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U.S. Surpasses Eight Million COVID-19 Cases; Biden Stresses Health Care At Drive-In Rally In Detroit; Polls Show Biden With Double-Digit Lead Over Trump; Cases Rising Rapidly Across Much Of Europe; Over 20 Million U.S. Ballots Cast; Trump Holds Rallies Despite Nationwide Surge In Cases; Nurse Receives OBE For Pandemic Work; Polls Close In New Zealand General Election; Millions Spent On Ads In Final Weeks Of U.S. Race. Aired 4-5a ET
Aired October 17, 2020 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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ISA SOARES, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): President Trump claiming the U.S. is rounding the turn in its coronavirus fight, even as new cases spike right across the country.
Plus, more than 20 million Americans have cast votes in the presidential election. What that could mean for the candidates.
The city of Manchester in a standoff with the U.K. government. Why it's opposing a new virus lockdown.
A warm welcome to our viewers in the United States and around the world. I'm Isa Soares. CNN NEWSROOM starts right now.
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SOARES: A very warm welcome wherever you may be watching. And we start in the United States. More than eight million Americans have now fallen victim to the coronavirus since the pandemic began. That's one fifth of the world's cases and one million more in just three weeks ago.
And take a look at this. More than 132,000 new cases have been confirmed in the last two days, an alarming rate of infection not seen since late July. Hospitals in seven states are reporting record numbers of COVID admissions.
But U.S. president Donald Trump now apparently recovered from his own bout with the disease, insists the country's quote "rounding the turn" on the pandemic. With U.S. elections just a couple of weeks away, he continues to hold crowded rallies, you can see that, all across the country, without any meaningful health precautions.
One glimmer of hope, one vaccine may be ready by late November. But as the head of the National Institutes of Health cautioned, it is a big if. And this is what Dr. Francis Collins is about to tell you. Take a listen. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DR. FRANCIS COLLINS, DIRECTOR, NIH: I'm still pretty guardedly optimistic, by the end of the year, we will have one or more vaccines that is safe and effective and we can start distributing it. But even that is not a guarantee. This is a very complicated science and sometimes things don't work the way you want it to.
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SOARES: Now nearly all polls show President Trump trailing his Democratic challenger Joe Biden. So he has launched an aggressive campaign schedule over the next two weeks. We get more now on that from CNN's Ryan Nobles in Georgia.
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RYAN NOBLES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: President Trump continuing his blistering pace on the campaign trail after recovering from the coronavirus. The president and his campaign hope to have him in front of supporters every single day, between now and the election.
And the president made three stops on Friday alone, hitting a number of swing states, including two stops in Florida and here in Macon, Georgia, a traditionally Republican state, where the polls show a surprisingly close race.
And the president hitting on all the big themes that he has throughout this entire campaign, picking on Vice President Joe Biden, calling him the worst presidential candidate in history, which is interesting, considering that Biden holds a sizable lead in many of the polls as we get closer to Election Day.
And he also talked about his town hall with NBC this week and listen to what President Trump had to say about the person who moderated that town hall. NBC's Savannah Guthrie.
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TRUMP: And Savannah, it was like her face, the anger, the craziness. I mean, the craziness last night. And I said good-bye. I said great job, Savannah. You did wonderfully. Good job.
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NOBLES: And it's worth pointing out that Savannah Guthrie has not disappeared and hosted "The Today Show" the day after she moderated that conversation and town hall with President Trump. On Thursday, the president will continue this pace through the weekend. He's going to be traveling to Nevada and Arizona and also Wisconsin and Michigan, all states that will be crucial to his hopes at winning re-election -- Ryan Nobles, CNN, Macon, Georgia.
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SOARES: Ryan, thank you very much. Joe Biden's rallies look and feel much different from the president
whose campaign is social distance and face masks and other measures. And on Friday he held a drive-in event in Detroit. Jessica Dean was there.
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JESSICA DEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Former Vice President Joe Biden coming to the battleground state of Michigan on Friday and making the Affordable Care Act and health care really center to his closing argument here in Michigan.
His campaign really believes that is a through line to so many issues that are driving this race, from the coronavirus pandemic, to President Trump's response, to the coronavirus pandemic, to Amy Coney Barrett's nomination process and Republicans' efforts to dismantle the Affordable Care Act.
