Transcripts For CSPAN2 Hearing On Government Agency Oversight Of Federal COVID-19 Response 20240712

The support also highlights problems the delivery of Economic Impact damage from authorized by the cares act. They were designed to ship of americans and get back on their feet quickly. But according to every student estimate, they still not, they can with 12 million in payments. Nearly three months after Congress Passed the cares act. As a result, many vulnerable americans have yet to read see these critical funds. The American People deserve to know how the money is being spent and if our government is doing all that they can to protect them from the coronavirus pandemic. I am deeply troubled by the findings. That the administration is seeking to evade accountability by undermining their oversight efforts. Make no mistake, the administrations refusal to cooperate with the gao is part of a broader effort to undermine evade, and ignore effective oversight during this pandemic. The administration is moved the inspectors general and without basic Information Congress issued an accurate legal opinions to try to keep billions of dollars in spending a secret. The america people deserve better. Only make something clear. Troubles of this oversight is not to cast blame but to make the comments for future success. The goals of this select committee are the same the goals of the administration rated to save american lives and leather goods. Message to be administration business. We want to help you succeed these goals. And this time of crisis, i sincerely hope of our colleagues in both sides of the oils as well as members of the Trump Administration will recognize the value of being with each other, and with the American People. The start for brady cooperating the gao is acquired by law. I am grateful mr. Corrado for appearing here today and to all the dedicated professionals in gao. These unprecedented times, and gal has risen to the challenge to help us ensure the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic is efficient, effective and equitable, and transparent. Although yield. Thank you mr. Chairman and i appreciate your comments especially this is something that we have been asking for for a long time. Members will slowly edges the ability to interact in person, any Committee Setting in public social distance while allowing us to do a business near as much more effective and gives us much more the ability to get the proper oversight we expect the people of this entry deserve. On begin by thanking pj a alfaro producing an initial report of the federal governments response for the covid19 pandemic it is so chart. Time. An analysis of the largest vessels relief effort in americas history while the relief effort is still being implemented is a huge task. The absence of important insights and recommendations but we should all recognize the limitations of this. We ask in fact we demanded that the federal government built plane metlife. Gao report is intended us so before that plane is even winded. The start from the beginning. The Chinese Communist party actively engaged in a coverup. And suppress doctors and journalists who attempted to walk the world about a novel deadly virus. Senior chinese leaders knew of weeks before it was announced. During critical period in december and january china withheld evidence of the virus. Evidence that confirms human to human transmission of the virus. Of the spread, china refused entry up of american the medical experts from around the world for weeks. During this time, china ordered medical supplies like mass entails another lifesaving ppe. Chinese exports of surgical masks and gloves were stifled by the Chinese Communist party during this period in china new the danger posed by the virus and while they hid the truth, use this vital time to stock up on the vibes of medical supplies. By the chinese authorities limited the cities. Chinas government urged International Carrier to maintain their flight schedules. Seating the virus throughout the rest of the world. The World Health Organization said as late as january 23rd, this is an emergency and china but is not yet become a Global Health emergency. At this time there is no evidence of human to human transmission outside china. The who exists to stop pendants. Paul and to trust the experts all china was hoarding the ppe and sending infected patients are the rules of the who misled the world police ossuary. This committee scaling its mission to be dealt old china and the who accountable for these facts that they withheld from america and the rest of the world the cause tens and thousands of deaths just in this country alone read sadly me know quickly the virus spread in america. The first step is february 29th and inform us of the super 120,000 of our family friends, neighbors. Knaus passed the first covid19 package march 4th. Five days after the first reported death. I was president bill march 14th. 27 thought the president signed the cares act rated together these bills represent the largest relief efforts in american history. Our real economy shut down. Overnight millions of the market at risk of losing their jobs. Chinas those behind, does it invest like demanded speed. They conceded. 4. 5 million ppe loans totaling over 500 billion in just three months. Theres no sheaves in size from including large banks of community bank, Credit Unions as lopez participated in this program. More than 5400 lenders have participated today. We should fear testimony that millions of Small Businesses who were saved by the ppe. It is smashing success. Given the speed we demanded in the overwhelming in any program, is always mistakes made and lessons to be learned. Gao report finds that the reliance on applicant Self Certification, but the ppe program vulnerable to exploitation. Nestor chairman, they chose to rely on Self Certification because of the need to expeditiously provide loans to Small Businesses. Congress demanded the speed. When he would have preferred them to take months to design the mistakes free program while millions of Small Businesses and tens of millions of workers lost everything they had in their lives. I appreciate them reviewing the program and making recommendations. Each of us to take seriously those recommendations pretty but that partisan attacks seem to imply that the Trump Administration should have slowed down the ppe pride that goes against everything we all voted on. Every democrat and republican who voted for the cares act shows speed over transfection. We didnt have that luxury. The millions of families who been saved from this program wouldve died on defined waiting for some perfectly run federal program which i would love to see an example that. The gao says that hhs experience substantial challenges. With this initial covid19 response. Over hundred years a hitter sure sadly because china lied and covered up the danger. Yes. I agree a great they were faced with historic challenges. An congresses by the way did not do an adequate job of keeping the National Stockpiles of life. And then we face charges hoarding. But look at what american has accomplished. If more than 20 million tests with covid19 have been performed in the United States. So many now the summer complaining about all of the positive covid19 responses that we are saying. After they demanded more desperate we have more tests, we have more positives pretty that was something everybody knew what happens. Most days now were conducting over 500,000 tester date. And were expanding their capacity. Delivered over 25 million swabs to support the blueprint. As of june 17th, fema and the private sectors combined corn art coordinated of over hundred and 15,000,095 respirators. And 16 billion gloves. Fema foreign aid to ships of the 14 day supply of personal protective equipment to over 15000 medicare certified Nursing Homes. The something we need to investigate further. This shipment, are meant to supplement existing efforts to provide equipment to Nursing Homes. But accomplished a great amount in a short amount of time. We need the efforts in therapy, vaccines and to move forward at warp speed. Thankfully the Trump Administration has launched operation warp speed to find these therapies. Congress needs to be a partner not an obstacle to the success of operation warp speed. House democrats, bring a drug price control bill to the floor next monday. They said that your plane would actually reduce the creation of lifesaving drugs. The council of economic advisers said that number could be up to 100 or fire lifesaving drugs not brought to market if the billy one bring next week aspirated never good time to stifle this. But this seems to be in an thinkable time to be pursued policies of slow down the development of vaccine. Coming on Speaker Pelosi to pull was built from further consideration on monday. We do not need to be slowing down the search for a cure. We still need to hold hearing on pulling china accountable while this committee spent so much im trying to find things that went wrong, i should also highlight some of the things we did well like the ppe which saved thousands of lives millions of jobs. We should join together who issued deadly nursing home orders going at the federal guidelines, finally complaint with the demands that we sent forward to turn of the data so that we can actually have transparency and accountability for the tens of thousands of seniors who died unnecessarily Nursing Homes because its governors violated the federal guidelines for the help to search for those answers. I yelled back. Thank you. Our witness today, mr. Jean. The witness stand so i can swear him in. Understand me the others who testify today. Would like to be sworn in as well. The director for the Financial Markets rated and nicole. Managing director of the healthcare team. Plus with a view to step forward. Thank you. Please raise your right hands. Your swear or affirm the testimony youre about to give ms. The truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you god. Let the record show that all three witnesses answered in the affirmative. You may be seated. Without objections, other written statements will be made directly. That, now recognized for your testimony. Thank you. Good morning to you. Members of the subcommittee. Im very pleased to be here today to talk about the First Comprehensive assessment of the legislation the congress swiftly passed in the ministrations been working hard to implement. We determined that the first two months after the legislation was passed, there was 1. 