we can have an adult legal conversation about this. i welcome that. it moves the conversation at least. even among the people so opposed into it into a better, more productive realm. one of the things i m most excited about is testing is coming back. if you have kids under 12 in a household, you need access to the rapid tests. giving help so schools can dot testing on a weekly or some more regular basis will give a lot of parents more confidence sending their kids to school and just a peace of mind until the vaccines can be approved for children. there s a recent poll finds only 40% of americans said president biden communicated a clear plan to combat covid. do you think he effectively reset things today? reporter: i don t think results like that, don, are a function of the clarity of
tonight president biden adopting a get tough approach as his administration tries to bring the surging covid pandemic under control. mandating federal workers be vaccinated and requiring businesses with 100 or more employees to ensure their workers either vaccinated or tested once a week. and expressing frustration with the nearly 80 million americans who are eligible for the vaccine but haven t yet rolled up their sleeves saying, quote, our patience is wearing thin. the justice department suing the state of texas over the new law s after six weeks. witht with john harwood
their shot because we see the bad responses from the right already, i mean, you know. yeah. i don t think the speech was for them. i actually agree with that strategy. at this point in time, given all the covid fatigue and the people who are working so hard and hospitals and just even looking at every sector and try to find people doing the right thing. they re frustrated. so biden said we ll give you some help here. and i think the message was pretty clear. he vented that frustration and that s i think probably the majority of people are. 70% of adults have at least one dose. i mean, he is a popular opinion here. that said, there are going to be arguments over this. i don t think it s bad to have a discussion about the constitutionality of mandates on private business. that s a reasonable discussion that people can have. you know, i mean, henry is saying we ll fight you at the gates of hell. you can file a legal brief and
overwhelming hospitals in a pandemic, in emergency situations where there are aren t beds. when it is preventable. it s not the same thing. it s apples and oranges. go ahead. yeah. we re in the middle of a plague. i was going to point out today i got two stories given to me. one we had a kidney transplant postponed. life saving in the city of in the united states. no bed for the person. you remember, don, amy klobuchar put off going in for a breast exam because she was worried about covid. there are plenty of facilities around the united states that can t handle the heart attack, can t handle a colon of course i because they re full of covi d
vaccination. i ad don t want to be talking about this a year from now. we don t get tough as we roll into the winter with schools open and kids unable to vaccinate. i worry the implementation won t get us where we need to be. people will be in close confines going into the winter. what about the ethics of allocating care and resources like icu beds? should someone who needs a life-saving cancer surgery have to postpone it because someone else refused to get vaccinated for covid? how are the decisions being made? well, look, my friend dr. schefter will know it. don t punish people who wind up sick. you re never sure did they not get a vaccine because one wasn t available to them or they had a family situation they were overwhelmed. it s tough sometimes for doctors to make these assessment of who is virtuous and who isn t. i don t want rationing in the er, in the icu by vaccination