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Cuomo Prime Time

As Coronavirus Cases Top One Million, Trump Says Count Will "Go Down To Zero Ultimately"; Florida Governor Defends Response To Virus At White House; One-On-One With Ohio Governor Mike DeWine; VP Pence Tours Mayo Clinic Without Mask, Despite Policy; Trump Claims U.S. Will Conduct Five Million Tests Per Day "Very Soon;" $46.5 Billion Plan To Scale Up Contact Tracing; E.R. Doctor Survives Coronavirus, Then Takes Own Life. Aired 9-10p ET

Aired April 28, 2020 - 21:00   ET

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

[21:00:00]

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN HOST: I love it. I love having the most powerful show of respect for the people who are most powerful, first line defense against this virus. I love it. We'll be talking about it as well. Erin, have a great night.

I am Chris Cuomo. Welcome to PRIME TIME. Is the worst behind us? Now, Trump said that and he will be right, but only if we do the right things right now, and here's the problem. The right things are the hard things and we haven't seen this President and his pals do well with making hard calls up to this point.

Hey, the Head of the Coronavirus Task Force, the Vice President, didn't even wear a mask at the Mayo Clinic. Why not? He has an answer. It's even more surprising than what he did.

Another surprise, are we going to run out of meat? We're going to test the situation going on in the country right now and the President's remedy.

We also have the governor of Ohio here to test his call to reopen in part on Friday. Can he test and trace enough? We'll see.

And we must remember one of our best who was lost to the silent killer in this pandemic. We all mourn when a healthcare hero is lost, because we are one in this. What do you say? Let's get after it.

The President is not only recognizing the need for testing now. He also gave you some key insights today.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, it will go down to zero ultimately. If you test, you're going to show many more cases. It will be - at the appropriate time it will be down to zero.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Now, first of all, you have to remember, Trump told you that COVID would be gone by now, right? There is no science behind his suggestions, but you know that already at this point or I hope you do.

But there's a key part of that statement that you may miss. He just told you why he ducked testing for so long, and they did duck it. More testing means more cases identified. Trump did not like the idea of showing how fast COVID was spreading, seeing how he was calling it a hoax and saying it was going to go away and just be a dozen or so cases.

Now we have to be careful, not just to throw barbs and play got you. No, no. We have to talk about it so we don't repeat it, OK? New models are projecting thousands more lives may be claimed by states if they reopen before they're ready.

Florida has a state home order that expires Friday. The governor their, Governor DeSantis talked reopening plans with Trump today and hit back at critics, saying he waited too long initially to shut things down.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

GOV. RON DESANTIS (R-FL): When you look at some of the most draconian orders that have been issued in some of these states and compare Florida in terms of our hospitalizations per 100,000, in terms of our fatalities per 100,000. I mean you go from D.C., Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Illinois, you name it, Florida's done better.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: I wonder if that list of states is also accurate in terms all the kids he sent back from spring break after letting them party down in a stupid way in his own state. I wonder if those states were all affected by that better - draconian.

Well, is that really the right way to be talking about the only thing that made a difference here? Let's take the situation to Ohio's Governor Republican Mike DeWine. DeSantis, as you just heard, threw some shade at his state as well.

Always good to have you on PRIME TIME. Sir, I hope you and the family are healthy.

GOV. MIKE DEWINE (R-OH): Thanks, Chris. Thank you. How you doing?

CUOMO: Better than I deserve. Family is doing great. We are among the lucky ones. No question about it. My wife and my son powered through in a way that I could have only imagined. I, as we all suspected, am the weak link.

Governor, let me ask you this. Governor DeSantis - this is not a competition. It's not, which governor is great. You're doing very well in polls in your state for how you're handling things. He will be judged by his own voters. But the idea that mistakes were made where you are because you have more deaths, for example, or more people hospitalized per 100,000, is that a fair metric for you? DEWINE: Well, I can only focus on Ohio. You know, Chris, we did this pretty early. We had the Arnold Classic scheduled and we stopped it. It was the first big decision to stop anything in the country, and we did that.

And what I'm seeing now is good. Look, we're still losing people. Every life is lost is just horrible. But, we've seen not only a flattening now, but a decline that began about a week or so ago in hospitalization. And so it's not going down as fast as we would like, but the hospitalization is in fact going down and so we're, we're happy about that.

