Good to see you. Well see you again on monday. How many people are sick with the coronavirus in the United States and when did they get sick . Answering these questions are crucial but they have never been answered well and it seems that federal government dramatically misunderstood what was happening in america as the coronavirus outbreak began. On the last day of february, the cdc reported that 15 americans had tested positive for covid19. Today the reported number is more than a million and at least some of the death and i can domincom economic damage could have been avoided if we started testing earlier. As more states prepare to work out, were far from the end and mid crisis lesson to learn our past failures do not need to dictate actions. As former head of the world bank wrote in the new yorker next week, its not too late to go on the offense against the coronavirus and there are promising signs that our offense efforts are working but well only succeed if were guided but one thing, thats data. There is no other way to defeat coronavirus. Owl of our decisions must be based on the evidence available to us not on the basis of political advantage or basis or misdirected protests. We can only succeed if we follow the science and that much is going to be our focus in the hour ahead. Tonight, in a week with so many medical and science headlines to keep track of, i am once again grateful to be joined by dr. Zeke emanuel for the hour. Dr. Emanuel is an nbc news and msnbc senior medical contributor. Zeke will give us a muchneeded reality check on the news of treatment, breakthroughs and vaccine development. Also ahead, Major Concerns about testing. Labs that are sitting idle, Antibody Tests wildly inaccurate and unregulated. Well talk about what is broken and more importantly how to fix it. Miami major Francis Suarez a covid19 survivor will be here in a few minutes. Mayor suarez is at the heart of the debate while florida is opening some as speblpects of i economy, the center of Miamidade County is staying shut. It a difficult state that playing out across this nation and that is so difficult because 30 million americans and thats most likely an under count are out of work, desperate for their next paycheck. Tonight, well examine the push to open up to get back to work versus the concerns of triggering a second wave of coronavirus if we open up before the science, before the data tells us it is safe to do so. So lets begin with the numbers. The United States now has 1. 1 million reported cases of coronavirus. The United States has 64,950 reported deaths from the coronavirus. The fda issued an emergency authorization for Gilead Sciences anti viral drug remdesivir for patients with a severe case of covid19. The fdas nod came after dr. Anthony fauci said the trial data showed that the drug had a quote clear cut significant positive effect in diminishing the time to recovery. Now, we should note this does not mean the drug should be used for all hospitalized patients. Previous research suggested the drug may have potentially dangerous side effects in some patients but the maker of remdesivir, Gilead Sciences is hoping that they can expand the drugs use for patients earlier in the course of their illness. Here is the ceo of Gilead Sciences on the today show. We were prepared and ready for this virus because of some of the work weve done with remdesivir for the past decade, and at that same time we put remdesivir in Clinical Trials, we made the decision before knowing it was going to be effective to expand our capacity knowing the Global Crisis this was and knowing we would have to be ready in the event that this turned out to be effective for patients. So we have gone from around 5,000 treatment courses to today almost 100,000 treatment courses and because of our investments early, we think we will get to millions of treatment courses by the end of the year. Meanwhile, america is starting to reopen. More than half the nations governors are relaxing pandemic restrictions in their states while hoping that the Novel Coronavirus doesnt spike setting off another round of closures but there is good reason for that caution. A new report from the university of minnesota suggestions that the coronavirus pandemic could stretch on for two more years with reoccurring spikes until roughly twothirds or more of the population has developed immunity. We have two pieces of news tonight from the white house. Nbc news is reporting that the white house whittled the field of possible vaccines in its Operation Warp Speed Program from 93 to 14 which will undergo more testing in the next couple of weeks and breaking tonight, the white house is blocking dr. Fauci from testifying before a house subcommittee thats investigating the coronavirus outbreak in response. The white house said it would be counterproductive to take him away from his work but while hes blocked from testifying before the house, nbc news also learned late tonight that a spokesperson for the Senate HealthCommittee Says that dr. Fauci will testify before that committee on may the 12th. Okay. Thats the catchup on where we are in the news. I want to bring in dr. Zeke emanuel, a physician who served as a Health Policy advisor in the obama administration. Hes now the vice voice for initiatives. Great to see you as always and as always, were loaded with questions for you. And the first one starts with remdesivir, whats the situation with this drug . Lets first talk about how remdesivir works. The virus, remember, comes into the cell into a lung cell and then gets ingested and has to reproduce and make a lot more viruses. Remdesivir blocks that because it incorporates into the gwinnegenetic code of the virus and basically breaks it up, and that stops it from reproducing. So what are these test results that dr. Fauci was talking about . Basically, they started in the first of february and theyve gone on for three months with over 1,000 patients involved in the United States, europe and asia. The results were in relatively sick patients, those needing oxygen or being on a ventilator and they left the hospital sooner after 11 days, patients who got the placebo left after 15 days. When you looked at the mortality, what proportion of patients died, 8 of patients died who received remdesivir and 11. 