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More U.S. States Ease Restrictions Despite Warnings; Trump Claims "The Experts Got It Wrong" On the Pandemic; U.S. Food Banks Struggle to Cope with Surging Demand; U.K. Death Toll Higher Than Initially Reported. Aired 5-5:30a ET

Aired April 29, 2020 - 05:00   ET

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

[05:00:13]

ROBYN CURNOW, CNN ANCHOR: Hi. Welcome to viewers in the United States and all around the world. Thanks for joining me. I'm Robyn Curnow.

So, just ahead here on CNN:

A rush to reopen. More states take their own measures to return to some sort of normalcy as division between leaders and health experts continue to cause confusion.

Plus, experts say a new generation of young people could experience a huge impact from the coronavirus, including everything from financial struggles to social differences. We have that.

And South Africans see many similarities in President Trump's handling of the coronavirus. Why it looks a lot like what they experienced during the AIDS pandemic.

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CURNOW: At this hour, we know a growing number of countries are moving forward with their plans to reopen their economies, even as the coronavirus continues to claim lives. Here in the U.S., some states not only easing stay-at-home orders, they're also starting to open parks, beaches and small businesses. But experts continue to warn that if restrictions are lifted too soon, the death tolls could start to rise again.

Now, in Georgia, for example, where we are here at CNN, one example, one model predicts that daily deaths would almost double by August if social distancing measures are relaxed. Despite these warnings, some people are desperate to get back to work. They are protesting the ongoing movement restrictions.

But others are still reluctant, we know, to return to normalcy. In California, schools and businesses remain closed.

Meantime, we're learning that the White House corona task force has not met in a few days. But in the coming hours, they are scheduled to hold their first meeting of the week. Well, this comes as the U.S. reached another sobering milestone.

According to Johns Hopkins University, the country now has crossed a million infections.

And as CNN's Jim Acosta now reports, the president is blaming experts for predicting the pandemic would not be this bad.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JIM ACOSTA, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): With the U.S. hitting 1 million cases of the coronavirus, President Trump is refusing to admit he got it wrong -- despite predicting back in February the number would be down to zero.

(on camera): You predicted that the number of cases would go down to zero. How did we get from your prediction of zero to 1 million?

DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, it will go down to zero ultimately. You have to understand when it comes to cases, we do much more testing than anybody else. The experts got it wrong. Amount of people got it wrong. And a lot of people --

ACOSTA: Did you get it wrong?

(voice-over): The president is insisting the U.S. has a handle on testing.

TRUMP: The only problem is the press doesn't give credit for that, because, you know, no matter what test you do, they'll say, oh, you should have done this, you should have tested 325 million people 37 times. No, the testing is going very well.

ACOSTA: The president is complaining about media coverage of the administration testing woes, even though he made this promise to Americans back in March.

TRUMP: Anybody that needs a test gets a test.

ACOSTA: The White House is trying to ramp up testing as new modeling shows a rising estimate for coronavirus deaths in the U.S., approximately 74,000 by August, from some 67,000 projected last week. Even the president appears to be embracing the new estimate.

TRUMP: Yes. We've lost a lot of people. If you look at original projections were, 2.2 million, we are probably heading to 60,000, 70,000. It's too many. One person is far too many for this. And I think we made a lot of really good decisions.

ACOSTA: Coronavirus task force doctor, Anthony Fauci, said the virus has become a global nightmare. .

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASE: What keeps me up is the emergence of a brand-new infection, likely jumping species from an animal that's respiratory- borne, highly transmissible, with a high degree of morbidity and mortality. And, lo and behold, that's where we are right now. The reason it is so unprecedented, it exploded upon us.

ACOSTA: Still, the White House is making more missteps, the Vice President Mike Pence touring the renowned Mayo Clinic in Minnesota without wearing a mask despite the clinic's policy that visitors wear masks.

The head of the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Stephan Hahn, wore a mask, but Pence didn't.

MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Since I don't have the coronavirus, I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to be here, to speak to the researchers, these incredible health care personnel, look them in the eye and say thank you.

ACOSTA: When the president was pressed on some of the early warnings he received on a potential for a pandemic.

TRUMP: I would have to check. I want to look to the exact dates of warnings.

ACOSTA: Mr. Trump tried to point the finger at Fauci, calling him Anthony.

[05:05:01]

TRUMP: You go back and you take a look, and even like professionals as Anthony saying this is no problem. This is late in February. This is no problem. This is going to blow -- this is going to blow over.

And they're professionals. And they're good professionals. But most thought this was going to blow over.

ACOSTA: But hold on, back in late February, Fauci did say it wasn't necessary for people to change their behavior but he warned the outbreak could be serious.

FAUCI: It depends on the nature of the outbreak. I mean, this could be a major outbreak. I hope not.