[21:05:00]

Last week we got a huge break in signing a contract for some real testing. By tomorrow we'll be up 7,500 a day. That will double next week and we'll end up within about three weeks 20 to 22,000 tests per day, which is a huge jump for us.

CUOMO: Right.

DEWINE: And that we're also working with Partners In Health to stand up our tracing around the State of Ohio. And so we're going to go after it. I like being on offense a lot better than on defense and we're very happy about that.

We're starting to open up a little bit. Not fast enough, obviously, for a lot of people, but we're trying to do this in a reasonable way. That gives people confidence that they can go to the businesses and that they will be safe.

So this Friday, we start really opening up with our hospitals. And next week we, we go into manufacturing that's not already open. And then on the 12th of May we moved to retail. We're not yet to restaurants. We're trying to plot that out and working with folks who run restaurants to see exactly how we can do that to keep people protected.

But anyway, it's a kind of a layered rollout and we couldn't have done it, frankly, if we didn't have a lot more testing that we now have that capability, which is a really great thing.

CUOMO: So let's talk about governor. Rate of increase of testing is important, but you guys are so far behind, not your fault, not anybody's fault, it's just the reality. Who cares about the blame? You just have to increase the game here, right?

So do you feel confident and tell us why the stuff that you're reopening, you'll be able to cover with the amount of testing and tracing, very key component and why that offsets a concern that you haven't completely met the CDC guidelines. You should be giving it more time. Why do you have confidence that you can do it the way you're doing it this Friday?

DEWINE: Well, we're really trying to - we're going to be doing two things. And we have two - there's two big concerns. One, you want to do the tracing and to get the tracing up so you can actually trace every single person that you - is tested positive, that's a big.

We've not been able to do that to nearly the extent that we want to do it. With more testing, we're going to be able to reach more of these individuals and then go find out who they were in contact with and try to isolate that. Be on the offense.

So we feel good about that. It's certainly is a work in progress, we're not there yet, but it is a work in progress. The - we're doing the rollout - I mean I've been watching numbers - good numbers as far as hospitalization for 10 days or so. Really good. And it's going down and so that's movement in the right direction and we now have a system--

CUOMO: Its definitely moving in the right direction. But CDC wants two weeks. They want you two weeks of down. You don't have two weeks of down. Do you believe that, that is just a guideline that you have a better metric?

DEWINE: No, I look, I think, if we're 10 days now, by the time we open much of anything, we're going to be over two weeks. I mean, all we're doing this Friday, everybody says May 1. The only thing we're doing on Friday is hospitals and that's really getting people - starting to get people caught up on medical procedures that it would have been good if they had had before.

We're not going up until May 4th - we're not going up till May 4th until we even open manufacturing. And May 12th--

CUOMO: That's why I'm not chasing, by the way. I don't think it's fair to chase you about hospitals, because they have their own protocols and things. And look, we've gotten to know each other in this now. I'm not going to come at you unfairly. I understand how difficult the balance is here.

People are so anxious to reopen in every possible way. It's hard to hold it back and be reasoned. You've done a good job thereby everybody's assessment. Let me ask you about something that's getting some temperature, because you're not opening up fast enough for some people. You're opening up too fast for other people. Tough spot, that's leadership. You wanted the job.

The idea of masks in the retail sector, you say it's not going to be mandatory. You should wear masks when you are around, you advise. But when you go in the store, you don't have to wear them. Why does that matter?

DEWINE: Well, here's what we did. We put a working group together - business group. They came back and they said, all the businesses you're opening up, all the ones that actually have already been in place, everybody wears a mask. Not only does every employee wear a mask, but anybody who's coming in into these manufacturing companies - and many of them are doing already. But this makes it complete. So we're very happy about that.

[21:10:00] But the issue was on retail, and what we have said is that employees should wear a mask. Most grocery stores now are doing that anyway. But as we expand to jewelry stores and other things, we want them to do that.

Where we really got the real push back quite candidly as - when we said, look, we're going to mandate that consumer. When you go into a jewelry store, you go into a grocery store, you're going to have to wear a mask. And it was quite candidly, a pretty much an explosion. People felt fronted by that and felt that - I had people say, look, you don't, you don't trust us. We can make our own decisions.

And it was clear, Chris, that that pushback was sincere and tough. And, frankly, we thought it might endanger a lot of the other things that we are trying to do. And so my hope is that everyone wears a mask. I've said, look, I go out in public, I wear a mask.

CUOMO: I've seen it.

