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Trump: CDC Has It Wrong On Vaccines And Masks; Sally Rescue Operations Begin; Almost 30 Fires Still Raging In Oregon; Trump Administration Pushing Imminent Vaccine Narrative; Growing Concerns over Vaccine Supply and Distribution; Report Slams Boeing, FAA for Deadly Crashes. Aired 1-2a ET
Aired September 17, 2020 - 01:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
JOHN VAUSE, CNN ANCHOR: Hello, welcome to our viewers from around the world.
I'm John Vause. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM.
Coming up this hour. The self-described stable genius and current U.S. president tells the CDC director with more than 40 years' medical experience he's got it wrong on vaccines and face masks.
Rescues are underway along the U.S. Gulf Coast after Sally dumped record amounts of life-threatening rain.
And CNN is there. With Turkey's Coast Guard rescuing migrants who say Greek authorities not only turned the boat around but left them adrift in dangerous waters.
At a White House news conference on Wednesday Donald Trump made it known that the director of the CDC had been spoken to and schooled about vaccines and face masks.
Trump told reporters that Robert Redfield, the man he chose to run the country's leading health protection agency, was confused and mistaken when he disagreed with the president while testifying before congress.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. ROBERT REDFIELD, DIRECTOR, CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL & PREVENTION: I think there will be a vaccine that'll initially be available sometime between November and December but very limited supply, and will have to be prioritized.
If you're asking me when is it going to be generally available to the American public so we can begin to take advantage of vaccine to get back to our regular life, I think we're probably looking at third -- late second quarter, third quarter 2021.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: We should note that what Dr. Redfield said there is what most experts agree with, but not the president. The timeline doesn't work with his political agenda.
Here he is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: I think he made a mistake when he said that. It's just incorrect information. And I called him and he didn't tell me that and I think he got the message maybe confused.
I saw the statement, I called him, I said what did you mean by that? And I think he just made a mistake.
KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: So you all had the call and you said that you told him that he had made a mistake. What was his response --
TRUMP: No, I didn't tell him anything.
COLLINS: -- and did he apologize.
TRUMP: I said what happened? And I got the impression that he didn't realize he said what he might have said.
COLLINS: But did--
TRUMP: I didn't see him say it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: And so, after that news conference, the CDC issued a statement saying in today's hearing Dr. Redfield was answering a question he thought was in regard to the time period in which all Americans would have completed their COVID vaccination.
And his estimate was by the second or third quarter of 2021.
He was not referring to the time period when COVID-19 vaccine doses would be made available to all Americans. A distinction perhaps, without a difference.
Then there was the CDC director's endorsement of face masks.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
REDFIELD: We have clear scientific evidence they work and they are our best defense.
I might even go so far as to say that this face mask is more guaranteed to protect me against COVID than when I take a COVID vaccine.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: No. Wrong again. Here's President Trump.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: When I called him about that, those were the two things I discussed with him.
And I believe that if you ask him he would probably say that he didn't understand the question. Because I said to him -- I asked him, there's two questions.
The one question which we've covered and the mask question. When I called up Robert today, I said to him what's with the mask? He said I think I answered that question incorrectly.
I think maybe he misunderstood it.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Maybe he did. Because after the president's news conference Dr. Redfield issued this statement.
"I one hundred percent believe in the importance of vaccines and the importance in particular of a COVID-19 vaccine. A COVID-19 vaccine is the thing that will get Americans back to normal everyday life.
The best defense we currently have against this virus are the important mitigation efforts of wearing a mask, washing your hands, social distancing and being careful about crowds."
And the president has accused his November rival Joe Biden of spreading fear about the safety of any potential vaccine.
Joe Biden rejects that and says he will trust the scientists but he will not trust President Trump.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JOE BIDEN, FMR. VICE PRESIDENT AND DEMOCRATIC PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: We can't allow politics to interfere with the vaccine in any way.
Americans have had to endure President Trump's incompetence and dishonesty when it comes to testing and personal protective equipment.
[01:05:00]
We can't afford to repeat those fiascos when it comes to a vaccine, when it occurs. The stakes are too high. American families have already suffered and sacrificed too much.
So let me be clear. I trust vaccines, I trust the scientists. But I don't trust Donald Trump.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: A recent poll shows 62 percent of Americans are concerned the White House will pressure the Food & Drug Administration into rushing approval for a vaccine before it is safe and effective.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
Patrick Healy is the politics editor for the "New York Times" and a CNN political analyst and he's with us from New York.
Patrick, thank you for taking the time. Good to see you.
PATRICK HEALY, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Great to be here, John.
VAUSE: There was a Town Hall on "ABC" on Tuesday night, and it was basically a bunch of undecided voters with direct and relevant questions for the president.
He didn't do too well. And at "FOX NEWS" -- well, it was an ambush. Listen to this.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
LAURA INGRAHAM, "FOX NEWS" ANCHOR: This was an ambush. And Biden's not going to take any questions like this, he's not going to get any questions like this.