And remember, Democrats ran this play, focusing on health care back in 2018, when they regained control of the House.
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DEAN: It worked for them then. And the Biden campaign believes it will be a very effective message this go-around.
Meantime, at a town hall on Thursday night, Joe Biden talked more about a question he's dodged for several weeks now, whether he supports packing the Supreme Court. Biden has said in the past, he said last night, he's not a fan of the idea. But he said he will offer his decision on it before Election Day.
He wants to see how Republicans will handle the whole process before he announces his decision but committing to saying something before Election Day.
And we move ever closer to Election Day. This is a voter engagement event in Detroit, Michigan, the campaign really focusing on states where early voting is already happening.
And they're going to send perhaps their biggest surrogate out to an early voting state out next week, former president Barack Obama, who hits the trail for his first in-person event for Joe Biden on the campaign trail next week in Philadelphia -- Jessica Dean, CNN, Detroit, Michigan.
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SOARES: Now let's get international perspective and bring in Natasha Lindstaedt, professor of government at the University of Essex.
And thanks very much for being with us today. Let's start off with the one impressive image I think it's fair to say that we've seen around the United States, of people lining up, some braving for hours and hours on end, actually, long waits to cast their ballots.
What do you think is driving this record early voting?
Is it enthusiasm?
The pandemic?
The presidency?
NATASHA LINDSTAEDT, PROFESSOR OF GOVERNMENT, UNIVERSITY OF ESSEX: Yes, I think it's all those things. I think it's going to be an election that will have record turnout. And we're seeing that 21 million people have already cast their votes early, according to states reporting data. That's 15.3 percent of the total vote counted in 2016.
And we're also seeing that it seems to be favoring Democrats. They have been really rallying their supporters to get out the vote early in states like Florida, like Michigan, like Wisconsin, where early voting has reached over 20 percent.
And Democrats in the states that are reporting data thus far have claimed that they have returned 2.5 million more ballots than Republicans. And now, this is part of the Democrats' campaign.
They want their supporters to get out early because they're worried about the way the counting is going to take place, because Trump has indicated he might not accept the results. The Republicans remain confident that their supporters will turn out to vote on Election Day.
SOARES: So with that point you made, part of the messaging, to get out and get out early to vote. Let's talk about the very different ways of campaigning that we've seen. President Trump, as we just showed you, Natasha, continuing to hold more campaign rallies, in defiance, I must add, of his own government's social distancing recommendation, as we're seeing now on our screen.
And he continues, as well, to minimize the impact of the pandemic.
For our viewers around the world, Natasha, does this disregard for the pandemic is, that hurting him at all?
Is there a way of knowing?
LINDSTAEDT: His disregard for the pandemic doesn't really affect those that are already going to vote for him anyway. They love everything he does. There's really nothing he could do that is going to turn these voters off.
What he does, is people who are hovering between voting for Trump or for Biden, they were uncertain, they were independent, people who really care about getting a handle on the pandemic and who aren't part of Trump's base, feel he has been incredibly irresponsible by holding all of these campaign rallies, in person, where people are crammed in.
They're sometimes not wearing masks. And this is reflective of the way he's handled the pandemic in general. He doesn't seem to really care about it. And he's downplayed it. And he said he did it to not create panic. But this isn't resonating well with voters who see that one of the
biggest issues of this election is health care and COVID-19 and who they think is better able to get the crisis under control.
SOARES: And what is clear is I think, as we head into the final stretch, that the more prominent members of the Republican Party are already starting to distance themselves, from the president.
Let's talk about today. Today, President Trump is campaigning in Michigan and Wisconsin, two states showing signs of trouble for the Trump campaign. Joe Biden having a clear lead there. But we've been here before and Trump won.
How is this different?
Is it different?
LINDSTAEDT: It is different because, in 2016, Trump was an unknown candidate. We didn't really know what he was going to do. So it was like a wild card situation.
And you also had Hillary Clinton, who was an unlikable candidate, in that she never had a 50 percent or more favorability rating.
Also Trump was really effective in characterizing her in a negative way by calling her Crooked Hillary. He has really struggled to negatively characterize Biden, he called him Sleepy Joe but that hasn't really worked.