DEWINE: I advise my family to do that. And - because what this does is it protects the workers. And you know, I had had a lot of family members call me in the last few weeks about grocery stores. Look, my son's in there, my dad's in there working, I'm afraid for him. It just made sense for customers to coming in to wear a mask.

So I hope - again, I know I'm talking to a lot of Ohioans, but you have the right to not wear one, but I hope you do, because it really is the right thing to do to protect the people who are working there and the people who are serving us every single day.

CUOMO: A tough balance, tough call. We'll see how it goes. It's interesting. Thank you for unpacking the dynamic, because I want people to understand how this goes.

I'm short on time, but I want to ask you this. So the President was hammering the decision to have mail in voting. You made a different decision. Have you seen any indication yet that mail in ballots in any way corrupted your election? Is there any proof of fraud that you've been told by your Secretary of State or other precinct officials?

DEWINE: Well, I had the Secretary of State Frank LaRose on our daily press conference to kind of give a report and tell people they still had until 7:30 tonight, that's over with, of course, now, but until 7:30 tonight to bring it to the Board of Elections.

So, look, we have seen, no problem. I'm not aware of any problem that Frank is told me about. I don't see a problem. We're used to doing this in Ohio. I mean, we run absentee ballots, not exclusively, but people have had the right to - for long time to vote for an entire month absentee and many people have gotten used to it and do it and our boards of election and everybody's used to dealing with it.

Governor, thank you very much. These are tough calls. And like I said, I know you're opening up on Friday, but I'm not going to chase you about the 14 days when you're talking about hospitals, I don't think that's a fair basis criticism. We'll see how it goes. We'll see how the state goes. You're always welcome here to make the case of what you're doing and how it's working.

DEWINE: Thanks Chris.

CUOMO: All right. Now here's what's not a tough call. You walk into a place, let alone a hospital that has a mask rule, you better wear one. The Vice President wasn't wearing a mask at the Mayo clinic like everybody else around him. I don't know if you've seen the picture. He has a rationale.

Let's see if that would work for anybody else and if it even makes sense. But that's just the first point. We have a lot of important things to talk about with Dr. Sanjay Gupta, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[21:15:00]

CUOMO: In a now deleted tweet, the Mayo Clinic, Minnesota wrote it had "Informed the Vice President of the masking policy prior to his arrival today." Now, you can delete a tweet. You can't delete reality. Take a look. The VP was the only one who chose not to wear a mask. Why not? Here's how he explained it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: When the CDC issued guidelines about wearing a mask, it was their recognition that people that may have the coronavirus could prevent the possibility of conveying the virus to someone else by wearing a mask.

And since I don't have the coronavirus, I thought it'd be a good opportunity for me to be here, to be able to speak to these researchers, these incredible healthcare personnel and look them in the eye and say thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CUOMO: Was the mass covering your eyes? Look, you can make an excuse for anything. But let's bring in Dr. Sanjay Gupta, because this is a teachable moment. Of course, if you're supposed to wear a mask, you should wear a mask. That's not the lesson.

If you think you have a 100 percent confidence cause you tested negative once, twice, three times, Sanjay, isn't the reality that we don't know that you're 100 percent not contagious when you test negative and that that test is only as good as the day it's on.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes. Yes. No question. But by the way, Chris, I'd be remiss if I didn't compliment you on the new do. Looks really good.

CUOMO: The, the missus did it. Over here I could - I don't want to say anything, because I'll get in more trouble. But, she did a pretty good job. She used the one here and here. She used the two and then a four. She'll probably yell at me down here if I get the numbers wrong. And then here it was an eight. Except for here, because I wanted to leave a little coverage for the power rallies, so she just brushed it down and then cut it with the scissors like that. But not bad. Right?

GUPTA: Wow.

CUOMO: Not bad.

GUPTA: Really nice. Yes.

CUOMO: Thank you, Sanjay.

GUPTA: Your wife have really hidden talents? Yes, you're welcome. But, no, I think you make a good point on - she did pretty good - Vice President Pence. I mean, he should've worn a mask today. I mean, there's no question about it.

[21:20:00]

I mean, first of all, it sets a good example. It's the policy of the hospital, right? I mean, this is the policy of the hospital. A lot of people get tested. I work at a hospital, I get tested. I still wore a mask.

Second of all - I mean, third of all, it's a hospital in the middle of a pandemic. I mean, there was a time when you wear a mask, right? He's seeing patients over there, they're sick patients. I mean this is potentially risky. But the two teaching points, Chris, I think you bring up are really important.