So why did the president decide to do this, to open himself up to a room full of basically Trump resistance?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: This was a train wreck by all accounts. The president did not emerge well from this, he did not come out unscathed. So why did he do it?
And then why did he tweet Wednesday morning, "Thank you for the great reviews of the "ABC News Show" last night."
What reviews? Even the best "FOX" could come up with was that it was an ambush.
HEALY: Yes. The president spins like no one else when he's talking about his own reviews. And as we know, ratings and reviews matter a great deal to him.
In this case, he knows that Pennsylvania is deeply important for his electoral calculus. This Town Hall was undecided voters in Pennsylvania, it was not an ambush.
There were actually voters there who supported Donald Trump in 2016 as well as people who supported Hillary Clinton and who didn't vote. So it was a pretty wide sampling.
But what you would expect is and what happened was people came with direct, tough questions to ask of this president. And he is not used to that kind of forum.
He's more used to appearing on "FOX NEWS" and getting very friendly questions for people like Laura Ingraham. So this was certainly not an ambush in that regard.
But it was something where the president felt the need to put the best possible spin on it.
VAUSE: Yes. There was a stark contrast to what we saw on Wednesday at the White House to what we watched on "ABC" on Tuesday night.
And when Trump was asked directly if he knew the virus was deadly why did he lie to the public about the threat?
And there was this incredible moment when he compared himself to Churchill during the blitz.
Here he is.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: He was very brave because he was at the top of a building. It was very well known that he was standing on buildings and they were bombing.
And he says everyone's going to be safe. I don't think that's being necessarily honest. And yet I think it's being a great leader.
But he said you're going to be safe, be calm, don't panic. And you had bombers dropping bombs all over London.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: If Churchill said the blitz is harmless, and will magically end by spring, leave your shelters, go about your business, yes, fair comparison. But Churchill did not say that.
I guess, what, because Trump has being recorded and can't lie but what he said, the fall back position is to lie about why he said it?
HEALY: Yes. It's a totally misleading comparison. And this is a president who reaches for comparisons of himself to great men, great leaders in history. But what he's not getting is that his own words on tape undercut him.
Churchill wasn't lying to the people of London and Britain. They knew what they were in for. He was focused on morale and safety, and one nation facing a great challenge.
Donald Trump is focused again and again and again, in his own words, on basically saying the virus is going to disappear, this is not his fault. He's done everything possible to take precautions.
And yet, we see again and again, the fact that he denies the science around masks, he denies what is more of a realistic timeline on vaccines. He wants to present his own version of reality.
Even where he has become Winston Churchill as a wartime leader. Which is clearly not the case.
VAUSE: Clearly. Not just Donald Trump but there's also Bill Barr, the Attorney General, who's making some incredible comments. This time about the impact of carnivorous restrictions, things like lockdowns. Here's Bill Barr. Listen to this.
[01:00:00]
Listen to this.
I think we have Bill Barr? Any moment.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
WILLIAM BARR, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES: Now other than slavery which was a different kind of restraint, this is the greatest intrusion on civil liberties in American history.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: That just seems nuts. I'm sorry, it's crazy.
HEALY: It's shocking, John. The Attorney General of the United States invoking slavery as a sort of point of comparison to lockdowns over the virus.
It's the sort of rhetoric that I think a lot of us has become used to from the President of the United States, from Donald Trump. But less so, at least, least from people like Bill Barr.
But he is now reaching I think -- and so many of the people around the president seven weeks from the election, reaching for this sort of extreme, extraordinary hyperbole to sort of cast their opponents and their enemies as -- even ideas like a lockdown to keep people safe and protect health as somehow abnormal moments in history.
But to compare it to slavery was -- it's hard to be surprised at this point quite honestly [ph] the Administration but it was just a -- it was a really surprising one.
VAUSE: Patrick, we're out of time. But it is notable that there doesn't seem to be this kind of stuff going on in any other country.
Thank you for being with us, Patrick. Good to see you.
HEALY: Thanks, John.
VAUSE: A quick programming note now. 1:00 a.m. this Friday, London time, 8:00 a.m. in Hong Kong. CNN's Anderson Cooper will moderate a Town Hall with Democratic presidential nominee, Joe Biden.
You'll see it only here on CNN.
Well, what's left of Hurricane Sally is drenching much of the south eastern United States dumping months of rain in just hours.
Sally hit as a category two storm early Wednesday causing widespread flooding and leading to hundreds of water rescues.
The National Hurricane Center says the flooding is historic and catastrophic in parts of the Florida panhandle and Alabama. And is putting lives at risk.
CNN's Gary Tuchman following the storm from Pensacola beach in Florida.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARY TUCHMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Here on this barrier island of Pensacola Beach, Florida Hurricane Sally brought hurricane-force winds for much of Wednesday morning, tropical storm force wind from Tuesday night until Wednesday afternoon.
