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Trump Backing Off Putting Parts of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut under Quarantine; Navy Hospital Ships Won't Treat Coronavirus; Health Care Workers on the Front Lines; U.K. Expanding Medical Capacity; U.K. Couple Feed NHS Workers; Spanish Official Says Country Approaching Peak. Aired 3-4a ET

Aired March 29, 2020 - 03:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

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MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Hello, everyone, and welcome to Studio 7 here at CNN Center in Atlanta. I am Michael Holmes.

Coming here on CNN NEWSROOM, the death toll in the U.S. from coronavirus doubles in just two days while Donald Trump backed down from a quarantine idea.

In Italy, blessing the coffins lined up one after another. Almost too many to count.

Clear waters in Venice, cleaner air in China, what our planet is telling us now during this global pandemic.

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HOLMES: Welcome, everyone.

In the United States, President Trump backing off his idea to put parts of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut under quarantine. Instead, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has advised that people refrain from non-essential travel for 14 days, which is pretty similar to what those states' governors had already put in place.

And the United States has passed another milestone, at least 2,043 people have died from coronavirus, double the amount two days ago.

In Europe, more sad news. The death toll there more than 10,000, an increase of 889 from the day before.

And in Asia, Wuhan, China, has reopened its public transit services, after a two-month lockdown, the city where the virus was first detected saying the epidemic is now under control.

We are covering this story from Los Angeles to Tokyo and many cities in between. From Madrid, under a new stay-at-home order, to Salt Lake City, Utah. Let's begin in Washington. Here's White House correspondent Jeremy Diamond. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: President Trump on Saturday backing down in the face of criticism. The president earlier on Saturday proposing a quarantine, essentially restricting travel for any residents of New York and people in parts of New Jersey and Connecticut, restricting them from traveling to other parts of the country.

The president late Saturday night instead backing down and proposing this instead, quote, "On the recommendation of the White House coronavirus task force and upon consultation with the governors of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut, I have asked the CDC to issue a strong travel advisory to be administered by the governors in consultation with the federal government. A quarantine will not be necessary. Full details will be released by the CDC tonight."

That was the president tweeting on Saturday night.

Of course there are already pretty strict restrictions by each of those three states already in place. Take New York for example. There is a stay at home order encouraging New Yorkers not to leave their homes except for necessities, like getting groceries or medicine. It's not clear what the advisory would do to change the situation on the ground.

But what is clear is the timeline of all this. The president's tweet backing down from his proposal earlier on Saturday morning came after criticism from New York governor Andrew Cuomo.

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ANDREW CUOMO (D), GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK: This is -- would be a declaration of war on states, a federal declaration of war. And it wouldn't just be New Jersey, New York and Connecticut. The next week it would be Louisiana, with New Orleans, and then the week after that it would be Detroit, Michigan, and it would run all across the nation.

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DIAMOND: Cuomo made it pretty clear that he not only disagreed with this proposal by the president but that he believed that it would be illegal if implemented or that the president didn't have the legal authority to actually impose some kind of geographic-based quarantine.

What is clear is that this is in keeping with the president's thinking over the last several days. The president has been eager to get the economy going again and what he has been looking at, as these 15-day guidelines are set to lapse in a matter of days, is putting in a system that would be more geographic based, looking at the risk in certain areas of the country.

But it appears his initial attempt to do something that would be geographic based, at least something that would be federally enforceable, so far, has not come to fruition -- Jeremy Diamond, CNN, Washington. (END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: In the Los Angeles port of San Pedro, it is all hands on deck to help in the fight against coronavirus. CNN correspondent Paul Vercammen is with the U.S. Navy hospital ship Mercy, where they are trying to lighten the load battling the pandemic.

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PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The U.S. Navy hospital ship Mercy is up and running here in the port of San Pedro.

