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Associate Professor Scott Hensley Discusses False Positives From Virus Antibody Tests On Market; Dad, 32, Leaves Note To Family On Phone Before Dying Of Coronavirus; Update On Coronavirus Response From Around World. Aired 2:30-3p ET
Aired April 27, 2020 - 14:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[14:30:00]
SCOTT HENSLEY, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF MICROBIOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA: OK, so, yes, let's take you as an example. I think you're up in New York, right?
BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN HOST: Yes.
HENSLEY: So let's say we take 100 people in New York, we take the blood from those 100 individuals and run a test. If there's a 5 percent false positive with that test, that means five of those 100 people we just tested are going to become positive but they weren't really exposed.
Let's say a sere (ph) prevalence in New York is it a true 5 percent. That would mean, out of the 100 people we just read, there will be five real positives. So five false positives, five real positives. That's ten out of a hundred people in the example I just laid out for you that would be positive in the test. Half of those are going to be real positives and half will be false positives.
If your test has a five percent false positive rate, it's like flipping a coin. If you're positive in the test, half the time, it's going to be a real positive, and half the time, it's going to be a false positive.
BALDWIN: That hurt my head a little bit. I'm trying to stay with you, but just being honestly.
Bottom line, how should people feel about these antibody tests because so many people are clamoring to get your hands on them because they want to get back to work and go back to their, quote, unquote, normal?
HENSLEY: That's right. I think what we have to do is evaluate the tests and identify which ones have low false positive rates, because the last thing we want to do is to give information to someone and tell them they are positive and they have antibodies to this virus but they really don't.
Now, the things you just talked about leading into this segment are true. We don't really know -- even if the test is accurate, we really don't know the level of antibodies that are going to be responsible for protection. We don't know how long-lived an individual's antibody response will be.
BALDWIN: Yes, yes.
HENSLEY: And there's likely going to be some variation among different individuals.
My advice is to let's enter this slowly. I think in the next week or two -- it's not going to take a lot of time. In the coming weeks, we'll have a better idea about which of these tests are reliable and which are not to be used.
BALDWIN: So let's just end this with this. Where are you when it comes to these tests? Where are you confident, really confident?
HENSLEY: I'm confident with the kind of test that is we're doing in my lab at Penn and these are very accurate. They're quantitative.
The problem with these tests, it's hard to scale them up for the whole population.
So in order to really get the accuracy and get the sort of point-of- care test people want, that's where it becomes a challenge.
And so again, I think we just have to evaluate these point of care tests, these tests that give results, very quickly and benchmark them against these more reliable tests. And at that point, then we can use this information and be more confident about it.
BALDWIN: A huge thanks to you and those folks in your lab at Penn, Professor Hensley, for doing this work and helping find some help for all of us. I really appreciate it. Personally, appreciate it.
HENSLEY: Thank you, Brooke.
BALDWIN: Thank you, thank you.
HENSLEY: Thank you.
BALDWIN: Coming up next, a 32-year-old father and husband dies from coronavirus complications but not before he left a note in his cell phone for his wife to find telling her how much he loved her. She'll join me live to share the touching message and what she wants the rest of the country to know.
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[14:37:15]
BALDWIN: Coronavirus, turned the world upside down. So many families lost loved ones, many times without even being able to say good-bye.
And that was the case for Katie Coelho. While she didn't get the chance to say goodbye to her 32-year-old husband, he left her a note in an unexpected place, his phone.
And in it -- I'll read this note for you -- Jonathan Coelho wrote this:
"I love you guys with all of my heart and you've given me the best life I could have ever asked for. I am so lucky. It makes me so proud to be your husband and the father to Braedyn and Penny."
"Katie, you are the most beautiful, caring, nurturing person I've ever met. You are truly one of a kind. Make sure you live life with happiness and that same passion that made me fall in love with you. Seeing you be the best mom to the kids is the greatest thing I've ever experienced."
"Let Braedyn know he's my best bud and I'm proud to be his father and for all the amazing things he's done and continues to do. Let Penelope know she's a princess and can have whatever she wants in life."
He writes, "I'm so lucky. Don't hold back. And if you meet someone, know that if they love you, and the kids, that I love that for you. Always be happy. No matter what."
Katie joins me now.