Number one, when you get a negative test that is a point in time. That is a point in time that you are negative. So if he's getting tested periodically, that's great. But you don't really know you can have another exposure and potentially harbor the virus in your body, have no symptoms as I think everyone knows.

Second point, which is something I don't think we talk about enough. We talk a lot about the tests. But in a lot of these tests, even the ones for the virus, Chris have a 15 percent false negative rate, so this is something that's kind of thing going to be an increasingly large issue as we move forward.

These tests got to work well. If we're going to have confidence in putting people in the workforce, 15 percent false negative rate is a really high rate. I mean, what are you saying then to people, you know, you have an 85 percent chance that this is correct. But maybe you still have the virus, we didn't catch it. That's going to have to be addressed.

But also, you know, the Vice President realizes that. So I hope he's negative. I mean, he looks like he doesn't have any symptoms, which is great.

CUOMO: Good willing.

GUPTA: But those are teachable points. CUOMO: Yes, god willing, we need our leaders healthy. Look, I'm not in the got you game. I think it's a waste of time. I think people are turned off by it. But all I'm saying is look, at some point you got to stop - you got to start being able to take any kind of responsibility for anything that's negative at some point.

I mean, this administration has never done a damn thing wrong ever and they just can't own it. I guarantee you people will find ways to defend them by attacking me, but they won't own the obvious. But that's politics. Let's move it to the side.

Let's talk. I don't want to muddy you with politics, you're better than that. Let me ask you about what we understand in the data now about testing. President says we're going to be up at 5 million testing in no time. How? How can you explain that we're going to scale up as fast as he says, even though that wouldn't even be enough? But can we get there that fast?

GUPTA: I think I'd have a hard time imagining how that would happen. I mean, let me show you the numbers, Chris, in terms of where we are, where we need to be and then where we ultimately need to go.

Right now, total, OK, 5.5 million - 5.8 million tests total. What the White House says they're going to be doing as a result of the plans they released yesterday, about 2 percent roughly of the country a month. OK. 6 to 7 million tests a month.

What this, this new plan from Harvard - the roadmap says 5 million tests a day by June and then 20 million tests a day by Midsummer. So the White House plan 6 to 7 million tests a month. Ultimately, we need to be at 20 million a day. So, it's a whole magnitude of difference here in terms of where the goals are being set and where they need to be.

And a lot of things need to come together. If you're going to go from 6 million to potentially 600 million tests a month, there's all those reagents, the swabs, all the things that we've been talking about, Chris have to be in place. Maybe there'll be new breakthroughs in testing, which would really help this equation. But this doesn't look like we're planning for what needs to be done right now.

CUOMO: Right. And remember he's not going to do it. The states are going to do it and they're cash strapped and it takes manpower. And the tracing has to go hand in hand with it, because every time you get a negative, you've got to chase it down and that's why we're still not talking about tracing.

I want to check two more boxes with you before we run out of time. One, antibodies. What's the latest thinking on whether or not you have any cause to celebrate if God forbid you get COVID or - and you get through it or you don't even know you had it and you have antibodies.

GUPTA: The honest answer is we don't know for sure right now in terms of whether or not it's going to give you protection. And if it does, how long or how strong. Many people believe, and I think with good reason, that it should behave like other viruses, including other coronaviruses, which means you will get some immunity for some period of time and that's going to be important.

I made the graph, Chris, that I promised you last night just to show you this.

CUOMO: Thanks.

GUPTA: How the antibodies sort of come about. So the blue line is your symptoms of infection. Green line is IgM. People are going to start knowing these terms that they never really thought they'd have to know before. The red line is IgG. But you can see these two antibodies sort of cross over for a period of time, because I think you said you had both, I think, if I remember what you told me yesterday.

CUOMO: Yes.

GUPTA: So you can look at where the red line and green line sort of meet there.

CUOMO: I had the low lining (ph) of IgM--

GUPTA: Yes. Low level of IgM and you have IgG. So you're probably in that - I wouldn't be surprised if you still had some mild symptoms, because you're still in that sort of out of the window of active infection, but still symptomatic a little bit according to that graph. Everyone's different, obviously. But I just wanted you to see sort of where you probably are in the trajectory of your illness. Chris.

