Return to Transcripts main page
Erin Burnett Outfront
Dow Suffers Biggest Loss in History; Trump Admits Coronavirus is Not Under Control, Issues New Guidelines; at Least 4,245 Cases in U.S., 81 Deaths; Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D-MI) Discusses About President Trump Telling Them to Get Ventilators And Respirators Themselves. Aired on 7-8p ET
Aired March 16, 2020 - 19:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN HOST: Erin Burnett OUTFRONT starts right now.
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: OUTFRONT next breaking news, the President admitting the coronavirus pandemic is, in his words, bad and not under control. He says it could last until July or August.
Plus, hospitals getting desperate, fears of running out of beds and ventilators. Dr. Sanjay Gupta on the race against time.
And a jaw-dropping nosedive on Wall Street, the biggest one day point drop in American history. Even Trump is talking about a recession. Let's go OUTFRONT.
Good evening. I'm Erin Burnett. OUTFRONT tonight, the breaking news, President Trump admits the coronavirus is not under control as his administration implements new guidelines to try to stop the virus spread. Tonight, at least 4,245 American cans have been tested and shown to be infected, 81 are dead.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If you're talking about the virus, no, that's under control for any place in the world. I think I read ...
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yesterday, you said it was.
TRUMP: ... no, I didn't. I was talking about what we're doing is under control, but I'm not talking about the virus.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: And late today, a rapid change in recommendations. No gatherings of more than 10 people. Just yesterday, the CDC had had that limit at 50 people, so slashing that to 10 and the President today telling older Americans to stay home all together to essentially take themselves out of the mix.
The mayor of the largest city in the United States, New York City, sounding this alarm.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D-NY): This is going to be a war basis in New York City. These are battlefield conditions.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: But the top infectious disease doctor in this country who has not been afraid to sound the alarm again and again and again to raise consciousness about this today was also urging calm. He said that the life-stopping and life-altering economic crisis inducing steps that are now being taken around the country affecting everyone's lives dramatically will not last forever.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: The guidelines are a 15-day trial guideline to be reconsidering, it isn't that these guidelines are now going to be in effect until July. But the President was saying that the trajectory of the outbreak may go to them. Make sure we don't think that this is solid in stone till July.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Very, very significant for all Americans to hear what he said there.
Nick Watt is OUTFRONT in Los Angeles tonight. Nick, how are Americans reacting to all of this?
NICK WATT, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, Erin, there have been calls from governors and mayors for more centralized action on this for some time. And there was a real shift in tone from the President. It does seem that now from President Trump all the way on then, there is a realization that these desperate times do call for desperate measures.
As the Mayor of New York also said today, pretty much everything is now on the table in terms of how we fight this virus.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Inside or go home.
WATT(voice over): Closures and chaos, the message, get used to it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We'll see what happens, but I think August, it could be July, it could be longer than that.
DR. JEROME ADAMS, U.S. SURGEON GENERAL: We have the same number of cases now that Italy had two weeks ago and we have a choice to make.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT(voice over): Because in the past two weeks, Italy has seen more than 1,400 deaths. To avoid that fate as a society and this fate as individuals ...
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KEVIN HARRIS, CORONAVIRUS PATIENT: Yes. That's the cough. I'll see you.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All right. (Inaudible) ...
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT(voice over): We must now social distance. At 8 pm tonight, all movie theaters, gyms and casinos across New York, New Jersey and Connecticut will close indefinitely. Bars and restaurants now takeout only. Other states and cities already doing the same.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOVERNOR ANDREW CUOMO, (D) NEW YORK: You can purchase through takeout and we hope that goes a long way towards alleviating any economic hardship.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT(voice over): In New Jersey now all non-essential travel strongly discouraged between 8 pm and 5 am. From midnight tonight in San Francisco, everyone must stay home except for essential needs. Meanwhile, about 36 million school kids in at least 35 states now forced to stay home, schools closed.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GOVERNOR MIKE DEWINE (D) OHIO: It would not surprise me at all if schools did not open again this year.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT(voice over): At airports, long lines for screening international passengers.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Very crowded, which is not ideal considering what this contagion is.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT(voice over): Some stores now disinfecting hourly.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
STEVEN SLOAN, GROCERY STORE CO-OWNER: When 9/11 occurred, I was around the blackouts. We've had hurricanes. Nothing has ever been like this.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WATT(voice over): Supply chain slowing as demand explodes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MIKE GRAHAM, BUSINESS OWNER: Right now, we're not charging people when they come in. As long as I can keep getting deliveries, I'll get food. I might go bankrupt.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[19:05:04]
WATT(voice over): Amazon under a surge of online orders, now warning of delivery delays.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ADAMS: When you look at the projections, there's every chance that we could be Italy, but there's every hope that we will be South Korea, if people actually listen, if people actually social distance.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WATT: Now, in South Korea, there has been aggressive testing, strong social distancing and they are now seeing a dramatic drop in the number of new cases every day, but it did take some time. And there's also a limit here to just how much the government can do as the Surgeon General pointed out this morning, we are not an authoritarian nation, Erin.
