dangerousvery situation. We just have to find a treatment. Congress has put tremendous resources into the International Search for treatment. Trying to make people whole economically. We are rolling out those programs right now. Hopefully a Health Care Safety net. I am in miamidade county. Our governor just has not issued a stay in place. Host do you think he may in the briefing in the wake of the briefing yesterday . Are you chatting with him . Every elected official is telling him he must. Saveant to stay lives in florida you must issue the stayathome order. Participate ino staying at home, social distancing, washing our hands. That is the only thing that will slow the virus down and begin to starve it until we get a treatment and eventually a vaccine. Oft is miami ready in terms its hospitals and medical systems . This is an area of hurricanes. Plan always had emergency Surge Capacity in our hospitals. Never on this scale. Of abusinghe process public spaces for the possibility of needing more hospital auxiliary. Workforce and making sure we get supplies. It is not easy to get supplies. Masks, all sorts of machines like ventilators have been in short supply. The supply chain is the states are competing with each other to buy these supplies. Some of those states are searching the world for these supplies. Hospitals, idual worry about our hospitals that are in the process of losing millions of dollars. They cancel nonessential operations. They are in fact the way in which hospitals in this country make money. They are really essential at some point. They are bleeding now. They need to make a deep investment in our health care system. The cost of treatment for those of whom who will not cover it. Host you are talking about a fourth Coronavirus Response by congress . When could we see that . What is congresses schedule, when you expect to get her to vote on Something Like that . Democrats in the house are working on the fourth coronavirus, still. The republicans have indicated they want to wait. We are not going to wait. We have been told that after april 20 we have to keep our schedule flexible. Up at a minutes notice. Those of us who are able to go up with the vote will of course go up and pass another bill. The leadership has the package together. Are saying we have got to do some health care some things for the health care system. Protecting people financially when they have to going to the hospital to be treated. Host congresswoman Donna Shalala joining us. I know there are cruise ships right now with infected passengers in discussions about whether they would be able to enter a florida or miami dock. Where are we on that . Guest i have not been in those discussions. To uset they are trying is not the big miami port. In fort lauderdale, the everglades ports. The issue is not whether they could dock. And happens to be patients employees on that ship . To isolatestrategy them to make sure they get the proper treatment . To make sure they dont add infections into the community. It is a planning process as far as im concerned. Of course there is a fear factor. That while we fear the coronavirus, fear itself is a virus. That takes hold them we dont have proper planning and authoritative figures telling us what the best science is. They will land someplace. There will be a plan for the people on board. The most important thing is first to protect the people on board including the workers on board and the people they are going to go into. Can devote that kind of resources. For longhem offshore periods of time is quite dangerous. It is the humanitarian thing to do. It does involve a certain amount of planning. Your thoughts on the information coming out of the task force during these Daily Briefings . How alec is doing his job doing hisis job . Guest i think the scientists have been extraordinary. Burks and the infectious who we have all known time,ght long period of dr. Fauci. Alex has his hand full. Im worried about dr. Fauci. The idea of pulling him out there every day for the briefing. I think the scientists are doing fine. Hink the political leaders the president keeps stepping on the messages. Once in a while he is disciplined, the way he was the other day. Himselfill focusing on and on his reelection. You can see that. That is very unfortunate. Haverats and republicans to come together. The country wants them to come together. The voice that reflects the Public Health information that we have in the scientific information we have. The fact that the president is nonverballyned, disciplined, personally disciplined, and periodically isfuses us with his messages unfortunate and dangerous. It is reckless. I said the other day i thought the president was a danger to our health. He never knew what was going to come out of his mouth that was inconsistent with what the scientists were saying. Both in this state and at the National Level it is clear, consistent, and reflects good information. Host former hhs secretary and congresswoman Donna Shalala. Thank you so much for your time this morning. Stay safe. Back to your phone calls. Phone lines split regionally here. If you are in the eastern or central United States, 202 7488000, mountain or pacific regions is 202 7488001. We were talking with the congresswoman about dr. Fauci, here is a column in todays Washington Post focusing on him. When america most needs a second opinion, dr. Fauci is there. Back to your phone calls. Mike in oak grove, missouri. Morning, john. Hows the democrat hoax treating you . Im totally beside myself over this thing. Reported our Intelligence Agency reported on this two months before it reached us. Donald trump hid that fact instead of letting us get ready. Im very angry about this. Donald trump called this a hoax. Gate matt gaetz played it off by wearing a respirator on the senate floor. Closeor kelly of kansas schools and the republicans moved to hogtie her, saying next she will be coming for her guns. Ron desantis let spring breakers go crazy for two weeks and then go home and spread it across the country. Devon nunez went on youtube to say now is a great time to go to a movie or dinner, the lines are short. This is anything but a democrat hoax. Anybody that can vote republican while this is going on is out of their mind. Anyone who has lost a loved one to this should be able to walk up and slapped donald trump in his face. Int stephen is next illinois. Good morning. About four days ago i about thedocumentary and how it started. It started in november, 2019. Fromst expanded from their china. The way china killed it was having people spray down sidewalks, do everything they could. They were building hospitals and Everything Else. Cctv. Ogram was on host looking for your Text Messages your tweets as well when it comes to this discussion. This is michael in portland, oregon. Those mortality estimates are indeed horrifying. The first time in any living from celebrities, newscasters, studio camera operators, everyone is at mortal risk. For the first time no one can be sure that they or anyone else will be here next year at this time. We areh carolina, hearing myrtle beach is experiencing a huge influx of visitors from new york and new jersey. Asking what are people thinking . Ray North Carolina says it will be tough but i dont believe the numbers will be that high. Numbers that raise referring to were out of ray is referring to are the white house numbers 240,000 deaths00 even with mitigation efforts. Things. I just have two the second one is more important than the first one. That person from missouri that called and said that trump thought it was a hoax, he didnt think the virus was a hoax. If you thought the virus was a hoax he wouldnt have spent 2 trillion to get rid of these problems. The second thing i want to say is we got some people going on in the media. Theis choosing not to show daily updates for the response to this virus. Americans need to know the latest updates. Cnn refuses to run it. They say it is part of trumps trying to win the election. He has given vital information. The president s government doctors are some of the best people to handle this. Not Donna Shalala. She wants you guys to all vote for senile biden and just throw trump out of office. That is ed in georgia talking about the media. Pope francis very early this morning also talk about the media. This was his tweet. Just after 3 00 a. M. Eastern time. That is prayed together for all who work in the media, who worked to communicate to inform us so people are not isolated into educate children. We pray for all of those helping us during this time of isolation. Caller thanks, cspan. Sad but true times. When he fired all of the generals, the generals do these biological weapons are out there. It is kind of weird that it happened during the tariffs. Had thetary probably best advice but he fired them all. It is a sad situation in that sense. Lets pray for this country. It is here and we will have to deal with it. Less america and bless the world. You may have heard about this yesterday, the captain of an american Aircraft Carrier has pleaded with the pentagon for more help with the coronavirus outbreak aboard his ship. Dozens of sailors have been infected. In a four page letter, the captain laid out a dire situation unfolding aboard the warship theodore roosevelt, which has more than 4000 crewmembers. He described what he said was the navys failure to provide him with that proper resources by moving sailors off the vessel. We are not at war, sailors do not need to die. If we do not act now we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset. The carrier is currently docked in guam. Mobley, told cnn in an interview that the navy was working to move this sailors off the ship but there were not enough beds in guam to accommodate the crew. Recommended offloading his entire crew and then quarantining and testing them while the ship was professionally cleaned. You could read more on that in the New York Times today. That story widely reported in other newspapers and news sites. Good morning. I saw part of the presentation yesterday. I dont see how we will mitigate the curve at this point. Wyndham doesnt have testing kits yet. That is one example. Market is going to have gyrations. To really mitigate the curve, it is going to be an economic disaster. Bind. In a real it is really hard to see the future. Deaths, i dont know if that is the middle range number or the highend, that is a lot of people. A real bind blowing number. Im beside myself. Curve andending the mitigation efforts. Heres more from yesterdays Coronavirus Task force briefing with dr. Anthony fauci. Dr. Fauci virus, if left to its own the voices we will have that curve that dr. Birx showed you. The other Dynamic Force is what we are doing, trying to do, and will do in the form of mitigation. These are very revealing bits of data. Ou saw what happened in italy you make the turn around the curve and you go. That doesnt happen all at once. Steps, which ie will, you will see why we are really convinced that mitigation is going to be doing the trick for us. What you have is increase in new cases at a certain rate. With the increase in new cases, when it begins to level off, the secondary effect is less hospitalization. The next effect is less intensive care. The next is less deaths. The deaths and the intensive care and hospitalization always indicationthe early that there are less new cases per day. The way you saw in italy and the way we will likely see i dont want to jump the gun, we are seeing inklings of this right now in new york. See, weare going to have to brace ourselves in the next several days to a week or so, we will continue to see things go up. We cannot be discouraged by that. Is actuallyon working and will work. Whereide dr. Birx showed you sign new york, new jersey, our goal which i believe we can the new yorks, new jerseys, help them get around that curve. Importantly, to prevent clusters of areas that have not yet gone to that spike to prevent them from getting to that spike. The answer to that is mitigation. Had clearly have had an effect. Although it is tough to quantitate because of those imposing forces, the reason we feel so strongly about the necessity of the additional 30 days is that now is the time whenever you are having an effect not to take your foot off the accelerator but to just press it down on the accelerator. I know what i hope and we can do over the next 30 days. Host dr. Anthony fauci at the white house yesterday. There is another briefing scheduled for today. We will bring it to you on cspan. Good morning. Host go ahead with your comment. Caller