But the winds weren't the story of this hurricane. The winds were scary but it was the rains. Torrential rain, buckets of rain that I counted for 23 straight hours without let up.
And it caused immense flooding problems here in Pensacola Beach, other parts of Florida panhandle and the Alabama Gulf Coast.
Thousands of businesses and homes suffered from flood damage. Like here, the Bibbetty [ph] y Beach Bar, now with flood damage. And next door, the Parasailing Wave Runners business, a restaurant, flood damage.
And we see this all around the region.
Rescues were taking place today. Emergency officials in Alabama and here in Florida rescuing people who were surrounded by water in their homes where they sought shelter during the storm. About 400 rescues took place.
I can also tell you about accident that happened. There is a bridge to get from here in Pensacola Beach to the city of Pensacola which is much bigger.
You have to take a bridge called the Three Mile Bridge. Well, that Three Mile Bridge was damaged by a barge that got loose -- maybe two barges, they're not sure. But either one or two barges hit the bridge, caused damage.
That bridge is now closed, it could be closed for months. And that is the only way to get there quickly, to Pensacola, the city that this is named after, Pensacola Beach. It's now a much longer ride to get there.
So that gives you an idea that can be caused by an immense storm.
There is concern there'll be more flooding tomorrow, on Thursday, and because of that, because of that concern, there is a curfew in place in this county, Escambia County, Florida. From dusk to dawn for the next three days.
This is Gary Tuchman. CNN in Pensacola Beach, Florida.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Let's go to CNN's meteorologist, Pedram Javaheri, for all the latest on this. So what are we looking at now, not just with Sally because there's like a whole bunch of these storms still to come, right?
PEDRAM JAVAHERI, CNN METEOROLOGIST: Seven, yes. Seven of these storms out there across the Atlantic that we're watching carefully.
One of which could threaten the same area in the next week or so that we're also going to follow.
But, of course, the images that are coming out of areas out of Florida and also around the panhandle region, Florida into Alabama where we've had significant flooding.
Showing you scenes that, of course, people trekking through water. We always say with these tropical systems, that's the last you want to do.
Of course, we know anytime people are displaced, animals and wildlife are displaced as well. So we've had reports of alligators, snakes, as often is the case down across this portion of the U.S. inside these waters.
But notice these rainfall totals. A staggering 630 millimeters out of areas around Pensacola.
[01:15:00]
Keep in mind the city of London, on average, well known for its rainy distinction, picks up about 621 millimeters every single year. So essentially, a year's worth of rainfall -- for you waking up in London -- they've experienced there in portions of the U.S. Gulf Coast. Which for them is about four months worth of rainfall.
But notice the strong winds have led to significant power outages, about half a million customers without power. Concern now is this system weakens and moves to the East, we get additional power outages along portions of the Carolinas potentially on Thursday into Friday.
And of course, it could spark severe weather as well along this region over the next couple of days. But we've got 21 named storms to work with from the National Hurricane Center this year. And guess what, we've exhausted 20 of them.
Wilfred is the final name remaining.
There are seven areas of interest out there across the Atlantic, several, of course, already haven't been given names.
But notice the area into the Bay of Tampico which is in the southern gulf of Mexico has a 70% chance of forming in the next several days, that could become Wilfred.
If it does, the model guidance, the initial run of the models here, showing you a general northern trajectory over the next several days. Certainly, an area of interest to watch. But I want to shift the attention over towards portions of the Mediterranean because we've talked about Medicanes before which are essentially systems that resemble tropical features, have tropical characteristics.
Well, there's one we're monitoring across portions of the central and eastern Mediterranean. Water temperatures again among record territory around the lower 30 degree Celsius which is comparable to what is happening in the Gulf of Mexico.
This particular area, this particular storm, named Ianos, sitting there east of Sicily, west of the southern portion of Greece.
Heavy rainfall, tropical storms, maybe hurricane force gusts in the forecast. And what happens with medicanes essentially, is they form very quickly, they linger just for about a 24- hour period and then weaken just as quickly as well.
So we do expect this to make landfall in the southern portion of Greece from Friday into Saturday.
But again, could see some very strong winds there, John. And also some heavy rainfall, of course, as it moves over land on Thursday and Friday.
VAUSE: Pedram, appreciate the update. Thank you for being with us. Appreciate it. See you.
Firefighters are making progress in containing wildfires burning across California and much of the Western United States.
Satellite images show smoke from these fires have now reached Northern Europe.
The agency in charge of wildfire management says the number of active fires in the western U.S. has fallen from 87 to 79, 22 burning in California.
Officials in Oregon say at least eight people have been killed, 12 are missing.
And as you can see by that photograph, firefighters are exhausted.
Here's CNN's Martin Savidge.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: We're on in the outskirts of Lyons, Oregon, it's about an hour and-a-half south of Portland, Oregon.
It's a community where the Beachy Creek fire roared through a little over a week ago. And this is just an example of some of what it did.
