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Cuomo Prime Time
Coronavirus Now in All 50 States; One-on-One with Former HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt; Coronavirus Outbreak Straining Hospitals and ICUs; Mnuchin: Coronavirus Bailout to Cost $1 Trillion; Biden Sweeps Super Tuesday 3 with wins in Florida, Illinois, Arizona; Coronavirus Outbreak Straining Hospitals & ICUs. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired March 18, 2020 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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MICHAEL MIGNANO, FARINE BAKERY COMPANY: That are supporting us on our GoFundMe page or also just dropping off food and groceries and money that we're just sort of replenishing the table. So the whole community can benefit from this.
DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: The owner of Farine Bakery Company in Queens, New York, Michael Mignano. Thank you so much for doing what you're doing. We really appreciate it, sir.
MIGNANO: Thank you.
LEMON: Thank you.
And thanks for watching, everyone. Our live coverage continues now with Mr. Christopher Cuomo.
Wow. This is backwards. I'm doing this.
CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: We're in the wrong places. And my head is huge.
LEMON: We could use some good news. What that guy's doing is quite amazing.
Here's the bad news. I went on the air at 10 o'clock, 5,838, now up to 6,135. In the time I've been on, 297 cases up. That's what we know so far with the weak testing that we have so far.
C. CUOMO: Testing is inadequate. The number is fake. At some point I'll show you a graph tonight that shows this wickedly dramatic upswing in cases that makes it sound like, holy cow, is this thing spiking.
But the whole beginning of the curve is artificial because we haven't been testing. We know this is going to happen. The cases will continue to go up. That's why we need to do all these precautionary things. People need to get that. LEMON: So before you kick me out I just have to say I appreciated your conversation today. What you're doing for your kids, your family, your mom. You're a good man. That's all I have to say, in this crisis.
C. CUOMO: You're a good friend. We're all doing what we can. And a big part of that is staying away from everybody else. But like that guy Mignano you had on and his partner, Babu, in the worst of times we will see the best of people.
LEMON: And stop being jealous of your brother. He's doing a good job. Take it away.
C. CUOMO: I am so proud. I am so proud. As long as he looks the way he does, I'll never be jealous of him a day in my life. No, he's doing great. So are you. D-Lemon, thank you.
LEMON: I'll see you later.
C. CUOMO: Hello, everybody. I am Chris Cuomo and welcome to a special midnight supersized edition of PRIME TIME. Here's the latest. Don't be surprised. All 50 states are now in the corona crisis together.
We knew it would be this way. We know it is spreading quickly. That's what it does, spreads like a common cold. Hits like pneumonia. And we also know if people don't surrender the me to the we and stay home, it will get overwhelming soon.
Most pressing, we know now most states don't have the capacity to treat the cases expected. They know that.
What is the White House doing about it?
Big question. We're also going to get insight tonight from doctors who've been treating coronavirus patients.
What's it like?
What are they seeing firsthand?
What is the experience for people who get sick?
Young, old, compromised.
Does the government seem to get the reality they're seeing?
How?
How not?
And help may soon be on the way economically.
But when?
Is it enough?
Is it a part of a bigger plan? My friends, we know the questions. We have to wait on the answers. But here's what we know. We either get through it together or not at all.
So what do you say?
Let's get after it.
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C. CUOMO: West Virginia was the lone holdout. Now they are the 50th and final state to report a coronavirus case within their borders.
Now what does perspective demand?
Of course, it was going to be everywhere. It's spreading through communities. We still have a very low death toll. Now that number, we can be basically sure of.
Are people dying of other complications that aren't being put in the mix?
We don't have real reason to be suspicious of that. But we know the case number has to be very, very low.
Why?
They haven't been testing. We are far beyond the point of contact tracing. It's community spread.
So, look, as more tests come available, what are you going to see?
Exponential growth in cases.
Well, why isn't that -- why aren't I more scared?
First of all, this is not the plague, OK?
And second of all, you know what you're going to see with these huge numbers?
The huge index of recoveries; 80 percent is the expected percentage. And we've been seeing that in other places and here. People get better. Some are even asymptomatic.