im calling with concerned about the 500 kids that were kidnapped, if they were still alive at the border of california. Get a chance to see the relatives. This illness have themselves, just inches away from each other. Someone should be concerned about that. Talking about those in immigration custody . Caller right. Host a story on that from the Washington Times today. Immigration activist stepping up campaign to force ice to release migrants amid the coronavirus crisis. Taking the streets of california and a driveby protest demanding the emergency shutdown order for federal detention facilities in the state of california. In washington, the congressional saying thoseus being held by Customs Enforcement be released, and those being processed at the border should be immediately released as well. There may be some exceptions for dangerous, illegal immigrants. Most doing held should be freed according to the caucus leaders statement. Time for a few more calls in this first segment of washington journal. Caller good morning. That was great timing. To finally hear from one of the open border liberal democrats calling concerned about the illegal criminal aliens trying to come across the border. We need to renew that conversation. It is ironic right now. States with the coronavirus are two sanctuary states, new york and new jersey. Proopen borders, let anybody in, lets talk about that now. I want to put aside this whole mess blaming President Trump and our experts. Not hearing anything about the open borders. That is why these states are peaking. A topic we will talk about in our next segment has to do with immigration and legal visas. The visas for immigrant workers, especially amid concerns about the food supply and how you keep those folks safe. It is time to close our borders and protect our country against everything. It is to vet and make sure we are not imposing risks into our country. Host do you think immigrant laborers should be let in . Should we shutdown the visa program . We need toporarily, shut down all immigration. Especially the illegal immigration. This, the left has gone silent on this issue. Nothing like this coronavirus has come along to show the and obvious harm for being a sanctuary state and embracing illegal immigration. You cannot check to see if they are diseased when they come across the border. Also we want to give them our taxpayer money. Not even citizens. We need to use that money to protect our citizens against diseases, pandemics, and other problems. We need to have a secure country input america first. We have not been doing that. Instead, mortgaging our future and our grandkids future and exacerbate impact of pandemics and even worse. In southt is dandy carolina, this is dave in florida. On the line we reserved for medical professionals. What kind of work do you do . Caller im a cardiologist. Host your thoughts this morning on the numbers . The briefing that trump gave the other day was nothing friend whoor his donated 6 million to his campaign. Trump has been lying all along. He started off with this story about how there would only be 15 cases and it would just go away like a miracle. As it turns out, it is becoming a huge disaster. He never really did close down the border from china. To entire time he claimed have close down entrance to the chinese, people that were citizens of the United States were coming and going from china constantly. That is another one of his big lies. Again, trump told us who he was from the beginning. He told us he could shoot somebody in the middle of fifth avenue and his more on followers would still vote for him. It just proved that the gop isnt even a Political Organization anymore. It is a psychiatric diagnosis. Are you being called in to help respond to this . It is turningrse, into a nightmare scenario that not even a stephen king or Steven Spielberg could have imagined. It is a horror movie. If we had competent leadership from the beginning in my opinion if there was a civics test before they handed out Voter Registration cards we wouldnt have this problem. Trump would not be the president. Host villas next out of middleton, new york. Live about 30 miles north of new york city. When i go to the Grocery Store, maybe one other person in the entire Grocery Store would be wearing a mask. They wouldnt be observing social distancing. Likeof the people acted nothing had changed. Host have things change now . Caller i dont know, i havent been to the store. People were not observing social distancing. Is finding people because they are not staying apart. It should be obvious to everybody that lives here, the reason these people are in the hospital, the reason the curve is so high is because they are not hunkering down. Thank god for donald trump is what i have to say. Have a good day. Our next callers from florida, good morning. Caller how are you this morning . Host im all right. Caller you are doing a very good job as far as keeping the callers on point. I appreciate it. Is suggestion rather, i heard dr. Ron paul, medical doctor on his show the a 3040 year member of congress who knows how government works. They were talking about a different approach as far as testing. A random testing, maybe take 1000 people and get more accurate numbers. A more representative take on this virus thing. Also, dont take this the wrong way please, but i have mentioned this to cspan. You can hear a lot of the callers. They politicize everything. I think that has hurt our country as far as resolving issues that affect us all. I like tie you divided the calls this morning on pacific versus eastern, central. God bless those folks on the coast getting up at 4 00 in the morning. Give them a fair share of the calls. I think we would actually get a more representative take on things. Do you think the country has come together in the past couple weeks . In what is expected to be a very rough few weeks ahead that the country will come together more . To answer that, no, i dont believe it has. You could judge that on the calls. Even when you dont have democrat and republican line, they are still politicizing democrats versus. It is talking points. It is not real opinions i dont fully whether they know it or not. They are earned on cable channels of choice the night or. Msnbc, fox, or whatever. Far aser thing is as gauging the economy, they are using the stock market. I think people should just take a look around at their neighbors. Is leftestroying what of the middle class. Mom and pop businesses are being killed. I dont believe they are going to survive this. Told onhat we are being the box in the living room, lets go back to using our own minds again. Byeally believe cspan can way keeping the calls away from democrat republican and do what you are doing. You can still have three lines and divide it like you have been with the regions and it might be more fair to the folks on the west coast who are getting up at 4 00 in the morning to do it that way. I like where you are going with the beard. Its gonna be good. Host thats phil in port orange, florida. One other story to mention in this opening segment this morning. Shalala, ao donna story about one of her colleagues on capitol hill out of new york, freshman democrat announced he was going to be deployed to the National Guard to assist in the city Coronavirus Response. It cap in the army National Guard and decorated combat veteran in afghanistan who represents Staten Island and parts of southern brooklyn and chose to deploy to do my small part to combat the pandemic and will help out hospitals in Staten Island and other parts of new york. Thats gonna do it for this segment of the washington journal this morning but stick around, plenty more to talk about including up next we will brasher on theil impact of coronavirus on the u. S. Agriculture sector and later we will be joined by dr. Allison hajek, an emergency medical doctor to discuss the latest on the u. S. Response and how it is impacting emergency rooms. Agriculture secretary sonny perdue has sent this video message to americas Agriculture Sector and he pinned tweet on his twitter page. [video clip] this morning i want to speak from my heart to all you folks out there working on the frontline of our Food Supply Chain. America,oiled in youve provide such abundant healthy, wholesome, affordable label food that we take you for granted. For all you people from the people who were stocking the shelves, people who were driving the truck to get the food to us who are processing the food and the people who grow the food and all the vendors that supply our farmers to help them grow the food whether its fertilizer, feed or seed or any other input, thank you so much for what you are doing. I know these are Uncertain Times but i want to tell you from my heart as an american citizen i am so grateful for what you are doing and i want to thank you for doing that. I know theres a lot of confusion about teleworking and all that. You have jobs that cant telework and we know that. We have inspection workers in the front lines day in and day out to make sure food is safe. Ii, we hadr agricultural deferments caused by Food Supply Chains was so important and thats what you are doing. Farmers, the farmers to go day in and day out the produce this food in this packaging. In the stocking of the shelves. Checking out people, you are vital to our economy and the needs of having a food supply. You probably heard me say before its due right and feed everyone. We cant do that alone in the usda but you are doing it. I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for what youre doing day in and day out. Stay in the job, make sure the America America knows that they depend on you. Youre the one for can make that happen. Bless you, stay safe and god bless america. Washington journal continues. Host the focus on coronavirus and u. S. Agriculture with Philip Brasher. For people who are right now seeing nothing but soldout Grocery Store aisles, what is going on in the agriculture industry when it comes to the impact of coronavirus, what are people seeing behind those aisles. Guest a lot is going on. Disruption of the last couple of weeks have been. Primarily, you have a lot of people courting and buying lots of food. A lot of other things. The supply chain is not set up for a surge like that so it takes a little while to get caught up. Cattle lots of hens and and pigs in this country, they are set to move through the system at a certain pace. The other really big thing thats happening is you have a massive shift for restaurants, in some casesail thats different products, different types of products, different types of produce, the bulk of that has to be shifted to retail. Unfortunately some of this may go to waste. Particular the fresh produce. Just thisis is is created all sorts of logistical challenges and otherwise, this whole shift and the rush to supermarkets. There is plenty of food to go around. In todays New York Times asked the question will the coronavirus threaten our food, the questionnaire. If it does, where would the strain happen first . What should we be watching for to keep that from happening . Chain all along the food have been working on this furiously for the last couple of weeks working with Government Agencies including Agriculture Department in the food and Drug Administration and the epa. Transportation departments, theres been a lot going on behindthescenes. But to your question, theyre all sorts of different points, you have to make sure you have an adequate number of truck drivers, make sure you have the workers staying healthy. One of the big concerns is federal inspections and thats because you cant packing plants cannot operate and slaughter animals and moving through the system unless there federal inspectors on site. A big concern early on anyway to continue concern is those inspectors stay healthy until someone gets sick as our backup personnel, usda which is responsible for inspecting meet has been working on that, we will see how well theyve done and one some problems cropped up. There are a number of places along the food chain where you have disruptions. It could have an impact primarily on prices initially. Host Philip Brasher is our guest. Easy enough to find. Segmentcall in on this as we talk about u. S. Agriculture and Food Supply Chain in the phone line split up in the eastern or central United States. If youre in the mountain or pacific regions. A special those who work in the agricultural industry, we would like to hear from you. 2027488002. Want to talk about that to truly know the stimulus package in any of that will help a bit of a breakdown from the usda on the money that was included in that package. 