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LINDSTAEDT: The other issue in 2016 was low voter turnout, from key demographics that support Democrats. So now with the polls, they seem to be not wavering much and there are big leads for Biden in key states like Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and Michigan and he is really close in the race in Florida.
So what we're seeing here is these leads are pretty big. And there are a lot of people who have started to change their mind on Trump or who won't vote for Trump. He's held a lot of his supporters but 6 percent of Trump supporters, said that -- voted for him in 2016 said they will not vote for him in 2020. And he hasn't made up any ground.
Remember all of these races were incredibly close. He won Wisconsin by 23,000 votes. He won Pennsylvania by 44,000 votes. So he doesn't need to only just win or maintain what he had before but he also has to make ground. And he has not done that.
SOARES: Natasha, always great to get your insight. Come back on the show any time. Have a wonderful weekend.
LINDSTAEDT: Thanks for having me.
SOARES: Pleasure.
Now health experts warn, despite the COVID-19 numbers now, they likely will get even worse this winter. CNN's Brian Todd takes us to communities already being pushed to the brink.
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BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Hospital beds on the move in Albuquerque, New Mexico, with hospitals pushing capacity. Officials in New Mexico say many coronavirus patients there need to be transferred from one hospital to another throughout the state.
And, tonight, they're worried about having enough people to take care of them.
DR. DAVID SCRASE, NEW MEXICO HUMAN SERVICES SECRETARY: Our hospital leaders' greatest concern today is staffing up those beds. They point out that the health care work force that's been fighting valiantly against COVID in New Mexico, they're getting tired. There's some people who've stepped back.
TODD: Cases have spiked to such an extent in New Mexico that the governor is telling people flat out don't leave your home if you don't have to. The virus, she says, is winning.
GOV. MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM (D-NM): This is the most serious emergency that New Mexico has ever faced.
TODD: Wisconsin is also seeing horrific spikes. And officials say many new cases are tied directly to virus spreads in prisons and veterans homes, like the King facility in Waupaca County.
DIANE LYNCH, WISCONSIN DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS: There are 52 members currently in quarantine. And there are 25 staff members currently out of the work unit with positive COVID tests.
TODD: Wisconsin and New Mexico are two of 10 states that just reported their single highest day of new cases ever.
The numbers are daunting all the way around. The U.S. topped 60,000 new cases in a single day for the first time since August 14, 32 states today trending up in new cases. The U.S. just passed eight million total cases of this virus. And America's top experts are very worried about the months ahead.
DR. ANNE RIMOIN, UCLA EPIDEMIOLOGIST: As we move towards the winter and the weather is getting colder, people will have fewer and fewer opportunities to be outdoors and to be able to just naturally social distance. We're going to be creating opportunities, more opportunities for this virus to spread. It is a dangerous moment in history.
TODD: Experts say, this year, even with so many Americans desperate for some kind of celebration, holidays will have to be scaled back to combat the virus.
The CDC has just issued new guidelines for how Americans can stay safe at Thanksgiving, among them, assess the infection rates in your community, consider postponing or canceling activities. Think about having outdoor dinners, weather permitting, or hosting virtual dinners. And limit the number of people at any gathering. Mask-wearing and distancing are more important than ever, America's leading voice on infectious disease says. And he's becoming impatient with people who aren't doing those things.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: So, if you think that by getting infected and saying -- pooh-poohing the prevention modalities, that you're living in a vacuum and you're not -- no, you're becoming part of the problem.
TODD: But Dr. Fauci said it is still not too late to turn the tide for what will happen with the virus this fall and winter, if Americans act responsibly, if state and local officials take good public health measures and emphasize all of that can be done without shutting the country down -- Brian Todd, CNN, Washington.
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SOARES: A stark warning for countries across Europe, as coronavirus cases there spread at record rates. Now according to data, from Johns Hopkins University and the World Health Organization, new case numbers right here in Europe are far exceeding the rise of infections in the United States.
Have a look. There you can see how red it is, more than 50 percent of the deep, deep red. The World Health Organization's European director, talked to CNN's Becky Anderson about what the public can do to really make a difference.
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HANS KLUGE, WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION: Is there a reason for panic, Becky?