2 trillion of assistance provided. In the former of almost 700 billion in direct spending and over 500 billion in loan guarantees. Now this assistance was accompanied by a lot of dedication and agility by various segments of our society. The heroic efforts may bar healthcare workers across the country. There is significant efforts were forwarded to the federal workforce. To implement this legislation. State and local governments and others made valuable contributions and continued to do so and with regard to the federal agencies, they give a high priority given the urgency of healthcare needs and severe economic downturn to move swiftly and validate the funds as we point out in our reports. There were tradeoffs that were made. Now reports designed to help them make some good cores good directions with regard to the tradeoffs. But as a consequence, they made Good Progress in distributing the money but only limited progress in ensuring in meeting this transparency and accountability bowls. Now report provides a comprehensive assessment across the entire federal government. But this morning my opening comment, just focus on those areas that i think our initial recommendations for improvements focus on. First is the ppe programs. I agree that they made swift allegations and setting up a nationwide program. In distributing the money. But there were some issues that i think need to be attended to very quickly. So our recommendation is a lot of confusion with the program. It was implemented the stream of frequently asked questions and guidance of their is some confusion still remains with the program. But all things in, any another site plan to ensure that the funds are safeguarded. Theres already some indications of fraud in the program. I pleased to report to the administrator, last night. An agreed to give us the information that we needed. In order to go forward somewhere in the process of finalizing arrangements for that. I would place i also offered to help them as they design their oversight and monitoring plans and she accepted my agreement. On the environment insurance area, the states are struggling to implement the programs, and the need for traditional staffing. However there is a potential problem. The overlap between Unemployment Benefits and employees who may have under the Paycheck Protection Program that were not paying people twice. We recommend they get guidance in a grade they will get guidance for the irs and the treasury Inspector General in the Tax Administration identified 1. 4 million payments of 1. 4 billion of aid that was provided to the deceased we recommend that the irs takes more measured to get the money back. They have done so. We also recommend Congress Give treasury the authority on Social Security administration so they can prevent these payments for being made. Not just here but across the federal governments activities. We also recommend that congress require that department of transportation to develop a National Aviation security plan for the communicable diseases. We recommended this in 2015 and so far theres not a plan because of bureaucratic wrangling by his responsible about his developing. The vessel in which aspirants will spread around the world, to quickly came through our Transportation System and always be behind the and thus become a National Aviation skinny planets coordinated and International Norms to protect safety in that area. So mr. Chairman, as i conclude my statement, on assure this committee that i want to continue to focus on this to meet her statutory responsibilities and report every two months. Also have about 40 audits underway now. So pleased they took the time to focus on a report and we look forward to working with congress. In the administration to make sure that these programs are prospectively and efficiently implemented to the benefit of the American People. In our economy. Thank you very much. Thank you for much for your testimony. We will now go into q a. Each member will be granted five minutes. The mate recognize myself for five minutes. According to your report, federal governments 677 billion in response to the hispanic is may 31st 2020. Without much money at stake, robust and sustained oversight is essential. If the executive branch cooperates did question is, why is it so important for the Trump Administration to cooperate with the gaos oversight. Two fundamental reasons. One will want to make sure we fairly represent their views and all the things they considered in carrying out this legislation. Our goal is to always provide a balance of fair comprehensive picture and secondly, we need the information in order to make our assessments. The data are critical to the analysis in the hearing out our responsibilities. So without the data, theres a totally incomplete picture. And what weve had. And i would note that in april, right after the legislation was passed my similar to all the departments and agencies the federal government. Explaining the fact that we were going to be doing realtime auditing. In monthly briefings to the congress and by monthly reports to the congress that we needed their cooperation. By and large we get the cooperation across the vast range of the federal agencies in the departments. Some of the irs commissioners made himself and his deputies available. And other agencies were very helpful. Thats one of the largest relief programs and its one in the history of the country. And it has failed to provide information critical to our review. Want to take a minute for that sba for its impact on the gao efforts to prevent ways tried and abuse in the ppe program. Two categories the most significant was access to the database and those characteristics we still dont know the what information they collect and with those other financial agents have so we were not able to do an analysis other than the data that they provided hopefully on their website as to aggregate data of Different Industries and different sizes of the loans. But we dont have the specific data yet. And this is why we said what we did. I listed support for members of congress on a bipartisan basis to encourage them and those efforts i believe have paid off. We didnt have it to do this report and secondly we didnt have access to the key Program People people were busy across the government to make time with us so they did make they were the ones we really wanted to talk to so now those officials have been made available otherwise we cant Tell Congress specifically what type of Companies Got this assistance risk analysis of what the potential may be for inflated applications misrepresenting the information they are pursuing a lot of investigations already. If you feel that information that you receive the last several hours and then names submitted are sufficient. And we dont have that we expected anytime if they say they promise to give us which is everything in the database and we will have sufficient information i will let this committee know one way or another as soon as we receive the information. I hope you will let us know very soon. I yield to the Ranking Member. To justify about the report as we have seen things so far i am encouraged to hear that you are testifying you are a negotiation to get the data you are looking for . Good faith negotiations so following up on my april letter they just didnt do it and to be overwhelmed to be fair with those statutory obligations Congress Said they want the information quickly so we have an obligation to talk to secretary minasian as well with the Small Business Oversight Committee. Is been cooperative . Yes. But the conversations have been good the one i had last night was the most promising. I appreciate that you share with us and to do with this much relief there would be millions of people out of work and millions of Small Businesses that would not even open they would be gone. We know that we want to make sure we get it right for somebody to suggest the administration is refusing to cooperate, that flies in the face of what you are testifying before