ACOSTA: Similar to warnings from other public health officials.

DR. NANCY MESSONNIER, CDC: It's not so much a question of if this will happen any more but rather more of exactly when this will happen and how many people in this country will have severe illness.

ACOSTA: Actually, at that time it was the president who was saying coronavirus cases would vanish.

TRUMP: When you have 15 people and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down close to zero, that's a pretty good job we've done.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CURNOW: Jim Acosta reporting there from Washington. Now, after President Trump spoke with reporters on Tuesday, he signed

an executive order forcing meat processing plants to remain open. Some of the largest plants in the U.S. had to shut down after workers tested positive for the virus, that at least we know 20 workers have died.

Well, this closure has prompted fears of the nation's food supply chain breaking down. But the head of the country's largest meatpacking union warned that order by the president needs to come with safety measures for workers. And they said while we share the concern over the food supply, today's executive order to force meatpacking plants to stay open must put the safety of our country's meatpacking workers first.

Simply put, we cannot have a secure food supply without the safety of these workers.

And as Jim just mentioned, Vice President Mike Pence, the chair of the coronavirus task force, is defending his decision not to wear a mask at the Mayo Clinic. Here's more of what he had to say about that.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PENCE: And as vice president of the United States, I'm tested for the coronavirus on a regular basis. And everyone who is around me has tested for the coronavirus. And 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 by wearing a mask.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CURNOW: Well, earlier, the clinic that it had informed Mr. Pence about its face mask policy even before he arrived. But also, that tweet has since being deleted.

Meanwhile, U.S. President Trump insists the U.S. is, quote, much better at testing for the virus than other countries. He tweeted the only reason the U.S. has reported a million cases of coronavirus is that our testing is so much better than any other country in the world. Other countries are way behind us in testing and therefore, far fewer cases, he said.

But facts first here. According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the U.S. is conducting an average of 16 tests per 1,000 people. While hard-hit areas like Italy and Spain administer 22 tests per 1,000 people.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta shares the actual number of tests the U.S. needs to perform daily. Take a listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Right now, total, OK, 5.5 million -- 5.8 million tests total. What the White House says they will 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 new plan from Harvard, the roadmap, says 5 million tests a day by June and then 20 million tests a day by mid-summer. So the White House plan, 6 to 7 million tests a month. Ultimately, we need to be at 20 million a day. So, you know, I mean, it's a whole magnitude of difference here in terms of where the goals are being set and where they need to be.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CURNOW: As you can see, Chris Cuomo there speaking to Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

So, I want to go now for some expert medical opinion.

Archie Clements is professor of infectious disease epidemiology at Curtin University in Perth, in Australia.

Sir, good to see you.

I know we can't say it often enough, but really, testing, testing, testing is the key for societies to try and get back to normal, and you know that all too well down there.

ARCHIE CLEMENTS, PROFESSOR OF INFECTIOUS DISEASE EPIDEMIOLOGY, CURTIN UNIVERSITY: Yes, indeed. In Australia, we've had very extensive testing from early on in the epidemic. We've had the highest testing rates in the world. And really, what that's given us is reassurance that, as we look to flatten the curve, if we had large scale community transmission, we'd be able to find it.

In Australia, we're in the privileged position right now where we're seeing very, very little community transmission. And lastly, we're on top of the epidemic and can now start thinking about how we relax some of the social distancing and other restrictions that we have in place.

[05:10:01]

CURNOW: And when you have that conversation, it's a conversation folks will be having across the world.

Here in Georgia, where I am in the U.S., they decided to let bowling alleys open, hairdressers, barber shops, restaurants all open as a first wave. In many ways, that's the opposite of what many other countries and other states are doing.

What is your sense of how Australia, and at least the folks who are doing it the right way will roll this out?

CLEMENTS: Well, in Australia, we're taking a risk-based approach and we're taking a slow and steady and phased approach, where the government's making decisions around relaxing some of the restrictions that are possibly lower risk, and then watching and seeing what happens, observing, and then thinking about lifting future restrictions. From an outside perspective looking at countries like the United

States, it seems way too early to be even discussing lifting social distancing measures. I know that there's a lot of impatience around getting the economy started again, but of course, the problem is, if you start lifting social distancing too quickly, you end up limiting your ability to flatten the curve, prolonging the pandemic, and worsening the economic consequences of the pandemic.

And so, I'm really concerned that in the United States you will see a much worse economic outcome because of that impatience to lift social distancing too early.

CURNOW: Let's also talk about what the world looks like in the next few months, possibly, actually, the next few years. I mean, I know a lot of people are saying, OK, let's look ahead to traveling. And I mean, I know you're in Perth there, which is in Western Australia. It's a good old flight just to Sydney from where you are.