BURNETT: No. Not at all. And in that context, you have to ask of people instead of demand of them.
WATT(voice over): Yes.
BURNETT: Thank you so very much.
And OUTFRONT now, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Dr. Celine Gounder, she is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine and Infectious Disease at NYU School of Medicine. And on the phone, Dr. Mark Rupp joins us. He's been with us many times on this program as we've covered this crisis. He's the Infection Control Chief at the University of Nebraska Medical Center and he has been overseeing treatment for coronavirus patients.
Sanjay, let me start with you. So these new guidelines which Trump put forth from the CDC, they say gatherings of no more than 10 people. Yesterday that was 50. We know last week, you would say it's doing 100 and 250 and a thousand. It has dramatically come down and now down to 10. What does the fact that this is changing so quickly say to you?
SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, it says two things. I think, first of all, these are somewhat arbitrary numbers, obviously. There's no magic number in terms of size of gathering, although one could argue that there really shouldn't be gatherings. I mean social distance means social distance and no gathering probably is going to meet that requirement.
I think what I get the sense of, Erin, is that the strategy is to not shock people too much to sort of introduce these things a little bit more slowly so that people aren't too shocked and I think that when you saw Dr. Fauci come back up to the lectern in Nick Watt's piece there, the other thing that he said was, look, this says 15 days to slow the spread, that's the name of these guidelines.
In two weeks, they may reassess and I think he's sort of bracing us for that. And at that point of reassessment, it might be more stringent that we're going to hear. So I think it's a little bit of a slow roll, Erin.
BURNETT: And so Dr. Gounder, the President predicted the pandemic itself, the overall pandemic, however many waves you have, patients could end in the United States this summer, July or August, let me just play that part again.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: They think August, could be July, could be longer than that, but I've asked that question many, many times.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: So first of all, Dr. Gounder, what do you make of that, that he's making? Obviously, Dr. Fauci made it clear that that is not referring to the emergency measures themselves, which could be alleviated or tightened or whatever it may be. But the pandemic itself over by the summer.
CELINE GOUNDER, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: That seems rather optimistic. I don't think anybody can really make projections about how long this pandemic will last at this point. We still don't have data out of Africa really and parts of South Asia that probably do have transmission. And so that's also part of how we think about is this a pandemic or not.
I do think Surgeon General Adams made some very good points, though. We're at this sort of decision point, tipping point where we could be South Korea and we could be Italy. And so the next couple weeks are really going to be crucial for determining that trajectory for the U.S. itself.
BURNETT: Sanjay, do you think it is possible at this point, because we keep hearing look at Italy and we're two weeks or 10 days behind it, do you think it is possible that the United States, and by the way, given that we for every infection we know about there is, we have no idea how many, right?
GUPTA: Right. BURNETT: Twenty, 50, a hundred more, we just don't know. We know the
numbers we know are dramatically off of the reality. Is it possible that we could still be South Korea instead of Italy?
GUPTA: Yes. I guess it's possible. I'm worried. I'm hopeful, but I'm worried because I think that South Korea, while the next two weeks are very important, as Dr. Gounder said, I mean, they were doing things before we were doing things. The testing we've talked about so much and I think most people are sick of hearing about it by this point.
But they're having that surveillance early on in South Korea, I think help dictate some other strategies and they did those things earlier. The thing about some of these social distancing things that we're hearing about, it's one of those things where if you're going to do it, you want to do it early. That's when it's going to have the most impact. It may still have some impact later on.
But I hope we didn't miss that window. I don't think we did. So, yes, I think we can be South Korea still, but I'm not sure. We lost some time here, Erin.
BURNETT: Right. Right. And that's the big question. Of course, Italy, you see them doing this dramatic and draconian distancing with no end in sight and it is hard to contemplate how long human beings can do that.