No.
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KLUGE: Am I worried?
Yes, I'm very worried. There are some simple measures, systematic, generalized mask wearing, together with a strict control on social gatherings could save in this region about 281,000 lives in six months.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SOARES: One of those countries, France, is seeing an exponential rise in new infections, 10 metropolitan areas there are now under nightly curfew as the country set yet another daily record for new coronavirus cases.
The curfew began on Friday at midnight. And it's running from 9:00 pm to 6:00 am the following morning. This is happening as France had more than 30,000 new infections on Thursday. Let's bring in Melissa Bell in Paris. One of the areas under curfew, and as we just said, infections are
rising and rising rather fast, so are hospitalizations, which is important for people to understand that.
But will the curfew, Melissa, from those you have been speaking to, will the curfew be enough?
MELISSA BELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: I think that is exactly what authorities are going to be looking at. Because they're following that advice from the World Health Organization.
And they essentially said, look, if we carry on, on this course and nothing is done to fix, this we're going to be seeing fatality levels four to five times what they were in April, by January of next year. And that's a pretty chilly warning.
Also the World Health Organization saying look, lockdowns need to be a last resort because of the social implications, the economic implications of those. And so France, in the face of the rising numbers, in the face of the record rising number of new cases over the course of the several days, over the course of last 10, they're saying we're going to try everything we can.
The latest strategy, are the curfews that are in the greater Paris region right now, right now I can walk out with my mask on and beyond 9:00 pm, I have to be at home unless you meet several criteria, you are going out to work, going to look after someone, you have a special document proving that you have a right to be out.
And if you are caught out, without that document, you could face a fine of 135 euros, if you're a repeat offender, there is a threat of imprisonment and a far greater fine. This is something that will be enforced by 12,000 police men and women.
Will it be enough to bring the numbers down?
For the time being, they continue to rise. It is as you mentioned the question of the ICUs in the greater Paris region, 46.8 percent of ICU beds are taken up by COVID-19 patients, there will be a point at which the hospital system simply can't take anymore.
SOARES: I remember that Macron wanted to reduce that to 10 percent, to between 10 and 50 percent. Let's see whether this curfew measure really is able to shift those numbers. CNN's Melissa Bell in Paris, great to see you, thank you.
Staying in France, nine people are being held for questions after a history teacher was attacked and beheaded in a Paris suburb. Police say they shot and killed the suspected attacker.
According to multiple reports, the teacher had currently shown students controversial caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed. CNN's Jim Bittermann has more for you.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) JIM BITTERMANN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: The attack occurred in a suburb about 45 kilometers from Paris. The secondary schoolteacher was decapitated at the scene and in the moments that followed, the assailant was spotted going down the street.
Police gave chase. They confronted him, told him to drop his knife and when he didn't, they brought him down with a hail of bullets. He was killed at the scene as, of course, was the teacher.
President Macron, visibly emotional, went to the scene this evening and he had this to say.
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EMMANUEL MACRON, PRESIDENT OF FRANCE (through translator): One of our fellow citizens was killed today because he was teaching students about freedom of speech, the freedom to believe and not believe.
Our compatriot was attacked. He was the victim of an Islamist attack.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BITTERMANN: The investigation into the attack has now been turned over to the terrorism prosecutor in France and this has been labeled by the president himself as an act of Islamic terrorism.
The minister of education, who also was tweeting and speaking about this tonight, said that he had -- attack, this attack was a despicable assassination of one of the republic's servants -- Jim Bittermann, CNN, Paris.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SOARES: The U.S. presidential election is more than two weeks away but early voting rates are up across the country. Millions of Americans have already cast their ballots. We'll bring you that story just ahead.
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SOARES: Now voters in Louisiana as you can see there waited in long lines for the upcoming election and this was the scene in New Orleans on Friday, not just choosing a president of course, also selecting a U.S. senator, six representative judges and deciding a series of amendments to the state constitution.
Well, similar scenes are playing out right across the United States. Election Day is still more than two weeks away but millions of Americans have already cast their ballots and in some places at eye- popping rates, for instance, in Illinois, up 400 percent over 2016. Pamela Brown has a closer look.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I see it as probably being one of the most important elections in my lifetime going forward.
