As we see an uptick in COVID-19 cases in the US, public health experts in the Tampa Bay area are taking a closer look at where things stand with the pandemic here in the Sunshine State.
forever. here is white house correspondent jacqui heinrich. the white house is not ready to abandon president biden s promise to shut down the virus even as six former members of biden s health advisory board urged the administration in a series of podesta to scrap their pandemic strategy and embrace the new normal of living with endemic covid. does the president believe that covid is here to stay? again, the president s goal is to defeat the virus. the president s focus and objective now is to save as many lives as possible. the doctors calling the administration s previous claims about the state of the pandemic premature. the cdc director in march i know you all so badly want to be done. we are just almost there but not quite yet. the president, in july. we have gained the upper hand against this virus. so far no white house response to the experts formerly on biden s own team. it s obviously been a busy day to read these articles. i m happy to do that, and i don
places unmistakably like washington and new york, little bit in massachusetts now and maryland. and eventually this pandemic phase will end, and we will he have to learn to live with endemic covid. you can already see the possibility of us having a society where there are low levels of covid, your vaccines will protect you from getting really sick so if you get covid, it will be like having a smiled case of the flu. and we will learn to live with it. but we re going to need to learn our lessons from this pandemic because there will be another pathogen. our cdc needs to be rebuilt. our surveillance systems need to be rebuilt and we need to really look at what this shows about how dysfunctional american medicine has become. there s no question about that. thank you, dr. reiner, for joining us this morning. coming up next for us, donald trump returns to the stage as he tries to cement himself as the 2024 gop
but this year spring training delayed, pitchers and catcher those where to be found. the clash has fans of america s passtime crying foul. it is devastating. the dispute resulting in a lockout, now in its third month. it is amajor league setback, not just for baseball, but for communities across florida and arizona that depend on the financial injection from the teams and their die-hard fans. they eat in our restaurants and stay in our hotels and as it stands right now, we just don t know if any of those folks will be in this area this spring. reporter: in lea county, florida, where the twins and red sox plays, spring train visitors spent nearly $69 million pre-pandemic. this is the third spring training season that we re kind of going through this. in 2020 it was effective but the start of covid, 2021, stadiums weren t at full capacity.
walensky, at this morning s covid briefing. we know that you have many questions regarding what prevention strategies are really necessary for this moment, especially as people are so eager to remove them. we want to give people a break from things like mask wearing, when these metrics are better. meanwhile, in virginia, governor glenn youngkin is going a step further. he is expected to sign a bill this afternoon banning mask mandates in schools. nbc news correspondent heidi przybyla joins me now. so an outright ban. so if you want to wear a mask to school, are you allowed to wear it or you just can t force kids to wear it. reporter: it s that the school cannot tell kids to wear it but the kids can choose to wear it. it s really an example, katy, of the local power struggles that will be playing out all across the country as we set the new rules of etiquette and health around living with endemic covid. now, this is also going to play