Transcripts For CSPAN Washington Journal 07272020 20240712

Text us with your first name, city, and state at 202 7488003. Senate republicans are expected to unveil their proposal today, led by Senate Minority leader Mitch Mcconnell. Floor, youso on the will be able to watch that on cspan two. Mark meadows, the chief of staff for the white house, was on capitol hill into the evening yesterday, negotiating with republicans on this narrower bill they would like to move forward on. From the new york times, republicans are proposing altering the jobless benefit the 600 withlace a plan that would replace about wages, aworkers lost change democrats are unlikely to endorse. And democrats oppose efforts by republicans to give employers employees protections from employers protections from lawsuits. [video clip] the original benefits actually paid people to stay home, and a lot of people got more money staying home then going back to work. The president has been clear, our republican senators have been clear, we will not stand that provision. We will be ready on monday to provide Unemployment Insurance extension that would be 70 of whatever wages you were prior to being unemployed, up to 70 . Hopefully as a way to get people back on their feet. Can i stop you there . Someone has said that will be impossible to administer and people will face gaps. We have looked at that. I have been on the phone with secretary scalia, secretary mnuchin. We believe a combination of working with mnuchin and scalia, will provide a way that will provide a threshold that will meet that guideline. Yes, some of the state benefit Computer Systems are antiquated. We will have to work from a federal government standpoint. Secretary mnuchin is ready to help with that. Make sure itl to is not antiquated computers that keep people from getting there benefit getting their benefit. An estimated 40 Million People that were going to be unemployed. Never got close to that. We are still well beyond where we would hope a healthy economy would be, but it is improving very quickly. The secretary and i have been on capitol hill over the weekend. Will back again today would be back again today, putting the touches on a bill senator mcconnell plans to introduce tomorrow. Ics being able to provide Unemployment Insurance i see us eating able to provide Unemployment Insurance, helping with our schools. If we can do that, along with liability protection, perhaps we put that forward, get that past, and negotiate on the rest of the bill in the weeks to come. Host mark meadows, former congressman, now the president s chief of staff. The benefit, the extra 600, expires july 31. The last payment in many states went out saturday and sunday. Shouldasking you, congress extend that extra 600 . Yes, no . And if you are getting that money yourself, we want to hear your story. By speakerled pelosi, say we will not only extend the benefits, but keep going with that extra 600. They do not want to reduce it to 70 of wages. But they are also saying there will not pass a narrow bill. We want a broader legislation, like the heroes act passed in may, 3 trillion. Republicans are saying lets keep it under one trillion. This is the speaker of the house. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [video clip] when do you expect to begin negotiating . We have been anxious for two months and 10 days. That does three things. Honoring our heroes that supports the and local governments, food suppliers, teachers, transportation workers, and the rest. Havingens our economy by testing, tracing, treatment, and distancing to end this virus. Third, to put money in the pockets of the american people, Unemployment Benefits, direct payments, etc. These are things they have voted for in previous packages. Brink, whenn the people are hungry, millions are food insecure, going to food banks, and we need more money for food stamps and emergency nutrition programs, and they are resisting that. In, that they would now they are in disarray and that delay is causing suffering for americas families. Texas,ony, brownsville, you say yes, extend that section or dollars a week. Tell us why. Caller absolutely. My house is the 99 . The money comes from out of their own pocket. We have many unemployed. The list goes on. Right now, i mean, it is the correct thing to do. Going to be worse than the depression. This is no joke. Host tony making the argument that many could face eviction. The same argument cnn notes. Benefit would cause an estimated 41 to spend more than half their income on rent, leaving them at risk of eviction. This was an analysis published thursday. Adultshan a quarter of missed payments last month, according to a Census Bureau survey. of adults are in households where there was either sometimes or often not enough to eat the last seven days. John, you say no. Why . They should not extend it unless they raise taxes on the last darvish on the top 25 and tax wall street transactions. This criminal in the white house has run up the deficit just like crazy. They ought to go ahead and extend it because there will be chaos if they do not. You will have mass riots in houston. There are 40,000 people infected in the last few days in houston. You will have massive foreclosures, massive layoffs, and i think the airlines and i will tell you what. Mark meadows is a liar. 50 Million People laid off. Way more than 40 million. 50 million unemployed. Anyway, you need to raise taxes if youre going to do this. Host all right, john. Nadine in the bronx, go ahead. I feel they should extend the unemployment than if it unemployment benefit. In my neighborhood, there are a lot of people who struggle to make ends meet, including my son, corey. If they do not extend the benefits, he will wind up losing his apartment. I have received a letter at the beginning of the pandemic. I try to apply for unemployment tried to apply for unemployment last year. They told me i could not receive health. Because of my i did apply last week. Etter sayingl they gave me money last year. They did not give me a dime of unemployment. Right now, all i am receiving is 72 a week, every two weeks, from hra. I could really use some of that money, so i am claiming every struggle it is a real to try to make ends meet. Host ok. In the wall street journal, reporting on the unemployment that, with itfact at 16 , there are not jobs for many people to return to. Addedork employers have back just over 500,000 of the 1. 7 8 million jobs lost between february and april according to the state labor department. More than 2 Million People are currently receiving Unemployment Benefits. Joining us on the phone is mike willis. Onreports for the hill capitol hill. What do we know about the timing of the republicans proposal and can you tell us what they would like to do in this legislation . Guest hello. Thank you for having me. It has been a bit of a mess and we think there is probably still a long way to go. Republicans are expected to introduce their proposal today at some point, probably this afternoon. The democrats passed their bill back in may, so it has been two months. They have been waiting around for the republicans to offer a counter proposal. That has come today, but not without a lot of work. Over the weekend, the last ditch negotiations with steven mnuchin, treasury secretary, and white house chief of staff mark meadows. They were meeting with geo staff gop staff and there has been a lot of disagreement between the white house, sender republicans, and the Senate Republican congress itself. Republicanserate facing tough reelections who want to put their foot on the gas. You have some in the camp of deficits are through the roof, we have already offered 3 trillion and we cannot throw out more. Thatis kind of the hurdle Mitch Mcconnell and Republican Leaders have tried to get over. They are straddling then divide between camps. House, has the white made demands that were not paddle that were not palatable to Senate Republicans. We expect to see their counterproposal today in the range of about 1 trillion. Host what will happen next . No indications that mcconnell can pass this through the senate. He almost certainly cannot. Not only does he have those conservatives who do not want to pass 1 trillion and would probably vote against this package, but the democrats who have filibuster power think it is woefully inadequate. The house bill that passed in may is 3. 4 trillion. Thursday see enormous divide it just in the size of what is enormous there is this divide in just the size of what is needed. To your callers about the unemployment benefit, and that will be one of the major sticking points in the house bill, the democrats bill, that extended the 600 stipend. The idea was, whoever lost their job would get 100 of the lost salary. States administer this. They do this by different methods and some states are more generous than others. Want 100 ofhat we lost salary because of the system and the computer decided on a 600 acrosstheboard bump up. In many cases, people are actually making more they had at the job they lost. Republicans are arguing that as a disincentive to get people back to work. So that is the fight that they are having. The republican bill is expected to have much less than that, about a 200 federal stipend, which is designed to bring the wage up to about 70 when you combine state and federal. By keeping it below what people have made in the past at their jobs, that is designed to get people wanting to go back to work to get the 30 . That is a real fight they will have once talks begin with the democrats, but those have not even started. The democrats are not even involved in this. Pull oc and schumer did meet with Nancy Pelosi Schumer did meet with mnuchin and meadows. They have kind of been on the sidelines, kind of, saying, wheres your bill . And want to propose something, then we can been these talks we can begin these talks in earnest. So all eyes on Mitch Mcconnell today. For what is the timeline the two sides coming together into green on one bill together and agreeing on one bill . Guest steny hoyer, the majority toder, has said we will have stay the extra week. Differences, the level of differences, and how much has to be ironed out, the expectation is the republicans will probably fight it out between themselves this week and begin the talks by the end of the week with democrats, then will have to bounce in to next week to get whatever agreement they reached to the president s desk. There is urgency because the benefits expire at the end of this week, july 31. That has kind of lit a fire under both sides. Steveou had yesterday, mnuchin and mark meadows on the sunday shows, and they proposed a temporary extension of the benefits. Nancy pelosi and schumer have been very adamant that they will not do this piecemeal. They will not do a temporary unemployment benefit extension. It was seen kind of as a