OK?
Now on the other side of the country from West Virginia, we're having one of the most vast American experiments going underway to slow down the spread. Talking about California. Shelter in place. Very extreme.
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C. CUOMO: What does it mean?
How is it being observed?
Nick Watt has the very latest from coast to coast.
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NICK WATT, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Confirmed cases now in all 50 states, more than 100 dead nationwide, unprecedented times, unprecedented measures.
MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: The president also has us inventorying what you all would understand as field hospitals or MASH hospitals that can be deployed very quickly.
WATT (voice-over): Two Navy hospital ships could soon be deployed, Defense officials tell CNN.
ANDREW CUOMO (D), GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK: There's a Federal Reserve of medical supplies, which is really our last best hope. You can't buy a ventilator, which is very important, because most of these people have respiratory illnesses. We're shopping for respirators all around globe.
WATT (voice-over): Federal officials warn there aren't enough gowns, gloves and masks stockpiled.
PENCE: We would urge construction companies to donate their inventory of N-95 masks to your local hospital.
WATT (voice-over): In San Francisco's Bay area, 7 million woke to a draconian dawn, now allowed out only for essential needs. Three neighboring counties, nearly another million people, will join that lockdown tomorrow night. Tuesday afternoon, New York City's mayor said he might issue a similar order within 48 hours.
BILL DE BLASIO (D), NEW YORK MAYOR: New Yorkers should be prepared right now for the possibility of a shelter in place order.
WATT (voice-over): New York's governor not so keen.
C. CUOMO: You say shelter in place if you stay in New York City. I'll go stay with my sister in Westchester. I don't think you can really do a policy like that just in one part of the state. So I don't think it works.
WATT (voice-over): Brooklyn's D.A. has stopped prosecuting low-level offenses that don't jeopardize public safety.
The Brooklyn Nets star Kevin Durant announced he's now tested positive.
On Tuesday while touting a $1 trillion economic stimulus plan, the Secretary of the Treasury reportedly warned Republican lawmakers that, without intervention, this virus could have upped the unemployment rate to a staggering 20 percent.
Nationwide a new normal continues to unfold. Uber and Lyft have stopped all pool and shared rides. In Vegas, the Palazzo and the Venetian now closing until at least April 1st. The airlines taking a hit, nearly a million fewer passengers in one day compared to a year ago.
STEVEN MNUCHIN, U.S. TREASURY SECRETARY: This is worse than 9/11. For the airline industry, they are almost ground to a halt.
WATT (voice-over): Meanwhile, Amazon is hiring another 100,000 workers to meet online shopping demand.
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WATT: And late in the day, a pretty stunning announcement from Orange County. Orange County home to more than 3 million people, just south of Los Angeles, they just announced they are banning all public and private gatherings, no matter how many people are at them.
They are telling everybody to stay six feet away from anybody who is not a family member. So all eyes will be on California, on Orange County and on San Francisco to see if people really do obey these new measures to try and keep us all apart -- Chris.
C. CUOMO: All right, Nick Watt. Thank you very much. Appreciate the storytelling here, keeping us up to date.
What an interesting question we're facing, huh?
Do you care enough about anybody else to do what you're being asked to do?
I'll remind you, you see it all over the Internet. A generation ago, people lined up, lied up about their age, lied about their health in order to serve this country and go away to hell for years to fight a world war, never knowing if they're coming home.
You're being asked to stay home and sit on a couch, which most of us do any chance we get.
And it's a hard call?
Come on. And now here's the good news. You're going to get some time to think about this because we don't know what's going to happen. All we know is if we don't try we've got big trouble. Don't listen to me. Listen to the man at the top, Dr. Anthony Fauci.
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DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: It probably would be several weeks and maybe longer before we know whether we're having an effect.
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C. CUOMO: Now look, why does he have to pick his words and speculate?
Because the man standing next to him, also known as the president of the United States, says, oh, we're counting down, it was 15 days, now we're at 14, then it will be 13 and we're done. I don't know why he's saying that. You don't know how long this is
going to take. Look at the U.K. Everybody says, why don't we do what they're doing, get some herd immunity to this, let it just go everywhere, don't close anything down?