[19:10:03]
Dr. Rupp, the CDC announced today that there is a vaccine in phase one, which is obviously the first of several phases required to put something in a human body no matter how desperately you want to try it. Here's what the President said about it today.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: I'm also pleased to report today that our vaccine candidate has begun the phase one clinical trial. This is one of the fastest vaccine development launches in history.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: Even if that is the case and even if this vaccine ends up being as promising as it indicates this early, so these are big ifs, doctor, Dr. Rupp, how soon could it actually come to the public?
DR. MARK RUPP, INFECTION CONTROL CHIEF, UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA MEDICAL CENTER: Yes. Again, I think this is actually a very quick pace for the development of a vaccine, but it's going to be months if not a year or so before this really gets into production and gets into the frontlines and we can administer it to our patients.
BURNETT: So Dr. Rupp, let me ask you another question about the primaries tomorrow, because you're dealing with this on the front line, which we're going to talk more about later in the program. But you've got Ohio, Kentucky, Louisiana, Georgia postponing their primaries, but Arizona, Florida, Illinois have not followed suit. From where you sit, seeing people starting to come into your hospital,
do you think that voting in any way in person is appropriate tomorrow?
RUPP: Well, I think it's important that we really do emphasize the importance of the social distancing and we may be able to achieve that in certain situations, again, trying to keep that spatial five to six feet difference between people so that somebody who goes to the polls potentially could be standing a couple of meters or six feet from the person in front of them.
There are some ways you could potentially achieve this. Overall, clearly, we need to be doing more electronic means of voting, more absentee voting. There are better ways of doing this.
BURNETT: Sanjay.
GUPTA: Look, I think people are going to be scared to vote right now, given all of these guidelines that are coming out. So you may have people who may - you just have lower numbers as a result. So you obviously don't want that. There are older people who, oftentimes, work at these polling places more vulnerable.
I agree with the doctor. I mean, you'd like to make this happen. Voting is very important. And I'm not sure when we say delay it, delay it till when? It's hard to figure that out. But I think it might be tough to both do it and follow the guidelines that just came out.
BURNETT: Right. Right, which is talking about tough to do it and follow the guidelines. Everyone has seen that if they have been anywhere like a pharmacy or a grocery store in the past couple days as well. All right, all of you are staying with me.
Next, hospital sound the alarm about a shortage of intensive care beds and ventilators. Is the window may be closing to have enough of them in time for an anticipated surge in patients.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We've ordered a lot. We have quite a few, but it may not be enough.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: And President Trump says that he gets a 10 out of 10 on his response to the crisis. His message to governors about those respirators was very clear, get them yourself. Is that right?
And the Dow records its worst one day point drop ever. Even President Trump is now admitting the obvious, the recession is the right word.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:16:38]
BURNETT: Tonight, President Trump urging governors to try to secure critical medical equipment on their own to treat coronavirus patients. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: If they're able to get ventilators, respirators, if they're able to get certain things without having to go through the longer process of federal government, it's always going to be faster if they can get them directly if they need them and I've given them authorization to order directly.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: The President telling governors on a phone call earlier, "We will be backing you, but try getting it yourselves." Governors are increasingly looking to the federal government for help as cases surged to more than 4,000 nationwide. And again, I emphasize known cases, we know that people who have it is a higher number than that.
Hospitals are warning they need more supplies to deal with unexpected influx of patients. Kaitlan Collins is OUTFRONT.
Kaitlan, what more could the Trump administration be doing to respond to this at the federal level, specifically?
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, the ventilators are one of the biggest thing because states are saying they don't have enough. They're worried about even if there's enough in the national stockpile. So one idea that you've seen some Democrats float in recent days is they say the President could invoke this mandate from the 1950s that would essentially nationalize the production of these ventilators, help them have enough because they say it's going to come to a critical time where they do not have enough in these hospitals to treat patients, that's essentially their worst fear, because they're going to have to make a decision who gets one and who doesn't get one.
We also ask the President today how many there are in the nation. He said he didn't have a number for us, but he would get us one. So we'll be letting you know about that. But you've also seen other ideas thrown around about what the federal government could do. One, from the New York Governor Andrew Cuomo saying he believed that the President could use the Army Corps of Engineers to try to retrofit certain buildings to turn into hospitals, because another concern is that there's going to be a shortage of ICU beds.
So those are all things that we're pushing the White House on today, because we're really moving on to what seems to be the next phase of this where we face these concerns over a slowdown in diagnostic testing, now the question is going to be what to do with all of these patients.