PAMELA BROWN, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): And it seems she's not alone. Not by a long shot.
More than 20 million Americans have already voted according to data from 45 states and Washington, D.C. analyzed by CNN, Edison and Catalyst.
In North Carolina, these long lines on the first day of early voting Thursday were the first indicator of huge turnout in the Tar Heel State. The state board of elections is tweeting that more than 330,000 voters cast ballots on day one. That is believed to be a new record, beating the 304,000 ballots cast on the first day in 2016.
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BROWN (voice-over): In Georgia, they've seen a 62 percent increase in early, in-person voters compared to the same time four years ago. A similar story in Tennessee, where early voting in person or by mail started yesterday. And they've already seen a 91 percent increase compared to 2016.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think more of the millennial and younger are a little bit more aware and maybe are more wanting to get out there and more aware of the issues.
BROWN: In Pennsylvania, the secretary of state says she expects that full results from mail-in ballots won't be available until the Friday after Election Day.
KATHY BOOCKVAR, PENNSYLVANIA SECRETARY OF STATE: Sometimes you might have an omission or an illegible postmark, received three days later, they can be counted.
BROWN: And in Michigan today, the secretary of state there announcing that people can't carry guns on election day at polling places, saying in a statement she's, quote, committed to ensuring all eligible Michigan citizens can freely exercise their fundamental right to vote without fear of threats, intimidation, or harassment."
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I don't feel he's been treated fairly by the Democrats at all.
BROWN: In Florida, the edge Democrats have in voter registration is narrowing. New data from the state shows about 134,000 more Democrats are registered to vote than Republicans, which is down from 2016, when they led by about 327,000.
And in California --
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You know what? It's not -- you can't just trust anybody right now.
BROWN: That frustration, part of a week-long drop box drama, which today appears to have been ended. The secretary of state announcing this afternoon the California Republican Party agreed to no longer deploy these unofficial ballot drop boxes, which were found in at least four counties, a move the former Republican governor Arnold Schwarzenegger called --
ARNOLD SCHWARZENEGGER (R), FORMER CALIFORNIA GOVERNOR: It's a stupid thing they're doing right now with these ballot boxes.
BROWN: In Florida, the election officials are taking steps to move ex felons with court debt from the voter rolls after a Democratic led effort to pay off the court debt for the ex-felons so they could vote -- Pamela Brown, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SOARES: President Trump loves to hold crowded rallies. After the break, how those campaign events are a likely link to a spike in COVID-19 cases in the weeks that follow. We'll bring you that story after a short break. You are watching CNN.
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SOARES: Welcome back to our viewers in the United States and around the world, you are watching CNN NEWSROOM.
New cases of COVID are surging in many parts of the United States, with the total number of infections now passing 80 million, up from 70 million three weeks ago. It's taking a toll on America's health care network. Hospitals in seven states are seeing record numbers of people are being admitted with the disease.
And with those rises in hospitalization, health care experts warn the number of deaths is certain to keep going up. As the U.S. election has been growing closer, President Trump ramped up his rallies packed with speculators and hardly any masks. CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta has more on the spike in cases and crowded gatherings.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Donald J. Trump.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: For President Trump's supporters, these rallies have come to represent a show of force against fear.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's a 99.9 percent survival rate. And I am going to continue to live my life. I hope everybody else does, too. GUPTA (voice-over): For many public health experts, though, these
rallies also have the elements of a contagion. Few masks. Lots of people closely clustered together for more than 15 minutes at a time.
GUPTA: You can't see the virus but what is happening during a super spreading event?
DR. ERIN BROMAGE, CNN CONTRIBUTOR: It is a rough analogy but if you think of a campfire and all you have is a gentle breeze that night, not everybody sitting around the campfire is equal in regard to the amount of virus -- or smoke -- that they're actually getting into their face.
GUPTA (voice-over): It is true, that outdoors can be up to 20 to 30 times safer than indoors. The virus more likely to disperse into the air. But it is still not completely safe. Again, think of that campfire smoke. It drifts and lingers and then travels wherever the wind may carry it.
But here's the problem, definitively linking a gathering like this -- or this -- to a later spike in new infections can be challenging, especially with 50,000 people becoming infected every day.