6 died who received placebo. That didnt mean that it was enough. It could have happened by chance so that was the result. That led the fda to say theres enough information here probably the benefits are better than the risk and well give this an emergency approval. Dr. Fauci among others said this is an encouraging first step. Its clearly not a home run for anyone. Let me just say a couple words in caution. This is good but not great. Were probably going to need multiple drugs to treat this virus again. We might have to move remdesivir up earlier and the last thing i want to say is now that weve approved the drug, its going to be hard to do a placebo controlled trial. Well have to test all new drugs against remdesivir and that makes it harder and will require more patients in any trial. For this trial we needed three months. That gives you a sense for how long the next trials of new therapeutics will be. Right. And a statistic we talked about a little last week that it is much harder than you think when were trying these new drugs if you want to try and get a result that is statistically significant you need a whole lot of people in the drug, in the trial. So theres complexity in developing therapeutics and vaccines. Thanks, zeke. Lets continue this discussion with miami mayor Francis Suarez. In march he was quan attornrant 18 days after testing positive for coronavirus himself. Hes joining us now. Good to see you. How is your health, first of all . Im doing well, thank you, ali. I had to quarantine like you said for 18 days. Ive been out of quarantine since then. Thankfully, i have not had any sort of after effects of relapses of any kind so ive been very fortunate. Major, yomayor, we wanted to you because what you go through is refective a lot of the country. Youre a mayor of a major center with an interchange of a lot of people. You started restrictions in miami earlier. You are not ending them as early as other people are but its boundaries between your city and neighboring cities are pourous. Tell me about your concerns about people who continued going to the beach, people who want to go back outside, enjoy the great weather but the fact is you got a city that is still under stayathome orders. Right. And its not only pothat but we have a very Large International airport. To give perspective, our International Airport receives 50 million passengers a year. That is twice the population of the state of florida. Even now when its operating at a diminished capacity, 10 of its capacity, its still 5 Million People which is twice the size of our county, which is a large county of about 3 Million People population. Its almost twice the size. So were grappling with not only internal threats of of course maintaining social distancing, staying at home and making sure residents remain disciplined so that we can continue to reduce the number of new cases, but were also dealing with external threats. So you know, its a very challenging dynamic and were doing the very best we can trying to be as proactive and careful as possible because of so many lives at stake. Mayor, let me ask you about the idea in many states, theres a tension between those resident whose dont live in mayor centers like miami or atlanta where the mayors want to keep things a little more tightly controlled for awhile and people in other more spread out areas where theyre not seeing the same incidents of coronavirus and putting pressure on governors to open up. How is that working in florida because you have a governor ready to open things up . Yeah, thankfully this week although he did open up a large part of the state of florida, he gave the mayors in the southern part of florida, which is the densest part of florida the ability to remain closed and thats why we have done that. The data that were looking at is kind of all over the place. We had yesterday the ninth highest amount of new cases in the last basically two months, and then the two days that preceded that, we had some of the lowest number of new cases since the beginning, as well. So part of the issue is were trying to interpret the data, the criteria that everybody talked about is of course, 14 consecutive days of diminishing covid19 new cases and also, diminishing complaints of influenzalike symptoms. And were not quite there in terms of how we feel the data should be interpreted. Were looking at it every day. We get two reports a day, two reports of hospitalizations every day and looking at all that to make a prudent decision. Its a very fine balancing act we as a major city have to make. Are you worried about a second wave and how are you going to handle it if you do get a second wave that everyone seems to worry about . Of course, we are, doctor. You have to understand that i was patient number two, literally, in all of Miamidade County. I was the second person at least that we knew of that tested positive. I was an asymptomatic person and i was tested because i happened to be in the same room with one of the early, you know, people who had said publicly that they tested positive for covid19 from a delegation from brazil. So we are absolutely concerned that there could be a second wave, and we realize how quickly you can go from patient number two, which was me, to patient number 12,257 which is where were at right now. So, you know, were trying to be careful and do everything that we can to avoid that second wave from happening. 