But Erin, I do want to note that in that briefing room today, the President seemed to be taking on a different tone than what we had seen him use in recent days. But he asserted that they had tremendous control over this. Today saying he just meant he was talking about the administration's response, but also what the timeline they were giving on all of this, saying this outbreak could last until July, potentially August. That's not what we've been hearing for the President before when he
had been hopeful it would go when the temperatures warmed up in the spring. Of course, now it seems to be getting a more realistic timeline here at the White House.
BURNETT: All right. Thank you very much, Kaitlan. And I want to go now to the Democratic Governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer. And Governor, I appreciate your time.
So on this issue of ventilators and respirators, obviously, is crucial for you and other governors. So the President says today if you're able to get them, try getting at yourself. He's saying the reason is it would be longer to go through the federal government. Is that true, as you understand it or is there something the federal government could do that would help you dramatically?
GOVERNOR GRETCHEN WHITMER (D-MI): Well, I mean, it's amazing to hear the head of the federal government say don't go through the federal government, because it works too slowly. We have to cut red tape. We have to harness all of our assets and make this happen. This is a dire situation, because I think this administration didn't take it seriously enough on the front end, he talked about hoaxes and they've used hyperbole and half truths, and now everyone is skeptical about what the truth really is and yet we know on the frontline, we Governors know, Republican and Democrat that we've got to step up and show the leadership in this country.
[19:20:09]
I think when I issue executive orders around crowd size or around extending unemployment benefits or around closing bars and making restaurants carry out only it's because there's not that leadership at the federal level. And we're worried because we need personal protection equipment, we need respirators and ventilators. We need to expand our health care facilities that are going to get overrun because people are legitimately concerned about their health and they've had a real leadership coming until we governors have stepped in.
And so, I think, yes, I am concerned about it. We are pulling out all the staff. We're calling in as many Michigan companies that could partner with us in this space, but it is important that the federal government gets their act together and does so post haste.
BURNETT: So today, you reference this, but you announced you were closing all public places, restaurants, bars and gyms. And of course, Governor, you, like governors around this country, are asking of your citizens that they make dramatic changes in their lives and dramatic sacrifices in their lives to protect everyone in your community.
For every day that this social isolation and this dramatic economic slowdown buys you, what are you able to add when you talk about what you need in terms of respirators, in terms of hospital capacity? Every day that the public complies, what are you able to add to save lives?
WHITMER Well, I think as we look at Italy and you were talking about it earlier, and we don't want to emulate Italy. We want to flatten the curve and that means taking aggressive action now so that our healthcare system doesn't get overwhelmed, so that these precious ventilators and respirators that are too few to meet the projected need are able to save lives.
And I think that by taking these aggressive actions, I've worked very closely with my counterparts in other states on both sides of the aisle to make sure that we're making judgments based on the best science and the facts, not out of fear, but out of pragmatism about trying to flatten this curve and save lives and make sure that our economy while we're going to struggle, that there is a shorter timeline for that struggle.
And so, all of these actions, everyone doing their part by washing their hands and practicing social distancing, is - contributes toward us flattening that curve and that's what it's really all about. And so when we ask people to make these sacrifices, trust me, it weighs heavily on all of us. But we know that for the sake of our public health, we've got to be aggressive and right now, these are the measures that all of the medical experts are telling me can help make a difference.
BURNETT: So before we go, Governor, Vice President Joe Biden, as you know, committed to picking a woman as his vice president at CNN's debate last night and you've been obviously incredibly involved with the campaign. You said today that it's not going to be you, why?
WHITMER Well, I am 14 months into my job as the Governor of Michigan. As this crisis shows, there's so much going on. I am grateful to be here. I think that there are plenty of phenomenal potential running mates for Vice President Biden as he runs for president and I'm grateful to be a co-chair of the campaign and I will help him vet to make sure he's got a phenomenal running mate and someone who can step in, if god forbid, that was necessary.
BURNETT: All right. Well, I appreciate your time, Governor Whitmer. Thank you very much tonight.
GOUNDER: Thank you.
BURNETT: And next, hospitals are in dire straits. So what can they do to handle the expected number of patients? What can actually be done now in these next crucial 15 days?
And Miami's Mayor has coronavirus? We spoke to him on Friday. He was just starting to feel symptoms as you may remember he was telling you, so how is he tonight? Well, we're going to talk to him. You'll see him later.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:27:54]
BURNETT: New tonight, President Trump unable to say how many ventilators and intensive care beds exist as the number of coronavirus cases is growing across the United States. But he does admit there may not be enough.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COLLINS: How many ventilators and how many ICU beds do we have right now and will it be enough?