But for people around the world, when do you see international travel, never mind, you know, internal travel, really taking off again? Is that going to be one of the last things that is opened up?

CLEMENTS: Absolutely. I think as community transmission gets under control in countries, social distancing will start to be relaxed, but the last thing that I think will be lifted will be the international travel restrictions.

If you look at countries like Australia, Taiwan, even China, where the epidemic is largely under control, the great risk is that we'll get resurgence with new cases coming in if we open up travel too early. So, I think that will be one of the last things to be relaxed and I do think we'll be living with travel restrictions for a number of years. They may not be hugely intrusive. They may not be as draconian as they are at moment, but I do think we will be living with some limitation on travel for some -- for a number of years.

CURNOW: You're an epidemiologist. I mean, obviously, these are social, financial, economic consequences of this. From an expert sort of medical opinion, what is the one thing -- and I'm asking a lot of doctors this -- what is the one thing that you still want to know about this coronavirus? Is there something that you think, you know, is the main overriding question from your expertise, that the world needs to know to get on top of this?

CLEMENTS: Well, the critical thing at the moment is the development of the vaccine, because that is the only way out of this pandemic. And really, what I would like to know is how effective is the virus in stimulating an immune response, how long are people immune for, to what extent can a vaccine invoke an immune response, and how quickly can we -- can we get through the scientific and regulatory process so that promising vaccines can be developed and rolled out? And really, so, the big question is around that.

CURNOW: OK, professor Archie Clements coming to us live from Perth, Australia, thanks so much. Really appreciate speaking to you.

CLEMENTS: You're welcome. Thank you.

CURNOW: Have a lovely day.

So, thousands of people we know are waiting for hours in line for food. This is one of the other consequences of this. Many say they've never had to do this before but are desperate to feed their families amid this pandemic here in the U.S.

Still to come, how American food banks are also just struggling to keep up with this.

Also, new data shows the death toll in the U.K. is much higher than initially reported. We'll explain the changes after this short break.

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[05:18:14]

CURNOW: Well, long, long lines for food banks have become an increasingly common and very distressing sign of the pandemic's impact across the U.S. Many of the people waiting for food say they've never had to ask for such help before, but laid off from their jobs, they're now desperate to feed their families.

As CNN's Jason Carroll now reports, these food banks are also actually struggling to cope with the demand.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

JASON CARROLL, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The line of cars stretch for more than a mile.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: How many people are in your household?

CARROLL: The wait for food at this emergency distribution site in Newark, New Jersey, more than an hour. But the need so great, those who came looking for help were more than willing to wait.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I've never done this before. It's a shame that I have to do this.

CARROLL: Many here say it is their first time asking for food.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There's two families in here. OK?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Open your trunk right here.

CARROLL: People like Rita Charles, who brought her elderly neighbor.

RITA CHARLES, FIRST TIME AT A FOOD BANK: We're alone, you know. Even my neighbor, you know, she's alone, too. So, that's why we appreciate it.

CARROLL: Julio Ortega, a furloughed truck driver, came with his wife, who was laid off from her job at a dry cleaner.

JULIO ORTEGO, FURLOUGHED TRUCK DRIVER: An experience, you know. First time. The kids, it's hard for them.

CARROLL: Week after week, as the number of unemployed rises across the country, so, too, does the number of people needing food assistance.

Feeding America, the nation's largest group of food banks, says it is now seeing a staggering 100 percent increase in demand at some of its distribution sites, like this one in Little Rock, Arkansas, where they ran out of food in less than an hour Tuesday.

The state seeing the biggest spike, Ohio, Florida, California, and Texas, where in San Antonio last week, people lined up for hours.

[05:20:05]

And with the increased demand comes more worries about meeting those demands, given diminishing donations food banks once received from what were reliable sources before the pandemic.

ERIC COOPER, SAN ANTONIO FOOD BANK CEO: Restaurants, hotels, and caterers aren't donating. Grocery stores are selling out. And so, there's not as much food to collect while the demand has doubled.

CARROLL: So much need, and yet, so much waste. Down the food chain, hogs in Minnesota to be euthanized, chickens slaughtered, their carcasses thrown out, while dairy farmers, such as Paul Fouts (ph), forced to dump 8,000 gallons of milk last week.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It kind of makes you feel sick to your stomach, really.

CARROLL: Part of the problem, restaurants and schools now closed, so farmers have fewer outlets to sell in bulk to. And with so many people sick, it has crippled their distribution channels, like the trucking industry.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I mean, the food's here. The farmers have it. And the consumers need it. Somehow, we've got to get the system in between to work for that.

CARROLL: Billions in federal assistance is scheduled in the next few weeks to aid farmers along with a program to get distributors to work with food banks. And at the state level, New York, which saw a 60 percent jump in food bank demand, launched an initiative to help cut the waste.