Because of how many people they would have die.
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C. CUOMO: And once they started listening to science, they are not doing that anymore. The whole point is to try to preserve us from pain.
So what's the biggest part of our struggle?
Getting you and me to realize it's real, it's not political. I know Trump told you it was a hoax. He was lying. He does not say that anymore.
But when you see scenes like this in San Francisco, this is shelter in place?
This is trying to do your best to not be around people?
My next guest actually helped write the book on fighting pandemics in this country when he was Secretary of HHS, Health and Human Services, Mike Leavitt.
Thank you very much. Good to have you. I see that you are doing what we should be doing. You're staying put in place at home. Now first question -- or let's do it a little bit as dialogue. I will play the suspicious American.
You people overplay everything, especially you guys in the public health sector. You exaggerate curves. You exaggerate things for effect. And now you're shutting down the economy and you want me to hide from something that's basically a bad case of the flu.
Why?
MIKE LEAVITT, FORMER HHS SECRETARY: Well, Chris, it's because pandemics happen. They're a biologic fact. They're a part of history. And when they do, they reshape the economics, the politics and the sociology across the world.
The problem is they happen far enough apart that one generation forgets. And we're at the place now where our generation is having this experience.
And I must say I think as a culture we have the best chance in human history to avoid the catastrophe that has befallen other generations before, because of the technology we have, the communications we have and the capacity to understand and to know about what is about to hit the United States.
C. CUOMO: So you have the can versus the should. Right?
Or the can versus the will. You're right. We have technology to communicate information and to stay remote and yet still stay in touch.
Right?
Virtually we can still do what we want to do, even if physically we're in one place.
In fact, we've worked very hard to get to this place, have we not?
But then you get the will, the should. People are selfish. And we're seeing that Americans are surprisingly fragile. Also one person goes out to buy a lot of toilet paper, the next thing you know, there's none left in a lot of population centers.
How do you deal with the will and generating the collective consciousness to do this?
LEAVITT: Part of this is human nature. We have to acknowledge that there has been skepticism about this. The problem is that anything you say before a pandemic actually happens seems alarmist. After it begins to unfold, anything you said or anything that's been done seems inadequate.
And that's the phase we're in right now. There are a lot of people out shopping in line tonight who wish they'd have done it a couple weeks ago but they are in fact beginning to comport with the rules.
I think what's happening in this country is remarkable. Shutting down entire sports leagues, standing aside from traditions and weddings and graduations and people coming together to do it.
Are they all doing it, in the sense of is anybody pleased about this?
Absolutely not. But we're doing a hard thing and we need to acknowledge that this is historic and we can make a difference that's never happened in human history before.
C. CUOMO: Now first of all, one of the reasons I was excited to have you on the show tonight is my director sent you, Elie (ph) sent your quote and I love that quote.
Anything you do before a pandemic is seen as alarmist. Anything you do after a pandemic is seen as inadequate.
That is so true.
And we will see that even here because we don't have enough collective buy-in. Yet I'm intrigued by what you say about what we're pulling off.
How are we doing? LEAVITT: Well, as Tony Fauci said, we won't know with certainty for a while. But we're entering a very crucial two-week period where we have a chance to flatten this curve.
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C. CUOMO: Why two weeks?
LEAVITT: -- we do that. We simply are not going to have enough ventilators. We're not going to have enough capacity if we allow this virus to take the natural course that it will. We're at war with a virus and we can only win this war collectively.
But we can win it. And I think over the course of the next two weeks, we're going to have to all do our part. And there's something for everyone to do. Every family needs a pandemic plan, every city, county, church, college, school, businesses. We all have a role here.
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LEAVITT: The thing that's unique about a pandemic is that it is so local.
C. CUOMO: Right.
LEAVITT: Anyone who believes that the federal government can come riding to its rescue in a pandemic will be tragically disappointed not because --
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LEAVITT: -- it's just impossible for the federal government to provide it everywhere. So it's a uniquely local emergency.
C. CUOMO: Understood and agreed. Two quick questions.
One, why two weeks?