negotiating tactic, because they know the democrats will not go for that. I think that is off the table even before it is on the table, but you are right. There is urgency here because if they do not pass something quickly, then millions of people are going to lose that check, 600, whatever they agree to, will be zero dollars if they do not agree soon. Host on capitol hill, they have minibus. Guest the federal government is funded through september right now. They have some time to play with. Democrats have made a point to pass their protrusions passed their appropriations as a tactic. They can say, we have done our job. One of the Main Responsibilities of congress is funding the government. After years of republicans not passing their appropriations bills, we are a more responsible alternative. A lot of that is messaging, but nothing is expected to reach trumps desk until september, when the real deadline shows a. Will be the house working, passing some bills. John lewis is lying in state. There are other things going on. What theyg thing is are going to do on coronavirus. Host you had attorney general william barr testifying on tuesday. Remind viewers why he is there. Fire he has come under from the democrats because they think he is abusing the office. They think he is just protecting the president. He dropped the charges against michael flynn. Re was the commutation of blanking on his name host roger stone. Guest yes. In there are these instances which they think william barr is abusing the office, abusing the doj. You saw him fire geoffrey berman, the new york prosecutor, who investigated Michael Cohen and was investigating rudy giuliani, trumps personal lawyer. Trumps personal lawyer. Be a lot ofl questions the democrats will have for attorney general barr. The doj is theory, supposed to be an taunus branch of government anna taunus branch of government. Butill be fireworks, nothing real is expected to come out of that. There are investigations the democrats are conducting, but nothing is expected to come out of it from a practical standpoint. William barrs job is not in jeopardy. There was talk of impeaching barr, but nancy pelosi has shot that down. It is just too close to the elections. They do not want to return. Centristhave candidates they want to send to washington and they do not want to put them in the place of having to talk about these sorts of things, especially during the pandemic intercession. Lillis, we thank you. Heard him mention the former congressman john lewis lying in state at washington. Yesterday come the civilrights trip acrosshis last yound pettus bridge, where afterere usa toda that, the body of the congressman will make its way to washington dc, where his casket will make several stops in washington, d. C. , including at black lives matter plaza here in washington, d. C. , and then make his way to the make its way to the capital, where at 1 00 p. M. Eastern, there will be a Memorial Service. Time, 6 00 p. M. Eastern he will be lying in state. The proceedings in washington are part of six days of ceremonies to celebrate lewiss life. Social distancing and masks will be required. Lewis will lie in state outdoors for public visitation on the east front steps of the capitol. Asks that people do not travel across the country. Back to her conversation with all of you about whether or not congress should extend these Unemployment Benefits and for how much. John in florida, you say no. Give us your opinion. Caller i will give you my opinion, but i like to work with facts. I am a registered independent, ok . The second thing is, instead i itieve instead of calling republican and democrat, you should call it republican and socialist. Third thing, black lives matter. That has nothing to do with race. Host lets stick with the topic. Caller i grew up on the southside side of chicago and i believe in working. We want people to work instead and watching home old reruns of gunsmoke or whatever. I mean, that is the capitalist system. Host ok. Paul, in virginia, you say yes. On the fence, like the other gentlemen. The premise of the question is really wrong because it is not Unemployment Benefits. As a whole. Because each state has their own timeline. I have been on unemployment before and each state has a specific time period that you can receive Unemployment Benefits, so, really, the premise of the question should be enhanced benefits. We have space challenges with our graphics, but point taken. Hill reporterr was saying, it is not the one milliondollar question, it should be the 1 trillion question these days. Somethere might need to be enhanced benefits on the , and the business of waiting until the end, where, you know, the enhanced benefits 31st today or on the and i would challenge these scholars to tell me of these scholars to tell me since when waited untilnot hour to pass anything other than continuing resolutions . So yeah, maybe a little bit me is aut the 600 to little excessive. Each state does have their own timeline, so a lot of the Media Outlets are reporting that the Unemployment Benefits will end. It is not just the enhanced, as to your point. Rom from forbes, moratoriums on mortgages and expires. A moratorium on foreclosures will expire. Expanded Unemployment Benefits expire july 31. The last payments went out saturday and sunday. The pandemic unemployment willtance program continue through december 31. Automatic forbearance for student loans, not private loans, will end september 30. Withdrawals from the 401 k , ira, or eligible retirement accounts are allowed through december 1, 2020. Lets go to and that and nnette. You say no. Caller i say absolutely not. Be helpful ifd they received the equivalent to the wages they were working when they were working. This is unfair to the ones who continued working. They get not one dime extra. And yet they are expected to live on what they make. Be,her example would work y, they go to im sorry, they keep saying they need the 600 to r to survive. You were surviving on what you are making. How are you going to survive without the 600 . It makes no sense. The number 600 itself is obscene. 200, thatsaybe, it. Cut it off. And maybe you can give those working also the same. It would have been more fair to give 100 to those unemployed and those working. Host you remember that in the first legislation that was sides, agreed to by both they did send out those stimulus checks. Newjersey. Com, the republicans will give you the stimulus checks but reduce your benefits. You may get a stimulus check if you go back to work. You may not immediately face eviction, but if there is no job for you to return to, you will likely see a cut to your unemployment and if it. Tom in maryland. You agree with extending this federal unemployment benefit. Good morning to you. Caller yeah. There is enough money in the United States for every american working person. Congress gave big business a 2 trillion tax cut. People already have millions and billions of dollars. The Unemployment Rate in this country has been not bad, but the fact is that the pay people are getting is not equivalent to what they have to pay out. A lot of people right now are andnd on rent and whatnot, i do not see why congress cannot appropriate a few extra dollars, since people have not gotten a pay raise in this country in so long. I cannot see way they cannot give a few extra dollars to people to get them on their feet, and that would improve the economy. Host some messages from viewers. Wages are for people who work whitecollar jobs and the same hours. What about us people who work hourly jobs and receive tips . There should be another Monthly Payment for those who are not on salary. Youave julie on twitter, cannot return to work and still collect unemployment. I do not care if they extended. If they do not, everyone loses. Diana on facebook, a rent Mortgage Program needs to be started. I would rather have my taxes go directly to a bank. Buffalo, new york, i have had no income since march. I have no savings. I do not qualify for assistance. No effect on my situation, but it seems crazy to me to pay people more than they made when working. You say no. You will hear from Senate Majority leader Mitch Mcconnell, majority republican of kentucky today. Hello, randy. When the first stimulus package was coming up, nancy pelosi and the democrats were on vacation. They did not come back to washington to get the bill signed to get the money out to the people. Now they are going on vacation again. And one more thing. These people they get this money come of 600 in unemployment, come the end of the year you have to pay taxes on that. In other words, one third of goes back tou get, the government for taxes. Mike from the hilt went in circles on what he said this morning. I do not know if he think this money just falls at of trees or what. I cannot believe what im hearing this morning. Get people back to work. That is what has to happen. In cleveland, your turn. Skated on obamas economy for a real long time. Hey folks, this is the trump economy. Fights covid drink bleach and swallow flashlights. We are talking about fellow americans here. How long does it take to get hungry . How long does it take to realize you are sitting on the street . Let me put it to you simple you want to live, beau biden. Thank you. Vic in windermere, florida. Caller i do not think you need extended unemployment. We need to revamp our whole social system. These people who think socialism is social programs do not even know the definition of socialism. We need social programs. One in 10 children are hungry in school. Trump cut the food stamp program. You have single mothers with children getting evicted. Who got 85 top 1 of the tax cut. When people realize, especially in the south, which is one of the poorest and least educated portions of the country, that they elect people who do not vote in their best interest. Problem because of systemic racism and the southern strategy to get people who cannot afford it to vote republican. They are not wealthy enough to vote republican. They need social programs, similar to norway, where you would not have a problem with it this with this. We are in a deep recession with 50 million jobs lost already. There are no jobs period. We need to change things. The top tax rate is the lowest it has been since world war ii. At one point, it was 90 at the top. Corporations are paying no taxes. Warren buffett is coming out and saying you have to raise taxes on the top 1 . We have to take care of people. Either you believe government helps people or hurts people. That is the problem. There is one area of the country with many poor people, with the worst education system, that upportues to s republicans. On facebook not . T on facebook, why noah in california. Up early, and you say yes. Caller good morning. My comment is, even if people are receiving more than they would make if they were