GOV. ANDREW CUOMO (D), NEW YORK: We're also immediately to stop this dumping of milk and get it to people who need it.

CARROLL: In the meantime, the lines and the demand keeps growing.

Jason Carroll, CNN, Newark, New Jersey.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CURNOW: Extraordinary scenes there. So, let's go to the U.K. New data from the British government shows

the true death toll from the coronavirus is much, much higher than initially thought there, and that's because it didn't initially include people who had died in private homes, hospices, and care homes.

So I want to go to London. Nic Robertson is joining me now.

Hi, Nic. And we were going to talk about the death toll, but I see in the last few minutes, we've got an email, just a sense of how extraordinary, the extraordinary times we're living in. The prime minister, Boris Johnson, he's just announced he's had a baby. So, we got some good news coming from where you are.

Tell us about that. What do we know? What a week for him.

NIC ROBERTSON, CNN INTERNATIONAL DIPLOMATIC EDITOR: Well, we have very few details about it so far. I think we can expect an update from Downing Street. We're more likely to hear, you know, some more personal comments from the couple later. Look, I mean, this is an incredibly serious time for the prime minister. He's only just back on the job. He's only just recovered sort of from what he's described as a near-death experience with coronavirus.

So, you know, every reason for the pair of them to be happy. Carrie Symonds herself just about three or four weeks ago, the fourth of April, was tweeting, I just spent the last seven days in bed with coronavirus symptoms.

And, obviously a lot of concerns for anyone who's pregnant during this particular time. This will be a very positive announcement for Downing Street and does go a long way to explain why last night downing street officials would not confirm whether or not Boris Johnson was going to show up in parliament in just a couple of hours' time for prime minister's question time.

Now we understand why. But he's still going to face those questions.

CURNOW: He most certainly is. But yes, what a week. He's back at work on Monday, has a baby on Wednesday, but still so many tough questions he needs to answer.

And one of them, no doubt, is the death toll in the U.K., spiking heavily. Just explain that to us.

ROBERTSON: Yes. I mean, what the British government's been doing here in their daily briefings is only telling the public on a daily basis the number of people that have died of coronavirus in hospital. But the office for national statistics produces data a couple of weeks or so in arrears, and the data it's producing has been shocking. It said that a third of all deaths across the country have been in care homes for the elderly people or the very sick.

So, this has masked the true magnitude of the death toll here. It's perhaps as much as 50 percent higher. That was certainly the case at the end of the 17th of April, just a week and a half ago, this month. So, what the government has now committed itself to doing is putting out statistics on a daily basis for not only those who have died in hospitals but those who have died in care homes, because those numbers are now tracking up to be almost as high as those in hospitals on a daily basis, and people who died at home.

And what this will do for the government on this daily chart, where they plot the U.K.'s experience death rate versus that in other North European countries, it's going to push Britain higher up the scale, so it's going to make the U.K. look like it's got the worst death rate of all North European countries, and that's not something, clearly, that puts the British government in good light.

[05:25:01]

The only country on the British government's chart that's worse than the U.K. right now is the United States.

So, now, they're putting all the data out there and it's not going to be pretty.

CURNOW: No, it certainly isn't.

Nic Robertson, thanks so much, live there from London. Good to see.

So, President Vladimir Putin has warned that a new and grueling phase of the coronavirus pandemic could be in store for Russia. In a televised statement, he announced self-isolation measures would continue through May 11th. Russia will eventually plan for reopening, he says, but Mr. Putin says the country has more dire needs at the moment and the worst is yet to come.

Well, Sweden has been an outlier in its response to the pandemic, while many countries across Europe are now looking to reopen, Sweden actually never closed, as you can see from these images. A CNN report compared its death and infections to other European countries and found more people have died there than in neighboring nations, but Sweden's prime minister, deputy prime minister, is defending the policy, saying the fight against COVID-19 is a marathon, not a sprint.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ISABELLA LOVIN, SWEDISH DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER: So, it's very much too early to say what strategy is the right one, but we also need to understand that we have to have these measures in place for a very, very long time. Sweden is not easing up on our measures. On the contrary, we're saying when our experts are telling us that we need more restrictions, we're ready to do that.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CURNOW: And we know at least one man agrees with the government's approach. Talk about a social contract. He got a tattoo of Sweden's chief epidemiologist who he says has done a good job in the handling of that pandemic. That is quite spectacular.

So, you're watching CNN. Still to come: we're about to find out officially just how bad of a

beating the U.S. economy has taken during this pandemic.

And then later, just what kind of a fix this crisis might have on young people. We'll talk with a writer from "The Atlantic" about generation C, Gen-C.

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