If you're in a real war and you don't know how long it takes and really your best defense is staying apart, so that people who are sick resolve their case without spreading it to someone else, why two weeks?
And while I agree it can't be all about the federal government, especially not in this particular administration in terms of what they're set up to do well, but the idea of using the military and the Corps of Engineers to build temporary capacity seems to be a no- brainer.
But it's not happening.
So why two weeks and why isn't the military, specifically the Corps of Engineers, everywhere in the population centers where they're saying we don't have capacity, helping?
LEAVITT: So let's start with why two weeks. Most of what we know about pandemics comes from studying the past, looking at the history of previous viruses that have terrorized the world. And one thing we know is that, left to their own device, there will be this spike where, over the course of time, it will be like a hockey stick and it's about six weeks long if left to its own device.
And it very rapidly outstrips the capacity. The beginning of that peak is a two-week period, two to three weeks, if we can keep it from spiking. That's the reason.
Now in terms of the federal government, look, the federal government has a critical role here. Vaccines, being able to help state and local governments with money. They do have military assets that can be deployed. We have a lot of assets.
And every -- it ought to be all hands on deck here. And I think in time, as this begins to be deployed, it can be.
One thing I will say, that when we were developing the initial pandemic plan, one of the things we had to be conscious of is that we do have national defense interests going on at the same time.
We -- this would be a time when a sinister enemy could attack and make things very difficult. And so we have to be doing more than one thing at a time. And that is not the only reason; I'm not suggesting that's the reason that they haven't deployed them in that way. But it is another consideration.
C. CUOMO: Secretary Mike Leavitt, thank you very much. Appreciate the perspective.
LEAVITT: Thank you, Chris.
C. CUOMO: Let's take this discussion to a doctor who knows firsthand the capacity crisis at play. Now her perspective. She treated the very first coronavirus patient in America. She's now arming patients with the knowledge but also the tools to care for themselves if there isn't enough room and resources, AKA capacity.
What a great idea. Let's get inside it. Next.
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C. CUOMO: It's interesting. It's been two months since we treated the first coronavirus patient.
Does it feel like it's been two months?
And now that we've seen more than 6,000 cases, and I keep telling you, I don't buy that number, I think it's way low, because we weren't testing. But doctors, to be sure, are fighting an uphill battle. We know
there's not enough tests, we know we haven't been testing, which is why I don't trust the number. But more importantly we know we don't have resources even for the cases we do know about and we expect.
So people are looking for other ways to help. One such person is Dr. Amy Compton-Phillips. She actually treated that first patient and joins us now.
How are you doing, Doc?
DR. AMY COMPTON-PHILLIPS, CORONAVIRUS PHYSICIAN: I'm doing great. Thanks, Chris.
C. CUOMO: So let's deal with a couple of different points of paranoia. First one is if you get coronavirus, that's it, you're going to be lucky to make it out, it is a painful and slow demise.
What have you seen in terms -- because you see online, you see how afraid young healthy people are about this.
And what's the reality?
COMPTON-PHILLIPS: So the reality is that four out of five people are perfectly fine. It's like they get a bad cold or they get a mild flu and they get over it and they keep going about their lives.
But about 20 percent, which is a lot of people, get bad enough that they end up in the hospital and have to receive care there. And about 5 percent of those people end up actually in the ICU and so pretty severely ill.
C. CUOMO: And then you have what we believe will be the mortality rate but within that number -- so not only do you have about 98 percent of the people survive this but the people that wind up in that margin that, God forbid, don't, you have very special traits usually elderly or compromised unless we screw up capacity to a place where we start having all these unintended consequences.
And that's where your second area of brilliance comes in. You know capacity's not going to be met. You hear people like my brother say, the governor of New York, I can't meet it, I can't build it fast enough, I can't source it fast enough, I can't find the equipment, it's not going to happen. You found a potential solution.
How?
COMPTON-PHILLIPS: So we're trying really hard to do several things. Because, one, we know, exactly like your brother's saying, we don't have the capacity in our hospitals and we don't have the equipment to keep our own caregivers, our own nurses and doctors safe and healthy. We don't have the PPE, the masks and gowns to keep people safe.