CUOMO: Very helpful. I will tell you what, we'll talk offline. I had that blood panel done and I'll tell you what, I think you guys are going to learn that this virus is doing all kinds of crazy stuff to us, because my blood work is cuckoo.

[21:25:00]

Nobody would understand anyway and they don't care. But I'll talk to you about it offline, because I was - my doctor is like, sit me down when she is talking about my blood work today. This is going to take a while to get back to where you were before you get this virus.

Now let me ask you something else. Meet, this idea of Tyson saying, listen we got a problem here, because we got a lot of workers in tight spaces where it's tough to keep them - the President says, I got this. I'll basically make them essential workers and they have to go back to work.

The workers are like, whoa, we can't be kept safe. This is tough. What is the balance in test here? How do you do this right.

GUPTA: Well, this is really tough one. I mean - because there's something besides just distance here in this equation, and this is something you and I've talked about. By the way, the CDC has a whole set of guidelines now just for this industry, so people should look at this. But you can see how seriously the CDC is trying to take this as well.

Problem is that you have distance six feet but also duration. You know this is why restaurants are probably potentially problematic, because you sit somewhere for an hour or so potentially in proximity even if you're physically distant away, it's duration, prolonged contact that seems to be a bit of an issue as well.

And that goes back to the meat packing industry, because people are actually next to each other. I watched these videos from Tyson in terms of how things are normally done. And people are staying next to each other for hours on end. So how do you separate people and cut down on that duration and still actually manufacture at the level you need to manufacture?

I don't know. It's really challenging and people have died, obviously who worked for the company and that sends a psychological wave through things as well. People are really frightened, understandably that they might contract the virus there.

CUOMO: I mean, Tyson's own numbers have thousands of people being affected by the virus, but this is going to be a tough call. There's going to - people are going to be unhappy no matter what in this situation. But this is really the biggest blow - potential blow to the food supply chain that we've seen. This is something we would have to watch closely, because it is a very tough set of circumstances. Sanjay Gupta, thank you for being the best of us, as always.

GUPTA: We'll see you soon buddy.

CUOMO: All right. The President insists we have enough testing to begin reopening America again. Now, by the way, that can't be right, but that answer isn't enough either. The math will tell the story.

My next guest says it's going to take tens of billions to properly test and trace. Remember, they're not talking about tracing yet. We have to. It matters as much as the testing. OK? To isolate those who have it and who they may have spread it to. There's a plan for Congress that we're going to float past you. What do you think about it? Let's see. Next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[21:30:00]

CUOMO: All right, so now we're talking testing, great, because testing is huge, but here's the reality. We will need more testing than anybody is talking about no matter what numbers they're throwing around on the federal level or they're planning for. We're still nowhere close.

And here's the other word that you just have to put into your vocabulary on this, tracing. Why? Because for every positive case you get, what about the people they've been in contact with? Who's going to find them? Those are all potential positive cases. You're not hearing about it. Why? It's another scary thing that this government is shy on and it takes manpower and manpower takes money.

Now, I know this is uncomfortable for a lot of leaders. That's too bad. You need to be aware, we have to be talking about it. It's going to make a big difference in what our new normal looks like. OK? So let's bring in former acting administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid. Andy Slavitt.

Andy, welcome back to PRIME TIME. Thank you for being with us. First of all, supposition number one. Yes. They're throwing out some impressive numbers about how they want to ramp up testing at the federal level and how they'll carry through to the states. The numbers are still nowhere near what experts who are looking at this suggest we'd have to do to have any real sense of how we're doing with this virus in real time.

ANDY SLAVITT, FORMER ACTING ADMINISTRATOR CENTERS FOR MEDICARE AND MEDICAID SERVICES: Yes, I think it's going to be a few months. And, look, even in a few months' time we're not going to be able to test everybody who wants one. We just saw data today, which showed that 92 percent of people who wanted a test were not able to get one.

Now, I think that's probably better today than it was then, but it's still nowhere close to what the president said, which is that everybody who wants a test should be able to get one and that's what we need to aim for.

CUOMO: Right. And look, even if they had the raw number of tests they need, which they don't that's a disingenuous answer because it's not just about having the test, it's about the things that go along with it, the reagent and all the different things to apply the test, the labs to process, the manpower to process, you know, all that part.

And then you have tracing. Now you tutored me early on and why nobody was talking about tracing. It's too hard and it was too scary for, because it's too hard to find the people and it takes a lot of time and every day that you can't find somebody there's another day that they're infecting more people and it's just better to ignore this, but we can't ignore it anymore. Can we?