14 billion dollars to replenish the Commodity Credit Corporation , who have been impacted. Specifically by the virus. Tother to expand access broadband in rural america. Start with the biggest number they are and what is the Commodity Credit Corporation. Use that toable to have the commodity programs, the commodity payments in congress replenishes it, theyve also used it for the last couple of years to make trade assistance payments. About 14. 5 was billion. Making the payments to compensate farmers for the impact primarily with china. The tariff or with china. They provided another 14 billion for that account presumably usda will be doing another round of those direct payments to farmers but they should have somewhere close to enough money for that. The other big one you mentioned aside 9. 5 billion set for livestock producers, whats called specialty crops that produce vegetables, thats the produce industry which is been disruptionrd by this and a lot of growers and shippers in the produce that they cant sell. Also local systems, farmers markets, farmers to sell into those farmers markets and csas and so forth. They could give for that as well. Philip brasher joining us. In an age of coronavirus. The special phone line for those who work in the agricultural industry, 2027488002. Other line split up regionally as we have done in recent days and weeks here. A topic that came up in our last segment this morning was immigration and the concern about there being another enough immigrant workers to secure the food supply. Can you talk about that concern on that front . Another issue that cropped up quickly and thats because this is the time of year when the state department and the Labor Department are working to approve applications for Foreign Workers to command to work in agriculture instead of a spec thats as special visa program. These workers often require interviews of consulates and embassies primarily in mexico but in a few other countries including south africa, central america, guatemala. Is that theens state department essentially is starting to shut down practical purposes these embassies and consuls in mexico. Great concern among agriculture groups about their ability to get these workers into the thetry in time for springfield to work with planning. Very important for vegetables. But other sectors as well. Scrambling to do something about that. Last week the state department came out and said they would waive these interviews for a large percentage of these a greatts and so thats part of the way towards dealing with that issue, still concern the process goes forward for some lingering concerns about farmers coming from south africa and some other countries. Some reaction to that state Department Decision last week you were referring to with the American Farm bureau, a statement from their president from last week, we applaud the administration for recognizing contributions of those workers that they make two farms across this country to ensure americans have access to healthy affordable food acknowledging the Critical Role of immigrant farm laborers by expanding the number of eligible while ensuring families continue to have access to stable food sources. Workers in the program represent 20 of the workforce so the contributions are necessary as winter a critical time in the planting season. Our guest, phil brasher, phone lines up for you. Lynn is up first of hawthorne, go ahead. Im a senior and i can transportation is dependent upon my mother. And we only get out for necessary things like food and other things, i live in putnam county, florida and theres a paper factory at georgiapacific in our county i cant understand the 17 Different Stores in one week and have not been able to find toilet paper and also rubbing alcohol. I understand hospitals probably need those but im a diabetic and i need rubbing alcohol. Wondered why they werent supplying the stores. Host Philip Brasher on supply chain issues. Guest its important for people to hear because when you buy more than you need, you make it difficult for people who either cant afford to buy a large supply or are having trouble getting to the stores and thats a lot of folks these days. It is difficult for the supply chain to deal with this, this is a real issue that consumers need to think about. Need. T you the stores will still be open, their essential infrastructure that are exempt from all the stayathome orders when you buy more than you need, you make it tougher for someone who is not in a position to go shopping and buy large quantities. Host the economist who wrote asking questions with the will threaten our food, he notes Domestic Production is not the only problem. United states relies on foreign supplies from us 20 of its food. In thomas 25 american cheese comes from italy, those imports are at risk, number another threat is those nations and others will take steps to protect their own Food Supplies, a major exporter of flour. The suspended exports of those products. Our foodspending supply in United States to countries abroad . And that are not something the United States government has been opposed to. You create all sorts of problems when you do that. With other countries not to do the same things. Havet happens when you large spikes in prices. You see these sort of bands cropping up, i think one of the issues we are watching for is to the extent to which we have disruptions, we certainly have that in china early on with covid19s first was raging over difficultmade it very to move product into and within china, we have not seen that here but things arent slowing down, the good thing is for the United States is for the most part we produce way more than we can use. Much of our agricultural relies heavily on exports because we produce with such prodigious production. Host a comment from tammy in new mexico the our text message service. Food pantries are desperate, why dont they donate the produce, the producers were talking about especially time sensitive ones. Guest they are trying to do that. Its a challenge, one of the things they are asking the usda to do is to the federal for reading programs, there is definitely an effort to do that. , they are working for just that very thing. Challenge andical it takes time. Host if there ever was a better time to do with spring around the corner, at least you might have something to eat. I planted my potatoes yesterday. This is out of lexington, south carolina, good morning. You are on board on. Caller thank you for taking my call. I was amazed by how quickly things can dry up in the markets and it seems to be the Mainstream Media is hellbent on creating a panic and making people rush the store. I want to help the food supply. Panic. Le really now where we point could lose everything. Much,ple panicked too they would have to go out and get other peoples food, you have to suspend the constitution and create martial law. Estimates on Food Supplies drying up . Guest again, we have plenty of food. What happens is you create these backlogs in the food supply. The other thing that happens is you create volatility in prices and have the shortages. Thats really been happening in the meat sector of the last couple of weeks. Thats because we have this tremendous surge in panic buying really a couple weeks ago now, people emptied the shelves. We have plenty of production, it just takes several days to catch up. To herres that we go pretty wellstocked now. The most part and adjust it creates disruptions to catch up. Volatility and a lot of volatility in prices. Washington state, brian works in the Agriculture Sector. Caller i work in farm processing. Processing the facility. Farm raised the product. What is your question or comment today . Caller bottom line is the first one that concerns me is across United States here on the first of november from the west coast to east coast and back and when i broke the middle of the country and got towards the east coast i was appalled at how many flooded crop fields i was seeing. I was seeing beat feels that had circle for but circle pivots with four feet of standing water on irrigated fields. That has to be a major issue there for inventory. But aside from that my buddys work in the produce warehouses, one sells and one buys in one and one hauls. I asked how business is going and they were saying they were concerned about the loss of their sales to the School Food Program inventory that those were being eased by the irregular retail consumption due to customer over stocking or extra purchasing or hoarding. And it was like a 30 number there that those School Programs were responsible for their warehouse inventory but they were being made up for just by the retail customer extra buying or hoarding. Guest we had an incredible amount of flooding in the middle class. There was a believe in roughly speaking the didnt get planted, primarily there some other crops. We still have plenty of supplies. Wellnot forecasted as below the ground is so saturated. But we are on track to have what looks like a good planning season. As far as those disruptions, that is whats happened. The closing of schools is a big issue because the food was going to schools needs to go somewhere else. Take those halfpoint cartons of milk. You dont buy those of the Grocery Store. Where do they go. It creates other issues. Products that are sold in the schools are not necessarily with , as which bind the retail very easy transition there. The the think schools are doing for low income students is making grab and go meals. , those are schools different than what they would be selling preparing in the school cafeteria. There are changes you have to work through. Talking about possible waste. This is rick from our Text Messaging Service saying i work at a large farm greenhouse establishment in southern virginia. Spring and fall i work three to four days a week. Im afraid on two fronts. That we may not be allowed to supply that we depend on in the second, the waste involved that we might face with a surplus of produce that we cannot move. This is out of georgetown, texas. Good morning. Im 81 years old, from california. My husband worked for Pan American Airlines as supervisor. Time preparing frozen meals for the passengers and then they took over. I understand summer assistance, getting food to people. But what concerns me is when i see these arenas that are being converted for what looks like 1000 beds. Im thinking the logistics of how you deal with this many people under one roof. Challenges isajor getting food to them. My mind thinks of the someone is going to have to do the work to fix on this. Because it will break down i think. Host as you are talking about that you also talk about efforts to increase the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program because it plays in to this issue here. All these Little Things that you dont really think about, a lot of people do after think about them. Intendede of that food can address can be used for the issue that she brings up. In terms of foodstamp programs. ,utrition assistance programs the this to trillion dollar stimulus bill the president past and the president signed on another 15. 