You and your family. We would love to hear from you. Our phone lines are open. For the eastern half of the country. 202 7488001 for the mountain and city time zones. 202 7488002 if you are a medical professional. We begin with the numbers courtesy of Johns Hopkins university. Around the world, 3. 1 million confirmed cases. The death toll in 185 countries is 216, almost 217,000. In the United States, the death toll has surpassed 58,000. Joining us from princeton, new jersey is the president and ceo of the Robert Wood Johnson foundation. He served as the former acting director of the cbc. Today, named on the restart and recovery commission. Thank you for being with us. Guest nice to be here. Host your region has the highest percentage of covid cases in the country. How do you balance the Public Health with the desire to reopen the economy . Everyone wants to get the economy back up and running. People are suffering. People are out of work. People lead income. You want to make sure that as you reopen the economy, you dont reverse that the declines that are being scenes seen in terms of hospitalization. You want to do it slowly, carefully, and based on the best available Public Health science. There are a lot of things in place to meet that, especially in a region like ours that has been hit so hard. It starts with having hospital capacity. If your hospitals are at the point where they are just getting by in terms of meeting the needs to take care of patients with covid, you are not ready. You want to have the capacity to take care of Covid Patients because the numbers will rise as you start to open the economy, you want to be about to take care of all of the patients who have been missing out on needed health care during this crisis. Just think about patience with cancer and heart disease. Patients who might have colon cancer or breast cancer. Theres a lot of health care that needs to be done. You need that capacity if you will start to open things up. Events, terms of major whether it is baseball at yankee stadium, marathons, parades have been canceled through months much of the news york city area. Guest thats a real challenge. In every plan you are seeing out there, things are talked about in phases. If you are following about that slowly, based on the best Public Health science, you will be opening up things that are lowest risk early on. Things like construction that air,e outdoors, in the where people can be six feet away from each other and still be doing the work. Gatherings,mass those things that we love as a society, they are going to be a ways off. It is hard to predict when that is. As dr. Fauci said two months ago, we dont declare the timeline here. The timeline is determined by the virus. It is too soon to know what will happen this summer. Will the virus go dormant in the summer, as some respiratory viruses do . Or will it stay active . Theres a lot to be learned before you can predict when we can all get together in big groups. Host this has been a day of milestones. One million cases in the country. This headline courtesy of the National Public radio. War, years of the vietnam 58,000 u. S. Soldiers died in that conflict. In the last 3. 5 months, more people have died of coronavirus than in the vietnam war. When you are that, what is your reaction . Power of shows you the Infectious Diseases. There was a time in the 60s when the Surgeon General said the era of Infectious Diseases is over. We are learning that microbes emerge and can cause threats to society that are absolutely overwhelming. What you found over history is that we have let our guard down. It is easy to become the complacent. It is clear that we have to do more to be safe as a society. Mostly, we have to do more to ensure that every member of society has the same opportunities to protect themselves, their families, their communities. With this pandemic, we are seeing that your income and the color of your skin are determining how well you do or how hard you are hit by coronavirus. Host why is that . ,hy if you are a poor minority you have a higher percent of death from this disease . Guest the data we are seeing, the data is very incomplete. Black americans, latinos, native americans are dying at three more times their percentage in the population. We need more work to fully understand that. There are a number of reasons. You have higher rates of underlying medical conditions. A lot of that comes from structural racism. If you look at communities where people of color came to live, Life Expectancy before the pandemic was often decades shorter than it was another communities. That comes from environmental conditions in some communities, access to good jobs and jobs that give you enough money to be able to afford healthy food. There are all kinds of reasons for that. There are things that are probably changeable, right now, to reduce the risk. If you look at essential workers, a term that no one was using before this began, essential workers are those individuals who have been told, you can continue to do your job. They are critical for keeping society going. In those jobs, black americans, latinos are represented at very high rates. The percentage of black americans who can work remotely is very low. If you look at the percentage who work in fields like health care, Frontline Health care workers, maintenance workers, food service, food production, there he high rates. If you are in those industries and you are not sheltering at home, you have more chance of exposure. While we have been talking a lot about the importance of personal protective equipment for people in health care, we have not been putting the same emphasis on transit workers. People on buses and subways and other forms of transit systems. They need to be protected as well. When it comes to the issue of isolation and quarantine with recommendations by Public Health , if you have covid, go home and isolate away from others who can do that . People who live in apartments with many family members, with older relatives, they are not able to safely isolate. They have infection, they are going home and infecting others in their family. Other countries are solving this. Those are countries with a lot less wealth than america. Host lets get your phone calls. Surely is on the phone from omaha. Were joined by the