12,257 and more than 350 deaths. Mayor, thanks very much for joining us and for your leadership on this right from the beginning. Francis suarez. Still to coal come, youve the news of a vaccine being hailed as a breakthrough but should we believe the hype . The squeeze on workers that just cant work from home. President trump orders meat packing plants open and some republican governors say if you dont return to work, you wont get unemployment, either. Up next, important questions about accuracy of testing and a new theory about how long you could spread the virus if you have it. Ow long you could spread the virus if you have it. When managing diabetes you cant always stop for a fingerstick. With the freestyle libre 14 day system, a continuous glucose monitor, you dont have to. With a painless, onesecond scan you can check your glucose with a smart phone or reader so you can stay in the moment. No matter where you are or what youre doing. Ask your doctor for a prescription for the freestyle libre 14 day system. You can do it without fingersticks. Learn more at freestylelibre. Us. Since the coronavirus pandemic began, there is one constant among all experts, the need for more testing. On march 6th when the United States had only 217 confirmed cases of coronavirus, this is what President Trump said while visiting the centers for Disease Control in atlanta. Anybody that wants a test can get a test. Thats what we started tonight, the United States has 1,102,937 confirmed cases of coronavirus. Now the actual number of cases is likely much higher, but we dont really know because we still do not have enough tests. There have been shortages at times of everything necessary to conduct those tests including personal protective equipment, specialized swabs, the reagent chemicals used by labs and machines to run the samples. Across the country, there are thousands of academic labs that could test for the virus that are being unused according to an op ed in the wall street journal written by two neuro sicientists from Michigan State university. Our Research Team used food and Drug Administration guidelines in a scientific report from wuhan, china to develop a covid19 test in early march. It took one week. Our test doesnt use the reagents other labs seeking and it could identify levels of virus so low that a typical test could miss them entirely. Yet, our lab sits idle. The Sticking Point is something called Clinical Laboratory improvement amendment certification, also known as clea. Most labs currently do not have this certification but with it, these labs could help drastically increase testing in the United States. Jack lipton is chair of chance National Neuro science at Michigan State sorry, translation neuro science and talked about his labs diagno diagnostic test known as a pcr test and what it would mean for the fight against coronavirus. I wanted to talk to you first to explain to people what a pcr test is and what the steps we have to go through are. So first, you get a nasal swab or get a saliva swab and you isolate the rna, the genetic code in the virus, then what do you do to get the test and determine if the person has been infected or not . So we take that rna and we turn it into something stable, which is dna and we take that bit and we amplify it and take it and run it through several cycles with some enzymes and those allow it to double for each cycle and the larger that we amplify it, the more we start to develop a signal and through that signal, we end up seeing whether weve amplified the genetic code virus and if we did, well get a bright signal and that produces a reading on our machine and that tells us if we are indeed having the presence of the virus. Now youve been reported to be out there saying that, you know, if we got harnessed a lot of act dem maademic labs like y that arent doing research because of covid19, you could generate 500,000 to 1 million copies you were quoted as saying, 1 million tests a day, 500,000 to 1 million tests a day. Is that really plausible . I think its absolutely plausible. I think its basic math. There is easily 10,000 labs out there that can run this kind of test. The realtime pcr system is very common in biology laboratories and anyone from a plant biologist to a neuro scientist, i happen to be a neuro scientist, we all use these tools. Youve seen a barrier youve reported a barrier in getting your type of lab and your type of tests approved and a lot have the government sanction it, allow it to be used for clinical determinations. What are those barriers in your experience . So, the main problem is that in order to run any of these ac. It involves getting a Board Certified laboratory director, thats something as an example i cant do but in the middle of a pandemic, i think we need to think about liberalizing our criteria while not sacrificing quality for the kind of