us today. There is cooperation, negotiation that would be any request for data. Youve gotten a lot of data see feel like thats going on. It didnt start off that way. Its in a positive direction and ultimately thats what you want to go. You want to see cooperation and you are getting that. I am appreciate that. Do you know how many loans sba gave out all of last year . Now i know it is 36000. Four. 2 or four. Six. Four. Six sounds more in line. And in how many weeks. Eight weak. In a week. Giving up four. 6 million loans all of last year all 52 weeks they gave out 36000. That is not ten or 50 percent that is 125 in an eight week period in all of last year. By the way we should be applauding because we want them to do that we asked them to do that and move at rapid speed and limit our demand so to criticize them and that goes against the very things that we voted for in the passage of the cares act is that we asked them to do im glad they are doing and effort estimates of over 99 percent of all loans there is fraud and abuse rooted out to justify the irs is working to go after that many i would love to see the loan programs and any segment of the Community Going after those that are doing wrong within the eight week. Four. 6million loans in the way we all expected to do which is i think we should be applauding go after folks and to be aggressive on that front i do want to ask about testing. And complaining theres not enough testing and working with the fda to get them to move the red tape normally they would take and then people are complaining there are more positives. Would it be fair to say if you do more test to get more positive cases . One potential. Some of us have been demanding answers going against cmf guidelines on Nursing Homes and unfortunately to tens of thousands of people dying who shouldnt have. Would you help us get the data because they are refusing to give the victims families asking for that same data and the governors are refusing as we should all be able to have access with this in the Nursing Homes and to save thousands of more lives. We did a report recently that showed that 82 percent of the Nursing Homes pre pandemic were cited for violations for inspections. Half of the Nursing Homes cited for violations. Thank you mr. Chairman for calling and the controller for being here with an excellent report with the federal response if you go through the challenges and i just want to point out how helpful it is as you go to the coronavirus to have this report to find the problems and want to hear your solution for the one one. 4 billion sent out to dead people we may be sending out money again depending on how the coronavirus develops so are you checking with Social Security . Irs initially determined deceased people are anybody who filed a return in 2018 or 2018 or 2019 should be pay they knew they were paying people that were deceased then it became publicly and treasury said no. Because they will not benefit individual. So they stopped it Going Forward but then they had to give treasury temporary access to the death master file including information far more complete than what they had before so i have had a recommendation for the congress for years to pass legislation to give them access to the full death master file they will stop the payments that my own mother received the payment unfortunately she passed away february 2018 and my sister got on behalf right on the check it said deceased. She sent me a picture of the end of course she we turned it but a lot of other people did not. Irs post on their website if you got one of these please return it but we are suggesting they have a proactive approach. Its very important not just the stimulus payment that payments for agriculture, education or whatever. I encourage you to do that. Nothings that that over the goal line yet. Thank you. Returning to testing that the first test applied by the cdc with the strongest language to experience accuracy and reliability issues with testing nationwide during the critical early weeks of the outbreak and also to the concerns of the accuracy of the antibody and viral test continuing through june. So basically the impact and the ability to determine who had the virus. And the setback in terms to get the testing deployed in cdc relied on its own process to develop the test. It was their own test and then it didnt work. They had to because of concerns associated but then they opened up testing to the private sector and others and sba doing emergencies authorization. Quickly after that they could not get out of the gate quickly but since then engaging a broader range of people. With that emergency use authorization if there are problems. It is a significant issue. In your report you go into the process and then trying to get a and we clinic get it from other places. There was criticism of procurement testing of supplies did you find out why that they were competing against other states and supplies . And for them to come in and coordinate at a National Level to make it available to people and my state and other states are still asking for federal coordination. Did you find out why with a coordinated National Strategy for procurement of supply . Were still looking in more depth but this is true in the past including one of which was done last fall that there is always lack of clarity with the his endeavors federal agencies as well as state and local responsibilities so when you try to start one sort them out in the middle of an emergency we recommend our report we will keep for congress with greater clarity with roles and responsibilities. And to rely on the state and the testing have to figure out how to help them get those supplies with the unique authority with the defense production act and other things so they make a lot of effort and headway. But the problem keeps evolving. There is a unified command group made up of hhs for preparedness. Fema and cdc they are working together now. Time is expired. The gao issued a report that the Government Program on programs have problems and glitches. Not the first time that is happened. Comedy years have you been at gao . Today is my 47th anniversary at gao. [laughter] fortyseven years . Thank you for your service. Me times have you testified quick. Im closing in on 200. Weve done this at the Oversight Committee youve done on you been there many time times. And that 47 years in the 12 or 13 years how many reports have you issued . Thousands. I was number two so for 25 years i would say about 15000. And the federal government has some problems. Shazam. A newsflash. For trillion dollars the federal government spends they were telling Business Owners you have to shut down your business. So we spent 2 trillion and then they say we are shocked there were a few glitches . As the Ranking Member said we have the ppe program that helps families across the great country so now the democrats say we have a major problem its a good thing we did that cares ac act. Taking peoples property so they couldnt operate. This shouldnt be a big surprise but lets talk about the report that just came out. Referencing the governor from michigan according to the governor who testified before the house energy and commerce a few weeks ago the supply they received in the early days of the pandemic. Now the same governor who said you can buy a dishwasher but not a gallon of paint you may have a home on northern lincoln one lake of michigan you can go your property. As the Ranking Member mentioned why do you look at that . They would not let people buy a gallon of paint but they could not travel to their own property you can put that statement in the report but not the things that they need. And with guidance of march 13 on the nursing complex. And then to mandate except covid positive patients . Thank you mr. Chair. Yes they issued guidance with mandate those patients so heres what you should do right . I march 25th there was the governor the great state of new york who said you have to take those patients and you cannot test them before putting them in the nursing home. I have seen that yes. Did you look at that issue at all . We are looking at Nursing Homes. You know how me days the governor of new york told Nursing Homes you have to take positive one covid positive patients to know how me days he did that. 46 days. Contrast that with what the governor of florida did he said someone who has come into a hospital in the say of two negative tests and so they come back and be you did not get into that . What you are looking at it . The following of that guidance that was just put out. That data this committee could use the idea a 2 trilliondollar bill that has a few glitches everybody understands that we are trying to get the money out but the study that what matters what you are doing. We hope to have that later this fall and earlier this winter. 