So when we first started seeing this we said we've got to do something different, this is the 20th century we don't have to treat this like the Spanish flu in 1918, what can we do that's different? So we're doing a few things.
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COMPTON-PHILLIPS: One is if you're worried about your symptoms, we have a symptom checker, a chatbot online that you can go in and see whether or not you maybe need help.
If you triage out that you need help, well, you can click on it and do actually a virtual visit.
And so we can actually have a caregiver and a patient chat and see whether or not you need something more. If you need testing we can then send you for drive-thru testing.
And if it seems like you have the symptoms consistent with the germ, because we don't get test results back for a while now, it's like three- to four-day turnaround time, we'll actually send you home with an oxygen sensor and a thermometer and be able to monitor you from a bank of nurses watching monitors in your own home so you don't have to be admitted to the hospital.
C. CUOMO: How many people can you watch?
COMPTON-PHILLIPS: Well, at the moment we're watching about 100 and we think we can do about 4,000.
C. CUOMO: Four thousand?
And then if somebody gets into a place where they are severe enough to have to come in -- now, where do you see this as -- help me understand how this can change the face of dealing with the flow.
COMPTON-PHILLIPS: Well, so with the flow, you probably wouldn't need it. But the thing that's a little bit different about COVID-19 is that pneumonia, that you can be just tooling along doing OK and all of a sudden crash, get much worse.
And the symptom of that is the increasing shortness of breath, particularly when you move around. And the way you can diagnose it, just like you often don't know you have high blood pressure unless you take your blood pressure, some people don't realize their oxygen level's starting to fall unless they measure it.
So that oxygen sensor can start letting people know like, mmm, we don't want you to fall off the cliff, we want you to come in when you're still like this. But we're seeing some signs of it going downhill.
C. CUOMO: Is the software adaptable to other states or do you have a special system?
COMPTON-PHILLIPS: It is something that could be done anywhere. So it's just really setting up the infrastructure to allow for it.
C. CUOMO: I'm going to spread the message. We're going to do it online. I know you've been doing some media but we're going to magnify it. Dr. Amy Compton-Phillips, you are someone we call an Ameri-can, someone helping us figure out how to make it through. God bless and you thank you for using your brain and your skills to help us get better.
COMPTON-PHILLIPS: Thank you so much, Chris.
C. CUOMO: Boy, oh boy, I told you, in the worst of times you're going to see the best of us come out. What an innovative idea, 4,000 people they can monitor at one time. Imagine what that will do to capacity.
Now it terms of measuring the effect, got to look at the markets. They bounced back.
Why?
They like that a lot of money's going to be thrown at people in America.
Why?
Because it makes a recession less likely.
Why?
It gets complicated. So we're going to talk to somebody who understands the economics inside out.
What are we doing that will make the economy worse?
What will it take for it to be better?
How long between the two?
Next.
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CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: A quick thing: when I was just talking to that doctor who's spending all this time trying to figure how to help the rest of us. She says she starting to work with her own people in the hospital -- guess on what? -- making their own masks. That's how short supply is.
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Maybe we're going to have to have people out there who know how to do this, and we're going to have to teach other how to make masks. I'm going to find out about it. I'm going to get you the information. If you want a way to help, that's a way.
Now, what's another way to help? The federal government says cutting a check for every American is no longer a fringe idea. It's front and center because of this crisis. What would it mean?
So right now, there's a one-trillion -- with a "T" -- -dollar bail-out on the table. That's what the treasury secretary wants. It would be bigger than any other bail-out we've ever seen in American history.
Two on the chart that you're going to see -- came when my next guest was the director of the National Economic Council. OK? Gene Sperling, I know him very well, actually, for most of my life. I used to work with my father. He went on to much bigger things as a big shot in the Obama administration.
Geno, it's always great to see you. First of all, let's deal with the big macro on this before we get into more of the details of the plan. I don't understand, many will say, why -- why all this money? Why does this have to be so big? Just don't shut things down. You guys are forcing us into a recession.