work that were trying to do here, which is get everyone to stand up and do what they can for this crisis and i think if we can develop a pandemic National Guard of the scientists and precertify them for this kind of work, we could stand this up whenever we need to without developing huge amount of infrastructure, right now the test costs for reimbursing for coronavirus testing is now at 100 a sample. Cms, which is the center for medicare and Medicaid Services is paying 100 per sample and thats because they need to hire more people and buy more equipment at places like Quest Diagnostics or lab core and if we were able to use the existing infrastructure we had, that universities, we would be much better equipped and wouldnt be spending money on equipment and lab labor. We can utilize the people for the most highly skilled researchers in the world to be able to do something they do all the time in a relatively standardized and simple way. Whats the most interesting thing you found since doing covid19 testing . Well or the most surprising thing to you. I think the most surprising thing to me was the length of time that individuals shed the virus. So when you hear people talk about if youre exposed to someone who has had covid19 or you think you have to isolate for 14 days. People tend to think that means that this disease is a 14day course. Its not. People can be shedding this virus for four, five weeks and longer. So i think that people really need to understand the length of this disease and how sneaky it is. People can feel better and, you know, we talked to our subjects and they feel better but they are still shedding virus. You feel better and youll go outside now, dont do. Th that, stay home. Thats jack lipton and the certification he is looking for is clea, not what i said. That was fascinating the last thing, the whole thing was fascinating but its possible you could be shedding this virus if you have it for four to five weeks. We know some people can shed for a long time. What we dont know are two important variables there, which is how many people shed for a long time, whats that curve look like . Are most people stopping to shed after a few days, 14 days, or do we actually have a sizable number that go out many days . And if theyre shedding, are they really infective . How contagious are they . And that again is something we dont know. Those are two important questions but we have known that some people can shed for a very long time and as dr. Lipton said, even when theyre feeling good, thats one of the problems of this illness, thats why it can spread so easily and opening up can be so dangerous because people feel good and they are still shedding. Thanks, zeke for clarifying that. While there is still some issues about accessibility when it comes to getting a test to see whether you have covid19, its getting much easier to find a different kind of test, the kind that can tell you whether youve had the virus and recovered. The second kind of test checks for antibodies in your blood but many of those tests have not been federally approved and could be producing unreliable results. Nbcs Josh Letterman reports quote as of this week, 150 Antibody Tests also known as serology tests are on the market without government review from the food and Drug Administration. Another 24 labs are conducting their own Antibody Testing without having obtained fda authorization. Several companies that produced the tests are the subject of an on going congressional investigation. Joining me is congressman roger chairman of the House Oversight subcommittee and economic and consumer policy. Congressman, good to see you. Tell me about this. We have a real excitement about getting these tests out there and i think it may not occur to people that even the test needs fda approval. Is it because of potential dangers in the tests or they might not be that accurate . Well, youre right these serological tests hold promise. The fda allowed hundreds of unregulated potentially fraudulent tests to flood the market and here is the problem, ali. That is a large proportion of them have high false positives, meaning that if you were to take this Antibody Test and yielded a false positive result, you could be fooled into thinking that you have antibodies to covid19 and potentially immunity when you actually do not. So you could relax your social distancing, go out and interact with a bunch of people, catch covid19 and get other people sick, as well. So you could make some really dangerous life decisions based on these unregulated potentially very fraud length tests. The other issue i have, i want to show you a New York Times report, one in four new yorkers had contracted covid19. The preliminary data suggests many more new yorkers may have been infected than previously believed and reports like this from all around the country. What does that tell us . A lot of people are anxious to know if they were exposed to it because it might allow them to either make decisions or know who to support in what sometimes feels like a very political fight whether we should be going back to work or continuing to stay at home. The short answer is that the science is still unsettled. We dont know exactly what the presence of these covid antibodies means in terms of how much immunity they confer if any on people for what length of time. What that means for in terms of what you can and cant do in daily activities. This is where the fda has to step into the void and give us precise standards so that even if you get