46 days the governor of new york when this was the worst putting positive patients back into the environment where the most susceptible people were. We need a study much sooner than that we knew this before he gave it to us. Thats what we need to know and how bad it really was the real numbers from new york that didnt follow the cms guidelines to cause tremendous harm to countless number of people and families and i hope it comes before the winter like soon. And we will move as fast as we can looking at ppe we have a body of work on this issue leading to the number of cases. We need hearings on that study asap. I yield to miss water. Thank you. I am appreciative to this information that basically identifies what has happened with the attempt to respond to this pandemic with several things and the facilities created of course by the ppe program with the response activity to do. Adequate safeguards that they are just going to eligible recipients and the report that teaches us the speed that they were processed in a limited safeguard is a significant risk was approved and of course this is all done in such a short period of time and we are spending record amounts of money. I want to ask you any legislation that is entitled the paycheck guarantee act . I have not heard of that. One of the members of the house has introduced a bill and the essence of that legislation is instead of trying to organize these different efforts to create these facilities we should basically pay people what they would be earning up to about 90000 and pay their rent and their bills in the way they would normally do it. I dont know how this works with ppe and Small Businesses but what you think about that idea. I can give it some thought and provide an answer offhand it has the benefit of going to intermediaries am not sure how you execute that so that they have Accurate Information but im happy to think more about it and give you thoughts. Will you yield for a moment. There are several European Countries have used this approach with the experience they have had and maybe let us know what you think we know that they executed the program and many of them or some of them took care of their clients first i talked with a couple of ceos and they admitted. Are you aware of that . Yes. Yes. But we will not be able to get that type of detail until we get the data. You know the banks, some of them, not all of them but those turned out to be the ones with the largest amount of loans. Tell me how did it happen that these hotels and restaurants could identify each of their installations to get a loan . How does that happen . My understanding that is a change in the legislation at the last minute to allow them to do that. It was part of the original legislation as i understand if im wrong i will provide a correction to the record or for the record but that allows that industry that have 500 people less per location. Did the sba sign off on that . I dont know their involvement in the legislation im sure the administration did if the president designed the bill. Did he undermine what the ppe was supposed to be about. I wouldnt secondguess the congress and legislation passed. I was assuming it was congressional intent. And for Small Businesses . The legislation that decision was in legislation from what i understand. Do you believe that was too cumbersome . We are looking at that. There has been some concerns about that, the application for loan forgiveness, we are looking at that issue as well. In many respects they rely on Self Certification there shouldnt have been that big a problem but could have been but we havent been able to do this detail work to do this. We dont have that information, and thank you. The gentlemans time is expired. Thank you, mister chairman, thank you for being with us, congratulations on the anniversary of service to this country. With regards to the ppp program, the subcommittee we worked a lot with, getting more money out the door, in 14 years, pretty significant to do that, the rate we saw was 280 million, it was authorized and that was 810,000 of one . I havent looked at the error factors if it is accurate. It is a good record. The number came from the media and the treasury acknowledges they have to clawback from businesses that got the ppp, the record getting out in 14 days. With regards to the stimulus checks, going back to the master file, we have never done, the Trump Administration gave access to this and we have not done that and is that not correct . I spoke to secretary mnuchin we have done our job and allowed this to happen in previous years. Also, your charge here is to figure the pandemics effect on Public Health and i want to follow up since we had a report in one of the local political magazines, 65 people died per month as a result of the lack of focus on their healthcare needs due to suicides, opioid abuse, cancer treatments, heart conditions, they didnt do 80 of the brain surgerys, your report looked at this part of the healthcare picture, it is 50 more people dying because of lack of treatment versus attention on covid19. We are focused in our report, to talk about we have been trying to focus on numbers of deaths over and above what would normally be expected over appear go of time and as one of the factors we are looking at. The factors are very important, when we look more about it. The exact indicator we want to be developing in terms of impact on Public Health, i think people when they hear elected think it is nonessential, these are important procedures in terms of Preventative Care so we will examine how quickly hospitals can provide this. About half missed the treatment, 150,000 cases are not being diagnosed. One more question, in regards to theres an increase in the number of cases detected, you would anticipate more tests, more positive tests, have you looked at the percentage of hospitalizations as a result of that . Because you would think if the virus had the same potency you would still have the same number of hospitalizations and deaths but anecdotally that is not happening. Can you verify that . We are tracking that information. It is an important point in terms of watching the number of cases but hospitalizations and the percentage positive are indications in terms of the spread. One thing we pointed out is we need better data in terms of hospitalizations, the number of icu beds that are filled, something we are continuing to track. Three weeks ago the university of Pittsburg Medical Center which somebody told me is where they did the research and help develop the polio vaccine these are the experts of the experts, the virus is mutating to a lesser strain. They are having more positives but less hospitalizations and less deaths, this could be the case. This is important point that needs to be made with regards to the media only telling you the cases are increasing but doesnt tell you deaths continue to go down and hospitalizations go down as well as most hospitals still have capacity to take care of that. Dollars data points are important. Hospitalizations and destined to lag. It is important to track this in the next couple weeks to see how the data changes. I yield back. Thank you very much, Mister Velasquez for five minutes. Thank you, from the beginning i have been calling for the administration to provide congress and the gao with data regarding the Paycheck Protection Program. It is our job to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars and ensure our programs are working as we intended. In my call with be fda administrator on wednesday she indicated, quote, congress and gao will be receiving loan data, this is a good step but we must work to guarantee gao can interview and collect Additional Data to conduct its oversight responsibility. This brings me to my first question, fda indicated to me they talked about full access to all ppp loan data. Have you responded to fda and gao to securely receive the data . We are in discussions with them about the details that will be done and we have the ability to secure the data. We deal with fact data, healthcare data, classified information of all stripes. Thank you. Has fda indicated time and days when they will provide you with access to official so you can conduct interviews . Theres been one date offered so far but im not sure. To compare the loans made by fda from 2019, what they have done today it is ridiculous. The Student Loan Program that is the flagship loan lending program, beyond that they cannot lend any money plus cuts the agency has suffered under this administration so budgets have consequences. They shut down the trans system. As a result of the money that has been cut so the first fda ig report noted fda implementation of the ppp did not align with the cares act objective of prioritizing underserved markets, gao has been able to draw any conclusions as to what implementation failures led to so many minority owned businesses from being shut out of the ppp program during the initial rollout . We will be looking at that issue but until we get the information we are not in a position to determine that. From my understanding they also did not collect demographic information and they are trying to collect it as part of the loan forgiveness application but it is voluntary so i dont know how many are going to submit the information that we are going to try to look at that and that is one of our key objectives. You note fda experienced it challenges like forcing fda to shutdown this site. Is gao considering future reports on it issues that may have resulted in some businesses not being able to access loans while other businesses may have received more than one loan . We will take a look at that issue. Do you think it is important for the Small