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VERCAMMEN: One thousand beds. 800 personnel, 12 operating rooms and it arrives here just in time. Southern California starting to see that jump toward what they call the apex of coronavirus cases. Big jumps in the number of cases in Orange, San Diego, Los Angeles and other surrounding counties.

Now what can Mercy do?

The idea is for it to take on any emergencies -- broken bones, appendectomies -- anything that is not a COVID-19 patient. If you look behind me, you can see there are crew members who are aboard the Mercy. They now have a do not disembark order.

They are trying hard to isolate this ship and make it exist in its own coronavirus-free, self-containment bubble.

Now this ship does have a lot of experience with humanitarian missions. One at the top of that list, 2004, the tsunami that hit Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean. It played a big role there.

Also here in Southern California, now, not only is the Mercy starting to help out but they've got all sorts of other moves in place to ramp things up. And they're still being very vigilant about stay at home orders.

This weekend, the first weekend where beaches and hiking trails are closed as Los Angeles moves closer toward the apex as we said earlier -- reporting from San Pedro, California, I'm Paul Vercammen. Now back to you.

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HOLMES: Here to discuss more about all of this is Dr. Raj Kalsi, an emergency medicine physician.

Doctor, I appreciate you taking the time. I was watching an interview you did on CNN 10 or 11 days ago. You said you were scared.

Has that feeling grown or abated? DR. RAJ KALSI, EMERGENCY MEDICINE PHYSICIAN: It's grown. But we are now, Michael, starting to see a surge. The surge that has been a phenomenon, a concept in the clinical world, is now happening to us.

So we've been watching internationally first and then we watched the epicenter at New York. And now we are starting to experience these patients coming in and they're coming in more quickly and they're coming in more sick and they're needing to be either ventilated or they're about to be ventilated.

And the fear that we have is multi-factorial. Almost as we talked about the last time I was on.

Will we have enough equipment?

Will we be able to depart from our COVID tunnel vision as doctors and make sure we don't miss other diagnoses, which is important?

And will we have the staff to be healthy enough to maintain all the efforts that we need to give to the community?

HOLMES: It's easy to forget that you guys are busy normally, before all this, with heart attacks and strokes and car accidents and the like. One thing that you've talked about is the standard procedure when a patient is, I think in hospitals they call it crashing, you know, in immediate risk of dying. You've got a team that rushes in, the crash team, to respond.

In this environment everyone has to stop and gear up.

That must take precious time, right?

KALSI: Absolutely, Michael. You bring up a great point. This is such a change in paradigm for everything us doctors and nurses and technicians and health care workers are designed to do.

We are rooted in compassion. And the compassion is race into the fire, like police officers and firefighters race into the line of fire or the fire itself and the potential injury. We race into that crashing patient.

And the problem is now we have to take our time. We have to don, meaning apply, protective equipment. And that takes time We have to coordinate a strategy to quickly assess the patient, intubate them, ventilate them -- this concept you're all hearing about.

And then limit exposure to my staff and other patients nearby so that we don't infect other people and we maintain the status of our department.

HOLMES: And not infect yourselves. You're the guys most needed. This often happens in times of war as well. The human side can get lost in the sheer numbers. Try to give us a sense of the emotional toll on workers dealing with what they're dealing with, seeing patients die when they perhaps wouldn't under different circumstances. KALSI: Michael, I have the honor of having worked a shift today at

one of my bigger institutions. We have 400 beds and I'm honored to work at that institution with amazing people, who I hope are watching now. And I'm speaking for them.

And we had to tell two patients, one over the phone, two daughters, that their mother was going to be a DNR. And because of this COVID-19 pandemic we couldn't do more resuscitative efforts.

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KALSI: Fortunately, they were amazing family members who did not want their mother to suffer more. So they allowed me to be compassionate and keep her comfortable.

And another patient who was 54 and suffering from cancer, we had to pull back the resuscitative efforts and the family understood.

