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About Two Million People Have Been Vaccinated For The Coronavirus; A Columbus, Ohio Police Chief Wants An Officer Fired After The Deadly Shooting Of A Black Man; We Take A Look At The Hardships And Struggles That Have Came In 2020. Aired 7:30-8a ET
Aired December 28, 2020 - 07:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[07:30:00]
DR. JONATHAN REINER, PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY: And other healthcare facilities around the United States and we really have to spend a lot of time educating the public about the safety and efficacy of these vaccines.
So, we've vaccinated about 2 million people, even if -- even if that number is a little bit larger because of issues with reporting, still not nearly enough. So, that's a million people a week.
To get to 80 percent of the population we need to vaccinate about 250 -- 260 million folks, closer almost to 300 million people and that will take us five years at that rate. So, that's obviously not -- that's obviously not going -- not going to do it.
But as the vaccine gets out into 1B, when we open it up to folks who are over the age of 75 and frontline workers and we start seeing vaccine in retail chains like CVS and Walgreens and Target and places like that, we'll see much larger numbers.
But I had some conversations with colleagues at work today about starting -- this weekend about starting to think about innovative ways to distribute vaccine to the community, you know, mobile -- you know -- vans that take vaccine out into vaccination days at churches or in school yards, things like that. Really getting out in the grassroots level and using that also as an opportunity to educate about the safety and need and efficacy of these vaccines.
ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN HOST: I mean obviously vaccines are the huge game changer, but so are would home testing be. And, you know, we keep hearing about how the FDA has approved it. When will this be common place that we can have -- go to CVS and buy a home testing kit and administer it ourselves and get the results?
REINER: Oh not soon enough. Look, I -- I thought that was the key to opening schools all along. Now, it -- it has not reached the level of consumer use in the United States because of concerns whether it was sensitive enough.
In other words, whether that kind of testing has too -- too much false negatives, but that was really a fallacious argument. Think about home testing as a gigantic fishnet. Maybe the holes are slightly larger in this fishnet, but because the net is so large you capture so many more fish. That's what home testing is. We should have had that months ago, hopefully we'll have it over the next several months.
SCIUTTO: It's a big miss for the country with enormous consequences.
REINER: Yes.
SCIUTTO: Let's hope the vaccine rollout goes better. Dr. Jonathan Reiner, thanks so much as always.
REINER: My pleasure, thank you.
SCIUTTO: Well Columbus, Ohio's police chief wants an officer fired after the deadly shooting of a black man. See what happened and hear from that man's family. That's next.
[07:32:30]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[07:36:50]
CAMEROTA: The family of Andre Hill, an unarmed black man fatally shot by a Columbus, Ohio police officer is demanding justice this morning. Police just released body cam video and we must warn you, it is very disturbing to watch.
On December 22, police were called to a non-emergency in the area. Video shows Mr. Hill walking towards the officer with a cell phone in his left hand, his right hand was not visible on the video, then the officer opens fire.
Instead of immediately providing aid to Mr. Hill as he lay on the ground --
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Get your (bleep) hands out to the side. Hands out to the side now.
CAMEROTA: -- dying, the officer is heard there cursing and shouting at him to get his hands out. The police officer -- the police chief I should say has called for that officer to be fired.
And we're joined now by the attorney for the Hill family Benjamin Crump and Andre Hill's daughter Karissa Hill and his sister Shawna Barrett. Ladies, we're so sorry that your family is going through this.
KARISSA HILL, ANDRE HILL'S DAUGHTER: Thank you.
BENJAMIN CRUMP, ATTORNEY FOR ANDRE HILL FAMILY: Thank you.
SHAWNA BARNETT, ANDRE HILL'S SISTER:
CAMEROTA: Karissa, tell us what you thought when you -- when police released that video and you saw what happened to your dad. HILL: Well, they came to my house and they showed me the video. It was five strangers and they just showed me a guy get out of a car with a gun and shoot my dad as soon as they saw him. And that's all that's in my head is my dad laying on the floor.
CAMEROTAI mean, did that video --
HILL: After that video.
CAMEROTA: -- yes, I mean Karissa, could that video answer any questions for you?
HILL: None at all. My family raised so many questions and concerns after that video.