Business committee to have access to the data so that if we need to make changes or the administration comes back to us and says we need to approve more money and provide more will be, how could we assess if the program is working as it was intended by congress if we dont have access to that information. How many times to come before the committee and secretary mnuchin . It is not right and we expect them to come forward, she committed to me on wednesday that she would be coming through the committee when she asked me what steps or what intentions you have in the committee Going Forward regarding the program. My answer is i dont have any data, i have no information to be able to make any responsible decision at this point so thank you, i yield back. The chair recognizes mister green for five minutes. Theres a lot of consternation about the spike in new coronavirus cases as with all the other Public Health decisions we face this year we have to make sure we take a holistic look at the data to ensure we have the truth and not some preferred narrative. It is is the alarming spike in cases and parts of this country due to greatly increased spread or could there be another factor . Lets be honest. The United States is testing people for the coronavirus at unprecedented rates and more people are seeing the doctor the country reopen so course we will see an increase in cases. Some Public Health experts is estimated we have 10 times the number of cases of coronavirus than being accounted for in testing. Others like doctor francis collins, of the National Institute of health have observed in the past, quote, the number of people who havent turned up in the Healthcare System but who already are infected is probably 100 times the number of cases you know about. Even cnn. I am referencing cnn reported just this week a new Study Suggests 80 of cases whenever reported in the month of march because we werent testing as broadly as we are now. Weve known since the beginning that there were likely far more cases overall than just the confirmed cases and as we tramped up testing we see that to be the case. Doctor donald daily of the university of pennsylvania urged us, quote, to change our mindset and focus not exclusively on the number of cases that on the severity of the illness continuing to point out, quote, you were people are being admitted and when they are they tend to be much less then that the beginning or the peak phases of the pandemic. We have to look at the hospitalization rates in context, the cdc reports, quote, for 65 years for people 65 years and older current cumulative covid19 hospitalization rates are within range of cumulative hospitalization rates observed at comparable time points during recent influenza seasons. That is good news and while we are clearly not out of the woods we need to look at the data in context. Asserting that the president has failed to contain the virus because the cases are going up is either blindly uninformed or blatantly malicious. First, the goal was to flatten the curve, not stop every person from getting the virus, that is physically impossible, trust me, i am a physician. Any honest broker will realize cases are going through the roof because we are testing through the roof. What is it . We have to have more tests, or now that we are, the president has failed us because we are testing more and there are more positives. I think most people will see the ridiculous hypocrisy in that. The media continues their narrative marching in lockstep with my democrat colleagues and ignore the context and the facts. If i came into far gentleman running on the sidewalk, there was no one within 100 yards of the guy yet he was wearing a mask while running. This speaks to the irrational fears this dishonest representation of the data by the media has caused. The media also ignores the fact that reopening society will save lives in other ways, cancer screenings deemed nonessential but in reality are very essential, social isolation which is devastating healthcare consequences can come to a end if we open up and americans can get back to work, feed their families, pay their rent and save the kids college. Of the data is also suspicious, colorados governor just revised the states deaths due to chloroquine down by 12 because he found the state Health Department was counting even automobile accidents from trauma death says covid19 if the patient had the virus, 12 , my question to you is have you looked at how states are counting their deaths in either of the states that will be revising the numbers down 12 . One of the findings in our report was the testing data cdc has been reporting is inconsistent and not complete. Not all the test data has been reported. States count Different Things differently and it has been a problem so you dont have good reliable data. We were getting ready to make a recommendation here but on june 4th cdc finally threw secretary of hhs use the Authority Congress gave them in the cares asked to set out testing requirements to all labs in the country hopefully testing will get better. Hopefully does not 12 across the country being revised down and we will get an accurate contextual picture. Manipulating the data to the progress of narrative is damaging the country and i urge we stop and especially in this committee. I agree with that. Also agreed ignoring science is damaging to the country. I try to practice evidencebased medicine. I just want to say, you asked we have meetings in person, we have accommodated you. I would love for us to abide by the attending physicians recommendations. Point of order. The cdc has said 6 foot social distancing, you dont need a mask, we are 6 feet apart, we dont need a mask. When i came in today i put my mascot because i walked past people. Now that im in a seat i dont need a mask. You are a scientist. Yes, sir. Your position. Clinician. Anyone walking past you and you dont have on a mask, you wore the mask to protect them. Yes. Of somebody who comes by who doesnt have a mascot i will put mine on absolutely. I just want i will yield to you, Mister Foster but i want to say this. If you wish to continue having these meetings in person, we have to adhere to the attending physician or i will not have the meetings in person. Point of order. I would like to raise the question, if we are sitting here without a mask, and we are speaking, is it possible that we could have emissions that are going on the desk, on the microphone, around us and if someone comes behind us who has not worn a mask and we are basically a knitting on the table, on the desk, have we been told by the scientists the virus remains on the surface depending whether it is wood or steel, you contacted surface and you have emitted, there has been emission, that you could become infected . Im going to yield to one of my favorite scientists who will answer that question. The chair recognizes Mister Foster. Mister jordan . Seems to be science and common sense that you should not put covid19 positive patients in Nursing Homes, that the inside space and common sense and that is the study we need as i indicated earlier. I have no control over the governor of new york. I do have some control over the subcommittee and i will exert it. Please rest assured i will assert what controller do you have. You are recognized for five minutes. Thank you. Our greatest, best hope for emerging from this crisis is through the development of safe and effective vaccines and therapeutics and great scientific progress has been made by scientists around the world and many of these products are entering advanced Clinical Trials but developing, manufacturing and districting vaccines and therapeutics are challenging and complicated task especially in a compressed timeframe and an International Supply chain. This requires not only great scientific efforts but also good technical project management, a real strength of gao, this is something ive not always seen in the federal response to this crisis as stated in the gaos report, multiple federal agencies are taking actions to develop vaccines and therapeutics to prevent and treat covid19 questions rain about timing and distribution. This should not be used as some sort of partisan hatchet. I know from conversations with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle on this committee that there is a great appetite for congress and the American People to get the best possible information on the status and likely timescales of the results of these efforts. I also know from conversations with many scientists and executives that there is a real desire for them to present the full complexity of their efforts, not in the form of soundbites in hearings or asking entering feisty medicine congressman detailed briefings on the technical uncertainties of what they are trying to accomplish, this is important not only to every american but every elected official. Is the mayor cannot make plans if they dont know whether a therapeutic will be available next month or not for years and this sort of getting the best scientific information on when these will actually happen from a neutral third party, something the gao is uniquely qualified to provide for us so the gao has expertise in technical project management so could you say what capabilities does the gao have