And this was a challenge, because that one I had to face in the hospital with the family right at my elbow side and explained to the patient also, who was quite aware and quite mentally aware to process the situation, that this is just a terrible time internationally.

And it's just so unfortunate, Michael, to see these patients die alone. Because when we do declare that they are COVID rule-outs, meaning they could have COVID, they are not able to have family at the bedside unless they are imminently dying because of the risk of co- infecting all of us through other people.

HOLMES: That is just horrific. I don't know how you and your team bear that, the families, obviously, but having to tell families but patients, too.

There have now been, there's well over 50 doctors in Italy who have died. Many other health care professionals as well. You must have genuine concerns about you, your team, medical workers in general, being taken out through all of this.

KALSI: So a couple things. One is we are screened as we come into all of the hospitals that I work at to make sure we don't have a cough, a sore throat, shortness of breath or fever. The minute we flag one of those, those people are pulled out, appropriately, they're pulled out of the game.

And the more we lose to those symptoms, whether COVID or some other illness, like another type of cold that's not COVID, we lose that support.

And I have three kids. I have a wife who's a nurse and she works at the one of the hospitals I work at and we are fighting for our patients. We need to be around. I respect so much law enforcement, military now more than ever. Their commitment to the country. This is our calling.

(END VIDEOTAPE) HOLMES: Well, in Italy, empty streets like these in Milan are a sight that's become all too familiar. People there heeding warnings to stay inside as the number of deaths crosses 10,000. CNN's Ben Wedeman looks at the devastating toll the virus has taken on that country.

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BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Coffins, one next to another, next to another, next to another. Lined up in a church in Northern Italy, the epicenter of this country's coronavirus outbreak. Social distancing means family and friends can't say their final farewells. The sick were all alone as they lay dying.

"They were people," says Father Mario, "who died without anyone to hear or see them, without the possibility to talk to their loved ones, with no one to comfort them."

The increase in new cases has of late shown signs of beginning to slow down. But now COVID-19 has killed more people in Italy than anywhere else on Earth. The public health system, one of Europe's best, has been pushed to the limits. The disease has killed more than 50 medical personnel, more than 7,000 have fallen ill.

Italy has been under lockdown for almost three weeks. Severe measures may be starting to bear fruit, says Dr. Moreno Tresoldi.

"We should see less people arriving in the emergency ward," he says. "And we will be able to better look after patients."

Even if the numbers are starting to level out, the damage coronavirus has done to this country is breathtaking. Friday evening, the 24-hour death toll was 969. Saturday evening, the authorities reported another 889 people had died. If there is light at the end of this tunnel, it is at best a faint glimmer -- Ben Wedeman, CNN, Rome.

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HOLMES: Also out of Italy, an incredible story of determination to defeat this virus. A 102-year-old woman discharged from the hospital after recovering. Doctors say Italica Rondona (ph) is a symbol of hope for the elderly. She survived more than 20 days in the hospital and is now resting at home.

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HOLMES: The staff nicknamed her "Highlander the Immortal" for her strength and her endurance. Good for her.

The pandemic has taken a terrible toll in Spain. And now the government is extending its lockdown. Why one health official says, amid it all, he does see signs of hope.

Plus, we'll take a look at Britain's sobering milestone and what they are doing to prepare for more cases. We'll be right back.

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HOLMES (voice-over): Residents in an apartment complex in France are bound and determined not to let the lockdown get them down. So much for 30 minutes each night. The neighbors go to their balconies to perform jumping jacks and lunges to keep their spirits up and their weight down after weeks of staying home.

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HOLMES: British prime minister Boris Johnson self-isolating after testing positive for coronavirus but he is still on the job and is sending a letter to every household in Great Britain, urging everyone to stay home. We're joined now from London by CNN's Salma Abdelaziz.

And the U.K. just had its largest day on day increase in deaths, 1000 people.

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HOLMES: What's the government doing to combat this?

SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN PRODUCER: It's a very grim milestone, Michael. And the U.K. government's position is at best precarious. Of course that is, as you said, as the prime minister has tested positive for the coronavirus. Other members of the government also testing positive and currently in isolation.

Many here describing this as we are around the world as a war, as a battle against this pandemic and health care workers are the front line fighters. Let's take a look at what one couple are doing to help.

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ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): Amid a paralyzing pandemic, husband and wife Neal Barrett and Janneke Diemel have found a purpose: feed as many NHS staff as they possibly can. Their days have become a flurry of activity, loading up meals from home.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You got something for us, sir?

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): Then driving by local restaurants, like this Italian cafe, eager to donate hot meals or selling bulk to make a little profit at a time when business is at a standstill.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: For all my friends.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you so much.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thank you.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): Rushing from place to place, the couple tells us it all started just over a week ago, when a friend and nurse asked the couple to drop off some snacks.

JANNEKE DIEMEL, @CRITICALNHS: Started off with 20 pizzas, which we brought and now we're delivering over 300 meals a day. So it's been a bit crazy.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): Inspired by their response, the couple set up a crowdfunding account and nine days later they'd raised almost $45,000 U.S. for their group called @CriticalNHS. And now they deliver hundreds of meals twice a day and more volunteers have joined.

Antoine Truteo admits there are risks but they're necessary.

ANTOINE TRUTEO, VOLUNTEER: Someone has to provide front line services just like the NHS itself are providing. I think this is key that one of us or some of us contribute in some way until we're unable to.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): The meals go to the staff at St. George Hospital, as one of only four trauma centers in London, it's preparing for an expected surge in COVID-19 cases.

ABDELAZIZ: So we're not being allowed to film on hospital grounds because restrictions are changing by the hour. What's key is to keep NHS workers from getting exposed. As the hospitals become overwhelmed, they have one message to the public: stay home, save lives.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): Outside the main entrance, Amerjit Chohan, CEO of St. George Hospital Charity, tells us many nurses don't have the time to buy food.

AMERJIT CHOHAN, ST. GEORGE HOSPITAL CHARITY: Obviously the hospital is busy. Staff are busy. It's a difficult time for the country. But everyone's doing their best. We're lucky to have an amazing NHS. St. George is an amazing hospital and we're appreciative of all the support.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): We also run into first year medical student Millie Clemens (ph), who's come by to drop off some sandwiches.

MILLIE CLEMENS (PH), VOLUNTEER: It is scary to think that had I been four years older than I would be part of the doctors tackling this now. I want to help in any way that I can.

ABDELAZIZ (voice-over): For many here that means supporting the country's front line medical staff as they brace for a battle sure to challenge even the most prepared.

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ABDELAZIZ: And you can really get a sense of the urgency there, Michael, yes, across the U.K. we are concerned about PPE, masks, gloves, having enough respirators but it's also the simple things, like these doctors and nurses working long shifts, long hours and don't have time to grab a meal.

So everyone here really trying to support their front line medical staff. The U.K. government wants to avoid the fate it's seen in other countries for medical workers, where thousands have gotten sick, many, a few dozen have lost their lives to the coronavirus.

Yesterday the government announced they will be increasing testing for NHS workers, turning an amusement park into a testing center. And that is, of course, to keep them staffed.

And while, of course, 1,000 people have lost their lives so far in this country, we are far from reaching the peak. So the idea here is to keep that NHS staff healthy and safe to make sure they are testing consistently to prevent any further spread of the virus -- Michael.

HOLMES: Yes, the U.K. slow to take lockdown measures. That's for sure. Salma Abdelaziz, thank you so much.

Well, Spain remains Europe's second-worst-hit country after Italy. But officials there are showing some cautious optimism. The director of Spain's Center for Health Emergency says the disease is stabilizing and his country is approaching the peak of the curve for coronavirus cases.

For the latest, journalist Al Goodman is there.

Tell us about the situation there, Al.