GENE SPERLING, FORMER DIRECTOR, NATIONAL ECONOMIC COUNCIL: Well, because Chris, I mean, this is the unfortunate news. This is the worst pullback in economic spending and economic activity we've seen in our lives and maybe since the Great Depression.
And think about this, when we've had downturns before or recessions, yes, there were people hurting. Some people lost their jobs. Some people lost their raises. Some people feared they would be next. But a whole lot of other people went on spending, traveling, doing all the things.
We've never seen a moment in our lives where every single person in our country is pulling back, and we are just absolutely closing down entire shops and industries.
My heart bleeds so much for the people -- the waitresses, the waiters, people in the food industry and other service industry -- who are losing their job by government mandate, no fault of their own. So you've got a dramatic fall in economic activity.
But, as you've talked about on this show often, as you are talking about with your brother last night, you know, this is not a market issue. This is a real economy issue affected by a healthcare crisis.
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If you don't solve the healthcare crisis, if you don't flatten the curve, if you don't have the type of testing that provides certainty, you know, the economic input you can put in, it can cushion the blow, but it cannot solve it. It cannot give the confidence that we know where the bottom is or how long this lasts.
CUOMO: You know, the U.K. went away from what they were going to do, but they said, Look, let's go for herd immunity here. And, yes, there are going to be more casualties but you know what? That happens. It will shorten the duration so that we won't have that kind of economic pain.
What about that kind of calculation? Maybe the government has gone too far with this. Maybe we're doing too much, and we're hurting ourselves too much economically for the benefit it will do to us in terms of fighting the pandemic. SPERLING: You know, I'm going to listen to the experts on this, as I
think we all should. But I think we as a people have the capacity to take this on.
But we need to understand, the market did respond well to an idea that I agree with, lots of people agree with. Give a payment to everybody -- 1,000, $2,000. It's good for demand. It gets economic activity going.
But -- and I cannot stress this enough --
CUOMO: If they spend it.
SPERLING: But yes, and that's what I cannot spend enough. This is one tool. This has to be combined with a major package that goes to our -- for a healthcare surge, to empowering state and local leaders to deal with the problems.
And I want to make one point in particular, which is, if you do not target and focus on the most hard-hit Americans, nothing is going to work, including these payments. Take somebody who loses their job for 12, 16 weeks. A single payment isn't going to help them pay the rent.
We need to take some dramatic efforts. Unemployment insurance. Right now, it's got huge holes in our country. If you're a gig worker, if you're a domestic worker, you often don't qualify. When you do qualify, it's going to be for a number of weeks. You get 33, 40 percent of your wages.
We need to now make it clear it's an emergency. It's going to last as long as you need it. Instead of 30, 40 50 percent of your wages, it should be more 100 percent.
CUOMO: How do you pay?
SPERLING: And work sharing. You know what? We pay for it.
CUOMO: How?
SPERLING: We don't worry about the deficit, because you just -- the United States Congress puts it out there. Because if you don't spend this money now to help these people -- it's the right thing to do on the grounds of compassion, because we love each other and we care about our neighbors.
But these are the people that are hurt the most. If you help them, if we do the right thing, they're the ones who are going to spend the most. They're the ones that are going to be able to make the rent.
These are the kind of things we have to do. And we have to do more. We may have to forgive student loans for a period of time. We need a moratorium on evictions. This is big. This could be the worst threat we go -- face for a while, since the Great Depression. And we better be thinking big in the fullness of America of what we can do economically; not just to spur demand by sending out checks, which I think is an important tool, but by unemployment insurance, paid sick leave, expanding Medicaid, housing relief, moratorium on evictions.
If we don't do these type of bigger things -- this needs to be part of the congressional package, and I encourage every member of Congress out there. It's good you're doing the paychecks. Good. But if you don't come with a broad, bold plan on unemployment insurance, on paid sick sleeve, on Medicaid, on helping state and local governments, it's not going to be enough.
CUOMO: All right. Now hopefully, you know, it's part of the lesson of 2008 also. You know, you shored up the markets. That was good. But there was that discussion about, well, what about the little guys? What about the people who own the houses? You know, what about what's going on with them and everything? And there seemed -- it seemed to be over-weighted in one direction there. This time, hopefully, it's different.