SLAVITT: Well, I think the hope is that once we get the number of cases under control, that what we've been living through, Chris, in particularly in New York, has been a rabid forest fire. What we want to do, we're not going to get rid of COVID-19, but we can do is hope that every time we could manage it, we can manage it to little campfires. And we see a little campfire, we can surround it. It doesn't, we put some stones around it. We wet - we water the ground. That's what this is all about.

[21:35:00]

It's about making sure that we have small number of cases. And that if I get sick, and I find out that I'm sick, that somebody helps me figure out who are all the people that I was in contact with in some sort of systematic way, because I don't want them to get sick and that's what we're talking about here. And so that we put a proposal together in front of Congress yesterday that we hope they act on, that I think is going to help really make--

CUOMO: Right. That's what I'm reading about while you're talking. So Slavitt and Scott Gottlieb, another big brain who's worked on this on numerous levels, 46.5 billion for tracing and isolating, 12 billion to help expand the contact tracing workforce by 180,000 people.

4.5 billion to use vacant hotels to isolate the people that you wind up tracing and finding out need to be monitored/tested. 30 billion over 18 months of income support. 30 billion to offer 18 months of income support. A per person stipend of $50 a day, like jury duty for those self-isolating.

The political pushback will be, are you crazy? All this money, all this people for what? We'll just test and we're never going to get to zero. You guys are being hypersensitive. This is not a science test. It's not an academic discussion at Harvard. This is reality. Get with it.

SLAVITT: Well, look, this is why we pulled together - Scott and I pulled together 14 other people including, Larry Brilliant, the guy who cured smallpox, including the guy who helped prevent AIDS from spreading by doing all of the contact tracing and people from both parties. We talked to Congress, we talked to the White House. We wanted to get their concerns.

And, indeed, people have some similar legitimate concerns and we think we addressed all of them. And, fundamentally, by saying, look, number one, we will help you in a private secure way figure out who you've been in contact with so you don't spread this around.

Number two, if you need to social - if you need to isolate and you don't have room at home, because you don't have a big enough house, you've got a one-bedroom apartment, you live with your grandmother, we will put you in a nice hotel space. You could watch Chris Cuomo at night. You can watch two weeks of cable until you're better.

And then third is, for people who live paycheck to paycheck, and their employer is not going to pay them, they're not going to be able to socially isolate. So for those two weeks, those folks really are performing a civil service. They're keeping the rest of us healthy.

So we thought to pay them over those couple of weeks, a small stipend, kind of like jury duty, which is the other kind of - like a civil service you're performing. In that way we think we'll be able to contain this virus. And I think with the people who signed this letter and the conversations that we've had, I'm very hopeful that it comes across as a credible practical solution. It's also a stimulus for the economy.

CUOMO: Why is it a stimulus for the economy?

SLAVITT: Well, first of all, I think getting 180,000 people working is not - well, it's not nothing. We'll also put $5 billion into the hotel and motel industry because they have lot of vacant rooms. And then, we'll put some money in people's pockets that needs to be there.

So we think this - but even more so, Chris, this will help us open up the economy faster. Because once you're able to test and trace, you can look around and say, hey, wait a minute. I feel safer. I feel like I can go to work. I feel like I may be able to bring my employees back. I feel like maybe I can work again because I know not that there won't be any COVID-19, but if there is any, there'll be able to find out where it is and who it's impacted and it's a feeling of safety we need to give back to the people of this country.

CUOMO: All right, so let's talk about that last part here, because I think it is the big X factor, which is how will Americans feel with more cases? I think it's the hardest thing to measure. We were all freaked out when this happened. We didn't want any cases. Everybody stayed home because they didn't want to get sick.

I suggest to you, and I want you a better take, that's going to fade and people's appetites for doing what they want to do will overwhelm what is needed to do to keep cases really low. And they'll say, but you know what? I'm OK with it.

And yes, I know that there's still more cases, I know cases are coming, I know it's taking longer because we're doing these things, but I want to do these things. And I know some people are dying, but I'm OK with it. Fatigue. And the only part I don't like about the fatigue, because I think the society should have whatever mores the masses suggests, is that it's going to be minorities and people in socioeconomic and tough spots with preexisting conditions that live in impoverished areas who are going to be paying the biggest price and it's going to be an uneven distribution. But that X factor of fatigue, of concern, is that one of the biggest things to watch?

