so doctors who rarely use the term game changer call two forthcoming covid pills game changers. they say they dramatically reduce hospitalization or death for people with mild to moderate covid. but the success really all depends on testing, which we haven t been great at. cnn s elizabeth cohen here to explain. john, as amazing as the results are of these clinical trials by merck and pfizer, you know what is even better, not getting covid at all. vaccines are more important than even these trucks. let s take a look at the results that merck and pfizer not when they did that with these anti-virals drugs. for america, they had some people taking a placebo, a drug that does nothing. nine deaths from covid in the group that got the placebo,
october surprise. he would support expanding gifted and talented program. instead of saying let s expand gifted and talents so there are more children like curtis sons and the sons and daughters of blacks and hispanics and others can get into gifted and talented and be qualified, no. the mayor just wants to abolish it. shame on him. reporter: democratic mayoral nominee eric adams, viewed as the front-runner in this democrat-heavy city, has not backed de blasio s plan. a statement says eric reserves his right to implement policies based on the needs of students and parents should he become mayor. clearly, the department of education must improve yacht comes outcomes of children from impoverished areas. mike: molly line, thank you so much. joins us now is former education secretary and fox news contributor dr. bill benefit.
we ve seen lots and lots of people leaving the city. is he trying to convince more folks to leave the big apple? yeah, this is an encouragement for people to get out who want their kids to succeed. the last thing he should do is abolish gifted and talented programs. if not enough kids are getting in, you don t think enough minority kids are getting in, start programs earlier that bolster their skills and bolster their achievement levels. go to harlem, go to the success academies which are almost exclusively minority. they have tremendous and profound success with minority kids. this kind of program could work. don t abolish it, make it better, improve it and make more people eligible for it by working at the lower grades to improve kids skills. this abolition of excellence, this attack on excellence is one of the things, one of the themes that s running throughout our educational system, and it s wrong. it s wrong, wrong, wrong. mike: as a former education
adams signals he might reverse the decision if elected. molly line has the latest on what s happening. hi, molly. reporter: good afternoon, mike. the current mayor, new york s bill de blasio, is on his way out the door, but before he lees, he s announced the phaseout of the gifted and talented program. actually making that happen will fall to whoever is expected to take over, we re waiting, which puts that issue right in the middle of the ongoing mayoral race. right now placement in this gifted and talented program depends on testing, quizzing keds as young as 4. create ins say the program disproportion at any favors white students. the new program will screen students, identify subject area strengths and then accelerated instruction will be provide all by retrain teachers all while students stay this their classrooms. the republican candidate for mayor, curtis sliwa, has unequivocally slammed the announcement, calling it an