TRUMP: I could get back to you with that number. We've ordered a lot. We have quite a few, but it may not be enough. And if it's not enough, we will have it by the time we need it. Hopefully, we won't need them.
COLLINS: And you'll give us the exact number?
TRUMP: Yes, we'll be able to give you.
COLLINS: Because so far they have not given us an exact number.
TRUMP: Yes, we'll give you. We could give you a number. If it's important, we'll give you a number.
BURNETT: So our U.S. hospitals on the verge of being overwhelmed by Coronavirus patient. Dr. Sanjay Gupta is OUTFRONT.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ADAMS: We're at a critical inflection point. We have the same number of cases now that Italy had two weeks ago and we have a choice to make.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GUPTA(voice over): This is the era of coronavirus, hospitals overcrowded in places like China and Italy, stretching resources thin and putting patients at risk. And the concern is that in a matter of weeks, that could become the United States.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. IRWIN REDLENER, NATIONAL CENTER FOR DISASTER PREPAREDNESS: We are so incredibly underprepared for a major onslaught of hospitals, which is basically now inevitable. I think we have to look at Italy and see what happened to them and I think we're in actually in worse shape. We don't have enough hospital beds, we don't have enough ICU beds.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GUPTA(voice over): According to the most recent estimates, even in a moderate outbreak, health officials estimate that 200,000 Americans will need intensive care and 64,000 will need breathing machines or ventilators. But the problem is the United States has less than 100,000 ICU beds and only about 62,000 full-featured ventilators on hand with an additional 8,900 in the national stockpile.
But since we're still in flu season, many of those are already in use.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REDLENER: And by the way even if we have the hundred thousand plus ventilators that we actually need, we don't have the staff to operate them.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GUPTA(voice over): So hospitals are bracing for a rush of patients, trying to free up as much space as possible.
[19:30:00]
That means getting patients who are well enough out of the ICU and cancelling all elective operations.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DE BLASIO: We just have to make this a standard across the board.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[19:30:05]
GUPTA: In some cases, hospitals are now trying to prevent patients who are well enough from coming to the emergency room in the first place. Like building tents to triage and treat potential coronavirus prevent patients who are well enough from coming prevent patients who are well enough from coming to the emergency room in the first place, like building tents to triage and treat potential coronavirus patients, using tele-help so that people can call in from home and building up their testing capacity, in some cases without people having to step out of their cars.
But all of this hinges on having enough supplies, which means hospitals are now rationing what they do have.
(on camera): My hospital, I mean, you had masks and gloves that were sitting out and you could use what you needed to use. That's changed.
DR. THERESA MADALINE, HEALTHCARE EPIDEMOLOGIST, MONTELIORE HEALTH SYSTEM: That's right. We've had to remove many of these items from the shelves.
GUPTA: To be clear, most people that get infected with the novel coronavirus won't need to be hospitalized, but for a small percentage of patients, the virus can be deadly.
MADALINE: We've had everyone ranging from just needing some supplemental oxygen through their nose all the way through people who were in shock and needing to be on 100 percent oxygen on a ventilator in the ICU.
GUPTA: When that happens, hospitals can quickly run out of space and supplies. And if staff don't have the protective gear, they may run out of doctors and nurses as well. (on camera): But if this is really affecting an entire community, an
entire state, an entire country, the world, are we ready? Do we have what we need?
MADALINE: Well, I think we're as ready as we can be. But without knowing what the future holds, it's hard to say whether we have enough equipment and have what we need. I think there are concerns, legitimate concerns as a nation if we're ready to handle such an enormous pandemic.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ERIN BURNETT, CNN HOST: And everyone is back with me.
I mean, Sanjay, so you just laid out the numbers. That say a moderate situation, right, and we'd hope we won't have to deal with more than that. But the point you'd make there is that, OK, you would have enough ventilators, although some of them no doubt already in use, but you have half the number of ICU beds as needed.
When -- given a 15-daytime frame from Dr. Fauci when they're going to sort of get a sense in which scenario we're in, is that enough time in any scenario to change that math?
GUPTA: I think it's going to be challenging and it goes back to what we were saying earlier, I wish some of this had been done before. Look, these are tough decisions. I don't want to minimize the difficulty of these decisions.