5d billion for the additional demand thats expected for snap benefits. Millions at work. We are going to have another , high priority for democrats and House Speaker nancy pelosi is to have a temporary increase in snap benefits. In the amount that a person or family can get. Temporarilywas thatg that Great Recession benefit eventually snapped back to the normal standard level. Its been there. Democrats are pushing to get an increase of about 15 . Host good morning. Caller yes. Store, i a grocery stock right now. Concerned because we have a few People International chain and locally who have been tested whative for the virus and is the problem, my concern is pushing the virus around through the system and handling that ,tuff and getting it to people that really concerns me because i understand that can happen and this is kind of new for us. Being happy trump supporter day. Thats all. Host on the first part of the comment. Guest that is an issue, the workers i mentioned that this is concerned having workers have to quarantine, having to plant anywhere along the chain you create disruption worse comes to worse you have to shut down because of an outbreak, it hasnt happened that im aware of. Of food getting you cant im seeing is leave the virus on service surfaces. Thats good reason to keep washing your hands. A lot of recommendations when you bring stuff to make sure you clean it off. A virus is on the surface. Host last call from march in michigan. Caller good morning. Thank you for taking my call. Just a question regarding the foreign and visa worker program. Why couldnt we get the Education Department and make some kind of program for the College Students that are not attending school at the moment and work out a deal where the students could go ahead and work in agriculture and help repay their debts. Thank you. Guest interesting suggestion. Supposedly these College Students are taking online courses. Once that i know are, the ones the teachers and professors i know are teaching these courses. But on the bigger issue of getting people to work in agriculture, it is extremely difficult to talk to anybody, often they will work for a short amount of time and then take off and thats an other sectors as well. Particularly in agriculture, it is extremely difficult, i come from texas and its extremely , its hard work, its to work in the fields in the summer. Brasher, on twitter you can find them at agri pulse as well. Appreciate your time this morning. Joined by we will be an emergency room doctor alyson hannigan. On the about much needed front whats needed on the front lines in the battle against the coronavirus pandemic. Later a discussion on how the electric grid is holding up with daniel of wired magazine. West Virginia Governor responded to a question about the aclu of West Virginia constitutional concerns over his executive order requiring visitors from to selfquarantine for days when they enter the state. [video clip] we want to be respectful constitutional right. People are dying all over this country right and left. What allbeyond belief of us are trying to deal with. We are dealing with an absolute pandemic and people are dying all over the place and im trying to do everything i possibly can to protect our people and i will do that. Im couldnt do that to the fullest extent that i possibly can. And from the standpoint of people coming in from new york or wherever, italy, china, wherever they are coming from, the have to quarantine themselves for 14 days. I wont take the time issue with it. Im gonna try and protect our people. And right now we dont want people coming in from any state, but especially want the people to know the people coming in here from new york, new jersey, connecticut. We expect them to selfquarantine for 14 days. If they dont do it, we will do it quickly. It ween if they dont do will see them being obstructing justice and a real issue. Yorkve the people from new and connecticut and new jersey. One of my best friends growing up my whole life, mike and i play golf and did everything together. And hes atogether surgeon in connecticut. But we can have mike here right now. Thats understood. These can have to quarantine himself and thats a simple as that. If you miss any live coverage of the governments response the coronavirus out break. Watch at any time at cspan. Org coronavirus. From Daily Briefings by the president of the White House Task force to updates from governors of the hardest hit states. Its all there. Use the charts and maps to track the global spread and confirmed cases the u. S. County by county. Coronavirus webpages your fast and easy way to watch cspans unfiltered coverage of the pandemic. Washington journal continues. Host a view from the front lines of the coronavirus fight. She is board member with the American College of Emergency Physicians. Dr. Haddock, you first just described what your days are like these days of the hospital and how you are spending them. Guest it is a busy time around the country, we are seeing the number of Covid Patients we are seeing escalate every day. Harris county currently has 563 cases and its a change in our workflow in this new age the pandemic. Job on theis your front lines . Guest i see anyone who comes in the door for any problem they might be having medically. Whether thats related to covid or the traditional things we would see like abdominal pain or toe infection. In this era of covid one of the challenges we have is trying to sort out those who are more likely to have covid and that requires a high level of protection for those caring for them. Reset the other patients. How do you do that when sorting out. Guest the main thing we do is ask about symptoms. At the beginning we were asking about travel history, had you been to an area where youre more likely to be exposed to the virus. We we know is widespread throughout the United States. Have you had fever or cost and then cough and or other symptoms that can still represent covid like diarrhea for example. Seen byet them only healthcare workers were wearing all the proper protective equipment to prevent transmission. Are doing tou sorting, what you wearing . Describe your ppe, thats the phrase, what that looks like. When any emergency physician is seeing patient suspected to have covid, they need to be wearing maximum protection so that includes a mask, the American College of emergency physician recommends that an n95 mask is worn when dealing with the physical exam on our patients. Whether its the heart of their lungs, cough or breathe heavily, that could expose us to the virus or droplets. So those masks, you have to be professional fit for them. They are very specialized fibers in them. Filtering out all the viral particles that could be entering. When of scouting up to see im wearing that mask and goggles or face shield to protect my eyes and nose for many droplets of virus the patient to transmit. And those are the pieces of personal protective equipment you really need to care for a covid patient. Host jeff to change that with every patient . Every patient. Especially in Emergency Department we dont know the test results on every patient. We are seeing them may have symptoms but just because you have that you may not have covid. You want to if youve one patient did one who didnt, the personal protective equipment particularly gown and the gloves from one infected patient infected. Worldwide there is a shortage of personal protective equipment. We know that these specialized masks take a lot of time to make and the rate at which we are using the personal protective equipment is unprecedented. Weve never seen consumption of this equipment at this rate but it is absolutely necessary to protect our Frontline Health care workers. Haddock is ouron guest this morning. Taking your questions and comments from the front lines of the coronavirus fight. Phone lines a bit differently this morning. Setting aside a special line for medical professionals. Other byes2 regionally. Eastern or central United States, 2027488000. In the nor pacific region, 2027488001. About thek, you talk American College for Emergency Physicians, folks who dont know what is that, you are a board member there, what has been your goal in the past weeks and this pandemic as this has spread . Guest the American College of Emergency Physicians as a professional organization. We have about 40,000 members who are largely Emergency Physicians and Emergency Physicians in training. Medical students will someday become Emergency Physicians. We want the highest quality Emergency Care to be delivered in the Emergency Departments across america. Forre one of the leading that. When of the biggest issues has been making sure we were talking about earlier to protect Health Care Workers and make sure we are able to continue providing that highest quality of care for patients. Host what we know about the rates of Emergency Physicians and some nurses catching this . Guest we dont have a lot of details yet. One of the challenges and difficulties is testing is definitely something we are tracking. We know even a few weeks ago there were several Emergency Physicians. One in the new york area and seattle area where they were hardest hit earliest who were in Critical Care being treated for covid infections. Short on the supplies were talking about and what is the followup on them . Know Emergency Physicians around the country are trying to be very careful, trying to conserve the use of supplies is much as we can while still making sure that we are optimizing these. How can you reduce some of the supplies reuse some of the supplies . Guest the n95 is a onetime use item. But its also been able to be used as a onetime use item because i would typically only see one or fewer patients needing a mask so in past years ive used primarily for seeing patients suspected of having or new had active tuberculosis because thats a disease that can be filtered out. Now we are be using that for the entirety of our shifts routinely around the country and the cdc saying that should be safe. One of the challenges when you are moving that mask to go from patient room to patient room making sure youre not contaminating it and we are looking at ways that those can be safely sterilized or be used for multiple ways because we know theres not enough Global Supply of those masks that provide the protection we need. Host what about what you are wearing in the rooms . The hazmat suits that we sometimes see pictures of in the news . That varies hospital to hospital. But the gowns are known to be safe as well for protecting you against the virus. Host taking your phone calls, we will start with evelyn out of connecticut. Good morning. Caller good morning. I want to say thank you for being an emergency room doctor at this time and subjecting yourself to all that risk. Ive had this idea ive been trying to put out there. Machine,user of cpap mine is called usingifies my cpap mask an ozone or activated oxygen. He put the mask in the bag and turned the Little Machine on and 35 minutes later it sterilizers. I call the company and they have proof that it kills sars and hospitals know that have ozone machines where they will purify whole room. Im just here to suggest that those simple, theres another one on television now and theres another one obviously using the one called so clean. You can put your mask in their and im pretty sure it takes about 35 minutes and then you have to let the one that i have, some of them are a lot shorter. Host unmask sterilization. Guest one of the things unmask sterilization is the n95 masks are made of more of a papery material instead of a plastic so some of the techniques that are used to clean plastic may not be valid for them because they might degrade the quality of the mask so it sounds like something similar to what evelyn was describing which is a hydrogen that comeschine gently be used to sterilize the mask. I think were going to need ideas like hers coming out to make sure we have enough for the frontline workers. Timothy out of wisconsin. Good morning on that line for medical professionals. What line of work are you in in the medical industry . Caller thank you for cspan. Im an anesthesiology provider. Weve been hearing about these new rapid coronavirus testing and it wanted to know how that will benefit treatment of patients and if you have any insight on what the sensitivity and specificity of those tests will be . I dont know the details. I can say rapid coronavirus testing had enough for the viewers might not know what that means, will the test be positive if its present. If we are testing in the Emergency Department and essentially going to downgrade the amount if the test is negative seems to be we need a very High Sensitivity test. If we have one of those tests that would be hugely beneficial because we conserve ppe for those who have coronavirus and not use it for those who dont. Lack of testing is been a huge challenge for us in terms of knowing who is infected and who is not. Test,when you call for a how long does that process take and when do you know the results and what do you do with that person in the meantime . Guest the timeline is highly varied, different labs have different turnaround times and we are seeing wait times in some cases and places around the country of up to a week so its a very long time especially with patients admitted to the hospital. Most of those tested around the releasedthe cdc has that for testing in the highest priority is for those second admitted to the hospital. Imagine if we are waiting for a week for that test and it turns out to be negative, that means thea week in the hospital first the person cleaning the room, all those people have been using the maximal protective equipment which is what they need to do. But having a faster testing regimen would allow us to conserve ppe and provide better care. As a patient were anxious want to know if you have this or not and know how the outcome of the current symptoms will