working, would people really want to go back . Really anhat outrageous amount of money . Of a 40e equivalent hour work week at 15 an hour. That is not a living wage. To say people need to pull themselves up by the bootstraps and get a job, go back to school, learn new skills. I am all for these discussions, but lets not stop from the bottom. Lets look at the greatest continuing robbery of all time that is the special interests taking the lions share of the money. This money is going to thisloyment, rentals money going to unemployment, rental assistance, and health care is a drop in the bucket. Most americans have less than 1000 in the bank. This is truly living on the edge. Host listen to the argument being made by republicans. Larry kudlow, the president s chief economic advisor. Here is what he had to say. [video clip] it will not not stop the assistance. They will cap the assistance at a level consistent with going back to work. State Unemployment Benefits estate in place. The benefitso cap at about 70 of wages. Studyiversity of chicago showed 68 of people actually have higher benefits than wages. We have had a flood of phone calls and complaints that small stores and businesses cannot hire people back. They went too far. Maybe in march it was necessary for that, but the consequences of people not returning to work secretary mnuchin said it right. We want to pay folks to go back to work. 70 ,p of the cap of wages, which is quite generous, we will have a retention tax credit bonus for going back. That will more than offset any of this. The trick here is going back to work. Do not want people state of thes union yesterday. Your term. What do you think as republicans unveil their proposal for moving forward on this issue of enhanced Unemployment Benefits and other provisions . Hills, excuse me, kimberly, in campbellsville, kentucky. Not think congress should extend Unemployment Benefits. Onhink they should base it the pay, on the wages that workers had before claiming these benefits, and it should for the next way few days until it expires and that should be the end of it. We should get people back to work and open up the country as soon as possible. Host all right. Jesup, georgia, good morning. Caller i find it amazing. These people talking about you can draw unemployment. When your employee calls you back to work and do not come back to work, your benefits stop then. It andte paid out for you are obligated to come back to work. Once you dont, your benefits are eliminated. These are facts, especially in georgia. Popeyesnt to work at and fill out for being sick with the virus and fell out for being sick with the virus because he is too poor to stay at home and lose a day. And they are worried about 600 a week, but they dont have a problem with amazon not being taxed at all . Give me a break. This is unreal. Thank you. Host ok. Bruce in raleigh, north carolina, you disagree with extending them. Good morning. Let me go to bob. Bob in new jersey, good morning. Caller yes. Ok. Said itthey should have for two reasons. They keep saying, it prevents people from going back to work. If i get called to go back to work, i have to go back to work. Host or you will lose the benefits. Caller yes, you lose the whole thing. The restaurant people are saying they cannot get people back to work, but if they call you to go back, you have to go. I plan on working until my retirement age of 66. 5. I would rather do that and get the 600 for six months, do you know what im saying . Most people would rather work. There was an article in the bartel in the Baltimore Sun explaining that. So give it till the end of january. Who cares . These other businesses are going to have to go out of business, like the smaller stores, because people will not have money to go to the stores. That is my opinion. I do not think it would kill the country to have it until january or whatever. Host you may have heard an earlier call or talk about how this is not taxfree. This is from business insider. The u. S. Government is adding 600 a week to the unemployment benefit, but it is not taxfree. Any eligible unemployed person will receive both regular Unemployment Benefits from their state and an egg fish and all and an additional six dollars per week. For state you qualify benefits, you will get the 600 added to weekly pay. On Employment Benefits are generally not taxfree. Any money received is included in your gross income. Kevin in michigan. Go ahead. Caller i was listening to these comments. Money forhe extra your essential workers, the people who went out and wrist their lives to keep this country and risked their lives to keep their country going . My wife does not even make 600 a week. Where is anything for them . We are willing to give people more money than my wife makes in a 40 hour paycheck. I do not understand how this can continue without bankrupting the country. Host all right. Dan, stafford, virginia, good morning. Caller i am a mid40s kind of guy. From the early 20s to just above 11 years old. My concern is what are we taxing for the future . Uncertain social media websites, there is a lot of friction, some friction, significant friction coming from educators. And im sensitive to that. The other part of this a guy made reference to norway. People have to be careful when they start picking and choosing examples, because certain nations in Northern Europe have compulsory military service. And i am not advocating for that one bit, whatsoever. Im not saying that makes a good form of government. When you pick and choose certain ngs, health care, industry even in sweden, you have to test to get into college, and if you do not make the cut, your kid is not going to college. You will be a janitor, garbageman, and that is that. Free choice seems to go away. There is a whole conference of understanding of what in the United States is important a whole comprehensive understanding of what is important in the United States. People pick and choose. That is part of their comprehensive system, not ours. That i want to caveat that. Many women both get drafted. That is not the case here. Host ok. The flags at halfstaff here on capital hill capitol hill to mark the death of john lewis. Yesterday, usa today notes, the lastcongressman made his trip across Edmund Pettus bridge, the site of louiss heroism in the civil rights movement. Today, the body of john lewis will come to washington, d. C. , where he will make several stops in the Nations Capital as well. The Martin Luther King Monument as well as the black lives matter plaza. You can see a picture of washington, d. C. On the screen. His body will lie in state on capitol hill. There will be a Memorial Service at 1 00 p. M. Eastern time. You can watch that on cspan and are website and our website cspan. Org. He will lie in state starting at 6 00 p. M. Eastern. The family of the late congressman has asked that people not travel across the country to pay their respects because of the pandemic. His body will lie outside because of covid19. Paying their respects today will be the former Vice President and democratic candidate joe biden, his campaign announcing yesterday that he will travel to d. C. Today to pay respects. You also see other notables as well today. You can watch all of that on seat n our website cspan and our website cspan. Org. We will go to sean in florida. Good morning to you. You have these enhanced benefits . Caller i do. Situation,trange particularly because i worked during the pandemic and then got laid off. The pandemic started in march. We worked march, april, may. 5. Last day working was june from june on i have been on unemployment. A lot of stuff, especially with this stimulus, they do not really put out there. One is childsupport. I think the thing is that they dont tell you that 600, they take half of that if you pay child support. Of that is automatically gone. That when thect stimulus checks did come out, the 1200, they take all of that for child support. You have people out here that are unemployed that were paying child support. This is the other thing i do not understand. People are being told that they have to leave work. I am putting in applications every day, even for unemployment, at least in florida, you have to put in applications to even get it. Nobody is calling me back because everybody is falling is filling out applications trying to get a job. Thatis bad in the sense there are people imagine you were a restaurant worker or something, where you are making then thisey, and pandemic happens and you are cut down. And people complain, oh, he is getting 600. He is actually not, and will have to pay that back in taxes when work does start again. It is a sure that simple solution to this, but to just cut people off the way that Everyone Wants to because they feel that they are being slighted because they did not get the 600. I feel like i should have gotten more money going to work. Learned from the reporter earlier that republicans, will unveil their proposal today, you can watch on cspan two. They sate we need to lower the amount of enhanced benefits they say we need to lower the amount of enhanced benefits. Instead of six or dollars a week, it might be 200 a week. That is something to watch today as republicans unveil their proposal, the next stimulus package to help with this coronavirus pandemic. We will go to alberto in new york. Apply for aid as well applied for aid as well . People do not realize country, you need 2000 to get out of poverty a week. It is not 15 an hour like they say. That is another problem we have that nobody seems to talk about. Host john in florida, you say yes. Caller yes, i think they should extend it. I have two sons in their 20s and they both work hard, make their way through college. What of my sons went straight through after getting his degree, to get his masters. They are both paying their taxes. Because of the virus, they are both unemployed. Times, in unprecedented in times where, over the last five or six days, we had 1000 people a day dying from this virus. So the jobs are not there like the republicans are saying. The jobs just are not here. People cannot go back to work because no one knows what this virus is going to do. The administration was saying they do not want to use taxpayer dollars to pay people to stay at sons lostsince my their jobs, they are still putting in applications trying to find jobs. Pay theirntime, they taxes, they work hard to get through school, and for the the taxnt to say dollars they paid do not count toward the government helping them and this time of need is not right. So they should extend it. I think this administration and the republicans should look at the situation we are in at this keepand work to help people safe and healthy and not starving and not homeless. Host all right, john. Debbie, kansas city. Good morning to you, debbie. Caller good morning. A soninlaw just bought house two