Good morning and welcome to morning joe. It is wednesday, april 1st. Along with joe, willie and me we have former white house adviser for Health Policy professor and advice proboast, doctor ezekiel emanuel. And cofounder and ceo of axios, jim vandehei joins us as well. Joe, that press briefing yesterday was dark. There was some hard truths that came forward in one big dose for the United States of america. That is a press briefing that Health Care Providers and doctors and scientists begged, begged the white house to give two weeks ago. To tell americans the truth. That is actually the briefing the Intel Community begged donald trump to give in january and february. They saw this coming even several weeks ago, doctors i know very well, scientists, Health Care Professionals were saying, mr. President , 100,000, 200,000, 500,000 people could die from this virus if you dont start moving. The president didnt want to hear it. This is, after all, a president who talked about one person dying and one person from china, but weve got it taken care of, it will be zero. And then soon after that in february he was talking about, oh, we have 14, 15 people who were infected but weve done such a good job its going to go down to zero. Then, of course, he said the media was overblowing it, that their coverage was a hoax of the pandemic, that it was going to go away. And then he said that it would go away in april, the sun would come out, it would magically go away. And, willie, yesterday we found out because the scientists and the doctors told the truth and the president finally let them tell the truth to the American People. And, again, what they said yesterday is what the president was urged to tell the American People two weeks ago. But now we go from the president blindly predict this was going to go away in april when the sun came out, the flowers would bloom and everybody would be fine, to us finally being told the truth, that april is, as elliot said, april is the cruellest month and we can expect 100 to 250,000 deaths in this country over the next two, three weeks. Good scenario. If, if we do everything right now. Since our response to this has been so delayed and so pathetic up until last week. Yeah, i know were going to talk a lot about what the president said a couple months ago, what he said a couple weeks ago, what he said just last week. It was last week he was talking about opening the economy again by easter for some parts of the country. He talked yesterday about, hey, this is not the flu. A lot of people have been saying its the flu. The president said it was the flu a couple of weeks ago. Well get into all of that. But just the numbers alone, ive heard the word sobering used a lot. I would say staggering when theyre showing these numbers that even with current social distancing guidelines in place, 100,000 to 240,000 potential deaths. And if the measures dont stay in place, that death toll could be higher. The next few weeks were told will be the worst. I want everyone american to be prepared for the hard days that lie ahead. Were going to go through a very tough two weeks. And then hopefully, as the experts are predicting, as i think a lot of us are predicting after having studied it so hard, youre going to start seeing some real light at the end of the tunnel. But this is going to be a very painful, very, very painful two weeks. In the next several days to a week or so were going to continue to see things go up. We cannot be discouraged by that because the mitigation is actually working and will work. Theres no magic bullet. Theres no magic vaccine or therapy. Its just behaviors. Each of our behaviors translating into something that changes the course of this viral pandemic over the next 30 days. The next couple of weeks were going to be seeing some serious things that the American Public unfortunately is going to have to get used to seeing. What were doing with the mitigation is to try and blunt that, but no matter what we do, even with the, i believe, positive effects that were seeing with the mitigation, its going to be a tough couple of weeks coming up. Now, weve heard, zeke emmanuel, that nobody could have seen this coming. The fact is everybody saw this coming. Everybody saw this coming in early january. So i know you, like me, have wanted the president to give this sobering press conference for weeks. And what happened in a strange way yesterday was a bit of relief because it was the first time that actually the president allowed his scientists and doctors to say the sort of things that youve been saying all along. As grim as yesterdays press conference was, as grim as the news was, it actually was a step in the right direction because it tells the truth about the hell were about to go through, but also says how we can avoid it in the future. What was your takeaway from yesterday . That the president had a conversion experience. He, you know, confronted the numbers and could not wiggle out of the numbers. And i notice, you know, you and willie emphasizing the 100,000 to 250,000, 240,000 people who might die in this country if everything goes right and everyone begins to adhere to these physical distancing measures and we can actually get the mitigation that dr. Faucis been talking about in place. But the fact is, we havent been doing it right for a long time. And the other graph that they showed was even grimmer, which was 1. 