the results back from these covid19 tests, you know what to do with them. Besides that, we think that the fda should clear the market of all those junk tests and only allow authorized tests to be on the market. Today there are only eight authorized tests according to the fdas website whereas there is more than 150 unauthorized tests which as ive said, could be very faulty in terms of their results. Congressman, given all this uncertainty, do you think its safe to open up based upon whether people have antibodies or not or is that just way too premature given what we know about the faultiness of these serology tests . Doctor, i think its too premature. We just dont know yet. Its true that it holds Great Potential but if youre rushing to reopen your economy based on these tests that are on the marketplace, i think you better think twice because right now in the absence of precise standards and science telling us what it means to have these antibodies in terms of what you can and cant do in engaging with other people, i dont think you can reopen the economy and say hey, you have covid19 antibodies. You can go out and relax social distancing and do whatever you want. Were not there yet. Congressman, thanks for joining us. Coming up, the extended Unemployment Crisis and what it means for americans. Nt crisis a means for americans. Were at the movies and we need to silence our phone. Who knows where that button is . I dont have silent. Everyone does right up here. It happens to all of us. We buy a new home, and we turn into our parents. What i do is help new homeowners overcome this. What is that, an adjustable spanner . Good choice, steve. Okay, dont forget youre not assisting him. You hired him. If you have nowhere to sit, you have too many. Who else reads books about submarines . My dad. Yeah. Oh, those are progressive cant protect you from becoming your parents, but we can protect your home and auto when you bundle with us. Look at that. In georgiaed today most ki of businesses were open after the governor did not extend his order for staying at home. Georgia began allowing restaurants to serve a limited number of dine in customers that led to scenes of waiters of masks greeting customers for custom order waffles and coffee. People who cannot work from home are being give whn what feels l an impossible choice, go back to work and risk health or miss wages. The centers for Disease Control said 115 meat and poultry plants in 19 states reported outbreaks involving thousands of workers. At least 20 meat packing workers have died of coronavirus. This week the president signed an order designed to keep the plants open. At a poultry plant in pennsylvania worker protested for more protective equipment and want the plant closed for cleaning after they say more than 20 boric workers tested po. At a beef plant in colorado, several workers have died of coronavirus. A worker there told nbc news hes happy to work but hes pleading for every worker to get tested. Were supposed to be practicing social distance and some of the areas you cant have social distance of the six feet and so like, today i was working and next to a guy and we kept bumping into each other, and like my first worry was what if he has the virus . And he keeps bumping into me and like is going to, you know, its going to come to me and then im going to bring it home and then all my roommates, my son, everybody is going to get it. Stay at home and lose pay or go to work and risk spreading the virus. As more states reopen, thats becoming the inescapable dile a dilemma. Joining me now, sylvia thank you for joining us. Look, this is a tough one and it is tougher yet for those people who have no choice in the matter. Often wage earning workers have less choice than most people do but in this case the president invoked the defense production act to keep some folks at work and even though many are unionized, the union cant over ride that. What do you make of this situation . This is people they want to work but dont want to die. Well, i think the first half of your show really sums it up without adequate testing, tracing, isolating, ppe, were just sending a lot of these workers, their families and spreading this into the community to their deaths. We know there are correlations between all of this, and, you know, even though, you know, trump signed the executive order to send them to work, he did so without any guidance, i mean, there is some guidance from osha but no hard and fast regulation with any tooth to it. Its clear that its much too soon to be doing this, and as you said, we have hot spots all over the country where these meat packing plants exist. This seems like a complicated problem, and it would seem like the communities in which the meat packing plants are located would actually be against opening them prematurely without testing because as we saw in south dakota, you can spread it not just within a plant but outside the plant once someone gets infected or as that worker said, you know, i could bring it home. Why arent we seeing more of the communities rallying to the side of the workers and objecting to keeping or to not cleaning plants or testing workers . I think one of the issues is again coming from washington dc that we need relief. We needed relief for workers, families and the communities. It has been far too slow. It hasnt reached a lot of workers yet and its not been anywhere near enough. People are getting desperate. They are going into debt. Here we are may 1st, another month of rent and mortgages