years ago. He works in the concert industry. He is a roadie for concerts. Right now, that is not happening. So obviously i want to see the benefits extended. On the other spectrum, my daughter works in retail, highrisk retail, i would say. Fitter, so she is up close and personal with people. She barely makes enough to get by on, but she went back to work. So there are all these people that are not going back. Florida,a, lakeland, you say no. Give us your opinion. No because i know people that will not take advantage of being called back to work because they are making week. Oney with the 600 oh 600 a week. Host however, if they are called back to work and they do not go, they can lose that benefit. State and the federal government will stop paying the unemployment. Caller ok, but that takes a lot of time. This has been going on for months. Young singlea mother in her 40s. She is in the medical field. She only works three days. She is not fulltime. With all these people getting this 600 plus of unemployment, they are making she does not even make 600 a week, but she has never been able to get this because you have to be laid off. Unfair,it is just so totally unfair to the people that have worked throughout this whole episode of pandemic. Releases Congress Really says no. It is so unfair to the people that really work hard. I worked all my life. I will be 70 next monday, and we worked. If you are wanting a job, you have two jobs. My husband worked. People are lazy now. Look at all of this rioting. Who is paying for that . Host all right, lola. We will go to floyd in ohio. Caller hello. How are you today . Host go ahead. Caller thank you for having me. I sit up and listen to these people criticize about not going about people not going to work. Should make some kind of a way. If you have really good people that want to go to work i have an idea. Why dont we take all of the senators and lead them off and give them 600 a week and see how much they like it . I guarantee you all of them make month, so15,000 a they are not worried about whether they will get something to eat. I will tell you what is more fatherus, a mother or a watching a child go hungry. You have dangerous people on the streets because no mother will watch her child be hungry, no father will watch his wife and children hungry. I do not think i do not know what they think they are going to do if they cannot get a job because the states are closed. You have people working here and there. Like thee sadie one lady said, they cannot do anything. People to do,nt lose their homes, live on the streets . So they have to do something. Thank you. Host we are going to take a break. When we come back, dr. Scott gottlieb, former fda commissioner, will take your medical questions about covid19, so start dialing in now. We will be right back. Cspan has unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court, and policy events. You can watch all of cspans Public Affairs programming online or listen on our free cspan radio app and be part of the National Washington journal conversation through cspans daily Washington Journal Program National Conversation through cspans daily Washington Journal Program. Brought to you as a Public Service by your television provider. Tonight on the communicators, Oregon Republican congressman greg walden. Is greaten there admiration for the brilliance that pulses in silicon valley. I have been out there with a lot of the companies, met with a lot of the leaders, and it is so exciting to be seeing what is developed and what the future holds. I will be careful how i say this, and i will probably offend somebody, but there is also an arrogance that comes with that incredible productivity and innovation that tends to downplay the effect that they have on Public Policy and people who are engaged in Public Policy. I will just say when you are that good, you are that they did, you are that strong, you are that innovative, sometimes you think you can discard public reaction or political reaction. Tonight at 8 00 eastern on the communicators, on cspan2. During the summer months, reach out to your elected officials with cspans congressional directory. It contains all of the information you need to stay in contact with congress, federal agencies, and state governors. Order your copy online today at cspanstore. Org. Washington journal continues. Now as dr. Ng us scott gottlieb, the former fda commissioner during the trump administration. He served from 2017 to 2019 and now a resident fellow at the American Enterprise introduced. Dr. Gottlieb i start with the headline in the washington post. The National Average hits fresh highs in more than a dozen states. Why do you think we are in the situation that we are in right now . Guest thanks for having me. What we are seeing happen is as a reason region starts to pull down, a new region heats up , and i think we are in this position because we have a lot of advection all around this country. We reopened not just early but aggressively, and that instigated more spread, and now you have a situation where there is just so much infection that to otherng to get parts of the country. The sunbelt is starting signs of improving. Places like texas, florida, southern california. Those states,s in particularly arizona and texas, when you look at the data. It is a little less clear in texas and southern california. At the same time, we see infections pick up in other states, kentucky, indiana, illinois, georgia, ohio, indiana, so the gains that we are making in the states that look like they are starting to peek will now be offset by the other states that look like they are accelerating. Host why are they slowing down and the sunbelt states . Why are they picking up in the states that you mentioned . Guest it is unclear exactly what the ingredient was that caused the epidemic to start to slow in the sunbelt state the policy action was slow to be implemented, but the government did try to take action, for example, to encourage masks or mandate masks. They took action to close certain congregate menus, like bars, reduce headcount in restaurants, close entertainment venues, like movie theaters, particularly in arizona. Consumers drawn back a little bit as they saw infection spreading in their state. More compliance with masks and targeted policy action may have been enough to start to bend the epidemic without a Strict Lockdown like we have had to do in the northeast, largely because the epidemics were more severe or intense, and we had less certainty about which way things were going to head, so it is important i think to look at what is going on in the south, notwithstanding the fact that i think the Political Leadership was slow to take action there. If they are successful in taking these targeted mitigation steps, combined with implementing mask mandates, and consumers just becoming more aware of the risks and trying to be more prudent in what they do on a daily basis, that might be sort of a middle ground, if you will, between Strict Lockdown, which do not seem to be culturally and socially and economically acceptable, does not seem like we are going to go that and sort ofain, pass the spread. Some kind of happy medium, if you will come up between something that is more to conan like a Strict Lockdown and kind of letting the virus course its way through the population, which itself is not acceptable, because of all the diseases that we have, so these kinds of targeted steps where you implement mask mandates and also take targeted mitigation steps may be the middle ground we have to reach for in other states. Host what is the role of the mask in stopping the spread . Guest well, it appears to be more and more effective. All of the incremental data we have gotten around the use of masks in the setting of covid seems to suggest that they are effective at stopping the spread of covid19. This is a respiratory illness. It seems to be primarily spread through droplet transmission, so larger aerosols, and the masks should be effective at reducing the transmission through that route. But also according to the protection of people who wear that mask. The higher the quality of a mask someone has on, the more protection they will be providing to themselves. A level 3 procedure mask, which looks a lot like msa dennis office might wear mask a Dentists Office might wear, or a surgical procedure might wear, that offers a lot of protection. , that affords about 90 of 100 protection, depending on how it is being worn. A cloth mask, deepening on the quality, will provide less protection than the level 3 procedure mask, still less protection, so the Higher Quality they can get, the more protection they will afford themselves. It will protect other people from you if you happen to be an asymptomatic carrier of the infection. The point i want to reiterate is when youre wearing a mask of the presumption as you are protecting other people from you you are also protecting yourself. The Higher Quality of mask, the more protection you are going to provide yourself. Host you write with mark mcclellan, former fda commissioner as well, in todays wall street journal, covid shows the need for todays stockpile. What are you arguing for a year . Guest if you have surge protection, it is always there. What is happening now is the commercial labs, which are holding the mass testing, those labs operate in a highly efficient fashion, so they use capital equipment, their big platforms that they used to do the pcrbased testing that we are doing to detect covid at maybe 70 , 80 capacity. They do not run in at 100 capacity, because you have to take those machines down for servicing, but what we are arguing is the government should effectively subsidize these companies to maintain excess capacity, so instead of running, you know, 2000 machines at 80 capacity, maybe by 4000 machines or 50 them at 60 capacity, so you have extra capacity built in, and youre running all the machines a bit less, and therefore you have Surge Capacity if you have suddenly had a big spike in demand for testing because you have it spreading or some kind of new pathogen. Right now, we do not have that capacity. There are other settings where the government will Pay Companies to build a reserve capacity. The example used in the oped is ne a drug ne nupagin. It is a drug you would want to have an excess supply of and the unlikely event of a radiological attack with a dirty bomb because the radiation when impact the bone marrow, and you would need that, so the government wants make sure theres going to be an unimpeded supply of the drug in the unlikely event of a terrorist attack. So they have built into the amount of money of supplying that drug for stockpiles some extra margins to basically harden the manufacturing facilities, if manufacturing es around theit country, and those asides are very hard and, even in the setting of certain calamities. This takes