And, Gene, let put a request in, you know, make it a little harder for you to say no, because it's national television. But as we learn more about what they're going to do, I need your help. I need to explain it to the American people about why this makes sense, why it's worth it, why it's enough, why it's not enough. There are going to be a lot of questions, because we don't even know what's going to hit us yet. And that's what makes this so different.
In 2008, you knew what it was. Every time something happened, every -- it was a reaction to it. This hasn't even really hit us yet in terms of the real pain. That is probably weeks to come. Hopefully, it won't be as bad as we suspect.
Gene Sperling, thank you for putting your brain and your heart --
SPERLING: Thank you.
CUOMO: -- in the situation. Appreciate it.
All right. Now, look, virus is affecting everything. It is unbelievable. It is amazing. It is fantastical. None of us can believe this is happening right now, on any level. It is bizarre. I'm with you, and it hasn't even really happened yet, and yet all of these things are happening. I get it.
You're going to see it in our politics also. Ohio didn't vote this third Super Tuesday. Three other states did. Big wins for Joe Biden. But what does coronavirus mean for the election now? You know you weren't paying attention to it tonight like you were last week. Everything has changed. What will it mean for the race?
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Let's go live to Washington and talk about it, next.
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CUOMO: A quick tally on tonight: Biden 3, Sanders zero. The gap in Florida was as big as assumed for the vice president on Super Tuesday 3, we'll call that. Let's get to CNN's Phil Mattingly in the CNN Election Center. Once
again, I was on the wrong side of wages about what the spread would be in Florida. I didn't think it would be as big as we saw, but it was about 40 points. What's the story of the night?
PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, I think that actually gets to the story of the night. It's not just that Joe Biden won all three contests tonight, sweeping Florida, Illinois and Arizona. It's how he won them. And it really kind of mimics what we've seen over the course of the last three weeks. Take a look at Florida.
As you noted, the expectation was that Joe Biden would win Florida comfortably, but look at this map. Look at the dark blue. That's all Joe Biden blue. Joe Biden winning every single county in the state of Florida. Perhaps more impressive was what he did in Illinois.
I want to flip back to 2016 and show how Bernie Sanders did. A very close race with Hillary Clinton.
Take a look at all this light blue. That's Bernie Sanders winning counties, not enough to actually win the state, to win the primary. But doing well enough to make them work.
Now flip it this time around. Bernie Sanders only won one county in the state. Now obviously, the vote, day of vote in Illinois was down because of obvious issues that are going on, but it underscores how Joe Biden has really brought the coalition together.
[00:45:10]
Flip over to Arizona, as well, and another very big victory for Joe Biden, 60,000 votes ahead with about 70 percent reporting. I think, Chris, when you look at tonight, it's just what we've seen over the course of the last three weeks. Joe Biden is in a place now, the party is in a place now, the primary is in a place now, where it has become his race. He's become by far the prohibitive favorite. And every single primary that we've looked at over the course of the last three weeks has more or less borne that out.
CUOMO: Two new prohibitions. One, turnout. What did we see tonight? It was down a little bit, but in this mood, we don't know what it's going to be like in November.
MATTINGLY: Right.
CUOMO: But if there is lower turnout, is it easy enough to say that even if Biden gets the ticket, that has to help the president?
MATTINGLY: Yes. I mean, I think that's the expectation. When you talk to Democratic sources and when you talk to Democratic campaign operatives, that's what they're concerned about. I think you talk to the Trump officials and they feel like that their energy, their base. They've driven turnout in places, at least in 2016, that perhaps they hadn't seen before.
I think the interesting thing about tonight, particularly given everything that's going on in the country, is in two of the states, in Arizona and Florida, at least what we've seen so far, because of the early vote, turnout is actually up in the primary.
CUOMO: Right.
MATTINGLY: But that's because of the early vote. And I think in Illinois, it's probably a better representation of where things are today and where turnout was down fairly dramatically. At least what we've seen up to this point, based on in person.
I think the interesting thing going forward is going to be, over the course of the last several weeks, you've seen turnout really move up for Joe Biden, which wasn't the expectation. That was the Bernie Sanders expectation. And can that be maintained?