You can tell that the fire that burned through here was fierce and just had incredible power. Just look at the trees, the way that they didn't just burn, they exploded.
And then if you try to look at the house and get an idea of what it looked like there's really no way. There is just sort of the chimney sticking out of the ruins and everything else is completely gone.
You can come on over in this direction and you can see the vehicles that were there. So you'd recognize those. But otherwise many people often say when they come back into a fire zone they don't recognize their own home because everything has been consumed.
Unlike a flood where, once the waters recede, it pretty much looks the same.
And the fire didn't burn the same everywhere. Here you can tell it crept along the ground by this sign, not burned at the top but you can see that the fire burned at the base. Until it got so weak the sign just toppled on over.
And that's another example of how these fires can burn so oddly. And this is really an example of that.
The house directly across the street. Which looks perfect. Right down to the manicured yard.
So how do you explain it? You can't.
And the woman who lives here who I talked to has extreme survivor's guilt. She was in tears as she was talking about how lucky she is. And how she knows her neighbors have lost so much.
There are 29 fires like this burning still in Oregon.
Martin Savidge, CNN. Lyons, Oregon.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: So remember when U.S. park police cleared that square across from the White House so Donald Trump could hold a bible upside down for a photo op?
Turns out that controversy wasn't enough. Find out what the White House wanted to use to clear those protesters. That's next.
Also Donald Trump's senior advisor and son-in-law puts political assassination on the agenda as a future tool of U.S. foreign policy.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[01:20:00]
VAUSE: A second term Trump Administration could see the U.S. back in the business of political assassination of foreign leaders.
President Ford issued a ban when he signed an executive order in 1976. But Trump's senior adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, says the controversial practice could become another tool of foreign policy. Saying quote, "It's a full contact sport. This is not touch football."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CNN INTERVIEWER: Does this administration rule out the use of assassination as a tool of U.S. foreign policy?
JARED KUSHNER, SNR. ADVISOR TO PRESIDENT TRUMP: Look, I think that President Trump always keeps all options on the table. You're asking me a question, I don't want to give you a non-answer.
But different terminology could be used to describe different methods you're going to take to try to retaliate to somebody for an action that they've taken.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Those comments comes just a few days after President Trump revealed he was ready to take out Syrian leader, Bashar al-Assad, but was talked out of it by the former defense secretary, James Mattis.
Now back in June when protesters surrounded the White House, the Trump Administration asked to use a heat rate to clear the crowds.
The revelation comes in a letter written at the time by a major with the D.C. National Guard. The device makes a beam which causes skin to feel like it's burning.
The heat ray idea appears to have been scrapped with park police opting for a more traditional chemical agent.
All so the president could walk to a church across from the White House and hold a bible upside down for a photo op.
CNN natural security analyst, Juliette Kayyem, is with us now for more on this.
So good to see you, it's been a while. A heat ray. I keep thinking Marvin the Martian but what is this thing? Can you tell us more about it.
JULIETTE KAYYEM, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Yes. So it's called ADS, it's the Active Denial System. It's just a way of emitting sort of just waves, right, that essentially sort of burn your skin, right.
So it sounds bad, it is bad. In fact, it's so bad that the military has never really truly adopted it both for practical reasons -- it doesn't always work but also for, basically, ethical reasons to be used against a crowd.
So what we know from the story is -- at least there's one email coming from the federal government meaning the White House and DOD essentially to the D.C. local National Guard -- it's sort of a complicated governance system -- asking if they had access to an ADS system.
The very request is outlandish. But shows you the mind space of a White House that was willing to do anything to clear that plaza.
VAUSE: Put this in context though. So an ADS system, has it actually ever been used before. And when it was developed, what was the purpose of it being developed?
What was the original intention, where would it be deployed?
KAYYEM: So mostly deployed (inaudible), it was tested by the Department of Defense for crowd control.
[01:25:00]
Mostly because our wars, essentially, in the last 30 years have been some kind of urban warfare, that we've been in urban areas.
So imagine a crowd starts to form. You don't want to do bullets in them, you may -- tear gas is complicated as well. So the system was tested out but it hasn't been actively used and it's never been used in a civilian domestic population.
The very notion of it, it's just -- shocking, I think is the right word. And shows -- it shows just how out of control the White House was and is often about the use of military assets.
VAUSE: It also seems incredible that if this thing has never actually properly been used or never properly developed, whatever, who knows how to --
KAYYEM: Yes. It's --
VAUSE: -- would these National Guard troops have any idea of how to use it?
KAYYEM: No. So this was my point on Twitter earlier. So I oversaw a State National Guard -- and people in the United States understand the distinction that they're sort of owned by the governor, right.
So they're a sophisticated military asset but they're not marines in the sense that they're fighting wars. So what they can do and the access to military weaponry that they have is well known by the Feds.
They know what the National Guard can do and can't do. They often in floods and hurricanes like you were just reporting on. So that's exactly right.