The hospital system is not built with a lot of redundancy in the system. And, you know, I understand that. But with this sort of -- you know, the pandemic and sort of what people have seen coming for some time, the numbers I was presenting here were the federal government's own projections for a moderate pandemic. So, this isn't something -- this is something they've actually arrived at themselves.
So, you know, like they say, you know, I think you want to hope you're not going to need all that extra capacity, but looks like we are going to need extra capacity, and we've really got to get moving on it.
BURNETT: Dr. Gounder, do you agree with the 15-daytime frame, that we're going to know which scenario it is within 15 days? Obviously, you would then have subsequent peaks, but now that you have this social distancing of whatever level we have achieved, that you would know the impact of that within the next few weeks?
DR. CELINE GROUNDER, CLINCIAL ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE & INFECTIOUS DISEASES, NYU SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: Well, this is -- the coronavirus increases exponentially as it transmits, so we're right at that tipping point. So if what we're doing today and the last couple of days does not make a difference, does not have an impact, we're going to know pretty quickly because you're going to see numbers shoot-up in the next two weeks. And I'm profoundly concerned that's what we're going to see happen.
BURNETT: Dr. Rupp, what are you seeing so far? DR. MARK RUPP, INFECTION CONTROL CHIEF, UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA MEDICAL
CENTER: Well, I think one of the things you have to consider when dealing with an outbreak is you're always behind the curve. And so, you're mentioning that it's going to take two weeks for us to see how we're doing. That's very true because what we're seeing today are the people that were incubating a week ago. What we're going to see next week are the folks inoculated today.
So we do have to put things into place very stringently as far as the social distancing, all those measures that we've talked about, with the things people can do personally to decrease the transmission of this. And then it takes a while to see those things start to have an impact on the epidemic curve.
There's no doubt we're going to need more capacity, and so, for instance, in our hospital, we're starting to curtail elective surgeries. Those operating rooms can be used for ICUs. Those anesthesia machines can be used as ventilators.
So we need to put those things into place so we have a little bit of surge capacity as we move forward.
BURNETT: That's really interesting. I don't know that, certainly, people may not have realized that's what that elective surgery ban would allow.
In terms of -- Dr. Rupp, when you're overseeing care of some of these patients and what you have seen thus far, is there anything you have seen that people should be aware of, in terms of when people are actually coming in the kind of care they're needing?
[19:35:05]
Is there anything that has surprised you versus the projections that you were given?
RUPP: Well, I think that much of the clinical scenarios that we're seeing are very, very predicted from what they've seen in other parts of the world. So we're not seeing too many surprises in terms of how people are presenting. It's pretty much the 80 percent to 85 percent of folks are coming in with very mild disease. They can probably stay at home and shelter there and recover there.
Five percent to 10 percent are requiring hospitalization. We have seen some patients requiring ICU level care and mechanical ventilation.
So we are seeing the whole gamut just like has been described. I think what people need to be prepared for is right now we're very much preaching we'd like to test everybody, figure out where the virus is and how it's spreading. But in coming weeks, the message is going to be different, which is if you have a mild respiratory disease we're going to assume that it's COVID-19, stay home, don't spread this to anybody else.
If you need medical attention as you get short of breath or show signs of pneumonia, that's when we want you to transition into the hospital and to have the care that you need.
BURNETT: So, Sanjay, when Dr. Rupp lays this out, you know, 5 percent to 10 percent of people who get this would need hospital care and a subset of those, ICU, we know where that's focused, right? We know that's focused on the elderly and people with underlying conditions, whether it'd be diabetes or hypertension. But, obviously, there are -- there are some who do not fit that profile.
Two emergency room doctors in the United States, for example, are in critical condition after being infected with the coronavirus. One of them was age 70, but one of them in Washington state is in his 40s, and he was treating patients with coronavirus.
What can medical workers do, too?
GUPTA: Yes.
BURNETT: Because they seem to be clearly at higher risk.
GUPTA: No, I mean there's a couple of things there. First of all, I think health care workers they may be getting a larger exposure to the virus because they're taking care of, you know, really sick patients. And so, I think that's going to put them at higher risk in the first place.
But also, you know, I think that there have been, you know, subsets of the population, younger people who have also been getting quite sick. You know, we didn't see as much of it in China, but you are seeing some of that in other countries. So I think we have to be a little bit humble when we look at this data. The China data is what I think a lot of people pay attention to. It's a pretty homogenous country, a lot of people smoke over there, who knows what the risk factors are.