And, Katie, just my most sincere condolences to you and the sweet kids. How are you holding up?
KATIE COELHO, LOST HER HUSBAND TO CORONAVIRUS: I feel I'm on the outside looking in. I think I haven't really sat down and decided to accept that this is what life is, but it's really, it's awful. I didn't ask for this life. I don't want this life without him, so it's just, it's really difficult.
BALDWIN: Those words. I mean, the way he talked about your kids and the way he says, "Don't hold back if you meet someone, they love you, I want that for you."
How do those words sit on your heart?
COELHO: I understand why he said them, but I wish he hadn't because there's no one that will ever come close to Jonathan in any sense of the word, whether a son, an uncle, a friend, a father, or a husband. But I know he knew that I wasn't going to be OK and I know he wanted to ease my heart, but there's no one that could ever come even remotely close to him.
[14:40:06]
BALDWIN: What a -- just a selfless thing for a husband to say, knowing that perhaps the end was near for him.
How did you even find this note?
COELHO: So once we had left the hospital, they had given me all of his belongings. And my husband's very anti-technology, so he didn't have an iCloud. So I know his phone is OK. I know that there was nothing going to happen to it.
But in my state of mind, the first thing I wanted to do was get all the pictures because I know that there are pictures that parents take with them and their kids that they forget to share with their significant other.
So I wanted all of those and when I pulled up his phone, I turned it on, the call log was up because he had been trying to call me the morning he was intubated. And I cleared that out.
And my dad was standing in the living room with me. I was on the couch and I saw it had some personal information on it. And then underneath it, I started reading it and I just started screaming, he left me a note. And I called his parents and I said, he left me a note, he left us a note.
And it was just, he knew that this is how Jonathan is. I would have never gone through his notes. There was no reason for me to ever go through his phone. So for him to leave that up, he knew that if something happened, I needed to be able to find that.
And I know he would have deleted it if everything had been OK, there would have been no reason to say those things, but he knew. He was such a planner, and a preparer, and wanted to make sure we were OK.
BALDWIN: He knew. He knew.
COELHO: He has always known what I needed and what our kids needed and he has always made sure that he's taken care of us.
BALDWIN: Katie, how did he get sick?
COELHO: I'm not sure exactly what happened. I know that because of both of my children, my daughter being an infant and my son being medically complex, we had self-quarantined as much as possible.
The week before the pandemic really started to hit Connecticut, before there were any closing down small businesses or anything like that, or social distancing, so we had already elected to stay home, cancel my son's therapies, not see anyone.
And my husband just was doing what he had to do to take care of his family, and it just happened so fast.
BALDWIN: Meaning, he went to work? What did he do?
COELHO: Yes, he was a probation officer for the state of Connecticut.
BALDWIN: So when you say he needed to provide for his family, he needed to show up every day and go to work?
COELHO: Yes, just like everyone who's an essential worker, no matter if you work in a grocery store or the judicial field or a doctor. In order to keep going and providing for people, essential workers have to go to work. So my husband knew and quantity wanted to do that. He loved his coworkers and boss, loves being a probation officer.
So he was afraid of getting sick, no matter how it would end up happening, but he just knew. He loved going to work. So, yes, I don't really know. And I wish --
(CROSSTALK)
BALDWIN: No, it's OK. People ask how, it's almost impossible to know how you got sick, right? But the bottom line is, he got sick, he got very sick, and he ends up in the hospital.
Did you -- I mean, was it quick, the decline of his immune system? What happened? What did doctors say to you sf.
COELHO: My husband's symptoms starting at home were very mild until 12 hours before he ended up in the hospital. The respiratory symptoms really started to affect him and became concerning. He had none up until 12 hours before he was told to go to the hospital.
And when they tell you, when somebody's in the hospital with COVID, it's a roller coaster, it was a roller coaster. My husband was taken off the ventilator at one point, and then reintubated.
I was told on Easter Sunday, I needed to prepare my family that his kidneys had failed, that my husband was the sickest person on the floor, and then within -- he had a 104.7 fever.
[14:45:06]
And then, within 48 hours, my husband's fever broke. They were taking him off sedatives. He was communicating by nodding his head. And we had a plan and he was doing so well.