SLAVITT: Oh, completely. Look, I think first of all, it's been - it's obviously been very hard on people. It's been hard on everybody. It's either - if it's not been hard on you economically or from a health standpoint, it's been hard on you sociologically. Right? I mean, we're used to having our support system around us, we haven't had that.

[21:40:00]

On the other hand, I've got to tell you, I could not be more impressed with the way the American public has responded to this threat. I think there has been a unity, a sense of sacrifice. I think quite, frankly, lots of lives have been saved. We've spared our hospitals from being overrun by and large. We're giving our scientists time. And the public really pulled together.

I mean, yes, there's, there's protest on TV and yes, there's all kinds of angst. Yes, there's governors opening this and that. But there's always going to be those exceptions. There's been some really reliable polls, including one by the Kaiser Family Foundation to the 80 percent of people believe in what they've been doing now.

I think that will fade over time, Chris, it has to. People can't keep this up forever. But I have to say, it's been incredibly impressive and incredibly encouraging and I think, hopefully, at least some of that spirit of camaraderie in community will last.

CUOMO: Right. I mean, look, Andy, first of all, thank you for coming on the show and explaining this. It's provocative what you're talking about, but we have to talk about tracing and isolating, it's as important as the testing. They all go together. We're just not talking about them that much, because they create political risk for people and we are in an environment where our leaders, especially up top, take as little risk as they can.

But I say all the time, nobody got it wrong, the American people got it right. They did things that couldn't be predicted in the projections initially. We did better than anyone would have expected. How we will do it going forward remains to be seen. But, Andy, I love you. And thank you.

Now, look, everybody knows we've got to do more. Literally, we. We are going to have to continue to step up and continue to forbear. But nobody is putting themselves on the line the way our health care workers are, and nobody's paying the price the way they are.

We just lost a doctor who actually survived her own COVID battle. She then took her own life this weekend. Why? Because that's how hard it is. And that's how many are hurting. The emotional toll, psychological toll, the mental health toll of this virus attacks every bit as much as the virus attacks us physically and we're ignoring it and I don't want to do that tonight. She deserves better.

We have her father here tonight. She was in the trenches. He wants to tell her story about what it is that killed her and what you need to know about how she lived her life, next.

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[21:45:00]

CUOMO: I hope by now you are aware that this virus is attacking our body completely and that includes our minds, our emotions every bit, as much as it does any other organ and system of the body. Health care workers, especially the ones on the front lines, they're feeling this more than most.

Distressed calls are up. We see it in the data. People are being killed from the mental and emotional toll. It just happened to one of our heroes this past Sunday. Dr. Lorna Breen, now the doctor treated COVID patients at New York Presbyterian Hospital. By all accounts, she was well respected and by all accounts she stepped up with the best during the worst of this.

She even contracted COVID herself. Dealt with it, as soon as she was better. She went back to work and then after all she did for others, Sunday, she died by suicide. Her father says she was killed by the enemy on the front lines and I'm sad to say he's right. He is a retired surgeon. His name is Dr. Philip Breen and he joins us now. Doctor, can you hear me? Can you see me?

DR. PHILIP BREEN, FATHER OF LATE E.R. DOCTOR LORNA BREEN: Yes, indeed I can. I can hear you very well. Thank you.

CUOMO: Doctor, I am very sorry to meet you under these circumstances and I hope you accept not just my condolences, but my thanks for your daughter in the city where I and so many other millions live, for doing the work of keeping so many safe, especially when it came at such a cost to her and to you, her family. Thank you, sir.

BREEN: You're very welcome.

CUOMO: What do people need to know about who your daughter was and what she was about?

BREEN: Well, she was a doctor every bit of the word that a doctor should be. She put her life on the line to take care of other people. She was in the trenches, so to speak, right, in the front lines. People were dying left and around her. And indeed, as you pointed out, she contracted the virus herself. Went home sick. Had it proven that she did have the virus and indeed stayed home for it, just a little more than a week, which I don't think was enough in hindsight.

But she - I think she felt an overwhelming sense of wanting to help her colleagues and her friends who are still fighting the good fight. And so she strapped on her harness and took the bit in her mouth and she went back.

And she talked to her just before her final 12-hour shift. And it during the time she was on that shift she went down in the traces like a horse that had pulled too heavy a load and couldn't go a step further and just went down.