AL GOODMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Michael. We're halfway through the month-long lockdown order, the stay at home order. And the cautious optimism, they're trying to do everything they can now, any tool that they can find to add to that to try to flatten that curve.

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GOODMAN: So the prime minister announcing to the nation on television Saturday night that, although people were allowed to go to work when the lockdown order started two weeks ago, for the next two weeks, that's not the case.

Non-essential workers will have to stay home. So during the weekday, the movement of people is even less than it already is.

As you can see, the streets are empty. And they want them to get even emptier. So these non-essential workers, the prime minister named construction workers, the cabinet will pass an order this morning to tell us the other kinds of workers that are non-essential, who have to stay home. They will get paid, the prime minister said, but they will have to get those hours back later.

All of this is to try to reduce the number of new infections, to try to reduce the number of new people going to hospitals, to ease the pressure on intensive care wards and try to save some lives, Michael.

HOLMES: Trying to flatten that curve, Al Goodman in Madrid for us.

The World Health Organization is reporting more than 2600 cases. Nearly 50 deaths across the African continent, no doubt that is a very low estimate. A shipment of medical supplies donated by the Chinese tech giant Alibaba arrived in Senegal to help health workers treat coronavirus patients there. More widespread testing, though, in Africa, has only been available

recently. Not much has been done. The WHO's director general says only two of the 47 nations in its Africa region could even do testing when the outbreak began.

Gruesome reports out of Ecuador could be a sign of things to come. Why Latin America might not be ready for COVID-19. We'll be right back.

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HOLMES: Welcome back to our viewers here in the United States and around the world, I'm Michael Holmes, you're watching CNN NEWSROOM. It is time to check out the headline stories for you.

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HOLMES: Around the world, the N-95 mask that can block the virus has quickly become a precious commodity and a medical necessity. CNN national correspondent Gary Tuchman takes us inside a plant in Salt Lake City, where workers are working around the clock to meet the need.

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GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Production of the N-95 respirator mask is ramping up dramatically throughout this country and the world. We are at the Alpha Protech Company in Salt Lake City, Utah. These are the masks in question.

This company says orders are 5,000 percent higher in the month of March than it was in February. In February they had 10 employees. Now they had 60. In the next two weeks they'll have 150.

Hundreds of thousands of masks are made here every week. This is a complicated machine; proprietary. But there's paper, plastic, glue. It all comes together right here. Once it passes this woman, it is then cut right here and this is where it looks like the respirator masks.

This woman who does quality control looks at them very carefully. If they're not absolutely perfect, she throws them in the garbage bucket; 3 percent to 6 percent of them are not perfect. They have to be very careful that nothing that has any flaws gets out in the marketplace.

After she's done, they go into boxes. They get sent throughout the country and throughout the world.

This is Eric Llewellyn, vice president of the company. I'm going to stand far away from him while I'm talking.

This is very pressure-packed work, correct? ERIC LLEWELLYN, VICE PRESIDENT, ALPHA PROTECH: It absolutely is. With the spread of disease across the country, it's putting a lot of pressure on us to ramp up our mass production and that's what we're doing right now.

TUCHMAN: These boxes will soon be going out all over the country and the world. That's hundreds of thousands of masks each week.

LLEWELLYN: Literally hundreds of thousands of masks each week and they continually want and need more. So we're continuing to ramp up our production.

TUCHMAN: You are making donations all over the country, correct?

LLEWELLYN: That's correct. We are donating back to the East Coast where some of the hardest-hit communities are.

TUCHMAN: Eric, thank you.

LLEWELLYN: Thank you. We appreciate it.

TUCHMAN: This work is very important but right now it's particularly heroic -- I'm Gary Tuchman, CNN, in Salt Lake City, Utah.

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HOLMES: So far, Latin America hasn't seen the kind of infection numbers that Europe, the U.S. and Asia have. But there are fears that that could soon change. CNN's Matt Rivers with more for us from Mexico City.