So to better understand the impact, CNN took a look at data from large rallies several weeks ago to see what happened to a relevant and related measure of the virus' damage: hospitalizations.
Now as you watch this, remember, after someone's exposed, it typically takes about four weeks before they might become sick enough to require hospitalization.
June 20th, Tulsa, Oklahoma: an indoor rally. Here was the situation going into that weekend in Tulsa. On that particular day, there were 197 hospitalizations in the state. On July 8th, 2.5 weeks later, the Tulsa Department of Health held a press conference.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The last few days, we've had almost 500 cases and we know we had several large events a little over two weeks ago, which is about right, so we can connect the dots.
GUPTA (voice-over): Then five weeks after the rally, the number of hospitalizations is at 625, more than triple what it was on June 20th.
June 23rd, Phoenix, Arizona: just days after that stop in Tulsa, President Trump held another indoor event, this time, Phoenix. When he visited, around 2,000 people were being hospitalized daily in Arizona, though the number was already rising.
Fast forward 10 days and that number shoots up to more than 3,000 cases daily and that's maintained over the next three weeks.
August 17th, Oshkosh, Wisconsin: take a look at what happened after the president visited Oshkosh, on August 17th, this time outside. Five weeks later, the number of hospitalizations rising by nearly 20 percent and continues its upward climb. As far as the recent rallies go, Florida, Pennsylvania and Iowa, they
have been all within the last few weeks. So we may not have seen the impact on hospitalizations as of yet.
BROMAGE: There's no doubt that there has been transmission at the protests, the political rallies. It's just a fact that the virus doesn't discriminate. It will find a new host in a crowd that's there.
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BROMAGE: If you are gathering together in a large group of people, there has almost certainly been transmission. It is impossible, very difficult to visualize that transmission or document that transmission, when there are so many people attending these events and then they scatter back out into their communities.
GUPTA (voice-over): On Saturday, the president's heading to Janesville, Wisconsin, about an hour away from where this 530-bed field hospital was erected earlier this week, a foreshadowing of what may be to come.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SOARES: Dr. Sanjay Gupta, with that fascinating piece.
Cases are also reaching alarming levels here in the U.K., especially in the northwest of England. Leaders have lashed out, over restrictions primarily in Manchester. Prime minister Boris Johnson had a message for the city's mayor, who has warned the plans adversely affect jobs, businesses and homes. And the measures include closing pubs.
Here is what Mr. Johnson had to say in response.
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BORIS JOHNSON, U.K. PRIME MINISTER: I urge the mayor to reconsider and engage constructively. I cannot stress enough, time is of the essence. Each day that passes before action is taken means more people will go to hospital, more people will end up in intensive care and, tragically, more people will die.
Of course, if agreement cannot be reached, I will need to intervene in order to protect Manchester's hospitals and save the lives of Manchester residents.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SOARES: CNN's Salma Abdelaziz joins us.
We heard the prime minister urging the local leader, the local mayor, to reconsider.
And if he doesn't, they will have to reconvene, what is the response on their side?
How are they going to react to this?
SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN PRODUCER: It's a truly extraordinary standoff. And there were talks on Thursday. And since then, radio silence. And, of course, yesterday prime minister Boris Johnson put pressure on the mayor of Manchester
But the mayor of Manchester is refusing to back down. The government's own scientists have said, that localized regional limited lockdowns are not enough to stem the rise in cases and said we need a nationwide lockdown. That's the first part of his argument.
And the second part of his argument is, well, Prime Minister, if you insist on implementing these regionalized lockdowns, then you need to provide the economic packages that these businesses need to stay open and to be able to return after a period of lockdown.
So essentially, the debate here is over the financial package and it's over Boris Johnson's strategy at large. And the mayor is not the only critic of prime minister Boris Johnson's strategy.
There is a growing chorus of opposition voices that are calling for a nationwide lockdown. Meanwhile, of course, towns and cities, including London, have their restrictions changed.
London today is waking up to new rules, essentially curbing social life for Londoners and now you cannot meet with anyone outside your household in an indoor setting, that means no meeting at bars, pubs and restaurants.
SOARES: Let's see if the prime minister gives in on at least the financial aspect and how much longer the Manchester mayor can hold off. Salma Abdelaziz, thank you.