The idea that they're just -- White House is just scrambling on a hunch for a system that is questionable to be utilized by service members who are not trained for it.
Every piece of it reeks of just a complete use of force without any foresight.
VAUSE: It's what, 50 days to the election --
KAYYEM: Yes.
VAUSE: -- and there are still surprises with this Administration.
KAYYEM: Yes.
VAUSE: It never ends. Juliette, thank you. Good to see you.
KAYYEM: Yes. I'll see you then.
VAUSE: Donald Trump says he's smarter than the generals. Now it seems he knows more than his medical experts especially about the timeline for a coronavirus vaccine as well as face masks.
More on that in a moment. And when that vaccine is available just how will all those doses reach everyone who needs it?
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[01:29:37]
VAUSE: Like a dog with a bone, the Trump administration continues to insist there will be a coronavirus vaccine sooner as in weeks, rather than later.
And now the U.S. Vice President backing up those claims.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MIKE PENCE, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We are literally -- we think we may well be within a month or so of having the first safe and effective coronavirus vaccine in America.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: He added we expect to have 100 million doses before year's end. And then hundreds of millions next year. But it seems almost every credible medical authority around the world said, not going to happen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. MONCEF SLAOUI, SCIENTIFIC HEAD, OPERATION WARP SPEED: If it's showing efficacious in November or in December we don't have enough vaccine doses. We have a few million in November and maybe 10 or 20 million of each in December -- that would be enough to vaccinate certain populations, start vaccinating certain populations but not the whole population.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: So once a vaccine is ready it will take months, maybe years to reach everyone in need. And for a brief moment the head of the CDC in the U.S. said Americans will get that vaccine in the second or third quarter of 2021. That's the vast majority opinion. President Trump apparently finds that timeline political inconvenient and said the good doctor was confused.
Dr. Jorge Rodriguez specializes in viral and internal medicine and he is with us from Los Angeles and he is never confused. It's good to see you.
DR. JORGE RODRIGUEZ, VIRAL AND INTERNAL MEDICINE SPECIALIST: Thank you, John.
VAUSE: Ok. You know, at best the Trump administration is playing semantics. You know, a safe, effective, viable vaccine could be approved in the coming weeks. That sounds like a eureka moment, everything is done. The reality is there's still a lot to be done before everyone gets immunity, you know, through vaccination.
In the U.S. assuming for example 60 percent get immunized, two injections, 200 million needles -- you know, this is a lot of logistics. So this process, talk us through how complicated this is?
DR. RODRIGUEZ: Well, it's very complicated. The first thing you need to do is to prove that the vaccine is effective in preventing people acquiring COVID. And that's nothing that neither you nor I nor Trump or anybody can determine because it depends on how much COVID is floating around in the environment and many environments because these studies are happening in hundreds of different locations.
So first off, it's going to be nearly impossible, all right, before October to prove that the people that have gotten the vaccine are getting less infected than the people that did not. That's A.
B, even if that happens there has to be statistical difference -- statistical difference that proves that this is not just a fluke. So Pfizer, for example, has said that they were already making vaccines just in case it is effective.
So let's say that it is effective, well, first of all the majority of the people haven't even gotten vaccinated and it requires two vaccines, a month apart which means that most of them are going to get their second vaccine at the end of October.
There's absolutely no way that there appears to be credible data that it will be available before November. And once that happens, the FDA has to approve it and then you have to start mass production.
So that timeline before the end of October appears to be more of a political wish than a scientific reality.
VAUSE: Which is not exactly a shock.
We have the CDC director and the president clearly having a conversation about face masks and vaccines. Robert Redfield said that face masks could actually be more important than a vaccine in controlling the pandemic. He also questioned the timeline for the vaccine.
The president said Redfield misunderstood and a few hours after that Redfield tweeted out, you know, "I 100 percent believe in the importance of vaccines and the importance in particular of a COVID-19 vaccine."
Basically he walked all of this back. You know, right now the worst job in the world, is it being a public health official in the U.S.?
DR. RODRIGUEZ: Excuse me, what was that?
VAUSE: Is the worst job in the world right now working as a public health official in the United States?
DR. RODRIGUEZ: I think it's very difficult but everybody who is a health official in the United States has to realize that everything that they have done up to this point, their reputation up to this point could vanish instantly, and they could lose all credibility and everything that they've worked for by not apply the science and the truth that has lifted them to those positions.
What I think Redfield -- what I interpreted him as saying is like hey do not put all of your eggs in the vaccine basket because even if a vaccine works, a lot of these vaccines like the flu vaccine is maybe 70 percent effective. 70 percent effective in people that A, take the vaccine which may only be 40 percent of the population.
So you should not always count that the vaccine is going to cure everything. And we know that wearing masks does help tremendously. So that's the message that I got. It wasn't that masks are better than vaccines.