the appearance of the hurricane, when amit has a facility in puerto rico that is extremely hard and, that has a lot of residual and redundant capacity. That is an example where the government has paid to make sure there is an unimpeded supply of the drug. You can make sure there is an unimpeded supply of excess diagnostic of vasily as well. Host he recently predicted 300,000 deaths of coronavirus by years end if these Current Trends continue. Do you stand by that . Guest well, i hope not. What i said was if we do not get this under better control, if we just look at the trajectory we are on right now, you would read Something Like 300,000 deaths by the end of the year, whereas we were having less week, dipping down over the weekend, as it usually does, because there is less reporting over the weekend, but if we continue on the current trend line, you will see an average of 1000 deaths a day, maybe more, as more people succumb to the infection were currently hospitalized, so if we dont get this under control, you can do the math on the number of days left in the year, and you get some pretty scary numbers. You will see hospitalizations for client in the south. Indicator,lagging even as new cases decline, death may even go up, because it will take time for people to see people with the infection to ultimately succumb to it. But, again, when you look around the country, you will see some outbreaks in the south that is currently the epicenter of the epidemic spread in this country, but you are seeing rises in other states. So all we do is have a rotating series of regional epidemics, and any games we make in one state are offset by increases in other states. This is going to be a very hard fall and winter, and we are going to see a lot of excess death and disease accrual on the way. Host lets get to calls. You lived the line, if in east and central part of the country, your line is 202 7488000. Mountain pacific, 202 7488001. In north carolina, good morning to you. Caller good morning. Good morning, dr. I will tell you, i am really disappointed in the medical and the research community, allowing the virus to get so politicized. I mean, it is almost as if no one is standing up and saying, hey, we have got to stop this. I mean, i knew at the time they opened up a government, it was obvious we could not open up. People were still dying, and people open up the government, and they are opening up the bars, i mean, it was almost commonsense, and yet still the political community, the standists, they did not up and say, no, this should not be done should i remember at time when the cdc was the pearl of the world. They told the world how to stop these kinds of things. And cdc is so politicized. We are talking about people going back to work. They are telling people to go back to work now [laughs] and people are saying, dont give them any extra money. They need to go back to work. And the desire is not out there. You have older people who are at home, some of these rich people who are at home, and younger people who have these lowend jobs, they have to go back to work out here, and none of the scientific or the socalled movers and shakers are saying, we need to stop this mess. Host ok, james, you proved your point. Guest i think on the second point, there are a lot of people who have to work and feel very uncertain about the environment, and that is very concerning to all of us, i think, engaged in public health, that, you know, there are a lot of essential employees can a lot of people in jobs being put at risk, not just First Responders, but people who work at grocery checkout lines, people who come into contact with a lot of people in a daily basis. They have to work, they have to continue to earn money, and they are putting themselves at risk. We need to get control of the infection, first and foremost, but when people do have to go out, that they have proper protective equipment. A lot of us were concerned about the reopening. It is not just the timing of the reopening. If you think back to march and april and may, different parts of the country had Different Levels of spread, and so it is reasonable that, you know, parts of the country that were heavily engulfed took more time to start reopening venues versus part of the country where there really was not as much infection. But it is not just the timing of the reopening, it is what they reopened and sort the pace of the reopening. I think with hindsight, we should have done a better job, is slowing down the reopening of the mostat werent obvious example is bars. If we wanted to keep the epidemic at bay and we wanted to takeudent and cautious and care, like settings that are purely entertainment, that are not a necessary feature of the economy, try to make sure youre in a position to open schools clement open those venues last, if you secure the safety of the public by opening those other, more important sites. That there aree bar owners and Restaurant Owners who hear this and say, my establishment is very important to me, and it is, but on the whole, if you look at a population level and trying to maximize gains to a society as a whole, uf cap those kinds of sites hold. Now that we have had a resurgence in infection, we will keep those close for a period of time. Host rich in ohio. Caller yeah, great discussions. I appreciate your suggestions, that have probably helped save 1000 or more lives. I would point out is handshakes, that would be significant. One thing that comes to my mind to make we could get information on people come and we do have it, can get the test back or less like one day come a could save on ppp. I can save the hospitals having to have extra rooms set aside. The other thing i thought about is, how much if we have real tests come on how much heat canks off viruses, if you heat the classroom to 90 degrees , when no one is in it. Colleges are studying Library Books right now, where you have real data to do that. It seems like we have got to have all the good ideas coming together, and i think when we do cantnd keep it, maybe we do it, but we know where its at, and share between hospitals, you just can see the winning plates coming one after another. I think that is what brought our deaths down. I will hang up and listen to your answer. Guest thank you for the question. I think with respect to talking about different ways to disinfect different classrooms, there are, you know, different chemicals that are being used to clean airplanes, being thought of to use indoors. It does appear that less of the split here is through contact with contaminated surfaces, what ,e call full mites in medicine so if someone touches a surface, and you touch the surface and face, then you touch your face, you would get infected through that route. One thing theyre looking at is retrofitting their hvac systems with different kinds of filters. It does appear that in certain settings, the addition of air conditioning may have been a controlling factor to the spread, and it may have been a around the virus could it was very hot in phoenix, texas, miami, so people, rather than going outside as we get into summer, were going inside, for the benefit air conditioning, and to congregate settings, and that was causing spread. If you look at israel, israel reopened schools about may 17. About 10 days later, they had major outbreaks. What happened during that time period if they had major heat waves, so they allowed children off,ke their masks they close the windows, and they turned on the air conditioning. They created an environment for viral spread. Aerosol transmission or droplet transmission, excuse me, droplet transmission are airborne, the difference is droplet transition is sort of wet, moist droplets. You have to be fairly close to someone to transmit through droplet transmission. Aerosol or airflow transmission means that the virus can sort of get into droplets, small droplets. Goes droplets can evacuate command virus can stay suspended in air, what is called droplet nuclei, for a long period of time. The classic infection spread aerosol transmission, that is airborne, is measles. Covid probably is not airborne in that sense, but it is probably mostly droplet transmission, but it is not a binary thing, either. Spread that are sort of through droplet transmission, under the optimal circumstances, can start to spreader a condition that across made ization. So if you put it in the perfect environment in terms of the temperature, environment, you have airconditioning on, blowing things around, people are sort of grouped together, you start to get a pattern of spread that looks much more like aerosolization, and that is i think what we are seeing. That is what is most important, to retrofit the hvac system. As far as testing, you are absolutely right. We need to be turning around the tests faster. A test that takes six or seven days to get the results back is not that helpful anymore, especially if we are going to be opening schools and try to use testing as a tool to identify and mitigate outbreaks in the local community, you want to be able to get that result back within 24 or 48 hours. Part of that means getting more testing supply into the market. Part of that means getting different kinds of tests into the market, so things like tests that can be done at home are going to be very important to help facilitate testing in the hands of consumers, something where you can ship them a test kit, you know, in the same day, they get the test kit, they swap themselves, send it back in, they can get into the lab the same day or the next day and basically get a result within 24 or 48 hours. Those kinds of innovations in the market will be very important for building out quicker results for patients that are actionable. Host dr. Gottlieb, i want to go back to the classroom. If you are in that optimal condition, as you laid out, where the airconditioning is running in a school, if those children and teachers are wearing a mask in those conditions, are they mostly protected . Guest it certainly helps. I do not want to say they are 100 protected, because the bottom line is we dont know. We dont have good data on this. Certainly wearing a mask is going to help. Most kids in the class are going to be wearing cloth mask. It will afford some protection. I think teachers, especially at risk, should think about wearing better protective equipment, and we should make sure we are getting that kind of protective equipment to teachers. Areremember, all children wearing masks, they are not air aerosolizing the air so much. That is the benefit of the mask in those settings. It will also provide a measure of protection to the children in terms of what they are breathing in. We have seen many studies now, but there are enough an that the virus should have spread but it did not because people were wearing masks. Study that these cdc cited was a case in missouri where you had to