CAMEROTA: Shawna, what do you see on that video.
BARNETT: I saw them take my brother's life, snatch his life away within a matter of seconds, no questions asked or anything and then leave him on the ground like an animal and not administer any kind of medical help or anything.
CAMEROTA: Shawna, I've -- I've heard you say your brother was not violent, he was the opposite of violent, he was a helper. He had on I mean -- and a tragic show of symbolism. He was wearing a Black Lives Matter shirt when he was shot.
What -- what can you tell us about your brother?
BARNETT: My brother was the most loving person that you could ever meet. He had no -- he knew no strangers, he didn't have a violent bone in his body. He was always the person who would lend a helping hand, always the person to deescalate and calm situations down. He was not -- that was not his character to be intruding or anything like that on anybody. So, my question that I need to have answered is why. Why did this happen to him?
CAMEROTA: Yes. Karissa, you said that your dad was your best friend, you lived with him. He was a vital part of your kid's lives. And so --
HILL: Yes ma'am.
[07:40:00]
CAMEROTA: -- so how do you make sense of any of this?
HILL: I'm still trying to make sense with it, honestly. I'm still trying to face reality that this is my dad that everybody's talking about. I'm just used to seeing this on the news now. I'm just used to seeing police use brutal force. I just never thought that my dad, him kissing me on Monday night in my bathroom before he left would be his last time kissing me.
CRUMP: (INAUDIBLE).
HILL: My children --
CAMEROTA: Yes, go ahead, Karissa.
CRUMP: I'll let her -- go ahead, Karissa.
HILL: My children, they still -- they're still not understanding where their big daddy is at. And that's what they're used to, is their big daddy on Christmas. They're used to their big daddy and we couldn't even have a Christmas dinner, because this officer took their big daddy away.
CAMEROTA: Yes. I mean, obviously, this coming three days before Christmas is just another horrible blow for the family.
Mr. Crump, why didn't police render aid after this? I mean -- never mind why did this happen. Why then didn't they help him once they realized that a horrible mistake had been made here?
CRUMP: Alisyn, it seems to be a flagrant disregard for human life and as Shawna and Karissa said, no one understands why they shot this unarmed African-American who had a cell phone in his hand and nothing else, in the first place, and we definitely don't understand why none of them, not one officer rendered medical assistance to him, even though they are trained to be first responders and he is literally on the ground gasping for breath.
Alisyn, it seems to be this culture that you shoot first and ask questions later when there's Black people. But then you don't even treat them with the benefit of humanity.
I mean, there is video that the family understands exists that after seven minutes of him laying motionless on the ground, they then put him in handcuffs. And so we're demanding that the other police body cam video be released, so the world can see that they continue to show disrespect to unarmed Black people in 2020 after seeing George Floyd, after seeing Jacob Blake Jr., after seeing Ahmad Aubrey.
How many more Black people will die in 2020 before we say, enough is enough? This is 96 Black people since George Floyd was killed on May 25th, 2020, that has been killed by the police.
CAMEROTA: So just so I'm clear on that, Mr. Crump, you're saying 96 unarmed Black people have been shot since George Floyd?
CRUMP: We know The Guardian said 96 Black people, Black men and women. And there may be different circumstances, but we know that number, during a pandemic, is just shocking, when you think about George Floyd was supposed to be the turning point where we stopped this and the fact that Andre Hill had a Black Lives Matter t-shirt, that had justice for George Floyd on it when he was shot.
CAMEROTA: Yes. I do want to ask you about that. Shawna, what did -- the fact that your brother was wearing Black Lives Matter, what did that mean to him?
BARNETT: That meant everything to him. The struggle that we go through, as far as Black Lives Matters, how people are -- how our people are being just shot and killed for no reason. And not getting any justification, like our lives don't matter. Like we're not worth anything.
I mean, I stated before, animals have more rights than we do right now. It seems that they care more for the animals out here. To let my brother lay there and die and not offer him any help in the whole 13- minute footage that we watched is unacceptable.
CRUMP: But yet, they put him in handcuffs. They don't offer medical assistance; they put a dead man in handcuffs.
BARNETT: While the officer was able to relieve his cough and get water. They let my brother lay there and didn't offer any help or assistance to him.