VAUSE: Here's the thing because Redfield isn't only one who'd made that statement. We've heard it from a number of senior officials who, you know, have said similar stuff. But you know, earning the public's trust, when it comes to you know, the safety of vaccines has been a long and difficult road.
[01:34:55]
VAUSE: And now it seems that it's being eroded. And once that erosion begins in earnest, how hard will it be to win that trust back? And what are the implications here?
DR. RODRIGUEZ: I think that you are absolutely right. I mean even I -- who I'm a big believer in vaccines, would have to actually see the date that is presented the FDA if they do approve this vaccine.
The American public is already confused enough because first of all, this is really not your wheelhouse. I know how science works and it takes a lot of proving and reproving for something to become dogma.
So we have one chance at bat to try to hit this ball. If a vaccine is released early and we find that A, it is not effective and B, if it has long term side effects, it is going to be years I think before anybody trusts another vaccine for coronavirus. So the first time has to be done correctly, period.
VAUSE: Yes and all this is sort of being put, you know, up for grabs, if you like because of an election and (INAUDIBLE).
DR. RODRIGUEZ: Yes. What a shame.
VAUSE: Yes, it is. Dr. Jorge Rodriguez, we appreciate you being with us. Thank you, sir.
DR. RODRIGUEZ: Thank you, sir. Have a good night.
VAUSE: Thank you.
The World Economic Forum warns that when a vaccine is approved there is a strong chance it will not be enough to go around and that's based on current manufacturing capacity.
Oxfam says rich nations have already bought up more than half of the expected supply even though these countries only represent 13 percent of the global population.
CNN's Anna Stewart looks into the concerns over the shortages and what's being done about it.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNA STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Pharmaceutical companies are inching closer to the finish line. There are over 170 vaccine candidates around the world, eight are in the final stage of human trials. Proving them to be effective, safe and achieve regulatory approval isn't the only challenge.
KATE O'BRIEN, DIRECTOR OF IMMUNIZATION, VACCINES AND BIOLOGICALS, WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION: We have to go from there to actually having millions of doses of a vaccine that can be delivered to people around the world.
We're investing in the process of manufacturing before we even know whether a given vaccine will reach licensure and could be used.
STEWART: Governments around the world have committed billions of dollars to vaccine makers, buying up hundreds of millions of vaccine doses which may not even work.
Pfizer in partnership with BioNTech (ph) plans to make 100 million doses of its vaccine candidate by the end of the year and over a billion next.
PAMELA SIWIK, VICE PRESIDENT, GLOBAL SUPPLY CHAIN, PFIZER: Well, it's absolutely not normal. It's unprecedented.
STEWART: To try and meet that demand Pfizer has set up separate manufacturing in the U.S. and Europe and is drawing on all its resources.
SIWIK: This really is a collaborative effort it has to be. You know, in this case the race right, the people talk about the competition. The competition is not each other, right. It really is working against the virus.
STEWART: Making the vaccine isn't the end of the challenge. Next up getting it to those that need it all over the world. Companies like UPS plan to be ready to pick up, store and deliver a successful vaccine. WES WHEELER, UPS: We don't know who's going to be first. We know that
Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca with Oxford University. We know that Encino (ph) in China is doing well. We know that Novavax is moving fast.
STEWART: Different types of vaccine need different transport and storage conditions. One of the biggest challenges is temperature.
WHELLER: A few months ago when we started to get good information about what temperatures would be required for these vaccines, we made an investment in freezer farm technology. So we have invested in both the U.S. and (INAUDIBLE) in Netherlands. It's one of our hubs near our Cologne air hub in Germany.
So we have made investments there and also on the clinical side we put freezers now in several of our depots around the world.
STEWART: Keeping the vaccine safe and secure is critical. And UPS plans to have 24/7 tracking for every single vial.
WHEELER: We are taking very seriously the fact that our clients are counting on us to move every single vial and not lose a single one.
STEWART: And they're not alone. Vaccine developers, suppliers, manufacturers and logistics firms are all taking unprecedented action. Not just to make but to deliver a vaccine for COVID-19.
Anna Stewart, CNN -- London.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: As the U.K. struggles with virus flare-ups the prime minister has ruled out another major shutdown.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
BORIS JOHNSON, BRITISH PRIME MINISTER: Now, I don't want a second national lockdown and I think it would be completely wrong for this country.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Can we afford it, Prime Minister.
[01:39:50]
JOHNSON: And we are going to do everything in our power to prevent it. And can we afford it? I very much doubt that the financial consequences would be anything but disastrous.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Spain though is planning targeted lockdowns. Authorities will announce new measures on Friday as Madrid responds to an increase in the number of cases. Since restrictions were lifted in late June, nationwide infections went from hundreds each day to thousands.
South Africa will reopen its borders and tourism and business at the beginning of October. The South African president says the reopening will be gradual now that infections are starting to fall. And starting this Sunday restrictions will be eased on public gatherings, the nightly curfew and retail alcohol sales.