president and ceo of the Robert Wood Jones association. Caller thank you for letting me on. About ao make a comment video i saw at 7 51 this morning on fox and friends that was put out by the cdc. Gov coronavirus19. It was concerning cleanliness. What shocked me is the lady toxic chemicals, spraying it all over the counter, was holding a small baby in her left arm with bare legs and little socks and spraying that chemical. I want to give a heads up to president trump. They were giving him a bad title that comedy made. That was his proof that he spoke to dr. Burke about that. Have you heard anything about toxic spray being inhaled . I thought, thats a perfect example to show on the air exactly what that video showed, that he was not off target. Dr. Burke had said, he mightve been thinking he had been shown a group of videos. He was thinking those over in his head. I think that came out. I just wanted to give him an opportunity to have that backup. Things for having me on. Host thank you. Your reaction . Guest thanks for that comment. Disinfectant, they are very useful at cleaning services. Surfaces. Many of those chemicals have chlorine bleach and will kill viruses on surfaces. It is so important that people understand that ingesting those chemicals can be fatal. Disinfectants use internally. Something that is not you may see things on the internet. It points to the importance of looking and finding sources on the internet for trust and science. The cdc website is one of those sites. Nih has a good site. Fema has a great site. It is good for him or control. I have not seen that video to see how close the baby was to the spray. Mom was not spraying that in the babys face or mouth. That is something that would be highly dangerous. Im a general pediatrician. I just want to say, do not use disinfectants on your children. Host we will go to add next ed next from california. Caller thank you for taking my call. Im just worried about fears in the world. Where is everybodys state . Things like this, coronavirus, pandemics happening through history, all through history. It happens and we get over it and go on. We need to stop the fear. The fear is killing us. Host thank you. Your response . Good you make a really point. Its important to put things in context. Most people who get Coronavirus Infection are going to do fine with this. Many will have no symptoms whatsoever. Those that have symptoms, many will be mild. The reason we are taking these actions that we are taking are to protect those people who are at the greatest risk for severe disease, hospitalization, and death. The elderly, people with underlying medical conditions. Pandemics every shaped history. You are right. Many times that has happened by millions and millions of people losing their lives. Hopefully, our science is advanced enough that we can experience a pandemic, we can minimize, reduce the impact on peoples lives, and work towards getting people back to work. Host cbs news with a story today that says thermal imaging allowone tool that could retailers and restaurants to understand who is coming into their facilities and telling those individuals who may have a high temperature, dont come in. He see that could we see that . Guest you may see that. Personally, i think that when it comes to people being out and ,bout with symptoms of illness it comes down to personal responsibility. A lot of people will have coronavirus and not have any fever whatsoever. You can get a false sense of security if all you are using is thermal screening. That equipment can be very expensive. There are a lot of things that can cause fever apart from coronavirus. I would rather move towards systems that tell people what symptoms to look for and what they should do when they have them. Stay home, stay away from other people. If they have coronavirus, they are not infecting others. Everyone in america should have access to health care so they can get answers. I have a fever, what is going on . There are 28 Million People in america with no Health Insurance. So many people have their Health Insurance from their jobs. As people are losing their jobs, the numbers of uninsured is going to rise. That put individuals at risk. It puts the entire community at risk when people dont have access to health care. You see higher rates among people of color who are underinsured and uninsured. Just got grandest his medical degree from the university of pennsylvania. He earned his residency at Johns Hopkins university as a trained pediatrician. Jerry, from michigan, youre next. Caller thank you. Is, i hadmy question an organ transplant. Im on a municipal and said medications. Immunosuppressive medications. My transplant doctor advised me to never get a live vaccine. Vaccinendering, this for these vaccines that they are trying to work on to come up with one, is that going to be would that be a live vaccine vaccine . That is my question. Thank you. Host good luck to you. Guest thats a great question. There are a lot of different approaches to making vaccines. Some take a live fire risk and they virus and they alter it in such a way that it is unable to cause disease but it can give you an immune reaction and protection. There are many different types of vaccines that arent live. At this point, it is premature to say what type of vaccine will go into testing and people. Whether any of these at vaccines will be shown to be safe and effective. Im hopeful with all the work going on and the different approaches that scientists will find a vaccine to work. We cant count on that. We cant, count on that happening in a timeframe that will affect the decisionmaking that has to go on. When theres vaccine, they will be available in a way that everyone is able to receive those regardless of their medical conditions, whether they have Health Insurance or where they live. Announcing if you want to fly on a plane, you must wear a face mask. Others may follow suit. What is the significance of that . How important are face masks . Guest i serve on the National Academy of medicine Science Committee that reviewed that question. World,u look around the different countries, the basic Cultural Practice regarding mask varies. What cdc and others have seen is that some of the Asian Countries where wearing the mask when you are sick is a norm, theyve had a lower