And so she went down, she was retrieved and brought back by her family to Charlottesville, Virginia where she was hospitalized for brief period of time. Judged well enough to be out on our own. But, clearly, was not better and her sister's told me that you could see in her eyes that there was something not there.

[21:50:00]

But any way, as of Sunday, she took her own life because I think she was tired. And she was the kind of person that somebody has very aptly put it, she was like the fireman who runs into the burning building to save another life and doesn't regard anything about herself. So she has paid that price. She has been in the trenches.

CUOMO: Doctor, I can't imagine what it's like for you to have to talk through this about your own child. But at least you have the legacy of her commitment following in your footsteps and creating her own path.

And just so people understand, before this experience, was the doctor struggling with anything that was own to you as her family?

BREEN: No, not at all. No, not at all. As a matter of fact, we talked about it quite a bit before and during it. And we have reviewed - the other members of the family have concluded that if we ever were trying to prognosticate about who would be solid, Lorna would have been the very last person to have lost her equilibrium, so to speak.

She had not one scintilla of any emotional or problem of stress or anything. She was a very outgoing person. She was a snowboarder. She played the cello in one of the orchestras in town. She volunteered at a nursing home. She was a salsa dancer. She just did everything and everybody thought she was really neat, including me. But when she went she just ran out of steam completely. And like I say, in my mind, its sort of like a horse trying to pull a heavy load and she was beat to the point where she went right down on our knees, right between the reins and with the bit in her mouth and died from the - trying to help.

CUOMO: Well, of course, you understand all this because you are clinician, you are a doctor. But a virus like this, first of all, there's huge unknown. We don't understand how it affects the body. But the idea that it would affect your emotions and how you feel and your mental health, as well as it would your physical health, makes complete sense, but we're just not focused on it. What do you make of that?

BREEN: Well, here's what I make of that. You know, the point is that the majority of patients who are dying are dying of pulmonary death. They're basically drowning, because their lungs are filled with fluid. And a lot of blame has been put on that.

But, increasingly in the literature, and I think when this is all said and done, there's going to be a gathering publication evidence that this virus affects the person's mind as well as their physical being, like their lungs.

And that it is - has worked on the brains of people who have been sick without us even identifying it to begin with. And Lorna would be an example of somebody who is a poster child for proving that this virus it is indeed working on people's minds and psychological equilibrium and really wreaking great havoc. But this this remains to come into the literature as time goes on. It hasn't really gotten prevalent right now.

CUOMO: Doctor, I must say I really admire your courage and your poise. I know you've seen a lot. I know you're a surgeon, and I also know it's different when it's your own family. So once again, just let me say I'm not going belabor this. But your daughter, by all accounts, was not just beautiful inside and out, but she lived a beautiful life.

And I just hope you can accept the thanks of people like me and so many whom she helped in this city during the time of really profound need. And I hope that is her legacy in a young, but very full life. Doctor, I am so sorry for your loss.

BREEN: Thank you very much. I would remiss - but I'd be remiss by not pointing out that even as we speak, there are thousands of people just like her in the front lines doing physical battle with the enemy and getting no recognition, no reward, no nothing for it. So my hat goes off to all these people who are doing their best to do a good job, and to take care of your fellow men without questioning about what they're doing to themselves.

CUOMO: Well, it's very magnanimous of you to want others included at a time of your own personal loss. And you are, of course, correct and there are also too many who suffer in silence about the mental and emotional effects of this virus and other illnesses and we will make sure that we talk about it much more than we have already. Dr. Breen, please extend my condolences to the family and let me know if there's anything we can do.

[21:55:00]

BREEN: Very kind of you to say so, and thank you very much.

CUOMO: Thank you, sir. And listen, let's just start now. OK? People are suffering in silence. The doctors, of course, right, were not given enough credit, nor support to the people who are fighting this battle for us most acutely.

But I want to remind you, if you're taking the toll because off the virus or just because the experience that we're all living through, it's so traumatic in so many different ways. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is always there, 1-800-273-TALK. 1-800-273-TALK. That's 1-800-273-8255. Once again tonight. I'll put it on social media. And, look, don't roll your eyes, don't roll your eyes. It's as real as any manifestation of illness. Mind, body, sprit, it is all vulnerable.

Now, let's keep honoring those on the front lines. All right. As an homage as honoring the loss of Dr. Lorna Breen, how some of our heroes are helping raise the spirits of one another, next.

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