turn out and being able to know that is a great benefit for the Health Care Workers. Caller good morning. I have question about testing the end its basically theres 80 of the people dont know that theyve had this, dont know if they are contagious. The university of miami on our local news said there is a devised antibody test, a blood test that takes advantage the takes five minutes that everyone can take and you know whether youve had it or you havent had , i canve had it already go back and help other people who havent. So what of the unity about testing americans. Guest i think a lot of this research is still in its infancy. I agree with reviewer that theres a lot of benefit if we can test and discover people are immune to coronavirus that would allow them to potentially resume their activity and in the meantime before we have that testing, Emergency Physicians really encourage everyone to stay home and stay safe. We dont know if we may have had a for sure, we dont know who may be in a symptomatic carrier which your viewer also alluded to. Everyone needs to behave at all times right now. Which means that six foot distance. In doing everything you can to limit your social contact with others to make sure we are minimizing transition. What do you do . Emt firefighter, ive been in the medical school for quite a long time, but what ive been trying to do for the last three weeks probably is to get out there that for an alternative, why not try the surgical gauze . We put it over the wound to keep the germs out and its seethrough enough for you can breathe through it so i put on like the surgical strips and put the adhesive waterproof table tape over it and thats much better i think where i spoke to the doctor last week and he said good idea, go to go to the cdc guidelines. Aboutwhere you have having to use the masks over again from patient to patient and that didnt make sense to me with the same mask on because you could be spreading it further. My thoughts were even with the people trying to make those selling masks, why not put 4 x 4 youe inside of it or over so that you can reuse that. That was where im trying to get it out there to the public and i didnt know who to go to. I went to the Governors Office in ohio on the telephone, by the time i got back it was so misconstrued that youre an emt looking for masks. I was trying to tell you please try that because its available everywhere especially since we are not doing elective surgeries. Lets get it out there and give that a shot over a bandana because thats what the guidelines are. You might as well put your shirt up over your nose and cough into that. You for your service as a first responder. The m night the n95 mask in particular are difficult to replace with anything but n95 masks or respirators which are that seal cap that you put over your head. That can filter out those particles. Things like gauze may be acceptable as alternatives to this but really cant replace that micron filtration. I will say with those used from room to room, their are used with a face shield over them which is clean from room to room. The transmission should be not really possible. On twitter with this comment. I recently was at an er and dont recall seeing those. He mentioned doctors and nurses with First Responders. First people came in contact with were those inquiring about insurance information. Arent ages vulnerable . Guest thats unsecured registration clerk he might be referring to. Are getting up close and physically touching doing physical maneuvers were at higher risk so there is Different Levels of equipment that are needed based on your level of exposure. I hope we are making sure everyone working at the hospital has an adequate level of protection but the closer you are to a patient, the closer contact is. I wonder if you have thoughts about the wearing of the surgical masks by the general public. The New York Times today has a pattern printed out a fullpage about how this how to sew a facemask and its desperate stepbystep directions. Guest it sounds like they are recommending or suggesting offering instructions on how to do a home designed mask, probably made out of cloth or at least that of household items. I will say with surgical masks being in short supply the most important thing is getting those into our Frontline Health care workers, paramedics, emts and others providing that frontline medical care. Just therecommend public use those right now. On top of using cloth masks or homemade masks i think its something that is evolving. Caller good morning. Ive got a question and a comment, i would like to know ont the doctors thoughts pinkeye. My wife is had pinkeye for three days and i have a videoconference call with my doctor and like 20 minutes to check her out. She has no symptoms are fever, just the pinkeye. Host are you concerned about coronavirus being a symptom . Caller yes because im seeing on the news that pinkeye could be a sign of corona. Fever, wed, she is no feel well. But i want to know the doctors thoughts on that. Ifst if that pete host that patient came in. Guest i cant comment on any specific patient of not seeing. I cant say its a common symptom or illness caused by coronavirus but its also really challenging because coronavirus can be asymptomatic. Thats what im was saying earlier about the need for distancing. We cant see in the individual does or does not have it based on the symptoms of anytime without testing. Im glad the caller has an appointment with telemedicine. That is something we are strongly encouraging as Emergency Physicians. That allows an opportunity for physicians to evaluate patients and provide care to patients without increasing the risk of exposure by them walking through a lobby or getting into an office. Everyone involved in that process. The more that we can use telemedicine to make sure people are safe and healthy, the better right now. Spent much of your day doing this and how much is in the emergency room. I am not currently a provider of Telehealth Services but our numbers around the country are getting more and more gauge on the country. Changes duringte the pandemic which are very appreciated by us that expand the use of telehealth to reach out. Theres aple requirement that any patient is evaluated for a medical emergency and thats really an important part of our mission as Emergency Physicians that we are seeing anyone coming in with any complaints regardless of their insurance status or anything like that. There has recently been a change in the regulations so that evaluation if needed can be performed by telehealth and thats an amazing change for us. To let us be able to optimally see patients while protecting them from protecting for another thing able to is as our workforce starts to have increased exposure to coronavirus and as physicians may be asked to be at home for the possible exposure and the possibility they could have coronavirus may be not be feeling terribly ill and be able to work. A physician was had an exposure to potentially work from home. To see patients in Emergency Department that they would normally see in person reserving was there in person to take care of that. Which is a great opportunity for us. Host how much is the administration reaching out to the American College of Emergency Physicians. How much did Congress Reach out as they were crafting the now three response bills. We have been in close contact from them and are excited about some of the changes we are seeing. There is always more being done. We seen a lot of positive movement. The telemedicine is a great example, another issue thats been big for us, in order to Practice Medicine in a particular hospital you have to be licensed by the state you are in and credentialed by the hospital youre practicing at. Weve seen some pandemic relaxation which is really helpful because it lets Emergency Physicians who are less hardhit areas potentially help out whether by telehealth or in person and areas hardest hit to make sure we are maintaining our emergency workforce. Host what are your thoughts on governors making appeals to Emergency Physicians, nurses and other doctors to come to their coronavirus, we change these regulations in our state and we would love to have you here, is that creating some competition here . Is not something ive been seeing a lot of. Its generally a lot of people willing to help wherever they are needed. The challenge is Emergency Physicians are very much needed at their home institutions, not just at the hardhit areas. The typical disaster that we are used to, speaking from personal experience in houston with hurricane harvey, the rest of the country was affected by that. We had the potential to get Health Care Workers in different areas to help us out here. And to keep the coronavirus while certain areas may be affected earlier or later, the point of this progression of pandemic we are going to see this in every county and so its important we have physicians everywhere. Host an emergency physician in houston and also a board member of the American College of Emergency Physicians. If you want to check them out online or you could call in. In the eastern or central time zones. If youre in the mountain or pacific time zones. And that special line for medical professionals. 2027488002 caller this thank you for taking my call. Systems where i cannot disinfectants like in aquariums and a hydroponics. What i used to disinfect is ultraviolet light using just a band at low intensity. For disinfecting toothbrushes, shoes, and other places where you do not want to use chlorine or bleach. Has anyone ever looked into using ultraviolet light with sc band towith the c disinfect n95 masks . Guest i have heard of that. There was a New York Times article about them using that at the university of nebraska. The challenge with these technologies is to making sure the quality of the mask is not degraded. I am glad to see more effort being put into that. It is going to be important in making sure we have enough ppe for everyone. Website that has been put together by some of our divisions where they are trying to get donations of ppe and making sure they are being distributed so that they can be used by Frontline Health care workers. My organization supports their efforts. Caller how are they distributing that and what is the process for doing that . Request know you can ppe from them. Some of the challenge is not all the ppe being donated has the proper certification. Masks allottedse to be used in Healthcare Settings are so vital. If we can find ways to preserve them and disinfect them and disinfect them and preserve their use, that would be helpful. Up you said it was get getup ppe. Org. Getusppe. Org. Janet, good morning. Caller a correction. I am from florida. Its a beautiful day. I am retired almost 30 years. The dg0 years ago we had s d. R. Jays and wiest drj and we switched over to the hmo. If i want to go to new york, what i be covered under my health insurance, which is a ppo . It has gotten more complex in recent years. Figuring out who is in and out of network can be complicated. One thing we have been advocating for as Emergency Physicians is making sure that treatment related to covid19 is covered so no one feels like they cannot access care. One of our biggest fears as Emergency Physicians is that people need us wont come into be seen because of the cost of care. We want to make sure anyone feeling short of breath, feeling like they have a medical emergency and is in need of care can come in. Host what are your thoughts about handling your shopping when you go out outside of the hospital . This is a comment from scott just down. I would like to know how we are going to stop the spread of the coronavirus when people are going through drivethroughs to get food and handing cards and bags back and forth. He is saying i am an hour from houston and i thank you for what you do. Food handling is a challenge. We cannot stop eating during this pandemic, but weve got to make sure the kent the containers are out. And, ibring my groceries am wiping the down with a cloth to try to minimize the risk of infection. I am also very careful when i come home from work. The scrubs i wear a work do not come inside my house. I make sure i am wandering them immediately and showering immediately because we do know that this is a virus that can be transmitted in a droplet on surfaces. You touch that surface, touch your nose or i, that is away the virus can be transmitted. We had to take a lot of care with food, clothing. That is why staying at home is so important. Host joe, good morning. Caller a couple of comments. Mi