today to provide oversight of Therapeutic Development and what additional capabilities might be able to stand up to address these efforts . We have been building our capacities in science and technology areas, we have a phd in microbiology that has experience with vaccine therapies on staff within a week as part of our effort, we have other people who have observed past efforts to build vaccines and distribute them so we have great capabilities. We also have standing arrangements with the National Academy of sciences, we just completed a joint study with the National Institute of medicine on use of Artificial Intelligence and Drug Development and i also have people on my Advisory Committee that made themselves accessible including Harvey Feinberg who used to be president of the institute of medicine so we have inhouse capabilities to do this and standing arrangements to get additional expertise. In my many years in science ive been on the receiving end of gao reporting on our projects and i have to say that although it was often painful at the time it made the projects better, having the gao come in and ask the tough questions we had been hiding from or dont have good answers for, asking what if this happens, do you have a contingency plan, what are your plans if the virus mutates, you deploy a therapeutic in the virus immediately mutates around it, what is your backup plan and simply asking those questions will often make the project stronger and give congress and the American People better information on the most important question we are facing as a world right now. We are planning to do that. And i look forward to working with you. Ive had good conversations on both sides of the aisle here on standing up and getting an agreement between you, hhs, to really get the kind of information like access to the databases so that you can get the answers that we need so if you get access to things like the details of the contractual arrangements, the true projected capacity to manufacture different types of vaccines and therapeutics, and reports in a timely manner and almost realtime, this could be one of the most valuable things this select committee could end up doing. We will make arrangements to do that. Weve done that on major weapons systems, look at the test data and analyze, happy to do that. I agree it is essential to attacking this issue thoroughly and providing proper safeguards, vaccines and other therapeutics. I appreciate that and yields back. Thank you. The chair recognizes mister raskin for five minutes. Thank you very much, i want to start with a few facts, 124,415 deaths in the United States from covid19, more than 2. 4 million cases of infection among our people, facts, hospitalizations in texas are up more than 215 since memorial day, florida just reported 10,000 new Coronavirus Infections in two days. Arizona as of yesterday had more than 60,000 cases, 1467 deaths and the infection continues to spiral out of control. The gao report raises questions about the irss handling of the Economic Impact statements, stimulus checks get people to this nightmare. According to the report irises issued 160 million payments, the agency has faced challenges in getting checks to our most Vulnerable People because hardtoreach populations like quebec individuals without bank accounts, the homeless, people with limited or no Internet Access or no english capacity, would you agree they are especially vulnerable during a pandemic in recession and likely in need . Absolutely. This be a top priority for the irs to reach these populations . Yes. We will be looking at their efforts to do so. They started some on the Interagency Council on homelessness and men of salary to help individuals coming out of prison so we will be looking at it to see if we have any additional suggestions. The irs faces difficulties but didnt file tax returns including recipients with welladjusted gross incomes. I heard from a number of these people, they usually have incomes below 12,000 a year and according to one estimate there as many as 12 million nonfilers at risk of missing out on their Economic Impact statement that they may need more desperately than the rest of the population. What should treasury and irs be doing now to ensure payments reach nonfilers without any further thought. They need to for different data sources to identify these individuals. Thats one of the things we will look at and makes recommendations . What will that happen. Its a matter of some urgency, my office and my colleagues offices are besieged with people who desperately need this money. We are working on it and i hope to have those recommendations by the next my monthly report. Im looking at the weekend, i hope your people are working for the we can. We wouldnt have been able to produce that report if we werent working 24 seven. I appreciate that. We spent 1. 1 million decedents, americans who had already died and i had from honest constituencies said we got this check from my wife or my husband is no longer with us. Iris was where this was happening in march but didnt begin to correct it until months later. What is up with that . That is shocking. Irss original determination was that the law required them to send a check to everybody who filed the return in 201819 so they figured it would include those people. They did it with foresight, that is what they were supposed to do. That seems to contradict common sense. In other words because we said it should go to everyone who filed taxes, they touched go to people who had died. What is the law because some people are saying should we cash this check . Why would the government be sending it to us . I agree. What is the treasurys interpretation after that was the intent was to help people who were affected by the situation which wouldnt include people who were deceased so they started at that point in time after iris made the first three payments and we believe the correct interpretation now is they should not have been sent and our recommendation is to try to get as much of the money back as possible. They change that policy of sending checks to people who have died. That is correct, they stopped after the first 3 rounds. Thank you and i yield back, mister chairman. The chair now recognizes mister kim for five minutes. Thank you, mister chairman. I want to begin by addressing something that came up earlier in this hearing, talking about cdc guidance when it comes to wearing a mask and social distancing. I just went to the cdc website and want to confirm that it says cover your mouth and nose with a cloth, face cover when around others and continue to keep about 6 feet between yourself and others. It is not saying it is one or the other, it is recommending both social distancing and using a mask. Moving for what im very concerned about the Trump Administrations values when it comes to providing personal protective equipment and medical supplies that our communities need to keep safe. According to the gaos report, there was an exercise in august of 2019 the determined collectivistic manufacturing capacity would be unable to meet demand for personal protective equipment and other supplies in the event of a global influenza pandemic. This was month before the coronavirus pandemic but the Trump Administration failed on these findings. If the, quote, nationwide need for critical supplies to respond to Courtney Kube exceeded the quantity in the Strategic National stockpile, do you agree the Strategic National stockpile was sort of the critical supplies needed during this pandemic . Yes. That has been acknowledged and they are trying to fix it now and trying to revamp the stockpile Going Forward. The exercise you talk about, the crimson contagion was pretty much an exercise that mirrored exactly what has happened with this particular covid19 situation but they told us they didnt have enough time to react to the findings, they did brief members of congress that they are trying to revamp the National Stockpile now but the masks left over from h1 in one were not effective anymore and had to be replaced because they were provided with a caveat. What steps could have been taken or should have been taken to replenish the stockpile . The issues, we raised this before prior administrations as well that there werent enough ventilators in urban hospitals around the country so we raise these issues over time. Our country has difficulty, the hardest part of my job is getting people to act before there is a crisis, has great difficulty preparing ahead and it is not unique to any administration. This has been a problem i have seen throughout my career in government. They had the information and either the money wasnt appropriated, they didnt allocate it properly, we are looking at details about it but clearly steps could have been taken previously and recently. Is characterized earlier in the hearing the problems we face in the government response were a few glitches would you categorize the problems in terms of supply of ppe is a few glitches . I wouldnt categorize it that way. On the supply side of the issue it is about the coordination side and this is something that was raised here, reports of federal acquisition and distribution effort to supplement the Strategic National stockpile supplies lacks coordination and result