And health care workers have been hailed as the heroes of the pandemic. Queen Elizabeth has recognized the associate director of nursing at Kings College as an officer of the most excellent Order of the British Empire, more commonly known here as OBE.
She accepted the award on behalf of her colleagues who gave their lives fighting the disease. Take a listen.
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FELICIA KWAKU, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR OF NURSING, KING'S COLLEGE HOSPITAL NHS FOUNDATION TRUST (voice-over): The honor, it's (INAUDIBLE). It's not just for me. The honor honors all of those who laid their lives down on the line and continue to serve. And it's not just about (INAUDIBLE). It's about all my former colleagues and it is an absolute privilege to represent the profession.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SOARES: It's also an honor to have her joining us now from London. Felicia, congratulations, first of all, on your incredibly well-
deserved OBE. If we can start off on the clip we had before, which is, you dedicated your OBE to those on the front lines.
Give viewers a look to those around the world, what your colleagues had to endure, what you saw and what you had to endure.
KWAKU: Good morning and thank you so much for inviting me onto the program. It has been very hard. Through March, April, up until June, July, we've witnessed things that we didn't think that we would witness.
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KWAKU: We saw people dying, patients dying, very, very rapidly, very quick pace. And we saw loved ones not being able to grieve and be with their loved ones when they died.
We had to convert clean wards, we would say, to COVID wards. And we had to take up training very rapidly and very quickly because the patients were so sick, that nurses that didn't -- that were not critical care trained needed to develop and train to become critical care nurses.
There was a lot of fear, a lot of anxiety across the whole spectrum of the health care workforce. And we had to dig really, really deep. It was a frightening time. And I'm glad to say that it feels better, although we are going into the second wave in this country.
SOARES: And talk about the next round of COVID, the next wave, which we're currently facing. But I want to talk about, you know, what you have seen, the growing horror, the death toll, particularly among Black, Asian and minority ethnic health and social care workers because they're the ones really who suffered hugely here in the U.K.
They are disproportionately affected.
Is that fair to say?
KWAKU: It is very fair to say, Isa. We saw at the end of March and beginning of April, the first 10 doctors to die were from a Black and Asian background and then we started to see that those numbers rise. and we saw evidence from the Office of National Statistics and the Institute of Fiscal (ph) Studies, some key reports that were telling us some concerning figures.
And then nurses and midwives started to tell us about some concerns they had on the ground floor. And these were predominantly Black and Asian nurses and Filipino nurses. And Filipino nurses have the highest death toll within the nursing and the (INAUDIBLE) workforce.
And they were telling us that they didn't have enough PPE, that they were being asked to go into areas where the PPE was insufficient. They felt pressurized (sic) to work in COVID areas. They felt that they were being disproportionately redeployed to those areas.
And they didn't receive enough training. And that was across the whole health care landscape.
What we needed to do, Isa, very quickly, was engage with the staff, to see what the real issues were. And so we held a series of engagement events so that we could actually get from the ground staff (ph), what was happening.
And they told us that they were dying, they were telling us they were working very hard to do their best. And their treatment wasn't always fair and they were very scared and very frightened.
SOARES: As we enter the second wave of the pandemic, what would you like to see, what lessons should we have learned?
Because the numbers are on the rise and they're rising rather quickly.
KWAKU: Yes, Isa, we cannot go back to what happened in the first wave. We know that people from Black and Asian and ethnic minorities are extremely vulnerable. And we know now, Black men are -- and Black women are -- so we must ensure that people have the proper equipment, the sufficient, even excessive levels of PPE.
And they must be kept protected and safe, that there is a real drive and focus on psychological safety so that people can raise concerns and those concerns are taken seriously.
And we also have to ensure that the voice of Black and Asian and Filipino nurse and midwives is listened to and heard at the highest level, so when they're making those decisions about us as a community, that actually we can influence, that we have a say in how the direction of care is going.
So as a (INAUDIBLE), we must take responsibility. We must protect our most vulnerable and that's health care workers and also health care communities that have people from Black and Asian communities. It's very, very, very important.
SOARES: Felicia Kwaku, thank you very much for your time. And thank you for your service. Yourself and all of those on the front lines.