due and so i think people are becoming desperate but really in the richest country in the world we shouldnt be here. We should be able to do better. And if you look at these meat packing plants, any reasonable response would be we need to close them down because the way they are running now is simply really exacerbating the situation and spreading the virus through the community as you mentioned. And so we could do a lot more. We should do a lot more and this is way too premature. Silva y, one of the things w tried to do is rebate checks that go to americans, the federal top up on Unemployment Insurance and the Paycheck Protection Program in which Companies Get grants if they people their people on payroll and the remarkably interesting effort that went through the airlines in which the airlines received grants to keep their people on payroll, this is a much more european concept than it is an american concept. Its actually not a bad one if the government pays companies to keep people on payroll rather than have them get off their payroll, apply for unemployment, thats a process to apply for health care and thats an unwelding process. What can we do once were out of this emergency period that we thought about the first three months in terms of keeping workers going . Well, i mean, what youre saying is exactly right. What European Countries are doing much more efficiently than we were is to directly take over payroll, nationalized payroll. That would have been the best thing to do right off the bat. Instead, we have a lot of people unemployed, some are on temporary layoffs that are good. Youre keeping the length between workers and jobs. We had the ppe that will help small and medium size businesses hopefully stay afloat and be viable when we can start to reasonable open up and have workers to go on the ready because what we do not want is to have everybody being delinked from their employer and employment and small businesses, many businesses closing down in droves because that means were going to take a situation where i try to remind people dont forget we did this on purpose. You know, we have 30 Million People filing i. U. Claims, Unemployment Insurance claims and thats a good thing because we were trying to do this. Were simply moving too quickly into the next phase to opening up, but, you know, as much as we can keep workers tied to their jobs, the better off well be in the long run. Do you really think the government can keep people on the payroll for the length of this until we get a vaccine . Isnt that going to be a huge stretch on the government and the economy and for the long term . Well, its certainly a huge stretch but dont forget there is a lot of work being done, which was just discussed quite a bit at the top of the program whe whe. Were the richest country in the world. Countries with not as much as we have are doing a lot more. Yes, we can do it. Can we do it until there is a vaccine . Im not so sure. Certainly, we have to keep things in place as the medical community is all saying until we have some reasonable amount of testing, tracing and isolating so we can do a better job at keeping people safe and healthy and certainly to keep tampering down the rate of growth of the infection so we dont have such, you know, explosions in infections that we overwhelm the health care system. I think were really early in the early stages. 22 annually 22 trillion economy. I think there is a lot of room to move here and one of the biggest things we have to do is make sure that d. C. Delivers to state and local governments so we dont start adding teachers and firemen and policemen to the unemployment ranks. Which is what happens when these states are unable to raise the money because they cant go into debt and they cant print money. Sylvia, thanks very much. Shes a labor economists and cochair on the center of wage and employment dynamics. Coming up next, how much optimism should we put in the news of a vaccine breakthrough . Ill ask zeke about that. First, here is a look at the heroes on the front lines of the grocery store. How much i feel a sense of pride being an essential worker, how much im grateful for the opportunity to serve our community, to nourish them. The job has a little bit more responsibility now and that makes me feel like somewhat of a hero. I know im helping someone eat healthier by working in the produce department. Im shopping for people that literally cannot leave their homes because they are in chemotherapy or have a newborn. Ive been working every single day to make over 100 boxed lunches for all employees as a way of thank you for coming in every day. The customers had no clue. They came in to do regular shopping and went to check out, it was a very heart field moment as they realized all their groceries were paid for. Im talking it off for this video. There is one particular customer when he saw we had the big wall full of groceries, over the moon. It was really lovely to see. One of the head clerks had trex costumes, it was really nice that he went around the store waving at customers. They were all taking pictures and loved it. Our customers are like our family. We have been getting the utmost support from them. They have been putting signs outside in front of the store appreciating what we do. They thank us every day for being here. Its such a tough time but at least people are thanking and grateful for your hard work. Thank you for what you do and we appreciate you. Thank you so much. Its very touching to me because i feel like