in challenges obtaining supplies here. How did that lack of coordination heard the efforts of critical supplies . Early on. I will ask, hhs was taking the lead, and the task force, the White House Task force came in and brought in people to focus on supply chain. What you categorize that as a few glitches . The problems of coordination as a few glitches because the problems getting ppe to state and hospitals. Know. One last part i want to address, in your report you requested information on the Strategic National stockpile prior to the pandemic, the types and amount of supplies states requested as well as what hhs and fema distributed from the National Stockpile to the states request, you did not have been information as of june 12th, seems like basic information to me about what is necessary to assess whether the stockpile is doing what it is meant to do. Have you received that information yet . We have not. When did you make that request . I dont have a specific date but it is a request we made early on but continue to work with have you been given reason you have not received this information . We have not. How much is in our stockpile right now . I do not. The question is who pays for our stockpile . Federal government provides appropriations and as the comptroller general mentioned the appropriations each year over a number of years what has been provided to maintain adequate supplies in the stockpile. It comes from our government and the American People, the American People stockpile and they deserve to know what has been done to keep them safe, the American People are still under threat from this virus, face rising cases across the country, we face threat of a second wave later this year and the American People deserve to know if we are ready, your testimony in the report today makes me concerned that we are not ready, thank you. I think the gentleman. Questions from all members. I would like to yield to the Ranking Member for any closing . Thank you for holding this hearing in this Committee Room and thank you for your report, your testimony, you have been working with the Trump Administration to compile this report and providing proper oversight and in your testimony you make clear you are getting that cooperation from the Trump Administration, clearly there are other issues with the Small Business administration is you testified today, they have been overwhelmed. Last year they issued 36,000 in eight short weeks they issued over 4 and a half million loans to the same program, over 125 increase in workload and in a time where we knew we had to move expeditiously, time is of the essence, to save millions of Small Businesses, to save millions of jobs so that families have the ability to pay their mortgage, to get back to work, to have their careers before them as we work through this pandemic, and unprecedented in terms of the response, the quickness that we have seen in getting testing brought to the market, tests that would have taken two years for the fda to approve have been approved in weeks, following safety guidelines but removing red tape. I applaud the Trump Administration for implementing operation warp speed to push more results for families, to get more testing, to get more secures, therapies, we are seeing revolutionary changes, drugs like remdesafir that are proving effective for many people, that would not have happened without the Trump Administration moving redtape out of the way so that we could save lives, continuing to search for a vaccine at rapid speed that we are seeing in the private sector because redtape has been cut but we need to continue to push for those kinds of reforms at that time expeditious response, clearly when you move expeditiously there can be mistakes made but its good for us to look at finding out what those mistakes are and correct them. Im glad you testified us agencies like the irs correct things along the way that they found but we also have seen that based on your findings that you presented so far the ppp program has more than a 99 success rate. That is revolutionary for a program that is given out most for a half million Small Businesses, 500 billion taxpayer dollars that have been used properly as we all voted for, republicans and Democrats Join together to say lets help the Small Businesses quickly, have over 95 effectiveness, lets go find the folks who abused it, lets go get the money back and im glad the administration is working to do this, some and she just the program with 99 success rate is a, shouldnt of happened, is ludicrous. Millions of families would be out of work, Small Businesses would be close even with the unemployment numbers we are seeing, each week those numbers are dropping because businesses are starting to open again and we look back to the science as doctor green talked about. Why did we do this . We didnt do this to hope that nobody gets coronavirus, so we hope nobody gets coronavirus but in the real world we know it is still out there and the question is do we just shut everything down and wreck our economy correct the livelihoods, there are thousands of people dying because they are staying at home and not going to their doctor, not getting their checkups and cancer treatments and colonoscopies and mammograms and immunizations, children will die because they are not getting immunized so theres a cost to keeping people home as well. We need to look at all of that. We talked in this committee about nursing home crisis that happens, every state experienced nursing home deaths but not all state experienced it at the same level. Lets look at the data we have gotten so far. We are trying to get more data because some of these states are hiding the data but what we know, if you look at the 5 states that violated cms guidelines, went against the science tens of thousands of people died that shouldnt of died. We want to know about that. I am glad you are looking into it and as mister jordan said we hope you do that quickly because we need to stop it from happening where it is still going on in states like michigan, to force Nursing Homes to they cant isolate them, kill tens of thousands of people and probably a lot more, the chair brought up the state of texas, the state of texas had 700 fewer nursing home deaths per capita than the state of new york, every state had nursing home deaths but not all state experienced the same thing, the state of florida had 500 fewer nursing home deaths per capita than the state of new york. We are to be looking at where it is working, where is working poorly stop it from working poorly and say why dont you follow the guidelines for folks doing it right off . I would like to have 0 nursing home deaths than 700 fewer in one state than another, you should be looking for why they are doing it right and why are they not and to all our members we are looking at the icu beds, the economy was closed down to make sure hospitals dont get overwhelmed and theres not a single state in the nation whose Hospital System is overwhelmed. Weve seen spikes, clearly we are following the spike in the governors are managing that but not a single station has the Hospital System overwhelmed. That was the barometer for closing the economy down. It is why we need to reopen safely and to address the people that are dying because things are closed down, that has to be understood as well. I appreciate the report you gave and i look forward to the future report and i hope the governors of those five states comply with the letter we sent and i will get you a copy of this. There were specific things we asked for their recording but not sharing with the public. We need to know more about what happened in states that followed federal guidelines and the result was thousands of people died in Nursing Homes that shouldnt. Why are they hiding the data . We are to find out. Appreciate that you will join with us to get the facts and uncover the scandal. With that i yield back. I think the gentleman for yielding back, let me close by thanking gene dodaro, ms. Brown, ms. Powers for being here today, we appreciate all the work you do to hold the government accountable especially during this terrible pandemic. Todays hearing has made clear there are tangible steps the federal government can take now to increase transparency, demand accountability from those receiving federal funds and to ensure tax dollars are used to help the American People and not divergent due to waste, fraud, and abuse. I want to thank the Ranking Member for calling attention to what happened last month and the month before in new york, i think we all like to know what happened last week in south carolina. My own state of georgia, and florida and texas, arkansas, oklahoma, although states are spiking within the last week and i am interested in last week and what we can expect next week as opposed to spending all of our time trying to figure out where the virus came from i hope we spend a little time trying to figure out where the virus is going next so as to be prepared for it. We talked a little bit today, i think the gentleman from illinois for raising the issue of vaccines. Im old enough to remember last time the country wrestled with vaccines. I was around, i was a school kid when we had the polio vaccines, jonas talk came out with a great vaccine, required