hairstylists that, you know, perform services on more than, you know, 100 people. Infected. Were they were masks, the people they were servicing more masks, and nobody got infected. That is pretty instructive, because in that setting, you would have expected at least somethin infecti some infection, and you did not see any infection. Host lets go to tina and remington, virginia. Caller good morning. Cashier inery store a highvolume setting. One of the things about masks is we have been mandated as employees to wear them for quite a while, but we have mandated our customers to wear them as well. We had to hire security to make sure they put them on before they come into the store. But the customers will strip them off when they come in. And by the time they get to us at the cashier stands, most of them are not wearing them anymore. And the people who are wearing them, if they have to cough or sneeze, they are taking them off. They will take them off, so they dont get them dirty, which defeats the whole entire purpose. The other thing we deal with is people are just so angry, you know, they are angry about the choice and whether they should have to wear them or not have to wear them, and, you know, they get confrontational. We have to deal with all of that. I just think there needs to be so much education to make people just drop the anger. Everyone is tired, and everyone is exhausted through this whole process. Everybody just needs to take a breath, and they need to say, what can i do . You know, i have been working tirelessly cleaning and just, i mean, to the point of exhaustion, trying to keep people away from each other and the six feet and it is just a battle. It is a battle every day. , you know, and you get to the point where people just have to upon themselves to take care of other people. One person cannot take care of 100 people, but if 30 people try to help, it spreads it out. The other thing that, you know, people get confrontational and they will talk about the masks, and, you know, i should not have to wear this. It is my right, and so forth. I just say, look, i think of it as this. If i go into an operation, i do not want the doctor saying, is it optional for me to wear a mask or not, because it is my right not to. That is what i hope the will educationith, some to reach people, this is not about a right, this is about being human and help each other in taking care of each other. Host ok, tina, dr. Gottlieb . Guest the caller makes a lot of sound points, and i can identify with the frustration. She is putting yourself at risk in terms of the job she is doing tonight other people are not creating protection, and creating an environment where she can be safe in terms of how she is performing her job. It is unfortunate, the way that masks have become a point of controversy in this country. It should never have been that way. I think there should have been a uniform message from our Public Officials and our elected leaders about the prudence of wearing masks. This is sort of the, i think, least intrusive intervention that we can all take collectively to keep this at bay. And if everyone were masks, you will never get 100 of people to do it all the time people do take them off when they are not a call get settings. That is probably ok, you know, you are not around other people, you want to flip it down, flip it back up when you get to a congregate setting, but if more people wore masks when they got to the congregate setting, we could get this under control. Price seems to be a small to pay. It seems to be a minimal intrusion, relative to all the other things that could happen, and if this epidemic continues to stay out of control. If a mask, general compliance of a mask affords us the opportunity to reopen most of our businesses for a lot of businesses, where people have the livelihoods, they can get back to school, that seems well worth it, and that is the choice to do i do not think people sort of appreciate that really is the choice we are facing kid we can come together and do simple things like wear a mask collectively, all make the shared sacrifice, or we will face these rotating regional breaks, and whether you like it or not, when the outbreak comes to your community, businesses will close, schools will close, and i think that is going to deny people more of their liberty than asking them to wear a mask. Host u. K. Prime minister boris johnson, who contracted covid19, is launching an in theesity campaign u. K. And saying, quote, i was too fat, when he contracted the disease, and it made it more difficult for him, he is arguing, to fight the disease. Your view on this . Guest well, there is data to withst that risk increases certain comorbidities, and one of those comorbidities is obesity. It is having a bmi, body mass index, above genetically as being obese. Theres more and more data now coming out that suggests that the bigger predictor of having a bad outcome is not in fact the comorbidities but just age. That age itself is the biggest single predictor of your risk of having a bad outcome from covid, and that the comorbidities, while probably also increasing your risk, the reason why they seem to more prominently increase your risk is because people have more comorbidities as they get older, and so it is confounding, you know, the data. Just the fact that as you age, you more likely have Heart Disease or be overweight or have Kidney Disease or lung disease, but it is actually age itself. And what is happening is people were getting in trouble with covid, getting in trouble because of the way the body responds to the virus. Think of the virus as having two phases. The first is a viral response phase, where you basically get the virus, and you get all the flu like symptoms of an upper respiratory infection or any coronavirus infection. But then most people get better after that, or most people do not develop symptoms at all, but then for a certain percentage of people, they have another phase command that is the viral response phase, the post viral inflammatory phase, where they actually develop an inflammatory response to the virus, and in that phase, their bodys immune system overreacting as it tries attacked the virus and create inflammation in the body, and that is what gets people really sick. Why some people develop akamai very small percentage, but some people develop that and most but onee do not know, of the predictors is age. We believe the people who are older have immune systems that develop likely to over to the virus they people who are younger. Host why are some young peoples immune systems, though, also overreacting . The percentage is lower, but why is that happening . Guest well, you certainly see bad outcomes among kids. It is rare, but there are bad outcomes among kids. Probably most kids have not been affected with covid. Covid,cted with certainly relative to flu, which infects maybe 13 million kids a year, 11. 8 million kids in 2018 2019 became symptomatic with the flu. Relative to the flu, we infected a very small number of kids with covid, but i think what you are thisencing is cases of sort of postviral inflammatory condition called multisystem syndrome in where theydmisc, two or three weeks later develop this systemic inflammatory response that appears to be some sort of autoimmune reaction to the virus, similar to a syndrome called kawasaki syndrome, that we also see in the setting of certain viruses. It is not unheard of. I mean, it is rare, but we see with other viruses, when they become epidemic in a community, certainly a very small percentage of people, after they recover from a virus, develop these very unusual autoimmune kinds of reactions, so i go virus or enterovirus becomes epidemic in a community, we will see cases of rare autoimmune phenomenon, like kawasaki. At children who have gotten the coronavirus also having kawasakilike syndrome, normal, seasonal coronavirus we do not fully understand this, but it does seem to be the case, just with any virus, that a very small percentage of people develop some kind of autoimmune reaction to the virus. We dont understand why. The question with covid is, is it happening at a higher proportion . Is this in a higher percentage of children, or have a lot of children just been infected coming communities like new york, where we saw these cases, or in florida, where we saw the unusual post viral inflammatory autoimmune conditions, the course of what we typically seek when any other virus becomes an epidemic in a community, and that is the question we do not know. As i higherar there incidence, just because we assume not a lot of kids have been infected with this virus, but we dont know yet. We are not going to have results until the fall. Host richard in colorado. Haver hello, dr. Scott, i a couple of comments and statement spirit i have been reading a couple of articles in news scientists, california, berkeley, lets see, uc berkeley, the new scientist from june 26 says the coronavirus is leaving people with permanent lung damage, and that some have irreversible lung scarring. Uc berkeley, from lung scarring to heart damage, and just a quick statement there, it says longlasting damage to lung, heart, and nervous system, so i am just wondering about the problems that might continue to happen if we have schools open, an open society, and all these young folks i am 54 years old but all of these younger have innd kids that i their teens that could have if they get this virus could have permanent lung and heart damage and other damages. Guest yeah, look, theres a lot we do not know about this virus. Someone made the comment, one of the researchers engaged in this, made a comment that he knew more about this virus three weeks ago that he knows today. And i think there is some truth to that. As we learn more about this virus, some of the conventional wisdom that we had is being overturned. It is a nasty virus, and it does seem to leave a lingering effect on a High Percentage of people. There was data that came out of the cdc that serve a people after they recovered from covid, and it found that about 30 of people had not fully gotten back to their sort of baseline level of function two weeks to three weeks after first being diagnosed with covid. If you compare that to flu, 100 would have returned to baseline function. These are people who were not hospitalized but had the infection, were treated in the community. So we have done the same kind of analysis with lou, you get a very different result. So there seems to be a lingering result in a high proportion of people, and there are people developing sort of longerterm post viral syndrome, residual lung dysfunction that we do not fully understand. Understand why people develop that and how it is being developed. As far as schools are concerned, i think we need to be cautious. I think we definitely should try to get kids back into schools, in class learning, it