rate of infection than here. The science in terms of how much protection you get from that is really pretty shaky. What i would say, the recommendation is to wear a mask you go out. It is less for your own protection. It is to protect others from you if you happen to be sick with covid and be in that asymptomatic phase. Its important that you dont change the other behaviors that we know to help. Frequent handwashing, not going out if you are sick, covering your coughs and sneezes with your elbow, disinfecting surfaces that you will be touching. Dont get a false sense of security that the mask is doing more for you than it really is. You travel to the facility, you must wear a face mask. Vice president mike pence was the only one who did not wear one. Does that send mixed signals . Cdc, i was i was at there for 13 years. I thought it was really important for leaders to model the behavior they wanted others to follow. Your words mean one thing but the visual really counts for a lot more. If the words are that people should stay six feet apart from each other, when you are watching newscasters on tv and they are six feet apart, that is a good thing. When you see political leaders six feet apart, thats a good thing. If the words are saying people should be wearing a mask, seeing our leaders doing that is a really good thing. Host dan is next from santa barbara, california. Caller i would like to talk with you about a movement that has gotten very powerful, very loud, very aggressive over the last decade or two. The antivax movement. I used to be an antifax or antivaxxwer,. I realized i was being lied to. All the grasecks. Sees were lies. Crazy conspiracies were lies. They have thousands of thousands of people who follow their pages on social media. Afraid by the time a covid19 vaccine comes around, these people will have a head start. They would have convinced thousands of people not to take the vaccine through their social media megaphone. It seems like scientists and doctors and the government does not have a very good voice at combating this meant information. Misinformation. Im wondering what your thoughts are on that. Guest it is a real challenge. As a pediatrician and a Public Health professional, i know that theres nothing that i did as a pediatrician that had more proven benefit for my patience than making sure they were vaccinated fully and on time. Is incredible in many ways. It provides access to unthinkablethat was even a decade ago. It also provides the platform for false information and information that is not supported by science. There are an increasing number of people in this country who are hesitant to give their children vaccines fully and on time. That greatly concerns me. It is very concerning when political leaders undermine the Science BehindPublic Health interventions like vaccination as well. It is something we have to overcome. I think you do it by treating people with respect, regardless of their views. Providing clear information. On a policy level, there are things that can be done as well. We know that laws that require children to be fully vaccinated to get to school make a difference. Including exemptions only for proven medical reasons, that makes a difference. There are things we can do to encourage people to get vaccinated. Shownk having scientists that vaccines work and are safe are important. Thats why its so important that as these axioms are being developed for coronavirus, they go through proper safety testing to show that they work. So that when we reach the point where theres one that we want to recommend that people get, we can do so with your confidence. Host for those who have a concern about a vaccine, either for themselves or their children, saying you are putting a virus in my body or it will give me that condition, you tell them what . Guest i try to present them with the facts. I work as a pediatrician once a week. Not during this crisis because my clinic is not seeing walkin patients. General, when i see Young Children for a twomonth visit appointment, i will do the physical. We will talk about things that are going on. Now it is time for your childs vaccination. If a parent has questions, i will answer the questions. The data shows the vast majority of parents vaccinate their children fully and on time. They trust their Health Care Providers with that information. It helps them make that decision. Thats a really good thing. Platformerns me is the that is out there some of it is trolls. It is not individual spreading it. Some of the information out there is very destructive in terms of Childrens Health. Host bill in evans, georgia, go ahead. Doctor. Hi, i had a question about the World Health Organization recently coming out and saying that theres no evidence that people who have had the virus will have developed and i body antibodies to prevent the disease. An immunere based on response to the vaccine to prevent the disease. How would that impact the development of a vaccine . That is at the terrific question. The World Health Organization came out and clarified their remark afterwards. There is no evidence that an infection doesnt give you an immune response. The point was that the science has not been done yet. Its important that we look at that science and say, after someone has had an infection with coronavirus, do they have immune factors, and i bodys antibodies . Do they prevent them from getting the infection in the future . If so, for how long . If you have those protective factors, is it possible for you to still transmit the infection even if you dont get sick . These are really important questions. You had the nail on the head. If you dont bid an immune response from a natural infection, it is harder to make a vaccine that would give you protection. That we have, once you have had them, you have a level of protection. That gives you a clue that a vaccine would work in a similar way. Host michelle, you are next. You are on the phone from california. Good evening. Caller good evening. You mentioned about access to health care only being to be blue had Health Insurance. That your me think messages to people who dont have health care, they would be turned away if they were to go to a hospital. I was hoping you would clarify that. As somebody who didnt have health care, i know that not to be