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MATT RIVERS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In Latin America, coronavirus cases are spiking, well over 13,000 and counting. That's about 10 times higher than it was 12 days ago, as more and more people keep dying.

In Ecuador, government workers were seen fumigating streets as its case total climbs. In one coastal city, government officials removed 100 corpses from different homes in three days, according to Reuters, some who died experiencing symptoms of the virus. Curfews in place made it difficult for families to get their deceased to funeral homes.

Similar preventative measures have sprung up elsewhere. In Argentina, for example, thousands been arrested for violating a nationwide curfew. And in Panama, a ban on foreigners entering the country had stranded a cruise ship off of its coast.

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RIVERS (voice-over): Four people have died on the Holland American ship Zaandam from unknown causes though it's now allowed to transit the Panama Canal on its way to Florida. Two people aboard have tested positive for the virus and, as of Friday, 138 more are experiencing flulike symptoms. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Pretty well confirmed along with the news that,

yes, we were in a very dire situation. We're hoping that that's the end of death but there's certainly no guarantee of that.

RIVERS (voice-over): One of Latin America's most dire situations is in Brazil, its thousands of cases and dozens of deaths are the most in the region. But even as individual cities like Rio de Janeiro have enforced stay at home measures emptying its famous beaches, social media accounts that support President Jair Bolsonaro have pushed a video campaign, titled "Brazil Can't Stop."

The president argues preventative measures that could hurt the economy shouldn't be used.

"I'm sorry. Some people will die, they will die. That's life," he says. "You can't stop a car factory because of traffic deaths."

In Mexico, President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador had played down the threat for weeks, regularly seen mingling with crowds until a few days ago. Though his government has taken more action recently, closing businesses and schools and encouraging people to stay home, it's clear some aren't listening.

Restaurants are allowed to be open and the streets are much emptier than usual but finding people out and about isn't hard to do. Meanwhile, the number of cases in Mexico has about tripled in the last week.

We've seen this virus devastate China, then Europe and now the United States. In Latin America, there are growing fears this region could be next -- Matt Rivers, CNN, Mexico City.

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HOLMES: You're watching CNN NEWSROOM. We'll have more news after the break.

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HOLMES: Welcome back. Italy has been hit hard by COVID-19. More than 10,000 lost lives. But a football team in Rome has found a way to lift the spirits of its most vulnerable supporters and help protect them from the virus.

AS Roma is delivering care packages to every single season ticket holder over 75. They contain key tools to fight COVID-19, things like masks, gloves and hand sanitizer. They also hold essential ingredients for Italian life, pasta and a bottle of beer.

The club's oldest fan is 97, born four years before AS Roma was founded. He got a specially-signed shirt from the club. Good for them. Last week they announced they will buy three ventilators and eight intensive care beds for a hospital in Rome.

We want to home in now on how the virus is affecting people's lives across the world. Japan's prime minister is pushing for a massive stimulus package to soften the blow to the economy but help might come too late for some small business owners in Tokyo. CNN's Blake Essig explains.

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BLAKE ESSIG, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): These days, Hideki Sugiura (ph) doesn't waste much time at Toyosu fish market. He moves quickly between stalls, navigating a narrow path in search of fresh fish and a good deal.

For more than nine years, this has been his almost daily routine, creating his menu on the fly.

Back at Sushi Marubatsu (ph), preparations are underway for what he says is typically a busy service catering to Japanese locals. At least it was until about two months ago.

"Simply customers stopped coming," he tells me, "customers stopped coming."

How do you deal with that?

HIDEKI SUGIURA (PH), SUSHI CHEF: I'm very sad. I'm angry for the virus.

ESSIG: Across town, vendors say it's even worse. The Tsukiji market is one of the most famous in the world. Typically this place is packed with people, making it difficult to walk. But as you can see right now, it's pretty dead and vendors tell me business is down up to 80 percent.