im not really anybody special. Im just doing my job. I dont think i realized how important we are to people, not just for getting groceries but for socializing and connecting with people, just simple things like giving them a smile and taking an interest in them, asking them how theyre doing and letting it be more than an experience of just getting groceries i think is really important right now. Important right now. You try to stay ahead of the mess. But scrubbing still takes time. Now theres new powerwash dish spray. Its the faster way to clean as you go. Just spray, wipe and rinse. It cleans grease five times faster. New dawn powerwash. Spray, wipe, rinse. Your cells. Trillions of them. Thats why centrum contains 24 key nutrients to feed your cells, supporting your energy so you can take care of what matters most. Centrum. Feed your cells. Fuel your life. Wefrom the 7,000 cignat, clinicians,. Supporting front line doctors and nurses, to everyone staying home to protect others. Find answers to your most pressing questions at cigna. Com covid19 trust us. Us kids are ready to take things into our own hands. Dont think so . Hold my pouch. Since 1926, nationwide weve been there in person, during trying times. Today, being on your side means staying home. Nationwide office of customer advocacy. But we can still support you and the heroes who are with you. Were giving refunds on Auto Insurance premiums, assisting customers with financial hardships, and our foundation is contributing millions of dollars to charities helping with covid19 relief. Keeping our promise to be on your side. Because were in a rush to get the vaccines done, we need to back up to Ten Companies because were not sure which one will work. Its a novel virus. Weve never done a vaccine like this before. Dr. Zeke emanuel and i spoke with bill gates last week about the unpresence decedented race a vaccine. It inevitable well get occasional news of possible breakthroughs. The New York Times this week reported that scientists at Oxford Universitys genre institute are preparing for trials that was effective in earlier tests with a monkeys. The vaccine is a modification of a vaccine for the mers coronavirus. Zeke, i see these headlines through the course of the week and my first thought is always i need to ask zeke. What do we make of this . So lets begin with what this vaccine is. They have taken a chip virus that is a virus that causes a common cold in the chimp and taken a piece of the genetic code that makes the spike protein for the coronavirus and put it in that virus and then they infect it in a person and produces a lot of immune reaction and yes, the tests they tried it on six monkeys and they seem to be immune to the fekt i. It no slam dunk. They tried it out on mers but it was never approved, it could work. Larger scale Clinical Trials are obviously going to be important. They have started in human beings but one of the big problems with the virus platform for a vaccine is production. It hard to produce millions and millions of doses of this. India has already got a firm ramping up production before we know whether this vaccine is even going to work but thats you know a big challenge and its you know, its a big challenge, and its going to be a big challenge if this turns out to be positive to produce enough for the whole world. So a week ago when you and i were reading bill gates paper and we were talking about it, one of the things is its hard to shortcircuit the process for a vaccine because it has to be tested on enough people to determine that its safe, right . We cant get and then manufacture and scale up a vaccine until we know that it doesnt have a detrimental effect or an effect that might be more detrimental than not having vaccinated people in the first place. Right. One of the things we need to know is that its not going to cause serious problems. And, again, these coronavirus viruses could cause a serious problem called antibody enhancement problem. That is, they could actually make the virus worse. The second problem is that we need to know that they actually produce enough antibody. And then the third challenge is do those antibodies and other immune cells actually protect you from infection with coronavirus . And those are all biology, and it takes time for the biological system to work and for people to actually see if they get infected. Cant rush that. Yeah, as much as one would like to in the most serious and Great Results of vaccines, it has been difficult to rush. Well, the president has made almost a habit of telling the American Public that the death toll virus wouldnt be so bad. At a briefing on april 20th, he said the toll could be as low as 50,000. Now, as nbc news reported this morning, the very next day after trump said that, his administration placed an order for 100,000 body bags. Now, of course, since then the death toll has passed 64,000, and it is still climbing. So, zeke, i have to ask you as a doctor, where do you see this going . Well, i have to say that, you know, these predictions are all hard. It was just about six weeks ago that two teams from Stanford University were saying, well, well get to 10,000 deaths, maybe its only 20,000 to 40,000, and here we are just six weeks later, and were well beyond those deaths. And a model the white house likes to use called by ihme up at the university of washington, they have a model that shows plateauing in the number of deaths at 72,422 or Something Like that. That obviously isnt going to happen. Were just 8,000 deaths