true. I hope you would clarify for that. Guest thanks for that question. Recommendations of cdc is if you have mild symptoms, that may be covid convection infection, rather than going to a Health Care Facility where you may expose other people or get exposed yourself and pressure on the Health Care System, call your doctor and they can help you with advice. If you dont have Health Insurance, you are more likely to go to the emergency room where you would be seen. By doing that, you are putting yourself that additional risk. In some states, in order to get tested, you have to have a referral from your doctor. Thatstates have been using for their drivethrough testing facilities. You get a referral from your doctor and go to the drivethrough and get tested. If you dont have a doctor, you cant get the referral and you have to go to the hospital. Thats not good for Health Care Workers or for you. If you dont have a car, you cant get to the drivethrough facility. Its important that as we are looking at the approach is moving forward, they meet the needs of all, regardless of income. And people without Health Insurance or people who have had discriminatory interactions in the Health Care System there is so much documentation about how people of different races are treated differently by the Health Care System, they may be more reluctant to go to the Health Care System at a time when they need it. Host your foundation is named after Robert Wood Johnson. Who was he . Guest Robert Wood Johnson the second bill that the Company Johnson johnson, a large pharmaceutical company. , hehe time of his death left 1 billion in stock to former foundation. We are the largest Health Care System in the u. S. Locust on health care in the u. S. , particularly the most honorable. Vulnerable. He felt businesses had an obligation, not just in the shareholders. To their customers, making sure that their products were safe and effective. Wereeir employees, they paid a living wage. And to their communities, so they were Good Environmental stewards. Lastly, to their shareholders. A lot of the principles he laid that is used by Johnson Johnson formed the basis of our general principles for running the foundation. As you hear us talk about the importance of everyone in america having a fair opportunity for health, people being paid a living wage, communities fostering health are all, that comes from our roots. Host mary joining us from saratoga springs, new york. Good evening. Caller thank you so much. I work as an Elementary School nurse. When a vaccine for covid19 is oops. Ped, host go ahead. We only got part of the question. How is it administered . Guest at this point, we dont know. Theres a point that i would love to make. Right now, schools across america are closed. The reason for that is we know from influenza, with influenza, children are a very significant part of transmission. A kid gets sick, they spread it to each other. They take it home. They infect elderly relatives. So controlling influenza in children is a way of attracting those who are most for an opera. Vulnerable. We are using the playbook for coronavirus. The studies have not been done to end find out how important children are in transition. Some countries are opening up their schools. Hopefully we can learn whether that is a safe thing to do or whether those children then start to lead to transmission and communities. Its important for Childrens Health and Mental Health and emotional health, its important in terms of their learning. A year off of school is a big hit, in particular for lower income children. Its important in terms of getting parents and caregivers got to work. Back intot get kids school, it is harder to get their parents back into the workplace. Tallahassee, florida. Good evening. Caller my question is about transmissibility to and from our domestic animals, cats and dogs. We have new information about that. The information seems to be conflicting. We are told that the pets can get coronavirus from humans. But that humans cannot get it from pets. I thought that mammals could transmit these diseases across species. I just wondered what you could tell us about that. Examplehis is a great of what happens whenever theres a new infectious disease. What we dont know always outweighs what we know. Here, in terms of the role of animals, the ability for animals to get infection or spread infection, theres a lot of learning thats going on here. Of covide been cases infection that have been seen in domestic cats. I understand there was a case of a dog. Theres new guidance from cdc and how to interact with your pets. If you have Covid Infection and the ability to have someone take care of your pet, that is a good thing to do. If your pet is sick and you are a high risk individual, having someone else take care of your pet. The ability of a pet to transmit the humans has not been proven yet. Saying, iterent from is proven that it cannot happen. Depending on your level of risk, you may want to take Different Levels of action here. I expect that the science will continue to grow and show what direction it goes, whether it can go in both directions. Host and from miami, florida. My next. Caller good evening. Thank you for taking my call. Is, with the country opening so, they are many hospitals. Will we have enough ventilators to be able to take care of the general public if this is the case . Host it is something we talk about often. The idea of herd immunity. Guest herd immunity and preparedness altogether. Let me tackle the preparedness side first. You definitely dont want to do major steps to reopen your economy if you dont have enough personal protective equipment for your Health Care Workers and other essential workers. You dont want to be taking steps to reopen your economy if you dont have enough ventilators, icu beds, other pets in your health care setting. , as weer piece of that are shifting away from everyone being under lockdown to a different strategy of trying to identify people who are sick, have more testing available, identify people with mild symptoms, and get those people into isolation, identify who those people who are sick had contact with, get them into isolation or quarantine. We have to make sure that everyone in america can do that safely. What has been going on so far is telling