5 million to 2 Million People dying if we dont get these measures in place. And that translates to 150 million to 200 million americans actually infected with this virus. And ive been saying that for several weeks have been pillerried on the right wing media because ive been saying if we dont do something in the next seven to 14 days, were going to have more than 100 Million People infected. And, you know, three, i think youve been a little generous and willies been a little generous. Two weeks ago we needed this. Thats certainly true. We needed it two weeks ago. But people have been warning about this for three or four weeks, since the start of march, that we need to get on this and do this. So i think theres been i real conversion experience. I think the real question is, how long does it last in the white house . We have had one or two grim press conferences before right after the Imperial College of londons estimate came out about two weeks ago the president gave a sort of sober press conference and then was right back to championing chloroquine and we only needed 15 days. This is going to be a long haul. I think dr. Fauch schi right fa and we have about another seven days to get this in place. Were behind the eight ball. Go ahead, joe, sorry. You go. You go. I would take a moment of optimism, you know. Im generally a very optimistic guy. And i have been talking to my colleagues in the medical schools in seattle and San Francisco in particular, places that were hit hard, hit early, and that, you know, seattle especially where they had the first case of this. And they did this physical distancing and mitigation measures pretty early because they were shocked. And they do seem to be working. So that comment that dr. Fauci made that white deaths will be going up, this social distancing and mitigation, wearing the masks will make a difference and we wont see it for a while because its what we call a lagging indicator in the health field, that does seem to be happening and there are some glimmers that you really can make a difference and the data arent just from china or other places, theyre from actually places in the United States, places that jumped on it. Youre going to need a president who can lead that the moment that things are getting worse but were able to see around the corner and its really going to be better in weeks. And i think, you know, this idea of 30 days does bother me a little bit because its too short. Yeah. You know its not honest, yeah. You are right about Washington State, theres some positive glimmers of hope coming out of Washington State. Even italy whos been through a month of hell, youre starting to see a slight bending of the curve in italy. Those believing that things are Getting Better. But i do want to underline the recklessness of talk show radio hosts and people online and trumpists, these trump hacks, jim vandehei, who push and who have been mocking people like zeke emanuel who warned about this day coming and so they, of course, are attacked online. I was attacked online by an idiot about quoting the Imperial College study. And then, of course, the president is now quoting those same numbers. So, of course, im sure theyll fall in line and talk about how brilliant donald trump was. These miracle cures, ive seen quacks and demagogs and people getting on and talking about hydrochloroquine, how its a miracle drug and how everybody who ever took it recovered and its a miracle drug. Even donald trump yesterday backing off of that saying we still have a ways to go after the press conference. But you have that and, jim, i will really im almost at a loss for words about whats happening in the state of florida with ron desantis who refused to cancel spring break, who refused to get people off of sand bars where 100 boats would crowd around and people would have drinking parties all weekend next to each other, who is still refusing to close restaurants, who is still refusing to do what every Health Care Expert in the world is begging leaders like him to do. And hes not doing it in the state that has has millions of Senior Citizens. And they are dying. They are beginning to die. And yet hes still not moving, jim. And i i must say, i dont get it. Yeah, i mean, i think the deniers are going to have to live with the stain of this for a lifetime. Theres no way like now you look dla usingaelusional if you listening to what is now a consensus. It took donald trump a long time to get there, as you talked about for months, but now were there. Theres a national consensus, republicans, scientists, doctors, anybody whos looked at the data, whos looked at the science now agrees that theres a real chance that 100,000 to 250,000 die, if we dont take quick action it could be higher than that. That the effect will mean theres going to be quarantine for almost everybody, probably not just april, definitely may, potentially into june, that you needed that economic package just to be able to keep the economy afloat for the next two months. Youre probably going to need another two, three, four trillion dollars just in stimulus to be able to get the economy back up and running. So anybody whos out there, whether youre on fox or whether youre a governor and youre still saying, well, i dont know, did we have to take swift action, its nonsensical. Look at china, look at italy, look at spain, new york, new orleans, detroit, this isnt Rocket Science. Its not a political debate. The consensus is there. So the big question is, and even i read dr. Emanuels piece, theres a way to get people back by june, if people make smart decisions. If people in florida are paritying and infecting elderly people who are at such high risk, shame on them. Thats going to require additional president ial pressure. There hasnt been a National Mandate that everybody quarantine. The next step is hes going to have to get out there and force people to do the things that they have to do even if theres bad economic consequences in the shortterm. Mika, bill gates wrote an oped where he said you have to make this shutdown national because right. Americans travel from state to state. You cant shut down one state and let people go to restaurants in other states because we still travel. We still go across state lines. Florida cant stop people from coming in to its state and other states cant stop floridians from going to their state. So unless its