CAMEROTA: Karissa, I know that your kids are little. What have you told them about what happened?
[07:45:00]
HILL: Well, unfortunately, my 6-year-old, he saw it on the news, because I guess it's everywhere, so he ended up seeing it by his self, and I had to tuck him in and talk to him about it, actually.
My son just said that he prays to God that big daddy gets off the floor and comes home. And it was just the hardest thing to have to tell him that big daddy is here with us and we've just got to fight for what's right and what big daddy wants. And he just looked at me and said, I'm going to be strong like big daddy told me to be.
CAMEROTA: Mr. Crump, what's next? What's the status of this officer?
CRUMP: Well, today, they're having a termination hearing based on the mayor and the police chief's recommendation. However, there is no guarantee that he will be terminated. And that's inexplicable to us, but we will find out that information today, whether this officer will be terminated, especially based on his history, Alisyn.
He apparently used excessive force against another citizen, beating his head into a windshield and that has been reported on. So what more will it take for us to say that some people are not fit to have a badge and a gun and be able to use deadly force in the name of the law?
CAMEROTA: Karissa, Shawna, we'll stay on this case. We're so sorry that you're going through this. Obviously, there are still so many questions that need to be answered.
Mr. Crump, please keep us posted on what happens and we'll be watching today.
HILL: Thank you --
BARNETT: All right (ph) --
CRUMP: Thank you, Alisyn.
CAMEROTA: Thank you for talking to us and we'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[07:50:00]
SCIUTTO: Let's come home (ph), let's cliche now (ph). For many of us 2020 can not end soon enough. Just a year ago the word coronavirus not even on our radar, now it's something we'll likely talk about for rest of our lives. CNN's Clarissa Ward looks back on the year of the pandemic and other big moments of a year frankly like no other.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CLARISSA WARD, CNN CHIEF INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: It's been a year we'll never forget. In 2020 we witnesses world changing paradigm shifting events all happening under the cloud of the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic.
UNKNOWN MALE: But what's the secret?
WARD: And CNN was there every step of the way.
UNKNOWN FEMALE: He was very scared.
UNKNOWN FEMALE: This is no longer safe.
WARD: A stretch of bad events started off the year. Wildfires engulfed Australia with apocalyptic scenes.
We can't see the fire but we can certainty smell it and feel it.
Burning up to 73,000 square miles, about the size of the state of South Dakota and killing an estimated one billion animals.
UNKNOWN MALE: This is not normal. It's like fires on steroids.
WARD: Lives were lost and thousands of homes destroyed.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: A day after claiming that Iran's top commander was planning to attack a U.S. embassy--
WARD: The death of Iranian General Qasem Soleimani in a U.S. drone strike on January 3 led to days of terrifying tension between the U.S. and Iran.
UNKNOWN MALE: Saying that there would be revenge, there would be some sort of response from the Iranians.
WARD: Threats of war and Iran's retaliatory attack on Iraqi bases housing U.S. troops.
UNKNOWN MALE: God damn.
UNKNOWN MALE: I'm not going to lie I was scared at the moment that it happened. It's something that we were ready for.
WARD: Just hours after Iran launched that ballistic missile attack on two U.S. military bases in Iraq a Ukrainian passenger plane was shot down in Iran killing all 176 people onboard.
UNKNOWN MALE: New video obtained by CNN seems to show a missile strike as a fast moving projectile flies across the sky before striking another object.
WARD: But Wolf, CNN has obtained new footage, CCTV (ph) footage that appears to show the dramatic and extraordinary force of the impact as that Ukrainian air liner slammed into the ground into Iran.
Meanwhile in China, the strange new virus began to spread. It's presence a silent clock counting down to the time it would bring the world to its knees.
UNKNOWN MALE: You've got to grasp the scope of this, 20 million people. That's what we're talking about.
UNKNOWN MALE: We've noticed a good number of people rushing to this train station. This railway station is located just a few blocks away from the seafood market, the epicenter according to health officials of this virus.
UNKNOWN FEMALE: Coronavirus is showing no signs of letting up.
UNKNOWN MALE: It was back in late December when Li sent a group message saying that a test result from a patient quarantined at the hospital where he worked showed a patient had a coronavirus. But hours after hitting send, Wuhan city health officials tracked Li down questioning where he got the information.