But we have to pay attention to younger people, who are most won't be getting sick, but the younger people, we do have to pay attention to.
BURNETT: All right. Thank you all so very much.
And next, the mayor of Miami, someone who fits in that young group, age 42, has coronavirus. He is speaking outright here next with the latest on his condition.
And an ugly and historic day for the Dow. Historic in the worst way, worst drop ever nearly 3,000 points.
A top senator is floating the idea every American should get $1,000. Is that going to work?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:42:01]
BURNETT: Tonight, the Miami mayor speaks out about having coronavirus. He tested positive on Friday after coming in contact with the Brazilian official who has the virus. You knee the same one that interacted with President Trump. President Trump's test was negative. The Miami Mayor Francis Suarez joins me now via Skype.
Mayor, I know we spoke on Friday. You had just been diagnosed in that time and I know when you and I spoke then, you said you were just starting to notice some symptoms, maybe some chills. How do you feel now?
MAYOR FRANCIS SUAREZ (R), MIAMI, FLORIDA: I'm very lucky. I'm sort of that 80 percent category which is basically feeling some minor symptoms. I've had some chills, I've had some aches, I've had some congestion, but that's about the extent of it.
Also, I've been very, very fortunate that so far, I haven't had too many -- I've been video blogging, the experience on my Twitter account @FrancisSuarez, and on my Instagram, @FrancisXSuarez (ph), and it's very comforting for people to see the progression and it's reduced anxiety levels.
BURNETT: Yes, I think it is. And for many people, I'm sure, you know, incalculably valuable.
Let me ask you, though, a crucial question because of your symptoms, Mayor, tonight, if it were not for coronavirus and the fact that you came into contact with someone, you know, who had interacted with the president and, the whole imbroglio around that situation, given how you felt, would you have even thought about getting tested or thought this was anything more than a kind of -- I don't know, just feeling like I'm just feeling under the weather?
SUAREZ: Yes, I probably would have. And, frankly, to be honest with you from symptoms and it could have infected more people certainly. It could have hurt people that I come into contact with that are elderly in particular because as mayor as you can imagine, you come into contact with hundreds if not thousands of people on a given week.
So I'm very fortunate that the department of health called me. When the picture surfaced I was in very close proximity with the person that had tested positive and that led me to get tested right away and determine what my results were.
BURNETT: So, you know, what do you -- I know, obviously you've been making all kinds of changes, you know, in Miami about trying to reduce people who are going to venues, right, whether it be bars and restaurants.
So what do you say to them? When they look at you they say, OK, you're fine, that might be me, you're young, too. There's a reason why you got that test, why you were proactive, why you chose to stay home, and that was because you could infect other people even though you yourself were not going to get very sick, right?
SUAREZ: Yes, that was the responsible thing to do. And you can't just think about yourself in these situations. You have to think about your loved ones. You have to think about the elderly in that community, the elderly in your own family. We do among the elderly, this can be a fatal disease and we do that
the fatality rate among the elderly is -- it can be significant, according to some of the early reports that we've seen. So we are asking all elderly members of our community to stay home. We're asking all members of our community to respect social distancing, and we are closing restaurants and bars other than for, you know, take out essentially.
[19:45:04]
BURNETT: All right. Well, Mayor Suarez, I appreciate your time. I'm glad to talk to you again and I'm really glad that it's under the circumstances that it is, that you're doing so well.
All right, thank you, sir. And I'll talk to you soon.
And next, the stock market in another freefall, another historic drop. And finding any bit of encouragement as people are just so suddenly and stunningly cut off from their every day lives.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is my dad, Mel Brooks. Hi, dad.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
BURNETT: Tonight, the Dow suffering its biggest point loss ever, sinking almost 3,000 points. That's a nearly 13 percent drop in one day. The selloff began immediately after the open. Trading was halted to help calm the markets. Selling accelerated after President Trump said the outbreak might not end until August and admitting something that may now be obvious but he had denied about the economic hit.
[19:50:07]
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REPORTER: Is the U.S. economy heading into a recession?
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, it may be.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BURNETT: May be. That is a big concession from a president who of course has prided himself on the economy and saying this would be a quick thing. It isn't. It's a recession. And it's fair to say that at this point.
OUTFRONT now, Austan Goolsbee, a former chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President Obama.