a national shutdown, florida will continue with its policies killing Senior Citizens and exporting death to Senior Citizens in other states unless florida and every other state shuts down and begins to take this seriously. And thats all responding to it. I mean, zeke, this is here to stay. Were being held hostage to this until theres mass uniform testing or a vaccine. And yesterday we got a lot of information on how many people were going to die and the fact that we need ventilators and we get a sense that the states are still in a situation where theyre competing with practically everybody, even the federal government, for supplies to help respond to this. But what about being able to map forward . I mean, under what scenario would you advise the president to relax the physical distancing standards if theres no mass uniform testing, including Antibody Testing . I think youre absolutely right, mika, which is you can only begin to relax these standards once we see several things in the data. You have to see that the total number of new places has plateaued, that the actual percentage of patients infected is going down. And that requires the data. And as, you point out, a kind of infrastructure for Public Health. You need testing and, you know, we probably need more than a million a day in the United States, not 100,000 a day. You need contact tracing. So if someone tests positive, you can actually contact their people, connections to the Tech Companies that know how people move, who they interact with so we can do it rapidly, and you do need this well big important change in behavior that has become habitual. I go out, i put a mask on. I come in i wash my hands. I wash my hands 20, 30 times a day. And i dont spew out droplets outside. Those are big changes for americans. And if we dont see that rapidly and were only going to be able to see that rapidly if we have leadership. Leadership from the president , leadership from all the other elected officials and celebrities and everyone else. Behavior change is really hard. We know that. And yet we have to do it rapidly if were going to get a hold of this. But i think youre also right, no magic cures. Weve got to be done with that that its going to be chloroquine. It might be chloroquine, but we need the trials and we need the data. The important element here is no opening up without solid evidence that weve actually turned the corner and gotten it down to zero and can have the infrastructure to squash it wherever it pops up. I did think it was interesting yesterday the president s been spouting chloroquine as a miracle drug. He pulled back a little. He has no idea whether it is or not, nobody knows whether it is or not because the studies have to be done. Dr. Fauci, dr. Birx, and serious doctors understand that, that theyre not going to give false hope because its very dangerous. But know, willie, they had a list yefd all tsterday of all ts we were told about being wrong about this pandemic, and i guess a lot of that is natural if its not done in bad faith by the federal government, the leader of the federal government of the executive branch at least, but one thing thats up in the air right now has to do with masks, has to do with whether this is transmitted via aerosol. And many people are starting to believe that it is. It doesnt mean if you i read this morning it doesnt mean that if you jog past somebody youre going to get it or if youre walking past somebody five feet away youre going to get it. It means if youre in the room with somebody, share the same air, if you talk to them for a while, then, yes, people are starting to believe its not just the droplets, as zeke said, its also the aerosol that you could get this from. So now suddenly Wearing Masks seems to make sense. Yeah, and the cdc is, in fact, considering, as we speak, making a formal recommendation that people not just people who have been infected, not just people who feel sick, but anyone who goes outdoors wear a mask if theres any chance youre going to be in contact with somebody. Thats, by the way, something doctors have been telling me privately all the time. If you guys go outside, wear a mask. Thats been going on for weeks and weeks and weeks. I wanted to make one other point you were talking about Governor Desantis. He said yesterday hes waiting for guidance from the federal government. Hes waiting for guidance on the task force. As we talk about florida, one of the coming hot spots in this pandemic, well, President Trump has a close relationship with Governor Desantis. If Governor Desantis isnt perceptive enough to see where this is head and what it could do to his state, we should implore the president to make that phone call to Governor Desantis if hes waiting for donald trump to tell him what do. Please, mr. President , call the governor and tell him what do because its coming to florida and its coming fast. Dr. Emanuel, i wanted to ask you a question that was posed at the News Conference yesterday which is this. If the federal government had put in place mitigation efforts earlier, if the federal government had taken this more seriously a month ago, two months ago, would we not be looking that the staggering curve that shows the potential for 100,000 to 240,000 deaths, as you point out, in a best Case Scenario . So ill ask you that question. If we had take then seriously as a federal government, much earlier, what would that number look like compared to what it is today . Well, i mean, again, the 100,000 to 250 is a bestCase Scenario. Im not a modeler and im not privileged to the modeling at the moment. But it certainly, again, remember, part of it is how high that curve is, how many people die. Part of it is how much its spread out so you dont have the maihem you have in new york City Hospitals at the moment. Its certainly the case two months ago if we had done the social distancing measures and thi