on am i on . Here are my comments. We have a model for this. That model goes back over a hundred years to the 19181919 spanish flu. 100,000 americans. Mi i the only person that has thought here we are in 2020 and the world of modern medicine and what is the best way to fight this thing . The way they did it then quarantine. They quarantined cities and towns. They sent guards out to key people out of their to keep people out of their towns. That is exactly what we are doing now. From 1918 until now. Over 100 years to get a handle on this and we still do not have a handle on it. You parallel the numbers dinesh what the numbers. What was the population in 2019 in 1818 . Host thanks for the comment. Dr. Haddock. Caller i hope we will see a successful treatment for this disease more quickly than we did in 1918. Either the development of a vaccine to prevent you from being able to contract this virus as well as effective treatment so that if your infected, you can be treated and we see higher recovery rates and lower mortality rates and lower rates of needing hospitalization and we are seeing now. Now vanare seeing we are seeing now. That is why it is so important to stay home. You feel about receiving mail and newspapers at your home . This viewer from tampa, florida is asking if that is safe. Guest i am sometimes leaving my mail to sit for a little while if it does not look like it as emergency mail. It is not likely that the virus can continue to be on the mail for days. This is an unlikely source of transmission. A likely source of transmission is going to be social contacts, those droplets that can be in the air. Even if you are handling your mail immediately, as long as you are washing your hands well, thats critical. Making sure you get all the surfaces of your hands, waiting 20 seconds, those measures are critical. Your house cannot be completely isolated from the virus. Handwashing, avoidance of touching your face, could help her vent could help prevent transmission. Caller good morning. You had a call earlier from a lady and that she suggested that using a 4 x 4 gauze over a regular surgical mask might be a good idea. And she was not trying to anpare it with and with m95 mask. We know that is the recommended mask. But i did not think i heard an answer to the question of the 4 x 4 gauze over a regular surgical mask. What do you think of that . Not a comparison, but what do you think of the suggestion . Byst potentially using four four gauze and place of a regular surgical mask . Is not reallynce for the use of surgical masks. Those are used for lower risk contact with patients who may have covid19. We may be looking at all options we have for regenerating those masks, reusing those masks if we start to run out, but i would also say that those surgical masks are less complex than the masks we need, those n95 masks to filter out the virus. I am hopeful we will be able to, with proper action by industry and government, get those surgical masks into high levels of production that we need. Supply of ppe being a concern, i wonder your thoughts on stories we are seeing of doctors being punished by hospitals for speaking out . Guest it is critically important that Emergency Physicians be able to advocate for themselves, for a safe workplace, and to advocate for safe care of their patients. Seen cases where physicians are being disciplined or taken out the schedule for speaking out about workplace conditions is concerning for me as an individual and to all of our Emergency Physicians. We want to make sure Emergency Physicians are able to wear ppe if the hospital supplies are becoming inadequate. One development we have seen is that the joint commission, which accredits hospitals, has released a statement saying they do not see a reason, from a regulatory perspective, why hospitals cannot allow people to bring in their own ppe to protect themselves. I think it is heartening to see that happen and i hope we continue to have that support. We are making sure all of our Frontline Health care workers are protected. Host a few more minutes with allison haddock from houston. She is joining us from home. She is a member of the board of the American College of Emergency Physicians. This is dan out of el paso. Diane out of el paso. I was associate dean of Baylor College of medicine. My best friend is an hiv patient. He has been in prison since august and he gets out in a month. I dont know what to do when he gets out. What do you think . One of our concerns as whoicians has been those are in unstable or group housing. If anyone comes in with symptoms of covid or potentially symptoms of covid, we want to make sure we have a safe place to discharge them to where they will not be transmitting covid to others and where they will be able to safely recover from their illness. So trying to make sure that your friend, when he is released, is in a place where he can, depending on the state of the pandemic at the time of his release, selfisolate properly to try and minimize transmission. It is going to be those stay home, stay safe measures yet ,gain to make sure patients particularly those who may be vulnerable to covid, are able to have the protection they need. Asks a man from virginia if there are plans to begin drafting Health Care Workers to support hospitals in cities that are becoming overwhelmed . Guest ive not heard of anything about drafting in particular. I know nurses and physicians are ready to help combat the disease. I have seen a lot of bravery in the face of this illness that we know can be transmitted to Health Care Workers. We have seen it being transmitted to help care workers at a very high rate, so i think we are seeing trent physicians who are willing to retirement and really step up voluntarily to take care of these patients. All americans and all americans at this time. Are seeing popup tents medical facilities to deal with the influx. Who are the doctors they get assigned to have to work in versus thes brickandmortar hospital setting . There is variability from city to city and how those are being run. The challenge is that this is an illness that is spreading everywhere so there arent there are areas that are not as completely spared where you can pull positions from. And credentialing. One last call from robert in greenville, texas. You are on with dr. Haddock. Caller thank you for all the work you do. Maam, i would like to post a comment here for you and then a question regarding it. There is an Excellent Program i watched last night on pbs on the spanish flu. I would recommend it to anybody. Go online and you can pull that up on pbs. Regarding the spanish flu, it was looked it in great detail. It swept through it swept through like this thing is. Im wondering if the people should learn a little bit from that. Warm people right from the beginning about the nature and severity of this virus, and the government response would have been far quicker. I would like you to comment. Host robert, we will take the question. I want to give dr. Haddock the final minute here. Go ahead. Understanding the severity of the disease is important and that is why Everyone Needs to be sheltered in place right now, practicing social distancing, proper hand washing procedures, and doing what they can to minimize transmission of this illness, which has spread exponentially throughout the country. Host dr. Allison haddock is a americanber at the board of physicians. Also an emergency physician in houston. Appreciate your time. Thank you for what you do. Yorkhouston, we had to new we had to new york. We saw those images of the United States Navy Ship Comfort gliding past the statue of liberty to dock in new york to help. We are joined onboard the comfort now by the Commanding Officer of that ship. Captain, can you describe your mission . York we are here in new to relieve pressure on the Health Systems here by taking care of noncovid19 patients. Host how are you going to do that . How many can you take care of and what is the process for getting them to you . Guest the ship was designed for major combat operations. Handleup to 1000 beds to the casualties of war. What we are going to utilize it for would be medical patients that will be coordinated through the city of new york and fema to us. To 80l be able to take up icu patients. We have care beds within these words. Many of those beds are bunk beds. In, this was to divined this was designed for combat operations. Our overall goal is to maximize the capability of the ship and take on as many patients as appropriate and coordinated through the city of new york, fema. Host it looks like people can it is not like people can walk up to the ship. It has to be through new york and fema . Guest more or less. This is a hospital to hospital transfer to make sure the patients that we do receive our covid19 free. As we know, a ship is really close quarters. We have got to do what we can to protect the Health Professionals who are providing the care as well as the other patients we have on board. Host can you talk more about the Testing Process . Everyone knows the stories of cruise ships becoming a floating coronavirus outbreak spot. Can you talk about what you are doing to protect your crew and the Testing Process . Guest it is incumbent upon the Hospital System and the organizations previously mentioned, whether they are local, state, or federal. They will be tested within seven hours. S within 72 what we are doing on the ship, we call it a bubble. That is we do not allow anybody on the ship who has not been tested or appropriately screened. If we need a technician to come aboard or are taken stores arm takingy are tested stores on board, they are tested in accordance with the cdc guidelines. We will make sure they have a mask before they come aboard. We are making every effort to make sure we remain covid19 free so we can conduct our mission and help the city of new york. Host your medical professionals, your crew, they are going to be staying on board the comfort drought the time they are there alongside the patients the comfort throughout the time they are there, alongside the patients . Guest yes. No one leaves the ship to minimize contact with those who have covid19. We will be here for the duration and aboard the ship. New york is a beautiful city and we would love to enjoy it, but the mission first. Host when you say the nate the patients need to be appropriate for the ship, do you plan to have pediatric or eldercare on the ship, or is this targeted to adults of military age . Guest we are coordinating through the city, their health officials, and fema. We provided criteria that would be appropriate for the ship. We will not take pediatric patients. There are some populations we do not have the specialists on board for. But overall, from a health care ,erspective, we are equipped both from a personnel perspective and an equipment perspective, to take care of just about anything the city can send us as long as it is has been screened as long as it has been screened and is appropriate for this. Bunk beds may not be appropriate for some populations. That may be a limiting factor, but right now we are just standing by, ready to take care of what they sent to us. Host before you go, when was the last time the comfort was deployed to a major city . Guest i would have to go back and look. It did respond to Hurricane Katrina and maria. It was in new york in 2001 after the attack there. This means a lot to all of us. We have traveled around the world and done all kinds of things on behalf of our nation and other nations, but nothing is more important than taking care of our own, and that is the people of the the people of new york. Host are there other ships like the comfort . Only two. Re are that is the Commanding Officer of the comfort and we appreciate your time this morning, sir. Doctors whofrom the operate the ventilators and the other medical machines to the issue of the electricity they keeps those machines running. Joining us via zoom from new york is Daniel Oberhaus, who covers Energy Issues and the future of energy for wired magazine. You opened a recent story about Americas Energy grid during the coronavirus pandemic by talking about what life is like for workers at the Niagara Falls powerplant. Can you describe a typical day up in Niagara Falls day at the Niagara Falls powerplant . Daniel, we will work on getting your sand going. Work on getting your sound going. On the phone lines, if you want to talk about the energy grid and the impact of the coronavirus on the energy grid, it is 202 7488000 if you are in the eastern or central time zones. Ares 202 7488001 if you in the mountain nor pacific time zones. We will be having this conversation about the energy grid this morning and tell our program ends at 10 00 a. M. Eastern. We will get you back to Daniel Oberhaus and wired magazine as soon as we can, but you can continue to call in this morning with your comments, specifically about the energy grid, but also those numbers released by the white house yesterday about potential coronavirus deaths in the United States. Here are a few of the headlines this morning about those numbers. 