ESSIG (voice-over): While shops on the surface are struggling, for those like sushi chef Toru Honma in the bowels of the market, it's a war of attrition, one which he says some have already lost.

"I feel very sad, it hurts. I'm sure others feel the same. It shouldn't have been this way," Honma tells me. A stark reality for many local businesses around town, already reeling from last year's hike in the consumption tax.

While many local businesses were hoping the Summer Olympic Games would help revive a stalling economy, the coronavirus pandemic instead is making things worse.

JESPER KOLL, ECONOMIST: You get the double punch and that's knocking out particularly small and medium-sized businesses.

ESSIG (voice-over): Economist Jesper Koll says businesses can expect profits deteriorating for at least the next several months. KOLL: We've had a de facto shutdown of all the major engines of

demand, that's consumption, business spending, exports of goods and inbound tourism.

ESSIG (voice-over): And for business owners like Hideki Sugiura?

SUGIURA (PH): I can't continue. I have to go to some way out.

ESSIG (voice-over): A virus with an uncertain future now has him questioning his own -- Blake Essig, CNN, Tokyo.

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HOLMES: Well, as we know and as we've been reporting, the pandemic is forcing people to stay home all across Europe. That has one impact you might not have thought about. It's causing air pollution to go down, way down. What we can learn when it comes to the climate crisis when we come back.

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HOLMES: Lights out across the world to mark the 13th annual Earth Hour, cities all over the globe went dark for one hour on Saturday to save electricity and draw attention to the issue of climate change. And, with so many people at home during the pandemic, it is expected that over 7,000 cities were going to participate.

Now the coronavirus crisis has helped one thing and that is the environment. As people stay home, the planes aren't flying, the air quality is improving. New images from the European Space Agency show a sharp decline in pollution over several major cities. As Bill Weir reports, this pandemic is a stark reminder of just how important it is to heed warnings from the experts.

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BILL WEIR, CNN CHIEF CLIMATE CORRESPONDENT: Hello, Earth lovers, Bill Weir, CNN, from a very surreal Brooklyn, where for some reason, I can't stop thinking about all the disaster movies that start with someone in power ignoring scientists.

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We have it totally under control. It's one person coming in from China.

WEIR (voice-over): That's just one of the parallels between coronavirus and the climate crisis.

TRUMP: You only have 11 years to live, folks, because climate change is coming up on us so fast. WEIR: Think about it. Both kill the most vulnerable and will cost trillions. Both will reveal heroic first responders and scientists and inspiring neighbors, as well as deplorable hoarders, grifters and profiteers.

And both are reminders that life as we know it depends on predictable flights and growing seasons and supply chains. But what if the age of predictability is over?

(on camera): Which brings us to the main difference between coronavirus and climate change: fear.

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WEIR: Exhibit A, Jane's Carousel here in Brooklyn. The last time it was this deserted and depressing was after Superstorm Sandy. Now, between the melting ice caps and sea level rise, there is no scientific doubt my neighborhood is going back underwater.

But invisible carbon dioxide molecules cannot shut down a carousel or a city or a world the way an invisible virus can, because we think we have time. Time waters down fear.

(voice-over): But if we can go back in time just a few months, wouldn't we take science a lot more seriously? Wouldn't we know the countries that wait for their people to start dying before acting suffer the worst? And the countries with the most transparency, decisive leadership and mutual trust, fare the best?

(on camera): We would know the importance of flattening the curve. You've probably seen this by now, right? This represents time. This is the number of patients. And the dotted line is our hospital capacity.

A sudden pandemic spike crashes the system. But with smart leadership and mass cooperation, we can flatten the curve. Guess what? This works with climate too.

(voice-over): Miami is trying to flatten the curve of sea level rise by spending millions on higher streets and bigger pumps. California is trying to flatten their curve with new wildfire regulations and insurance laws.