people to go home. Many people are going home to relatives who they are infecting. Other countries have provided hotel rooms, dormitory rooms, and income so people can safely quarantine or isolate for 14 days. We need to do that. The issue of herd immunity is an interesting one. It is something that traditionally we like to do with vaccination. If you can get a significant number of your population to have protective factors for a given disease, they become buffers. The virus meets somebody who has those protective factors and they cant infect them. Maybe these summary behind them doesnt have the protective virus. For different Infectious Diseases, the percentage of your population that has to have immunity is different. For Something Like measles, it is very high. 95 of people need immunity. We will have to see what it is for coronavirus. We will know more about that when we get a sense of how the people in communities have actually had this infection with no symptoms whatsoever. Asymptomatic infections. If it turns out a lot of people have had that, we would be closer to having a sense of herd immunity than if it is only a small percentage of people. Host if theres a single fundamental lesson from the early months of this pandemic that you can apply the future pandemic, what would it be . Say, lets never let our guard down again. We have incredible people in our Public Health system. The federal level, the state and local level, our laboratories. Over the decades, when we have not had Health Crises like this, it has been easy for politicians to cut funding. Weve lost tens of thousands of critical Public Health workers. Lets not have that happen again. Coming out of this, and we will come out of this, when we come out of this, lets commit to investing in the highquality Public Health system that we need and deserve as a nation. Lets make sure that that system can enter ensure that everyone in america, regardless of income, geography, race has the same opportunity for health and wellbeing. Pandemics have had a way of reshaping society. Let three Shape Society to the one that we think we should have. Host we will conclude on that note. P attrition, former acting director of the cbc, the president and ceo of the Robert Wood Johnson foundation, joining us from princeton, new jersey. Please come back again. We appreciate it. Guest it has been a pleasure. Host we want to turn our attention to the economy. We have aligned set aside if you are unemployed. 202 7488002. This is a headline from the washington post. The president s intelligence briefing repeatedly cited the , indicating that the president was first alerted to this pandemic in a number of meetings in january and early february. Today at the white house, this question to the president in the open office oval office. What were your intelligence advisers telling you in january and february . Were you warned about what was happening with coronavirus and the threat to this country . Should there have been more warnings . Pres. Trump more than the democrats. A month later, nancy pelosi was saying, lets dance in the streets of chinatown. At professionals like anthony saying, this is no problem. This was late in february. This will blow over. They are professionals and good professionals. Most people thought this was going to blow over. Ofjanuary, toward the end january, we did a ban with china. That was a very important step. Ultimately, we did a ban on europe. That was very early in the process. If you look at it, i was badly criticized by Sleepy Joe Biden and others. I was criticized for ugly. Horribly. He said all sorts of things. He apologized. Two weeks ago, he put out a segment that i was right. We did a ban. Many people, democrats, professionals, republicans, said that this would never happen. That it would be no big problem. You saw that better than anybody, just deborah. I took it very seriously. I will not be banning china from coming and if i did not take it seriously. Were you getting warnings . Pres. Trump i would have to check. I want to look as to the exact dates of warnings. I can tell you this. When i did the ban on china, almost everybody was against me including republicans. They thought it was too harsh and unnecessary. Professionals, republicans, democrats, everybody disagreed. Host thats from the president in the oval office responding to this headline from the washington post. His daily breeze in february, citing the virus as a potentially serious threat. Not only to Public Health to the economy. Joining us on the phone is michael strahan, a resident scholar and director of Economic Policy at the american into presence into. Hes the author of a book. Thank you for being with us. Guest thank you for having me. Host let me put the numbers on the screen just to reinforce what we are looking at in terms of unemployment in the country. In march, 10. 5 Million People filing from employment. In april, 16 million. In total, 27 million americans out of work is of the pandemic. When the recovery happens, every expert expects it will happen, what look like . Guest i think it is somewhat early to know for sure. I think we know that the recovery will take place in different parts of the United States at different times. We are already seeing 43 million americans who live in states that are opening up this month. Several states have locked down orders that expire on may 1 or the end of april. Time, much of the midwest will continue to be lots down well into may. People in different parts of the country will experience recovery at different times. Recovery will look differently in different places as well. Different states will approach this in different ways. In some states, you will be able to go to a restaurant. In other states, you wont. In some states, you will have to wear a mask to go to a retail store. In other states, you wont. One big feature will be the lack of uniformity. It has drawbacks. It will allow states to learn from each other. Concern isa major that all americans will experience a recovery that starts and stops. Recovery in have the summer as the warmer weather knocks the coronavirus back to a much more manageable level than where we might have another round of the virus in the fall. We might have to reimplement social distancing policies. Heres a range of outcomes were just