I mean, Austan, this is a huge admission for the president. The question now seems not if there is a recession. It is how long and how deep it will be. AUSTAN GOOLSBEE, FORMER CHIEF ECONOMIST UNDER OBAMA: I agree with
that. I thought -- I actually took some heart from the president's press conference today because for the first time he did not seem to be trying to minimize, downplay, or otherwise convey some information that you didn't have to pay any attention to this. We still have to deal with this fact that we've undermined our credibility. But I think this is a right place to start.
Now you see the fed has thrown everything it has. We've got the interest rate down to zero. We have gone back to the world of QE, and the market doesn't think that's going to be enough, and they're right, was when you're in a panic, stimulus does not yet work. So, you've got -- as they say in financial crisis, you can't do anything until the bank runs stop. And right now, we're having a health run instead of a bank run, and we've got to tone that down.
BURNETT: So on that front, and you talk about the Fed did everything it could do, and QE, quantitative easing, they're trying to do everything to prevent a debt crisis. But you do think there is a stimulus that would have to do with the virus itself, and things like -- I mean, you know, you look at China, Wuhan, the U.S. isn't China, but they were building hospitals in six days. That's how they solved their ICU and ventilator problem. Where we're hearing we don't know if we can or can't.
You think there's something the government can do here with the stimulus front?
GOOLSBEE: Look, I do, because when we're in the first part of the bank runs, what I call the virus economics, anything that slows the rate of spread of the virus or gives people the feeling that there is a bound that it will not get worse than blah if you are diagnosed with the virus, all of those things are the best stimulus there is.
The best thing you can do for the economy has nothing to do with the economy. It's to slow the spread of the virus.
So if we had a ramp-up of stimulus, which is pay double and get triple, quadruple the number of ventilators we have now, expand the ICU space, rent out hotels for six months, the entire hotel to make it a waiting space for non-critical care. All things like that, as well as lots of testing so that we can isolate the people who have the disease, if we have a peak and then it goes down, then you reopen the door to the economy being able to come back.
And hopefully, potentially come back in a rapid basis. Now, you do still need to make sure that people don't starve. People don't get foreclosed on, they don't get thrown out of their homes, businesses don't go bankrupt. All of that stuff, too.
BURNETT: Right, but the bottom line is if people have a confidence if they're sick, they would get care and they would get the best care and there is want this fear around that, that removes -- because right now, the market doesn't know what it's going to do, right? It's not going to start going up and what's it going to do?
GOOLSBEE: Right.
Yes, that's exactly -- look, it's got this uncertainty and there's no lower bound. Erin, you know, you covered and we were there in the financial crisis. It has that same feature. The crises often have that feature, if there's uncertainty and no lower bound, then they go nuts.
BURNETT: All right. Well, thank you. Thanks for talking to you, and yes, you and I spent a lot of time talking then. There is much like that. Thank you.
And next, people are doing what they can to make the best of what is a very bad situation.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We stay home and we eat here, right?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[19:58:30]
BURNETT: Tonight, Americans are hunkering down and they're getting creative with how to pass the time.
Here's Jeanne Moos.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEANNE MOOS, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Going stir crazy? How to fill those endless hours of quarantine -- the Internet has plenty of suggestions, from a Pac-Man type puppet, gobbling up vehicles, to the fitness instructor in Spain who gave a workout class to his neighbors.
To turtle tic-tac-toe, the turtle is the o, competing from permanent quarantine in his aquarium. The turtle tanked.
There were plenty of cheerleaders like Max Brooks.
MAX BROOKS, SON OF FILMMAKER MEL BROOKS: This is my dad, Mel brooks. Hi, dad.
MOOS: Urging younger folks to protect older ones like 93-year-old Mel.
BROOKS: If I give it to him, he could give it to Carl Reiner who would give it to Dick Van Dyke, and before I know it, I have wiped without a whole generation of comedic legends.
MOOS: Model Heidi Klum posted herself kissing her husband through glass, not to mention her own reflection, and Arnold Schwarzenegger trotted out a pet mini horse and donkey.
ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER, ACTOR: Oh, yes, that's yummy. There's Whiskey and there's Lulu.
MOOS: To promote eating at home, while these live action matchsticks representing the power of social distancing caught fire online, created by Los Angeles visual artist Juan Delcan and his wife Valentina. The message everywhere, don't be a spreader.
BROOKS: I'm going. I'm going.
MOOS: Let's hope the message is contagious.
SCHWARZENEGGER: Look at this picture, yes.
MOOS: Jeanne Moos, CNN --
SCHWARZENEGGER: No biting.
MOOS: -- New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BURNETT: That is weird.
Thank you for joining us.
"AC360" starts now.