But so much of humanity still thinks about the climate crisis the way a spring breaker thinks about coronavirus.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We ain't in no school and we can do whatever we want.

WEIR: Since the global fossil fuel economy slowed down, you can see the cleaner air from space. In just a few weeks, China conserved about half as much heat-trapping pollution as Australia or the United Kingdom burns in a year.

(on camera): Mother Earth can bounce back if we let her. It shouldn't take a global pandemic and recession first. Just more smart science, more smart leadership and a sense that we're all in this together -- something to think about the next time you wash your hands for 20 seconds to save people you will never meet and life as we know it.

(voice-over): Bill Weir, CNN, New York.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: Daniel Kammen is with us to discuss this; he is a professor of energy at the University of California Berkeley.

This is quite staggering and unintended consequences, but what does it tell us?

DANIEL KAMMEN, UC BERKELEY: It shows how quickly we can change our system. We've seen 30-40 percent drops in pollution over many of the world's cities and it shows us how quickly we could switch to clean energy if we took climate change as seriously as coronavirus.

HOLMES: Hmm.

Are you surprised?

I mean you're probably not. I'm a little surprised at how big the changes are. You know, as you say, you know, 30 percent, 40 percent. In some parts of Europe, the pollutants in Italy, one area of Italy, slashed by a half. It is massive.

KAMMEN: It is massive. But it also shows us that actions do matter. Our individual decisions, whether we take an extra trip, whether we just drive to go get one thing at the store or come back. Those actions all add up.

And when we scale it up to industry and countries and regions, it really shows us if we put our mind to it and invested in science we could not only do a far better job on climate change but we could do it in a much more equitable way than what we're doing now.

HOLMES: People point out in these days of Amazon ordering that one little package, that's got a carbon footprint that gets to you.

When this is all over, does that pollution just return?

When it passes, could it be even worse in a way?

Because you're going to have nations like China ramping up on production to catch up on lost time.

Or do you think changes can be sustainable going forward?

KAMMEN: You're absolutely right. We saw that before. After 9/11 we saw a great diminuation (sic) and then saw a bounce back and more aggressive overconsumption afterwards.

But climate is a battle we'll be fighting for not years but decades. So the real question is, can we learn the positive lessons out of this horrible experience with coronavirus and say we want to switch to clean energy now? It's cheaper in many places and we want to invest in better systems so low-income areas can generate their own power and make themselves more resilient. We are not doing that today by denying some of the poorest communities testing and respirators.

So we're making a natural disaster into a social disaster when we have all the tools to make this into a chance to build a green stimulus.

HOLMES: Great point. I've seen a lot of people make the point that, you know, wouldn't it be nice if the world reacted to climate change --

[03:55:00]

HOLMES: -- the threat from climate change with the same sense of urgency as we're reacting to coronavirus, because climate change can and will cause more deaths and have more impact, ultimately, going forward.

Do you agree with that?

KAMMEN: Absolutely. In China we're already seeing a plan to ramp up coal production when they've become the leader of wind and solar production as a way to fight economic downturn. That's the wrong lesson.

The right lesson is we have these technologies ready to go. We should be deploying them now. If we think the coronavirus came on quick, as we've seen from wildfires and some of the hurricanes and other disasters, climate change will overwhelm our systems.

Investing now, believing in the science and then acting on the science, that's really our best defense.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

HOLMES: Well, with all the uncertainty and anxiety in the world over the coronavirus, a moment of zen for you now. Going to show you some puppies from the Atlanta Humane Society having a run in the, of course, closed Georgia Aquarium.

They had a blast, making friends with the fish, zooming through the attractions and getting out of the doghouse for the day, something we all look forward to someday. A lot of puppies being adopted at the moment, by the way. People stuck at home, going down to the shelter, pick up a pup and give it a home.

Thank you for watching CNN NEWSROOM, everyone. I'm Michael Holmes, do stay with us. The news continues with Anna Coren after a quick break. I'll see you tomorrow.