Still ahead migrants described what happened before they were forced from Greek waters.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He grabbed me from my neck and started hitting me. They put a knife to my husband's stomach and they held a gun to my son's head.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
VAUSE: Rescued, disillusion and telling their stories to CNN. That's coming up.
Also a damning report from the U.S. congressional committee on the cause of two Boeing 737 Max crashes.
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VAUSE: Greece has denied accusations the coast guard is turning migrant boats back into Turkish waters then leaving them adrift.
CNN's Jomana Karadsheh accompanied the Turkish coast guard on one mission in the Aegean Sea -- a group of migrants rescued from a tiny raft told her what they've been through.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JOMANA KARADSHEH, CNN CORRESPONDENT: This is the new pattern. The Greek coast guard vessels right on the edge of Turkish waters. The crew telling us that they've just got an information about a possible pushback incident, migrants at (INAUDIBLE) beach possibly on a life raft.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The Greek ship is moving towards its own waters. It's not fleeing towards Lesbos.
KARADSHEH: Turks mobilized for a sea rescue with the added risk of COVID-19. Now it's a race against time. These waters have already claimed too many lives. They spot the motorless life raft drifting.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Take the rope, take the rope. Grab the rope, and don't let go.
KARADSHEH: One by one they emerge, 11 in total. Barely able to stand -- cold, wet and exhausted. They huddle together at the back of the boat.
She says you really don't want to know what they have done to us.
Still in shock, they recount how they made it to the Greek island of Lesbos two days earlier, but they were caught by Greek authorities. They say their belongings and money taken.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He grabbed me from my neck and started hitting me. They put a knife to my husband's stomach, and they held a gun to my son's head.
[01:44:59]
KARADSHEH: They were forced on a boat and abandoned at sea. Fatima says her family fled a hopeless Lebanon. They've tried to seek crossing five times in the past six months. This was the first time they had reached Greek soil.
Human rights advocates in the United Nations Refugee Agency have documented many similar accounts since March. Watchdog groups accused Greece of violating human rights obligations by expelling asylum seekers, at times leaving them adrift at sea for hours.
According to the Turkish coast guard, there have been close to 200 pushback incidents in 2020. They say they have rescued nearly 6,500 men, women and children.
Ayat (ph) who's from Somalia says that they were treated like animals. Everyone we have spoken to here says that they don't want to try this trip again. They don't want to try and go through Greece because of what they went through. They're really shocked that this is how Europe deals with human beings.
In response to CNN's reporting, the Greek government denies that they are pushing back migrants and refugees. They say authorities are guarding the borders according to the rules of international law. They accused Turkey of weaponizing the migrant issue at a time when immigration is at the heart of a political storm in the E.U.
SALEH DHAIWI, MIGRANT PUSHBACK VICTIM: I hear that Greece is part of the E.U. I wanted to get to the E.U. to Germany, to educate my children and live their but if Greece represents the E.U. I don't want any of it.
KARADSHEH: Definitely, definitely they say they will not be going back to Greece after what they have just gone through.
These forced expulsions and pushbacks seem to be morphing into the new norm. Not only putting the most vulnerable at risk in treacherous waters, but also drowning out the values that Europe claims to stand for.
Jomana Karadsheh, CNN -- in the northern Aegean.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: And German chancellor Angela Merkel's has announced refuge for more than 1,500 migrants now sheltering on Greek islands. That comes after fire last week destroyed Europe's largest migrant camp, left thousands of homeless people on Lesbos. Merkel's office also said Germany is committed to working with other European nations to help solve the migrant crisis. Well, get used to record low official interest rates in the U.S.. The Fed says the economy will need a lot of help for a long time to come.
More on that in a moment.
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VAUSE: The U.S. Federal Reserve has said interest rates will be kept where they are right now, near zero, through 2023.
CNN's John Defterios in Abu Dhabi with the details on that.
And this is all about, you know, the labor market improving and that's unexpected for another couple of years. But the Central Bank chief is pretty blunt about all of this.
JOHN DEFTERIOS, CNN EMERGING MARKETS EDITOR: Yes, he was really direct, John, because this is his last appearance until after the election. So the Federal Reserve traditionally stays out of politics. But he was pretty clear with the messaging even though the stock markets weren't entirely happy with what he had to say.
[01:49:59]
DEFTERIOS: As you noted there, interest rates staying lower for longer until 2023, perhaps even longer than that. Not bad to have some inflation, so they're letting that go to 2 percent to kind of reinflate the economy because of the pressure we've seen.
The economy is bad, but not terrible. He's suggesting here you can get to negative 4 percent, not the original recession of 6.5 percent but this is predicated on Congress acting.
And we talked about this 24 hours ago, John. There's still a gap between the House Democrats and the Senate Republicans. Even Donald Trump weighed in and said that the Republicans need to come around to get that number up to at least $1.5 trillion.