KWAKU: Thank you.
SOARES: Straight ahead on CNN, results are pouring in, in New Zealand's general election. A popular (INAUDIBLE) politician has grabbed an early and possibly overwhelming lead. We'll go there live for the very latest.
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SOARES: Early results in New Zealand's general election are pointing to a possible landslide with (INAUDIBLE) Jacinda Ardern's Labor Party with more than half of the ballots counted.
Labor's holding steady with about half of the vote. And the national party (INAUDIBLE) vote if the trend holds, Labor could have enough votes to form a majority government without forming a coalition. It could be the first party to do so since New Zealand adopted its current system in 1996.
Journalist Donna-Marie Lever joining me now from New Zealand.
We're around, what, 50-60 percent of the vote counted.
How is it looking?
Give me a sense of the numbers.
DONNA-MARIE LEVER, JOURNALIST: So 60 percent of the vote has now been counted. Jacinda Ardern's Labor Party sitting on 49.4 percent, topping around the 30 percent mar since results started coming in. Those figures incredibly strong compared to opposition Judith Collins' national party, 26.7 percent. Again, those figures have not changed much at all since the results started coming in tonight.
SOARES: And how much has her zero COVID strategy been a success in battling the pandemic helped her in the polls here?
LEVER: Look, I think Jacinda has featured very strongly in the polls as prime minister, since the early campaign here began. She has hovered around that 50-55 percent as the prime minister and it really hasn't changed.
Very early on, this election here in New Zealand was called the COVID election, with the idea that the response to the global pandemic, front and center, and how the economy has recovered.
She moved very quick, she moved very fast, to put the country into a lockdown and it really does seem to have paid off for her.
SOARES: We'll be sure to be checking in with you in the next hour or so. Thank you very much.
Now the U.S. is in the final weeks of the 2020 general election campaign. And both sides have unleashed a blitz of advertisements. A look at the ads as well as the money paying for them after the break.
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SOARES: Now the U.S. is now approaching the home stretch of the general election campaign and both Republicans and Democrats are plowing millions into political advertising. But Democrats have a big advantage. They raised $135 million more than
Republicans in September. CNN's Tom Foreman has more on the numbers, plus the ads the campaigns will hope will win undecided voters.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Joe Biden knows what military families go through. He knows what it is like to send a child to war.
TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In battleground Arizona, Biden is pushing hard on the message that could resonate with conservatives while Trump is trying to punch his way out of second place in the polls.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE (voice-over): I worked for 40 years and paid my taxes. I've earned my Social Security and Medicare.
FOREMAN (voice-over): Reaching out to the state's large number of retirees and anyone else who will listen.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): President Trump will end our reliance on China, eradicate the coronavirus and make our medicines and supplies here in the United States.
FOREMAN (voice-over): One thing tilting the math in Biden's favor is the sheer volume of his ad spending. Coast to coast, Biden has so far dropped $423 million, compared to Trump's $368 million.
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And this week, Democratic ad spending will be more than twice as high as Republicans.
BIDEN (voice-over): It's a simple proposition, folks. We're all in this together. We have to fight this together.
FOREMAN (voice-over): So while the top Biden ad in Iowa is talking unity in that battleground, Trump has tried to pick targets, driving after Biden's blue collar support.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): I'm a proud leaning (ph) guy and Teamster. but I won't be voting for Joe Biden.
FOREMAN (voice-over): Same thing in North Carolina, where the polls are also close. Trump and his allies are looking to raise fears about a Biden presidency.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): The arson, the looting, the chaos, the liberal mob is tearing America apart.
FOREMAN (voice-over): While Biden is plowing ahead with a steady message of a front-runner. UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Joe listens to both small business
owners and workers to create his economic plan that cuts taxes for middle class families, creates 18 million new jobs in his first term and raises wages by as much as $15,000 a year.
FOREMAN: In September, Biden had a mammoth haul of donations, $383 million and that's $135 million more than Trump. What that means is the challenger goes into the home stretch with plenty of money to put ads just where he needs them and keep the heat up on the business man president -- Tom Foreman, CNN, Washington.
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SOARES: And that wraps up this hour of CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Isa Soares. I'll be back at the top of the hour. You are watching CNN.