hoping for the best ones. Host is that the difference between av recovery and a you recovery . Recovery and a u recovery . We could have another sharp drop in the fall if there is a resurgence of the virus. We would climb out of that again. Thats the ebb and flow type of recovery that we may end up seeing, depending on how the virus behaves. That is particularly challenging to address with Public Policy. Ue debate over the v and boils down to what kind of timeframe you are interested in. If you are looking at a quarterly basis, right now we are in the Second Quarter of the year. April, may, and june. The Third Quarter is july, august, september. Thats coming up. The Second Quarter, the current quarter, looks atrocious. Contractee the economy at an annualized rate of 30 or more. 1520 ly have Unemployment Rate now. Right now. Calamity that people have never seen before. We will have a lot of improvement over the summer in the Third Quarter. Judging by a quarter to quarter basis, i think we will see a v. At what point does the economy fully recover from this . At what point does National Income fully recover . At what point is the economy producing as many goods and services as it did on figuring 10th, before the virus was a concern . There, you are looking at a year, a year and a half from now , at the earliest, barring some sort of technological innovation. That is really what our hope should be. It would not be prudent to base policy on that. Host this week, the Treasury Department with another 300 billion to the Payroll Protection Program to help small and mediumsized businesses. Is that the right approach by the Central Government . Guest i think its a very welldesigned program. The idea was that we had to basically shut down the economy very quickly without much warning. The goal of the program is to avoid a wave of millions and millions of Small Business closures. A secondary goal is to keep workers attached to their employers, keeping them getting played paid by their employers. Those are the right goals. They are the right goals for businesses. These are productive businesses that are contributing to society. Their liquidation would serve no purpose. Hastypical Small Business liquidity of cash that they can survive on without revenue. Money needed to get out of the door quickly. Its good for workers to keep them attached to their employers. Its good for the economy overall. It stops the Unemployment Rate from rising too rapidly as well. It allows for the overall economy to remain healthy. With thischallenges program, theres no question about that. The people have received money who should not have. I think that is obvious. Programgn of the prioritized getting money out the door over targeting the program as well as the government would have been able to. I think that was the right prioritization. Situation really could be like the 1930s. I dont think that theres an adequate appreciation for just how much of a disaster this really is. Saw 10 million Small Businesses go bankrupt because congress tried to make sure that this money was extremely well targeted, only went to the people who needed at the absolute most and did not prioritize speed, we would have seen many more businesses close than what we have currently seen. The end implement rate wouldve gone higher than it will. I think when we are looking back july, we wille or be happy that congress prioritize getting money out the door as soon as possible, knowing that there would be some people who took advantage of the system, knowing that a lot of to people whod go need it but not the businesses who needed the very most. It is a good program. I think it needs to be of limited better. There are technical things the Treasury Department should be doing differently. Phase ofer the next the economic recovery, we will need different kinds of programs. The idea of getting money out the door as quickly as possible to the Small Businesses was the right idea. Phil is joining us from corpus christi, texas. Good evening. Caller thank you for taking my call. Candidate trump would often reference the deficit, 24 trillion. 24re already above trillion. We talk about all the stimulus money. It is like some mana from heaven and we never have to pay it back. I have worked for decades. You mentioned 1930s. I couldnt help but think about the Weimar Republic of world war i. They were pushing will barrels full of cash around to buy local bread. Is that where we are headed . Host thank you, phil. Guest i dont think its where we are headed. I think it could be where we are headed. A very likely would have been we were headed if the Federal Reserve had not acted so quickly and decisively. A major difference between now and the Great Depression is that the depression was due to some serious imbalances in the economy. Those imbalances were compounded by a series of Public Policy mistakes. Serious Public Policy mistakes. That, with hindsight, we will look back on what congress and the fed did and see things that they could have done differently or better. Think we are doing that on the whole, the approach that congress and the that are taking is the right approach to this. That will help make sure that its not, we are not looking at a decade of real misery like you had during the Great Depression. Think, over the short term, this could look similar. We could see an Unemployment Rate of over 20 . We could see massive economic contractions. The question is, how long will we be in that state . How quickly can we rebuild . The thing that we have going for us now, Public Policy will be goals at both of those than it was during the Great Depression. I think that the fundamentals of the economy are in a much better state than they were in the 1930s. The longer we stay shut down and the more damage we incur some the worst those fundamentals become. That really speaks to the tension we are facing right now when trading off what to real plan with Public Health. I dont the were in for another Great Depression. We could be if we dont do the right things. I think that on a superficial level, looking at just the to sister, the worst of this could look similar to what we saw in the 30s. Host the National Debt now at 24 point trillion dollars and growing. Deborah on the phone from tucson, arizona. Was, they question was forment souped