a shot. Colonel sabin came up with a little drop of syrup on a lump of sugar and according to all the science it was more effectiveness i happen to remember which communities got salt and which communities got sabin. I grew up in the communities that got salt, the least preferred and least effective. I know there will be 19, there are about 19 countries that supposedly in search of a vaccine. Thats what i want to see the committee focus on. What vaccines come forward, the effectiveness of vaccines and where they are allocated, not just the efficiency of the work but how effective it is going to be and how equitable they will be distributed. I grew up a victim which is not equitable. And i am not going to preside over a process that would revisit that or even continue its so i am going to be concerned about the future and thinking about the future. Let me just read for our benefit this is a document from the attending physician and i want to read it. The United States house of representatives meetings, in a limited, enclosed space such as a Committee Hearing room, for greater than 15 minutes, face coverings are required. That is not me, that is the attending physician. We are not going to have another meeting in a confined space for less more than 15 minutes if we are not going to abide by this. I will stay in the safety of my home. I would ask all of you to do. I grew up believing the first sign of a good education was good manners. I think it is good manners to look out for your fellow men. I see all the staff Wearing Masks. I dont know what this is. I will be glad to yield. I think the gentleman for yielding. As doctor greene pointed out, there are guidelines out there to how to properly social distance and we are following those and i understand doctors might look at things differently and one to give extra precautions but the precautions that have been out there are clearly being followed and doctor greene pointed that out, none of us would want to put anybody else in harms way, the house has been having votes on the house floor safely, properly with social distancing, with the necessary supplies to make sure we can wipe down spaces not here but on the house floor, working in similar areas speaking at podiums, as one person is out they went down the area and another person follows those guidelines just like we do here. I would yield back. I yield. Go ahead and after you. I wish, mister chairman, we could work this out pursuant to your suggestions following the exact instructions of the capital physician. We dont have a cure right now, we dont have a treatment and we dont have a vaccine. Weve got one thing which is the Public Health guidance from the centers for Disease Control and the vast majority of doctors in the land who do not think this is a hoax and do not think this is invented and do not think it is political and there is one thing we can do, we can put our masks on and keep our distance and i dont understand why my friends in the minority who i know are sincerely motivated people would lambaste the majority for trying to keep the continuity of government going with committee meetings, online with remote or through proxy voting and say Everybody Needs to be here and then show up and not wear masks and put terror and fear in your colleagues and perhaps your staff. Miss waters lost her sister to this disease. We have lots of colleagues who have gotten covid19, weve lost 125,000 of our country men and women, no other country in the world in which Wearing Masks has become a political or ideological statement. It is a Public Health measure. We have a rule that says you have to wear a jacket on the floor of the house, people tease mister jordan about never wearing a jacket. I dont care about his not wearing a jacket, that is a fashion statement but when he doesnt wear a mask and interact with other people in the Legislative Assembly it is dangerous. That is a Public Health menace. Can we all agree we will abide by the chairmans suggestion in the capital physicians strict recommendation and lets go forward and lets try to meet together as much as possible as opposed to driving us away could i ask my friend in reference to mister jordan, use the term public menace. I hope you werent referring to him, he walked out of here with a mask on. He walked within one foot a friend mister green. I saw it happen. It happens all the time. We might think we are in the 6foot bubbles but we are not and i see it happen on the floor on both sides of the aisle you start to hang around with people, we are social beings as people begin to interact, you saw what happened in the pencil when you legislature where one of them came down with it, told is party but didnt tell the other party, created absolute panic and more division. Why are we the only country on earth where this is now a matter of political partisan debate instead of just Public Health order . Why dont we just follow what the Public Health authorities are telling us what to do . The chair recognizes mister green. Let me say before i cite this study that just came out june 20 seventh that if you put the gavel down and say we want to wear masks or require masks i will wear my mask but i want to inform the committee, the lancet published on june 20 seventh made a analysis where they look at all these other studies and compile the data and draw conclusions with hopefully more confidence because they are looking at multiple studies, they looked at 172 studies across 16 countries on 6 continents. They found that a one meter distance decrease your risk with moderate certainty. When they do the metaanalysis they say hi certainty, the data is convincing enough to say there is high certainty that the conclusion is accurate, there is moderate certainty and there is low certainty. On the mask issue it was low certainty that it makes a difference. The new england journal of medicine, one of the most respected journals in the nation had an article that said outside the healthcare setting the masks dont work. It was referenced earlier about fomites but documents are being passed around in here all the time. Are we sterilizing each document before we hand it off to one another . I havent seen that. The mask that was sitting outside is there for anyone to go out to the bathroom, pull a mask out and touch other masks in the stack and the next person comes along and collect the masks, we are not doing surgical sterilization here and i just want we have to be consistent. If you say i want you to where he mask i will wear a mask, youre the chairman of the committee but i want us to make decisions based on sound data and information, thank you. Are you arguing we should not meet in person . No, not at all. Because there is no certainty, the mask may not work, we know how the disease is transmitted so the mask, a probability of working, maybe we ought not be meeting in person . If youre asking my clinical opinion my opinion is patients at high risk categories, anyone who is 65 years or older with comorbidities should wear a mask. If you dont im telling people in tennessee it is not required. As i understand it the mask is not to protect me. Give me a little protection but is to protect other people in the event that im infected in a majority of infections i understand are people who are a systematic or present dramatic, you dont know whether youve got it. We as members of congress we have members who didnt realize they had it and were fraternizing with everybody else, why is this so complicated . Theres one thing we can do to protect other people which is put on a mask, doesnt cost us anything, why would we not do that . Wise up some sort of macho thing if i dont wear a mask i am tough . If you want to be tough go spend the day with the nurses and doctors in the hospital, all of them come out and say everybody where your masks, listen to them. You dont want to stay at a with them listen to them. All the First Responders say save us from this nightmare, where your mask. I can cite many other professional saying the opposite. That is the challenge we are in. Dont wear a mask . I am not wearing a mask. That is the medical advice to people not to wear masks . I could share medical literature with you. Against the centers for Disease Control, harvard university, Johns Hopkins all the studies i have seen. Thank you. Without objection all members have 5 days to submit additional written questions for witnesses to the chair, it will be forwarded to the witnesses for their response. I ask our witnesses to please respond promptly, as promptly as you are here. With that this hearing is adjourned. [inaudible conversations] bins watch booktv this summer, saturday evening at 8 00 pm eastern, settle in and watch several hours of your favorite authors, tonight we are featuring 2time pulitzer prizewinning author and historian david mccullough, author of a dozen books including the wright brothers, the american spirit and his most recent, the pioneers and watch next saturday as we feature commentator, author and founder of the National Review william f buckley, bins watch booktv all summer on cspan2. Cspan has unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the Supreme Court and Public Policy events. You can watch these in Public Affairs programming on television, online or listen