shy of that, and theres three months between now and august 4th. Were getting to the top of the curve, it appears, but remember the number of deaths on the way up is equal to the number of deaths on the way down on that curve, which means were on track to have clearly more than 100,000 deaths. And unfortunately, it looks like 110,000, 120,000 is more likely by august, and that is really painful, it seems to me. Let me ask you before we get to your final thoughts, does the number of deaths on the downside have to be equal to the number of deaths on the upside, or is there a way to make that curve drop fast . Probably not a way to make it drop fast because youre still circulating virus, and its going to go down. So we know we know that got it. All right. It looks symmetric. Yeah, all right. A lot of these deaths, probably most of them, are happening in, as you and i have discussed, the saddest way possible with the dying person separated from their family, alone in a hospital room, on a breathing machine. I know youve got some thoughts about this that are very personal, zeke. Yeah. My 92yearold father died from brain cancer this past october after a short illness. I got to say that may be the most meaningful time i had with him was our last moments together. We were lying side by side on my parents bed. He just put his fingers on my hand and began caressing my hand. It brought back memories of my childhood when he used to run his fingers through my hair, squeezing my hand at my college graduation, or when he gently put his hand on my back when we watched my newborn daughter. As an oncologist, i often encourage family members of dying patients to grasp the hand of their loved ones and talk to them. Invariably they stood by the side of the bed, and they took their hands and smoothed the hair on their relatives head. It made everyones pain more tolerable and helped bring them to closure. Im very heartbroken for the covid19 families who cant lie side by side with their loved ones the way i did or deprived of those final caresses and moments of being together, and who then cannot grieve together at funerals and Memorial Services because of physical distancing. I have to say i almost feel blessed that my father died before covid19. Not only could i be at his side, but my family was able to come together to grieve with friends at his very impressive memorial service. More than 64,000 americans now have died from covid19, and thats a Massive National tragedy. But it hurts so much to think of those tens of thousands of families who grieve alone in this pandemic. Zeke, its remarkable. I do have to ask you this. You know, there are milestones in our years. We are coming into a very warm weekend, and the new York Police Department has announced its going to have foot patrols out there to make sure people are social distancing. People want normalcy, and something you brought up last week when we talked to bill gates was the idea that the resumption of school feels like normalcy. Here in new york, Governor Cuomo has said there will be no more school till the end of this school year. But the idea that come september, parents who have kids at home who cannot afford to be at home, they may have to go back to work. There are students going to be wanting to go to colleges. There are going to be colleges that may be in a position not to graduate some of the students that are necessary for the workforce. Whats your sense of how that milestone, education, back to school for k through 12 and for College Students looks like . Well, i will say to you that this week ive talked to a number of College President s aldie baall debating this question and trying to figure out how its going to be possible to open. I know were looking actively at denmark and other places that have opened schools in the hope we could open it. I think it was Governor Cuomo who said opening schools, opening business, and opening transportation are all interlinked and we have to do them conjointly, so thats really important. Zeke, thanks as always for spending the hour with me. Well do it again next week. A reminder, if you want more of zekes insights into the coronavirus, and you do, check out his podcast, making the call, with new episodes every wednesday. You can find it on apple and where ever you get your podcasts. Im going to see you back here tomorrow morning and sunday morning for velshi beginning at 8 00 a. M. The 11th hour with Brian Williams begins right now. T now. Thats why lincoln offers you the ability to purchase a new vehicle remotely with participating dealers. An effortless transaction all without leaving the comfort and safety of your home. Thats the power of sanctuary. And for a little extra help, receive 0 apr financing and defer your first payment up to 120 days on the purchase of a new lincoln. Make it tough to take care of yourself, thats why you can rely on natures bounty. To give you the support you need. To stay motivated keep active and sleep well. Add a little more health to your day. With natures bounty. Adden k the Empire State Building high above the city of new york lit up tonight in tribute to Police Officers everywhere. A memorial to the fallen and a salute to those now on the job. Good evening on this day 1,198 of the trump administration. 186 days to go until our president ial election. And before leaving for camp david today, the president left us with this quote. Hopefully were going to come in below that 100,000 lives lost, which is a horrible number. And indeed it is. Heres a