100,000240,000 in the numbers released by the white house Coronavirus Task force about potential deaths amid the outbreak. That headlight from the wall street journal quoting trump as saying, and this could be a hell of a bad two weeks. This is the headline from the front page of the Washington Times trump learns of a very painful two weeks. From the New York Times total best case death toll is dyer, noting that trump and his physicians putting that number out yesterday, a day after the new deaths in the United States topped over 800. Those the numbers this morning. The numbers to call in and join if youin, 202 7488000 are in the eastern or central time zones, 202 7488001 now nor pacific. Mountain or pacific. We will go back to Daniel Oberhaus. That Niagara Falls powerplant, what does a day in the life there look like right now . Guest the powerplant is run by the New York Power Authority which is the largest utility in the United States. It provides about 25 of new yorks power. It is a lot of it is hydroelectric. Ago, the a few days Power Authority began to start checking workers when they came on site to screen them for coronavirus, which involves taking their temperature, a series of questions about travel, how they are feeling, and basically staggering the control room operators such that it limited contact between the two shifts. They operate on 12 hour shifts and so those were staggered between different control rooms to limit contact between workers and ensure there is always a full staff. In this case, it would be a minimal staff. Only about four or five people in the operating room at a time to keep the lights on in new york city and new york state. Host in this age of working from home, how much can the Energy Sector actually do that and how many have to be in the control room pushing the buttons and monitoring the power activity . Of the critical employees and utilities and transmission organizations need to be on site. It is not something you can do remotely. You cannot going through a vpn or something to control the wires or the generators on site. That is a pretty small staff. It does not take more than a dozen or so people. The rest of the workforce is working from home. I spoke with people at various transmission organizations and utilities and they said the majority of their workforce is operating remotely at this point, but there is a handful of critical employees responsible for overseeing the generators that need to be physically onsite. Host the story were focusing essayericas electricity from the coronavirus for now. The author that essay is here this morning. As people ares, calling in, you write in that story that it could come to a point where Energy Companies are employees to live and the power plants. How would that work and why . Week this happened last at the new york transmission operation. They started having employees living on site in trailers. There are a handful of employees doing that. They operate like they would do normally. The reason they do this is to limit the operators contact with the outside world. These are specially trained individuals. They dont have a ton of them, so if one gets sick, that could be a major wrench in the operation of a utility. The idea is to have them live on site. At this utility, there are two trailers. I am aware of any other transmission organizations that have taken the step. Both utilities and transmission organizations should they ,eed to do this, for instance the New York Power Authority had to do this in the 2003 black out after hurricane sandy, so there wellversed in how to handle these situations, although this is the first time they would be doing this in response to a pandemic. Host what does it mean to be designated Critical Infrastructure . Guest . It is exactly what it sounds like. It is what the United States needs to keep running. Sectorss one of 16 designated as critical to the United States. The other ones are dams, transportation, water, nuclear plants. Theres a wide range of sectors here that need to continue operating. If you do not have electricity, Everything Else grinds to halt. If the grid goes down, that is really bad news for hospitals and First Responders. How many Power Companies are there connected to the grid . Are nine a regional transmission operations that pipe power across state lines. They run the big transmission lines. Overe other end, there are 3000 utilities, some state owned, some privately owned, so there is a lot of coordination need that needs to happen to board. Re everyone is on host whose job is it to ensure that coordination is happening . Electricity is an councilr coordination that has stood up a panel that interfaces with the department of energy. This kind of self organized group of utility operators has been getting together twice a week on the phone to discuss best practices with the department of energy and what they should be doing. They have a very detailed roadmap that is constantly being updated on their website about how utilities should respond, different actions that utilities can take. A lot of it is pretty baseline stuff that everyone should be practicing, such as washing hands, social distancing, and making sure that operators are being screened prior to arriving on site, so that they do not infect other people. Other energyime, regulatory organizations have also started taking actions in terms of giving utilities flexibility in how they operate the generators. Than making, rather sure than making sure that employees have the highest training, one organization has said you can bring in on you can bring in unpaid employees that can step in on trade employees that can step in to make sure the light stay on. Host we are talking about the lights staying on amid coronavirus . Taking your phone calls. Steve is first out of decatur, georgia. Caller thank you for being on, daniel. I have thing one thing i have to say to the callers. Bynot bog the show down saying good morning back to the host. Every second counts. Host that is all steve wanted to say. We will go to larry. Good morning. Are you with this . Caller yes. The ern would be with with the power plant grid be able to keep up with the demand . That will be all. That is a great question and the answer is yes. Compared to a lot of disasters and emergencies that utilities have to deal with, the coronavirus is i suppose one of the easier to handle on the demand side. What countries such as italy and china have seen as the number of infected persons in the country grow, the demand for electricity is sharply decreasing. Italy saw a 21 decrease in electricity demand compared to their peak from last year. Similar numbers were seen in china. The reason for this is a lot of the load shifting from industrial manufacturing and commercial operations to as peoples can continue to work at home and plants are shut down. The u. S. Has already started to see a decrease in demand, which gives utilities some breathing room in terms of how they are going to deal with this. For the foreseeable future, demand should not be a problem. Host you talk about the foreseeable future and your story. You note concerns about hurricanes and that knocking out parts of the grid around the country and the concern about layered crises here. Explain. Guest while reporting on this story, i had the opportunity to speak with john mcwilliams, a former doe official. His main concern was this idea of layered crises that the power sector by have to deal with. This is something i also heard from utilities and transmission operators. Basically, this sector of the economy is very well prepared to handle emergencies. They have critical protocols in place for pandemics. There protocols in place to deal with natural disasters. They can deal with each of these fine and i think they have demonstrated this during the coronavirus. The electricity subsector has handled this phenomenally. The problem comes when you start having multiple calamities start piling on top of one another. What john was saying was that right now the utilities are handling it fine. The problems start emerging during say wildfire season or Hurricane Season. If we have an active Hurricane Season, that means utilities are going to be stressed in terms of their ability to respond to grid outages as a result of the hurricane while also operating with a minimal staff. The hope is that the curve is flattened by then and utilities will be able to handle this or that we do not have a very active Hurricane Season. If we do, this could end up posing a major problem in terms of getting the number of citiesrs needed to keep online while dealing with multiple threats. Ift it is 202 7488000 youre living in central or eastern time zones. It is 202 7488001 in mountain or pacific time tones time zones. Good morning. Good morning. I would like to say good morning to stephen georgia to steve in georgia. This is a data driven event. One thing i have not heard 240,000talk about is people potentially die and we have 320 7 Million People in 327 Million People in this country. 007 . Less than i just wanted to get that point across. Host michael in maryland. Good morning. I feel the same way as the last caller. They are over blowing this pandemic. On my drive to work, i calculated 0. 2 . It is a very low kind of host how many people would need to die for you to think it is not overblown . Plant we have 7 billion 7 billion people on the planet. People die all the time. This is part of the natural order. People die from the flu. Host that is michael. We will try to steer back toward the energy grid. Good morning. Morning. Ood whether or not the placeents being put in for the coronavirus, whether they have backup generators in case something was to go down and people in place as far as electricians to organize this, etc. To incannot speak particular. But the ability to provide backup power is wellestablished. Plenty of supply should the demand drastically increase for whatever reason. As for how individual users are going to be handling increase in electricity demand, that is going to be on a casebycase basis. I would certainly hope that anyone dealing with Emergency Response has thought about how to deal with variations in electricity needs. You one of the individuals interviewed and your story was a member of a trade Group Representing private utilities. This was his quote we need to be treated like First Responders p or First Responders. Are they . Guest yes. The federal regulatory thatssion sent a letter utility operators need to be treated as essential. I think i was to reiterate that should a multistep lockdown going to place or more stringent conditions on who can or cannot leave their homes that utility operators should be among those that can travel to and from their place of work. As far as i can tell, no one is challenging that. It is hard to imagine a scenario in which utility or operator in which utility terry in which utility operators are not allowed to do their job. They are being treated as essential personnel. The question is going to be more about getting ppe in sufficient numbers for these workers, which would be essential. This is where the electricity andector counsel comes in e. Eir ability to the do utilityable these operators to do their jobs effectively and safely. Saw Congress Pass and the president signed this to thision dollar stimulus stimulus. For the number in that grid . Guest this counsel is making sure that enough money is allocated and resources just in general for utilities to be able to do their job. Point, the utility subsector has a unique arrangement despite being competitors. These different utilities have a network of mutual groups such that if one utility cannot meet their needs, whether it is due to sick employees, not enough operators to run their plants, they can actually call upon other utilities and ask for assistance, which in this case could be lending operators to help them run their facilities. There is a robust support network for this. As to whether or not that will actually involve some sort of stimulus package remains to