Here's the fed chairman saying why it's so important.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JEROME POWELL, U.S. FEDERAL RESERVE CHAIRMAN: The initial response from fiscal authorities was rapid. It was forceful, and pretty effective. That said, my sense is that more fiscal support is likely to be needed.
Of course, the details of that are for Congress, not for the Fed. But I would just say there are still roughly 11 million people still out of work due to the pandemic. And a good part of those people were working in industries that are likely to struggle.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
DEFTERIOS: Yes, that's the case, John. And we have the jobless claims coming out today, 850,000 -- that is still a high number. That's the prediction from Wall Street.
And we are seeing that the Asian markets are quite disappointed with what the Fed chairman had to say because there's nothing -- there's no silver bullet there. In particular, Hong Kong is down 1.3 percent. Seoul is down 1.2 percent. But also Tokyo and Shanghai are lower as well, John.
So this is a tough time, right, without the stimulus in the system.
VAUSE: Talk to me about Snowflake, and not, you know, animal farm. This is a tech company, what -- first day of trading and the stock almost doubled?
DEFTERIOS: Yes. Sorry, I didn't mean to laugh because this is a name you'll never forget, right? Even the ticker symbol, SNOW on the New York Stoc Exchange. But it had a fantastic debut and this is all about technology data storage and data analytics.
And it's not a newcomer to the business. It has over 300 customers -- actually 3,000 customers and about 150 that are in the global 100.
So it's well-placed, backed by Warren Buffett, the sage of Omaha, the billionaire investor who many said is late investing in the technology, but he likes this one because the fundamentals are so strong.
And as you suggested, the stock was up better than 100 percent. Finished up 112 percent. And the largest software IPO ever at $70 billion dollars, right. Not bad but it has the kind of wind at it's back here because of all the investment in the technology.
But this where you could see the demand line staying strong from this point forward because of the demand for those services and the technology space.
VAUSE: John, thank you. John Defterios live in Abu Dhabi. Appreciate it.
Well, a U.S. House report, 238 pages long has detailed mistakes at the Federal Aviation's Administration and Boeing which resulted in two deadly crashes.
Richard Quest has more now on the investigation into Boeing's 737 Max.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
RICHARD QUEST, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: 346 unnecessary deaths -- that is the damning take away from a U.S. Congressional investigation into the 737 Max, detailing alleged failures of Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration.
The problems first came to the public attention nearly two years ago. Lion Air flight 610, a 737 Max carrying 189 people crashed into the Java Sea only 13 minutes after takeoff.
Then, in March 2019, what we've been told was unthinkable. A second Max crashed. This time, Ethiopian Airlines flight 302. It went down only six minutes after takeoff, 157 passengers and crew were killed.
This time, the international authorities took quick, severe action.
DONALD TRUMP, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We're going to be issuing an emergency order of prohibition to ground all flights of the 737 Max 8 and the 737 Max 9. Hopefully they will very quickly come up with the answer, but until they do, the planes are grounded.
QUEST: 20 months later and the Max is still grounded. This new report puts the blame not on the pilots in those doomed cockpits. Instead, it details how years before these crashes took place, management at Boeing intentionally downplayed the significance of their new MCAS flight control system. And a too cozy relationship with the regulator, the FAA, failed to provide adequate oversight.
For the 346 victims and their families, it has been justice delayed.
[01:55:01]
PAUL NJOROGE, FAMILY KILLED ON ETHIOPIAN FLIGHT 302: It never leaves me but my family's flesh is still in Ethiopia, mixed with the (INAUDIBLE), the jet fuel and pieces of aircraft.
QUEST: Boeing first tried to blame pilot error. It became clear software pushed the hopeless aircrafts' nose down.
The executives eventually said they had accepted responsibility. The company paid a combined $50 million to the surviving families as a start.
DENNIS MUILENBURG, FORMER BOEING CEO: We've made mistakes. And we got some things wrong.
QUEST: The families said that wasn't enough, and confronted he then CEO Muilenburg directly.
NADIA MILLERON, DAUGHTER KILLE DON ETHIOPIAN FLIGHT 302: When you make all mistakes like that, and you can acknowledge them, then, you know, maybe someone else should do that work.
QUEST: Muilenburg was finally ousted earlier this year. The new CEO and former chairman David Calhoun has promised to get Boeing's most important project back in the air. The failure of the Max has been devastating to Boeing's reputation and its profits.
Now, in the final phases of testing, before approval to return to flight, Boeing is promising the 737 Max will return to service as they describe it as one of the most thoroughly scrutinized aircrafts in history.
Richard Quest, CNN -- London.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
VAUSE: Boeing did respond to the reports saying it had learned many hard lessons from the accidents. The statement reads in part, "We have been hard at work strengthening our safety culture and rebuilding trust with our customers, regulators, and the flying public."
The FAA said in a statement it will work to implement the recommendations.
And with that, I'm John Vause.
CNN NEWSROOM continues after a short break. I will be back in a moment.
[01:56:47]
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