I think the other thing we all have to wonder right now is, is there going to be another primary vote anytime soon? At least one where there's in-person voting. We've already seen Georgia was supposed to be the next one up. They've moved their primary up. Others have started to move theirs, as well.
So will this be the last one of the nights we can talk about this like this? At least for the time being, that and what Bernie Sanders decides to do next, kind of the big two questions outstanding.
Because Chris, we're talking about Bernie Sanders. Look at the pledged delegates right now. Joe Biden opening up a nearly 300-delegate lead. Think about where we were at the end of February to where we are now. Joe Biden has this on lock for all intents and purposes. And the question now becomes, what's Bernie Sanders going to do?
CUOMO: Well, and that would -- look, I should be standing next to you right now, right? Talking to myself in every commercial break in about 100 different things. But I'm here because our country has changed. And what is your best sense of how coronavirus is going to shape the story of the election?
MATTINGLY: Look, I think it's anecdotal, because it is early. Think about how fast things have moved. Just seven days ago, there were still sports being played in the United States of America. Now, everything is shut down. Every city is shut down.
The speed by which this has all occurred is head spinning and, I think, politically, people are still trying to figure things out. I think one of the things when you talk to Democrats, when you talk to the Biden campaign, they say this is his moment because this is who he's pledged to be. He isn't trying to remake entire systems, because people in this moment of crisis don't necessarily want their entire systems to remain. They want to be able to leave their house. They want to be able to go to restaurants. They want to have a guy in the office that can do it on day one.
So they feel like this tracks with what Joe Biden's message has been. Whether that ends up being the case, we'll have to wait and see in the months ahead. CUOMO: It does remind me of when it was Obama and, may he rest in
peace, McCain. And when it was a national security contest, McCain was giving Obama all he could handle.
And he said, I'm not an economic guy, but if you want to stay safe from your guy. And then all of a sudden, it flipped to that economic crisis and the race changed. I wonder if this one plays that way, as well.
Phil Mattingly, thank you for the brilliance, as always.
So the government has a choice to make. And it's not only a hard choice. They don't have a lot of time to deal with it. We don't have the capacity to handle what's coming. What are they going to do about it? Dr. Sanjay Gupta is among those openly worried about capacity. It is amazing to think that he is working 24 hours a day, but he is. What is the priority? Next.
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CUOMO: Hospitals are overwhelmed already. So how do we handle what's to come? Chief doctor Sanjay Gupta.
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DR. JEROME ADAMS, U.S. SURGEON GENERAL: We are 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.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (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.
DR. IRWIN REDIENER, NATIONAL CENTER FOR DISASTER PREPAREDNESS: We are so incredibly under prepared for a major onslaught to the hospitals, which is basically now inevitable. I think we have to look at Italy and see where they -- 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.
GUPTA: 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.
REDIENER: And by the way, even if we got the -- even if we had the hundred thousand plus ventilators that we actually need, we don't have the staff to operate them.
GUPTA: So hospitals are bracing for a rush of patients, trying to free up as much space as possible. That means getting patients who are well enough out of the ICU and canceling all elective operations.
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MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D), NEW YORK CITY: We just have to make this a standard across the board.
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 patients; using telehealth so that people can call in from home; and building up their testing capacity, in some cases, without people even 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 a mask, gloves. They were just sitting out. You could use what you needed to use. That's changed.
DR. THERESA MADALINE, HEALTH CARE EPIDEMIOLOGIST, MONTEFIORE MEDICAL CENTER: That's right. We've had to remove many of these items from the shelves.
GUPTA (voice-over): To be clear, most people who 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 are 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 proper 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 are as ready as we can be, but without knowing what the future holds, it's hard to say whether or not we're -- we have enough equipment, and we have what we need. I think that there are concerns, legitimate concerns about as a nation, if we're ready to handle such an enormous pandemic.
GUPTA (voice-over): Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN, New Rochelle, New York.
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CUOMO: Remember, we know what's coming. What are we going to do with it?
Now, stay with us. We've got new guests within sight. You must hear about what is to come. Next.
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