be seen. Host from woodstock, georgia. Hal. Is how there my question was if is a shortage of people to maintain the grid and there is a problem with the grid in the northeast, does the northwest have the ability to divert power from the northwest to the northeast, sort of like plugin another part of the country because of a lack of people to maintain the grid in that part of the country where it is strained being sick . Thank you. Guest that is a great question. The american grid is divvied up into a lot of sub grids based on region. There is power flowing between these regions. To that question, i think it depends on what this means by a grid disruption. If a power line goes down, utilities have the ability to send out workers to handle physical disruptions to grid infrastructure at this point. They are still following best practices in terms of social distancing and ensuring that the workers are staying safe. You are outside for whatever reason. Youpe you are not, but if are and see a utility worker working on a power line, they are asking people do not approach workers or that if a worker goes in your home that people continue to social distance as these operators do their jobs to make sure the grid infrastructure remains online. I hope that answers that question. First of all, i want to think cspan for taking my call. I am in florida. The coronavirus is very scary and i think people really need rulesntain the cdc because Hurricane Season is coming up june 1. I was here during hurricane irma. Im angel hospital was evacuated. A Major Hospital was evacuated. I was without power for seven days. It is important that we maintain the cdc rules and regulations that are issued by our government and that we pray that god gives us a gentle Hurricane Season. But i thank you for taking my call. Host daniel, your thoughts . More i could not agree and that is what the former doe official was saying. We have to hope there is a really mild Hurricane Season this year because it is hard enough for the electricity subsector to deal with hurricanes when there is not a Global Pandemic going on. When the number of operators is also reduced, that increases the challenges as it does for other institutions like hospitals as well. Hopefully the Hurricane Season is mild. Marilyn from pennsylvania. Good morning. Caller theres a situation here at the limerick power station where 7000 workers were brought in from all over the nation for an exercise and one of our officials has expressed concern that they are not keeping within safe distance from one another and that they may not and that they might bring to the community virus. I wonder if that is of concern to others . Guest absolutely. Funnily enough, this is an issue that the nuclear it Nuclear Industry is grappling with. Spring happens to be the time for refueling their power stations. It typically involves a scenario like you described. Hundreds of contractors from all over the United States traveled to a particular Nuclear Power station where they stay for one or two months while they refueled the station. That creates a lot of problems. You have an influx of people from all around the u. S. , and a huge increase in the number of people on site at the power plants. Maintaining social distancing while performing this critical function, which is getting spent your rods out of the reactor and into a storage pool, becomes a major challenge. All of the Nuclear Power stations in the United States all but two of the Nuclear Power stations in the United States are scheduled for refueling. How Nuclear Power stations handle this differs. For instance, a lot of stations in the midwest that were refueling in february and march have handle this handled this operation more or less the same with the additional pandemic protocols, such as more handwashing state handwashing stations. I do not know what is happening at this particular site, although i hope they are implementing screening procedures and continuing to follow best practices in terms of keeping the workers and community safe. Host from Nuclear Power plants to clean energy, can you talk about what is happening at solar power, wind Power Facilities around the country . Is it different for them . Is it less people involved . Guest the response that he utility or generation station has is going to be unique to their situation. Nuclear is a special case due to the nature of the fuel being used. They tend to have more people that they need onsite to maintain than to maintain a solar farm. However, there renewable industry has been very vocal over the past week about the problems and challenges that the coronavirus is creating for their industry. Solar in particular is expecting a huge decrease in the number of panels that will be coming through china. There will be huge supply chain issues. There are also Power Generation tools that need to be installed by individuals. That creates a lot of problems in terms of how you get workers out in the field and keep them safe while continue to while continuing to install solar panels. There questions in the Solar Industry between individuals in the Solar Industry and government officials about how to do it. The same thing is happening in the wind sector. They are seeing a decrease in investment because of all of fewerecause there are people that can go and install wind turbines. Every industry is going to be impacted by this whether it is natural gas or clean energy. Everyone is struggling. Host it may be a good time to show this chart from the u. S. Energy information association. This is Energy Consumption in the United States by source for the year 2018. Petroleum, 36 . Coal, 13 . Nuclear power, 8 . Solar, 11 wind and back in 2018. A few minutes left with Daniel Oberhaus. Talking about the energy grid in the u. S. Amid coronavirus. This is sheldon out of brownsville, california. Undergroundoing with the grid part of the future of our electricity . Guest that is a great question and i think it is still an open one. Going underground comes with a lot of advantages. It helps keep the system more robust as opposed to having hundreds of miles of these really thick transmission lines that can get caught in trees and create problems in terms of the in terms of how the infrastructure is protected. The elephant in the room is how to pay for this. And know when exactly once their backyard dug up to put the systems in place. I think it is going to depend on what we do in terms of upgrading our transmission system. The United States really is in dire need of an overhaul of its transmission infrastructure. If we decide to heavily invest in that, going underground could be a great option in a lot of cases, especially in regions that are that experience a lot of outages or are vulnerable to infrastructure damage. This could be a great option. In places like florida, it does not make as much sense. There are ways to build stronger polls and plot out stronger poles and plot out the grid. I hope that they go underground more in the future, but it is very expensive to do that compared to draping them from pole to pole. Host do we know how much of the grid is underground . Guest i do not have those numbers on hand. Host but it is a lot more that are above . Guest the vast majority. There are major projects, for instance in the midwest, where there is a major transmission line going underground into chicago. It was a multimillion dollar project. A very expensive proposition. Texas. Texas furman, your next. You are next. Segmenti was watching a on 60 minutes about the hurricane that devastated the bahamas. They decided to go with more solar and put a lot of their transmission lines underground to offset the big winds. Also responding to the other caller about the same thing, about more utilities underground designig conduittype where they have multiple utilities including gas lines and what have you and a little trolley that could run along and service various substations and stuff. That is pretty much where i was going with this underground idea. Host thanks for the call. Guest you bring up a good points. A good point. When i looked at what happened in puerto rico and the aftermath, a good portion of the island lost power in months for some cases for months in some cases. It creates a lot of hardship for people. What you saw in the aftermath was exactly what you said. You saw an uptick in the amount of residential and commercial solar installations. Puerto rico is going to end up leading the way for the rest of the u. S. And they are really. Mbracing micro grids in the event of a major grid power can be supplied locally. People are beginning to embrace this idea of having a grid that is hyperlocal that in the event of an outage they can still get power when they need it. After the wildfires in california last year, he saw an uptick in interest in microgrid ideas. Pge was kind of going to lean more into that. Moreare going to take conventional measures this wildfire season. But i think youre right. The trend right now is towards energycally distributed resources to deal with everything from hurricanes to Something Like this pandemic. Hear whenrm we often we are talking about the grid is ferc. What is it . Guest it is the federal Energy Regulatory commission . They oversee all the regulations that come to utilities. There is also an entity called nerc, the north American Energy reliability council. They are not a government organization, but they work with government. Is the entity within the department of industry responsible for creating regulatory guidelines for the electricity subsector. Tallahassee, your next. You are next. The inability of families to pay for utility have an effect on the cost of running the grid . Still anthink that is open question. Demand is going down for the greater grid. I think most americans are crunch a bit of a cash either due to being out of work or having reduced work. I do think that the ability to pay for these Vital Services such as electricity is going to be a major challenge that americans are going to have to deal with going forward. Hopefully it is addressed in an equitable way by our representatives. Host last call. This is joseph and rockville, maryland in rockville, maryland. My question goes back to the details of the hospital supplies. Knowthe guest happen to whether there is enough spare Power Generation capacity among hospitals to cover the extra ventilators that people are saying might be necessary . Guest that is a great question. I do not have the exact numbers on hand, but i can say that oftentimes institutions that are vital like you cannot have a fiveminute power outage at a hospital there are some of need powerthere that on all the time. Hospitals are, always well equipped with backup Power Generation. Sometimes that is diesel generators, increasingly it is fuel cells. If the be amazed problems the problem hospitals it up facing is not being able to meet the energy demands of increased ventilators. If anything, it will be procuring the ventilators and other protective equipment they need to treat the influx of patients. Host Daniel Oberhaus is a staff writer for wired. Andcan find him on twitter his work at wired. Com. Very much enjoy the conversation. Guest thank you for having me. Host that is going to do it for our program. We will be doing we will be back tomorrow morning. In the meantime, have a great and safe wednesday. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2020] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] any of ouriss coverage of the coronavirus outbreak, you can watch at any time on www. Cspan. Org coronavirus. There. L use the charts and maps to track the virus global spread and confirmed cases in the u. S. County by county. Our coronavirus webpages your fast and easy way to watch cspans unfiltered coverage of this pandemic. Coming up next, new mexico governor Michelle Lujan grisham will hold a coronavirus briefing. Later today, California Governor Gavin Newsom will give an update on the coronavirus pandemic in his state. Thats starting at 3 p. M. And also today, the White House Holds its Daily Briefing at 5 p. M. Eastern. Yesterday, president said there could be up to 240,000 deaths in the u. S. From the pens affect pandemic even if social distancing is maintained. This story from the New York Times representative rose will help set up hospitals in a Staten Island district on the other parts of new york city. Yesterday, new mexico governor shel Lujan Grisham held a briefing on her states Coronavirus Response. She was joined by members of her cabinet and a representative from the new mexico National Guard