is important for a whole host of reasons, but we need to take measures to prevent outbreaks in schools we cannot tolerate a situation where we infected a lot of kids, because we were not prepared. If you look at other countries, what they have done, they have taken extraordinary measures. They kept schools in very small cohorts, smallpox, so students only interact with a very small number of students throughout the day. They have mandated the use of masks. They have done things to create social distancing in schools. Protective equipment to teachers as well. So you look at the netherlands, taiwan, germany, israel as well, for a period of time, they have taken pretty significant steps. So we are looking at this to prevent outbreaks, because we do not know what the longterm consequents are in all the children. Even in children are much less likely to get sick from covid. They are much likely to become symptomatic, and that seems to be the case the data seems to suggest that. But then there is a question our kids were more likely to spread the virus . Now the conventional wisdom is they are less likely to get sick, but as they become symptomatically they are likely to spread the virus. ,hen they do become symptomatic they are just as likely to spread the virus as an adult. There was a big study out of south korea about a week ago that looked at index cases, caused single individual other infections, there was only on the small number of kids tested in the steady, about 4000 people they looked at who had covid, in they track their interactions with about 60,000 individuals. Only a small number of kids were captured by the study, because only a small number of kids become symptomatically. But at least in the 10yearold to 19yearold cohort, for the kids who did become symptomatically, they were more likely to spread the virus than other age groups. So that another data suggests that as kids do become symptomatic, they are as likely to spread it. Symptomatic,become what is their risk of getting sick . Theres not a lot of data on this, not a lot of reports of kids in the u. S. Of becoming severely ill although, tragically, there are some reports of that. What we do not know is the denominator. We know the numerator. We know have any kids have been hospitalized. We know how many children have tragically died from covid. We do not know how many children about the infection. One number on the cdc website looking at the outcome of kids to become something that it was of 2100 kids in china who became symptom met again. Covid who got covid and became symptom atic, about. 6 developed critical illness, where they had multiorgan system failure, they multisyndrome respiratory syndrome. That is not sound high, but it is high, especially if we end up having very large outbreaks in schools and a higher proportion of kids becoming infected and symptomatic. Point, we original want to open our schools, do it prudently, with humility about what we do not understand about this virus and take whatever reasonable steps we need to take. Host quinlan, texas, richard, your turn to talk to dr. Scott gottlieb. Go ahead. Caller good morning. Yes, dr. Gottlieb, when the kids go back to school, two weeks in class, two weeks online, that would allow them to have a 16day quarantine period, to see if they have symptoms, and to possibly provide them with n95 masks. Thank you. Guest right. I think the masks are a good idea in the schools, and i think you will see a lot of kids do that. It is hard for kids to wear a mask. I think they need to be properly changed on that. You need to have time for kids to properly change their mask, because it will get moist and uncomfortable. As far as a hybrid model, i think a lot of School District are going to do this, and it district. The i think if you have a school, you have a physical infrastructure where you create social distancing between kids, you have enough space to keep kids in smaller pods, you might be able to go back to five days a week in class could learning, coupled with masks, especially in a community where there is not a lot of background spread, but if you are in a community where there is already a ot of viral infection, you might need to keep students apart a little more. Those School District might reasonably opt for hybrid models, bringing students back ray morning session, an afternoon session, or they might have a twoday week, threeday rotating schedule. Highs will might be a hybrid model, where you have a situation where it is harder to create social distancing, harder to keep students in a small pot. It might be harder to enforce masks in a high school, but the highs will also might be able to distancelearning situation better and do individual study at home versus elementary school, where you might want to work harder to get students back into five days a week of learning, because interaction with the teacher is more important, but you also might have more opportunity to deal with the Elementary Schools , more naturally distance, if you will. The classes are smaller to deal with. You have a bigger infrastructure to separate. Students in that setting i think different district are going to do different things, depending on what their model is. In the bottom line is, the most important thing is to inform how muchrict do, is bread is in the community. Number one thing a community can do is create an opportunity to reopen schools on time and get students back into classrooms and get their local spread under control. States like where i am in connecticut, which has a low infection rate right now and a very low is that if any rate, and the single digits, and hopefully they are able to maintain that, you know, we are going to have the opportunity to try to open the schools in the fall. In states where you see major epidemics, it is going to be more difficult. And then, you know, i think every community is going to have to reassess based on how they fall and winter goes, in different district are probably going to have to close a different point in time when they do start having large outbreaks and, you know, possibly, hopefully not, possibly have outbreaks in the schools as well. Host john, greenwood, indiana, good morning. Caller hello, dr. Gottlieb. The thing that bothers me most about letting these kids go back to school is you realize that we are 5 of the worlds population and 25 of the deaths. That just tells me that you guys as medical professionals have done a terrible job, absolutely terrible. You have got to say, you cannot go back to school. If a kid goes back to school for 18 years, missing sixmonth is not going to screw his life up. , think a lot of mistakes were made in terms of the virus, and we continue to make mistakes, there is no question about that. A lot of the mistakes that lead to excess death and disease were mistakes in terms of how we handle the virus in certain hybrid settings, particularly Nursing Homes and longterm care facilities. We had a situation where the virus got into facilities and spread very quickly, because they were institutional type of facilities, and you had a lot of vulnerable people. So a lot of the excess deaths were in those kinds of settings. We have taken steps to try to control better the introduction of virus into those settings and protect people who live in those settings better, but we are still not doing a perfect job, and you are still seeing people in Nursing Homes succumb to the virus at a very high rate. So i think that is where a lot of the initial mistakes were made, a lot of the mistakes continue to be made, and where a lot of the excess deaths that this country had, relative to other nations, was. But there is no question, i think, that we are experience and an epidemic that is far in excess of what other countries experience, and there is only a small number of countries that are experiencing as much death and disease from covid right now as we are. And that is for a whole host of reasons. But the primary one is that we just never got rid of the infection. We never really crushed the virus and got it down to low levels, where we would be able to use what we call casebased intervention. Widespread testing, tracking, and tracing of sick individuals to keep the virus at bay. Certain states now are doing that, they are doing it successfully. You look at massachusetts, met got the virus down, at least for now, maintain it at those low levels, but in other states, they never got rid of the virus. They always had high risks of spread. They never got to a point where they use those kinds of tools to control the virus, to keep it at bay. Host we will go to hawaii next. Allen is watching there. Go ahead. Hi. Caller hi. Thank you for taking my call. It is nice to talk to you, and hi, greta. If you cut me off, i understand. The first item is coming hopefully i can get intermediate responses. I cannot hear you, so i do not know if you are there. Host we are listening, alan. Go ahead. A woman, dr. Monica presentation, that got a lot of press in the area. I saw her on the grand rounds, and she basically was discovering a paper, which actually has not been published yet, but i think it will have some importance. One of the things i found intriguing was her comparison of crucial populations, which were like petri dishes, i guess, and one with the diamond princess, which i guess came here and spread infection with an 18 infection rate that was a symptom attic. The other was an argentinian shift, and that when she cited as having 81 a symptom attic of the population that eventually tested positive, and this was part of the contention in her ,rticle, i guess in her work that the viral dosage of the mask was very low. Type of mask, they were considering the actual viral inoculum was low, and then so it was a very high population of infected people being asymptomatic. I guess in the paper, there is a discussion about the possibility of that is a good thing, because apparently she is an expert on hiv and things. And the pcl immunity, not just the antibody immunity, looked very impressive, and i, you know, i am waiting for more information from other writers on this. Now, the other thing i wanted to bring up, which is possibly connected to this, is my state, in hawaii, we are having real problems. We are kind of like a, little a, little test o, so we are on community spread, and watching us open up its really painful, because we were almost down to nothing. Of time when it was really flat. The governor and the mayors thought they were doing a really good job, but now we are up, you know, for our population, it is still low. I think we had, like, this week 60 , 50 ,ghest, like which is nothing like the west coast. I have to attribute it mostly to people, just like other communities, just becoming exhausted and fatigued, and the beautiful beaches, certain people wanting to communicate and hang out and hang out together and