[07:55:00]
WARD: Dr. Wenliang would pay with his life for his bravery like thousands of other medical professionals on the front lines all over the world.
UNKNOWN MALE: (Inaudible). I can't breathe.
WARD: Shutdowns followed across the globe. Life as we knew it seemed to grind (ph) to a halt overnight.
UNKNOWN MALE: For the town of (inaudible) the month of March was a month of daily death. You just need to look at the death notices here. This woman died on the 7 of March. This man died on the 8 of March.
UNKNOWN MALE: Standing here you not only see the (inaudible) of this disease but the silence with which it kills.
WARD: Empty flights, deserted city centers and cruise ships floating listlessly through the open water, their trapped passengers hoping in vain for a place to port. The virus made its way around the world like the grim reaper taking victims as it spreads it wrath.
UNKNOWN MALE: I was called out last night to a dear old gentleman. It was his wife of many years had passed away.
UNKNOWN MALE: This video shows patients lying on the floor at a (inaudible) hospital.
UNKNOWN MALE: These are bodies and if just watching the video is difficult imagine going through those containers in-person looking for your dad's body.
WARD: On March 11, the World Health Organization declared a global pandemic.
UNKNOWN MALE: Pandemic is not a word to use lightly.
WARD: By then, life as we knew it already long gone, millions across the world living for months under strict lockdowns to try to stop the spread of the virus. Face masks became a familiar sight and social distancing a way of life.
In early August, Lebanon was struck by a massive deadly explosion sparked by the detonation of thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate killing more than 170 people and injuring more than 6,000 others.
UNKNOWN MALE: This is where CNN's office used to be.
WARD: Something of this magnitude so unnecessary. This has pushed the rage felt by the Lebanese population to unprecedented level.
In 2020, CNN exclusively exposed a troll factory in Ghana backed by Russia that was actively aiming to influence the 2020 U.S. presidential election. And let me tell you, Anderson, it's not where you might have expected it to be.
This is the compound where the operation has been based. There's no sign for an NGO. We're about an hour outside of the city and to CNN (inaudible) investigation identified Russian FSB operatives who trailed Putin's nemesis (inaudible) before he was poisoned.
UNKNOWN MALE: I get out of this bathroom, turn over to the flight attendant and said to him I was poisoned. I'm going to die.
WARD: After a difficult spring fighting the COVID-19 pandemic, most of Europe opened back up for the summer but despite the short rest bit (ph) in the summer months the virus back with a vengeance in the fall and winter in Europe.
UNKNOWN MALE: These things the Germans are doing now is they're outing a stricter lockdown in place a lot earlier than anybody would have thought.
UNKNOWN MALE: A troubling headline coming from the U.K.
UNKNOWN FEMALE: Worry growing over a new COVID variant.
UNKNOWN MALE: The implications of this new variant that could be 70 percent more infectious but not more deadly in the U.K. are growing. UNKNOWN FEMALE: French border is closed. All day long we've seen these police officers in (inaudible) jackets turning these 18 wheelers that you see behind me around with their goods.
WARD: Worldwide coronavirus cases hit 73 million in December. There were 16.5 million in the United States alone and more than one million deaths globally. A uniting global goal in 2020 a vaccine and by December we saw the first approved vaccines administered.
UNKNOWN MALE: Let the mass immunization program begin, 90-year-old Margaret Keenan making history as the first person in England and indeed the world to receive the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine outside the trial.
WARD: A moment of hope that 2021 will be the beginning of the end of the pandemic that spares no one. Clarissa Ward, CNN.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SCIUTTO: Listen, you can't underestimate the scale of the hardship, the life change but I will say that closing note sticks with me because there are reasons to be hopeful as we head into 2021. I mean there are two vaccines, right? And they're being rolled out by the millions today. It's going to take time but there's sign of hope.
CAMEROTA: Well, modern medicine has been remarkable in 2020. I mean the idea--
SCIUTTO: Yes.
CAMEROTA: -- that this happened so quickly and we've never seen it before but I can't believe we fit all of that into one year. You were telling me right before this that President Trump was impeached.