up four months. Do you think that was a good idea . Will people go back to work . Arizona is 12 an hour. You know . When do you think these people will go back to work, when its over . Should they have shortened that amount . Host thank you. Guest i think it was the right decision to make on unemployment. It was the right decision because we did not want people out looking for jobs during the shutdown phase. It was the right decision because there would be greater need as a consequence of the shutdown. Was too much. It has created a situation where come itre earning more is greater than income they were receiving from their jobs. Thats a problem. Thats not a huge problem right now, when we still want people to be in their homes and not looking for work and not working if possible. Its going to be a big problem when the economy reopens and it comes time for people to find jobs. The way the economy will heal is by unemployed workers finding jobs and getting back to work. So i think that congress is going to need to figure out what to do with those benefits. They certainly should not be extended beyond their expiration. Startld not be crazy to to reduce that generosity before the expiration date. Finding ways to use the unemployment system and benefits to encourage people to give get back to work, take given its of this is the most promising way to go. Host we have a minute left. Quick question from troy, new york. Go ahead. Caller yes. I wanted to know if they do a second wave of a stimulus check, will that throw the economy to a per host go ahead. Caller if they do a second wave of stimulus checks, will that throw the economy into an even deeper deficit . Host thank you. Guest it will. It will extend the deficit. We should not be worried about that right now. Senior scholar and director of Economic Policy studies at the American Enterprise institute, joining us here in washington. Thank you for being with us. Guest thank you for having me on. Host Florida Governor ron desantis with the president , defending his decision in florida and saying that he has been doing a better job than other governors. Heres what he told reporters. [video clip] most toook at the connie and orders that have been issued in some of the states and complain or florida in terms of our hospitalizations per 100,000, are fatalities per 100,000. You go from d. C. , maryland, new jersey, new york, connecticut, massachusetts, michigan, ohio, illinois, you name it. Im not criticizing those states. Everyone in the media was saying florida would be like new york or italy. That has not happened. We understood, we have a diverse state. We understood the outbreak was not uniform throughout the state. We had it a tailored and measured approach that not only helped our numbers be way below what anyone predicted, but also did less damage to our state going forward. I had construction going on. And a it in a safe way way that is probably more sustainable over the long term. I think people can go back and look at all the criticisms and look now and nobody predicted that florida we have challenges. This is not an easy situation. Weve had people in the hospital. Im in a situation where i have less than 500 people in a state of 42 million on ventilators as of last night. 6000 ventilators that are sitting idle, unused throughout the state of florida. You have these numbers. Are you concerned at all about another outbreak coming this summer or fall . Thats why we are doing this. It is a novel virus. It is unpredictable. Were in a situation now where we have so many tools to be able to detect. One of the things i was talking to dr. Birx about, the Florida Department of health has a fully integrated Health System with the county. We have been doing Contact Tracing from the very beginning. Now, once the outbreak gets way certain point, the mitigation is really what you do. Contact tracing will not be able to stop. In florida, we had such an uneven outbreak. We were doing Contact Tracing throughout this whole time in parts of the state that the outbreak was not as severe. They limited the spread and did it very effectively. Host thats from Governor Desantis at the white house earlier today, meeting with the president in the oval office. Joining us from his district in illinois 18th Congressional District is darren lavoie. Thank you for being with us. Guest good to be with you and your viewers. Host tourism is a pretty big part of your Congressional District. I know that has been an issue in recent days. How do you see that coming back in the months ahead . Guest it will be tough. Getting people on airplanes or on buses or to travel to crowded museum will be tough. Im fortunate to represent the same Congressional District that Abraham Lincoln did. We have the stateoftheart Abraham Lincoln president of museum. It attracts people from all over the world. It will be difficult to get people back to places like the Lincoln Museum and other places. We also have some of the best hunting grounds anywhere in the midwest for turkey and dear and ducks. Thats a big source of tourism. That is more seasonal. We will have challenges as we try to bring people back to our area to engage in tourism, no doubt about it. Host you were going to come back next monday. Your reaction to the change by Speaker Pelosi and the congressman to hold off your return until later in may . Guest im disappointed. We have an obligation to responsibility to act now. Weve been back twice already in the last six weeks to vote on two different stimulus packages. I was back there for both of those. The house has implemented a lot of social distancing protocol. We have been following the cdc guidelines. We are supposed to go back and do our job. It is hypocritical that we are asking Health Care Workers to work, Grocery Store clerks, truck drivers, and yet we are staying at home for another week. The last point i would make, the senate is coming back. Mitch mcconnell is doing the right thing. ,oday, the announcement was listen to the advice of the attending physician. The attending physician also covers the senate. The senate feels that it is safe enough to come back. We need to get back and start doing our job. Host Speaker Pelosi said the house has more members and staff involved. That was one of the big differences. Guest we were there last