forgetting to wear their masks. Host ok, alan, lets take those two points. Mentionedler the cruise ships, and i am part of a task force that can improve safety on ships, not just the current outbreak, but sort of into perpetuity, but i think that those studies that he referenced on the ships, that they experienced on those ships, as well as a lot of other literature right now, in terms of informing what percentage of people develop infection but are truly a symptom attic a they develop symptoms from around 40 of people will get the coronavirus but will never get covid come of disease. Maybe a little bit less, maybe a little bit more, we do not know for sure, and certainly in the cruise ships, you had a population that was maybe a little older and more vulnerable, developing symptomatic illness. Virusnot uncommon for a asymptomaticympto infection. Certainly with coronavirus, the rate of a symptomatic convection seems to be higher. Come i think he mentioned an ocular, could that be a correlate to people a versus enzymatic infection, there probably is some truth to that, that if you get a bigger load, a dose of virus, if you will, if when you get infected, you get infected from more droplets, you just get more virus that causes your initial infection, you are more sick. To become that is probably true, early on. That is what you saw a lot of doctors getting sick, because when they had patients, you had a lot that had the virus, so they probably had a more severe infection themselves, whereas others only got a small inoculate because they were physically far away from the person, or maybe they had a mask on, and partially protected them. So inoculate does seem to correlate with the propensity to get very sick from this virus, and that is true from other viruses as well. It is not something that is novel to the coronavirus. Host louise in fredericksburg, virginia. Caller hello. I would like to know it seems as if we have 4 million coronavirus out there, right . Are all of those people active corona, or are they passed . And here in virginia, they are counting whenever you take the Antibody Test and you are positive, and you take the covid test and you are positive, they are counting them as covid, even though the Antibody Test is showing that you had covid, possibly, and you now have the antibodies. They are counting those together. When the governor was asked why this was coming said well, some other states are doing it, and now we are doing it, and, you know, it is just difficult to sort. So i want to ask you, are we counting those with the Antibody Tests, that are positive for the antibody, which means they had covid, they no longer have covid, and the ones that are tested for covid and are positive why are we counting them both as positives . Host ok, we will take that. Guest we should not be, and there were some states that recounting people who were antibody positive and people who were pcr positive together. And what you really want to see the antibody positive tells you people who have the whoction, most of whom cleared it. We should be talking about people actively infected. The 4 million, most of them have recovered. What you really want to understand, to know where we act, as the number who are currently infected, and that is positiveo have tested in their last seven to 10 days for you can sort of surmise that they are probably actively infected in a timeframe like that. That is the number that is operative. What gets reported everyday is at the number of new cases, for a period of time, i think many of them and cleaned it up, and the covid tracking project has done a good job of tracking it accurately, but the Antibody Tests and ppr positive test were inflating the numbers. Right now, we can surmise that the active infection of the population is somewhere a little less between 100 and 200, somewhere between 100 and 200 people currently in the fight relation are actively infected with covid. It is hard to sort of pinpoint what the exact member is. I would put it between 150 and 175. Theerent modeling suggests different numbers, so theres no sort of good point estimate. That gives you sort of a ballpark figure on what the rate of active infection in the populace and is in the United States currently, and obviously it varies substantially, depending on what state you are in. Host what are antibodies, and what do we know about them and what it means for a potential vaccine . Guest so antibodies are produced by your body to attack the virus, and so one of the things that we measure to see if people have been exposed to the virus and been previously infected is the presence of antibodies in their blood, because they linger for a period of time, and sometimes a long period of time. Antibodies are also your first line of defense. If you get infected by the virus, your b cells are going to provide antibodies, as you mount an immune response. Those antibodies are going to attack the virus, and as you recover, they will stick around for a period of time, and if you get exposed to the virus again, they will be there to attack the virus. There is a lot of focus on the fact that the antibody levels seem to decline, and sometimes decline pretty quickly. I do not think we should be surprised by that. If you look at seasonal coronavirus, the same thing happened. This coronavirus, in some respects, is behaving like a seasonal coronavirus in that you get infected, you mountain antibody response, you clear the virus, you recover from it hopefully, most people do and those antibodies stick around, and within six month, they are gone completely. Certainly after a year, you will not have antibodies. That does not mean you will not immunity. Level of you have memory cells in your lymph nodes that have seen the virus and develop some memory to it, and if they see the virus again, they will be there to quickly start turning out new antibodies. You also have t cells in your body, they get free programs to attack the virus and hang around for a long period of time, so, again, if you are expose the virus, they will be there again to attack the virus. Even if you do not have circulating antibodies, you will have other forms of immunity offer you some measure of protection, maybe not what we call sterile immunity, meaning you can get the coronavirus again, and maybe you can spread the coronavirus again, but if you do get it again, you are less likely to get as sick as you did the first time. Now, there are exceptions to everything, but with respects to a vaccine, what that means for a vaccine is these vaccines induce an antibody response, and that is what we are measuring right now, to see if the vaccine might work against coronavirus. We are looking at whether or not these vaccines are generating an antibody response. But there is data to suggest that they are also enlisting other kinds of cellular responses, so they are also inducing t cell response, and so they are inducing a fuller complement of immunity. Now, that is what we believe, based on preclinical data, some very early clinical data, and literally a handful of patients, a few dozen patients. Obviously we will not know how protective they are into we put them into largescale clinical trials, which is starting to happen now. I am on the board of pfizer, as you know, which is one of the companies that are developing a vaccine against the coronavirus. Host headline from cnbc, u. S. Agrees to pay pfizer 2 billion for 100 doses of coronavirus vaccine. When will we see this, dr. Gottlieb . Guest not speaking specific late of pfizer, but i think we will have general availability of a vaccine as a 2021 event. Whether it is moderna, youazeneca, merck, or j j, have a number of companies relatively in the same position in terms of where they are at, maybe one company is a month ahead of another, but they are all generally in the same position. You have maybe three to five companies that are all generally in the same addition, and i think if one or more of them are successful in largescale clinical trials, meaning that they demonstrate that the vaccine is safe and effective against preventing covert asease, they have set benchmark that it needs to be 60 protective at preventing covert disease, covid pneumonia, getting symptomatic disease, i think if one or more of these vaccines is successful, a reasonable timeframe for having it available for widespread distribution is probably early 2021. I think anything before that is, you know, probably aggressively optimistic. That does not mean that vaccine could not be available for a select population ahead of that, but they could make it a month and emergency use authorization from people who are vulnerable, maybe First Responders more likely to be exposed to the virus. But i think in terms of having a vaccine for general distribution, being able to go to a Doctors Office and get a covid vaccine, that is really an early 21 event. Host fairfield beach, florida, michael. Caller yes, hi, with regard to random testing, which i occasionally hear about, but i never see results, apparently it is leadership, and i do not know if it is a matter of the government not spending the money can and it is not really capitalisms responsibility, but no one is taking a leadership, and i beg you host michael, i will leave it there, because i need a Quick Response from dr. Gottlieb. The house is going to gavel in. Guest i think the caller is talking about a cinematic testing, and the federal government should be supporting that. There is a stimulus bill coming through congress right now if youre hopefully there will be funding in the bill to do more routine surveillance funding for covid. Host dr. Scott gottlieb, former fda commissioner with the trumpet Administration Come of resident fellow with the American Enterprise institute, i want to thank you for joining us this morning and spending an hour with us. We appreciate your time. Guest thanks a lot. Host as i said, the house is about to gavel in for the morning our speeches. If they take a break between those and their legislative agenda, we will come back, but for now, live coverage of the house. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] the peaker pro tempore house will be in order. The chair lays before the house a communication from the speaker. Clerk the speakers room, 2020. Gton, d. C. , july 27, i hereby appoint the honorable Henry Cuellar to act as speaker day. Tempore on this speaker ofcy pelosi, the house of representatives. The speaker pro tempore to the order of the house of january 7, 2020, the chair will now recognize members from lists submitted by the majority and minority leaders for morning hour debate. The chair will alternate recognition between the parties. With time equally allocated between parties and each member other than the majority and minority leaders and minority whip limited to five minutes. But in no event shall debate continue beyond 9 50 a. M