And I know the statistics with people being on ventilators in general, people being on ventilators over 14 days, people on ventilators whose kidneys fail. I know that, and I wasn't immune to that. But my husband was doing so well. And within five hours of me calling and checking on him, he was gone.
BALDWIN: That's awful.
COELHO: Yes. I don't know -- none of it, it doesn't make sense for everyone but doesn't make sense to me.
BALDWIN: I don't want to keep you too much longer but tell me about your husband, how old are your kiddos, and what exactly will you tell Braedyn and Penny about their dad?
COELHO: So my children, Braedyn is 2 and Penelope is 10 months. I sat them down the morning that my husband passed and just told them that daddy was very sick and he fought really hard to come home, but God needed him, but he's always going to be here.
And we talk to him every night. I say, let's say good night, dad, tell him we had a good day.
And I will never let them not know what an amazing human being their father is and how much he loved them and how fun and goofy and loving he was. If the New England Patriots were the second or third love of his life, and if he could talk only in office one liners, that's just how we were. And he was my teammate and my best friend. And I'm going to spend the rest of my life missing that.
But making sure that the kids know that because every kid should grow up knowing that the people that raised them loved them and were a good team. And my husband and I will always be a good team.
BALDWIN: Sounds like you were a lucky woman to have shared as much of your lifetime as you have with him.
I do want to just close by, listen, a lot of people need help and there's no shame in that. And there's a GoFundMe page set up for you and your sweet children. Already up to nearly $800,000.
Katie, what will you use this money for? How can people help you?
COELHO: Well, I never asked for a GoFundMe to be set up. My husband would have been like, I can take care of us. But I stay home to take care of my son, who is medically complex, and this will just be able to make sure that we're OK.
It's going to help my husband rest a little bit, because I know him going, he was most afraid that we wouldn't be OK. He would always say, I'm so afraid something will happen to me and I'm not going to be able to take care of you and the kids.
So I appreciate everyone so much. And this, I would give it all back just to see him again. But I appreciate that they want to take care of us.
BALDWIN: I appreciate you. I appreciate the strength that you've shown just talking to me on live national television, speaking so lovingly about him and your family.
Thank you. You will be in our prayers and the kindness of strangers is something special through all of us.
Katie Coelho, thank you.
We'll be right back.
COELHO: Thank you so much.
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[14:53:18]
BALDWIN: New Zealand prime minister is declaring a cautious victory over coronavirus. New cases in the country are down to the single- digits.
For more international headlines, let's check in with our correspondents around the world.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Clarissa Ward, in London, where Prime Minister Boris Johnson is back at work more than two weeks after being released from the intensive care unit of Saint Thomas Hospital where he was being treated for the coronavirus.
The prime minister spoke to reporters here earlier today. He said that there were encouraging signs that the U.K. is close to succeeding against COVID-19 but warned it is a moment of maximum risk and that restrictions need to stay in place to prevent a second wave of infection.
BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: I'm Ben Wedeman, in Rome, where the prime minister announced, one week from today, the lockdown will begin to ease.
Construction and manufacturing will begin and funerals with a limit of 15 people per funeral. And given that more than 26,000 people have died from coronavirus, it's expecting that the churches will be very busy.
MELISSA BELL, CNN PARIS CORRESPONDENT: I'm Melissa Bell, in Paris, where, in France, the country is under partial lockdown for several weeks and the police in Paris and France's other cities and making sure people are still respecting what the French call the confinement.
That is, they only leave to go to the supermarket or the pharmacy or for essential work and they have the proper paperwork on them. That is what the police check. The special form that you fill out in this country before you leave the home. Already authorities say they've given out nearly a million fines.
[14:55:16]
SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I'm Scott McLean, in Madrid, where the streets look a lot different. They're filled with kids. Today is the second day that kids have been allowed to play outside on the street for an hour a day with a parent. So long as they steer clear of neighbors. Parks and playgrounds are still closed.
This small bit of freedom for children is floated as a trial balloon to see how quickly Spain can further loosen restrictions. Right, now the number of active infections is shrinking. And if that trend continues, even seniors will be allowed out to exercise beginning this weekend.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BALDWIN: Thanks to all of you.
Coming up, U.S. military Reservist is getting online death threats after a conspiracy theory spread that she's patient zero for the pandemic in China. Our interview with her, a CNN exclusive, is just ahead.
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