thursday. We voted on two different measures. We did it in an organized way. Exercising social distancing. People all across this country right now, many of them on the front lines in the health care industry, are doing the exact same thing. I think that is part of our job. To step up and lead. Were not doing that by sitting at home. Host what has the last six weeks been like for you and your family and constituents . Guest disruptive. Different. Challenging. Like everybody else. My wife and i have three teenage boys who dealing with elearning. Getting comfortable with zoom, blue jeans and skype. We have been hunkered down in our home, like everybody else. Communicating has been a lot different. You think of our job as members of congress, we vote, do constituent service and advocate for our districts. Now you have to do that through a different form of communication. From the time i get up early in the morning until i go to bed, i am texting, emailing or on a Conference Call doing at least things, things. Host is your wife and family use to having you at home so much . Guest no. If there is any silver lining, that has been enjoyable. I have heard that from a lot of other people, spending family time together. Our lives are complicated, so that has been good. Host you represent the same district your dad represented. He went on to serve in the obama white house. How is he doing . Guest he is doing good. Like any dad, he has lots of advice. He is doing well, he and my mom are doing well. They have 16 grandkids. I am trying to focus on College Funds for grandkids. And spoken like a father grandfather. What is the biggest change you see when you return to washington . They were talking about the act, 3 trillion is the number we have been seeing. What will happen . Guest the federal government plays a big role in getting people through this difficult time. To 3e spent close trillion over the last few weeks. I want to see how that money gets spent. Has beenhe ppe program impactful to Small Businesses. We are putting all this on a credit card and going into debt. I think we have to respond appropriately. Secretary mnuchin said our response is like a baseball game, nine innings and we are in inning four or five right now. We have to be nimble. The biggest thing is getting our economy going again. We cannot spend our way out of this. We have to look at how we transition, tier, balance getting our economy going again. That is something i hear a lot about in my district in illinois. All the one state fits approach to governors, your approach is different from chicago. How do you think the governor should deal with stayathome orders moving ahead . Guest i was disappointed the governor earlier, and of last week, kept shelterinplace for the entire state. Remember, we are much different than chicago. 75 of the state of illinois is farmland. We have been lucky, we have not had the infection rates that chicago has had. Approach. Ded a tiered chicago is a hotspot, but peoria, springfield and quincy, we need to be treated differently. We are much more like iowa, missouri and indiana than we are chicago. No doubtrating part, coronavirus has been impactful and hurt people, but poverty hurts people. Ae longer we go without paycheck, the bigger the problems we will have. I am hopeful our governor will reconsider and open things up in a smart, measured, transitional way. It definitely can be done. The scientific and medical evidence shows that. The 18thresents Congressional District, joins me from his home. Good luck with the elearning with your three boys. Guest thank you. Host we look at the latest numbers from Johns Hopkins university. 1212. Wide infections new, in the u. S. , 533. 132. Wide deaths program, aghts clinical psychologist from harvard university. She is also the president of the anxiety and Depression Association of america. Chief medical officer of Partnership Health to talk about the pandemic in developing nations. Tomorrow evening another primetime edition of the washington journal. We are back tomorrow morning at 7 00 a. M. For washington journal. Thank you for joining us this tuesday. Enjoy the rest of your evening, stay safe and keep healthy. [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] washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up this morning, a discussion of what federal spending on Coronavirus Relief has done to the federal budget and debt with committee for responsible budget president maya mcguiness. We will talk about potential vaccines and treatments for covid19 with the cofounder and director of the institute of human virology at the university of Maryland School of maryland medicine. Watch at 7 00 eastern this morning. Be sure to watch washington journal sunday at 9 00 a. M. For a look back 50 years to the interwar student protest at kent state, which erupted into deadly confrontation between students and the Ohio National guard. Today, Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell talks about the state of the economy had a virtual News Conference after the federal open Market Committee meeting. Live coverage begins at 2 30 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Changed sincehas cspan began 41 years ago, but our mission continues. To provide an unfiltered view of government. Already, we have brought you primary election coverage, the president ial impeachment process, and now the federal response to the coronavirus. You can watch all of cspans Public Affairs programming on television, online, or listen on every radio app. Be part of the National Conversation through washington journal, or through our social media feeds. Cspan, created by private industry, americas Cable Television companies as a Public Service and brought to you by your television provider. California governor gavin newsom said his state is weeks, not months away from reopening lower risk nonessential workplaces. His remarks came during tuesday. Oronavirus briefing other topics included the prospect of starting the fall school term anywhere between july and early august. Gov. Newsom two weeks ago today we laid out a road map for reopening the california economy in a phased, thoughtful approach. We put forth six indicators to drive our Decision Making. Politics wont drive our Decision Making prork tests wont driverotests ou