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Hospitals Preparing for Delivery of Vaccines; Battle to Build Trust in Vaccine in Trump Country; Army-Navy Game Moved to West Point Due to COVID Concerns. Aired 11:30-12p ET
Aired December 11, 2020 - 11:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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KATE BOLDUAN, CNN ANCHOR: Health care workers will be among the first to get the coronavirus vaccine once it is green lit. But it is clear there will not be enough to go around, initially. But even before that, hospitals are right now preparing down to the smallest detail how to store, prepare and administer these shots from the moment they arrive.
Joining me right now is Dr. Susan Mashni, she's the chief pharmacy officer for the Mount Sinai Health System. Doctor, thank you for coming in.
When the first shipments come in to Mount Sinai, what needs to happen in those first minutes?
DR. SUSAN MASHNI, VICE PRESIDENT/CHIEF PHARMACY OFFICER, MOUNT SINAI HEALTH SYSTEM: Well, we absolutely need to be able to safely receive those, bring them to our sub-zero freezers and be able to put them away. Each of the doses needs to be put in the freezer within 90 seconds from the time it's unloaded from the box. So it's going to be a well-orchestrated affair when it happens.
BOLDUAN: Are you running -- I mean, 90 seconds is -- I mean, that's honestly something -- not something to mess around with. I mean, are you running drills on this?
MASHNI: Absolutely. SO there's videos and practice sessions. Our teams will be going through those practice sessions. They have been already drilling through and will continue to do that up to the time we actually receive the vaccine.
BOLDUAN: What needs to be done to prepare the doses after you get them in the freezer when it's time to get the shots in arms?
MASHNI: Sure. So it is a frozen suspension. So we need to be able bring those up to room temperature, that will take about three hours. So we have to be planning when we're going to have those vaccination pods when we know we're going to need doses. And then we'll need to reconstitute those and draw them up into individual doses.
It's yet to be determined and really depending on how we run the pods, whether we'll drawing up the doses at the point that we'll giving them or we'll be drawing them up in the pharmacy and bringing them up to the vaccination areas.
BOLDUAN: And, Doctor, you really have to have someone -- I'm not trying to be flippant at all but like a clock counting the minutes here.
MASHNI: Absolutely. It's really vital that folks open the box, we need to count, make certain that everything that's in the box is received intact and then go ahead and get it into the freezer, yes. So it's going to be a well-orchestrated event and I think there's going to be a little sweating going on outside of that freezer making certain that we get everything in.
BOLDUAN: Yes, no kidding. Assuming the FDA gives the green light to the Pfizer vaccine, let's say, today or tomorrow, when do you anticipate administering the first shots?
MASHNI: So, we are actually set up if we receive the vaccine over the weekends to go as early as Monday or Tuesday.
[11:35:07]
We've just received notification last evening from the New York Department of Health, which is overseeing how we're doing our vaccination rollouts some information about who we give the vaccine to. So we're working on those priority schedules right now. But we're ready to stand up the pods. We've also been doing some dry runs for those too to be ready.
BOLDUAN: You've also been actively recruiting more people to actually administer the shots. How many more people do you need?
MASHNI: So it really depends on how many people to who we administer the vaccines. So we know that we'll likely administering both to our own employees and then maybe some other organizations around New York City. But we know maybe in our -- perhaps in our largest facility, Mount Sinai Hospital, we'll likely have 12 vaccinators set up at any station at any given time. So it will be in the hundreds of extra staff.
And we'll use some of our own internal staff to pull them in. We'll have volunteers, medical students and pharmacy interns, pharmacy vaccinators to help also. But, yes, it will be a well-orchestrated event with a lot of extra staffing.
BOLDUAN: Do you know yet who is going to be getting the first dose?
MASHNI: So we do know it's going to be our emergency workers, so folks in our emergency department, intensive care units, other people that are inadvertently exposed to the aerosolized virus for prolonged periods of time. So we'll be working on exactly who those folks will be. Actually, we're working on it right this very second to get all those schedules set up.
BOLDUAN: Wow. Doctor, thank you for coming on.
MASHNI: Thank you so much.
BOLDUAN: Up next for us, skepticism about a COVID vaccine is a real concern for public health officials. How real is it? Listen to this.
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PASTOR GREG LOCKE, GLOBAL VISION BIBLE CHURCH: The pandemic is not real.
ELLE REEVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, what do you think the pandemic is?
LOCKE: Not COVID-19.
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BOLDUAN: As we get closer to having a vaccine available, one major question still remaining, will people get it? Vaccine skepticism, it's a real thing and it's a real challenge to public health in this moment. From the president on down, officials are promoting the safety and efficacy of these vaccines.
But CNN's Elle Reeve went to Wilson County, Tennessee, Trump country and found that message isn't getting through.
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REEVE (voice over): News of imminent vaccines comes just as COVID-19 surges through rural parts of the country and the political debate is as heated as ever.
LOCKE: I don't want to wear a mask when I go and eat.
REEVE: We wanted to know if the same resistance to masks would happen to the vaccine. So we reached out to Greg Locke, a pastor in conservative Wilson County, Tennessee, who says he has grown his congregation by protesting COVID control measures.
LOCKE: We're not going to close our church, ladies and gentlemen, because of COVID-19.
There's a lot of sincere people that are doing their best to put out a vaccine. But I'm not going to take it. I don't believe the government can tell me when or how I can stick a needle in my arm or my kid's arms, super government overreach.
REEVE: Locke says he's moved his services outdoors not to limit the spread of COVID but to handle all the new people who have come. LOCKE: Faith over fear. I ain't worried about fake pandemic.
I'm saying the sickness is real, I'm saying the pandemic is not.
REEVE: I don't understand what you mean when you say the pandemic is not real.
LOCKE: Pandemic is not real.
REEVE: But what do you think a pandemic is?
LOCKE: Not COVID-19. It's no pandemic.
REEVE: But what do you think a pandemic is?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think we've been stuck on the pandemic question too many times.
LOCKE: It's ridiculous.
REEVE: Well then, why can't you answer it?
LOCKE: I did. There's no pandemic. COVID-19 is not a pandemic.
REEVE: Well, what is a pandemic then?
LOCKE: Not what we're experiencing. I'm 44 years old. We've not had one in my lifetime, so I don't know, and this is not it.
REEVE: To be clear, a pandemic is a disease that spreads across many countries and affects many people. The World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic in March. And experts say about 70 percent of people need to get the vaccine to control COVID spread.
LISA BORCHERS, CHURCH SERVICE ATTENDEE: It's not been tested enough. We don't know what's going to happen with it. Later on, it may help you now, but in the future, it causes more harm in your body as it get (INAUDIBLE).
GRACE PENIX, CHURCH SERVICE ATENDEE: It's not -- you know, this anti- vaccination, it's the devil. It's like -- personally, it's a choice.
REEVE: Some people at the service told us they'd seen him on Facebook and liked his message.
LOCKE: Donald Trump won the election by a landslide and he will be re-elected as the president of the United States.
REEVE: We wanted to know how widespread his views are. So we drove deeper into the Wilson County, where there's a COVID testing site at the Fairgrounds. We Met Quintin Smith, a cattle farmer who runs the agricultural center there, and takes extra care to keep things sanitized during COVID.
QUINTIN SMITH, DIRECTOR, JAMES E. WARD AGRICULTURAL CENTER: You know, go to a Fairgrounds where everybody is as proud of their bathrooms as I am. Come on in.
I'm cautious about running out and doing anything. I think they're most excited about there being a vaccine but I think it's going to be everybody wait around and watching the first responders and the nursing home folks and if there's any reaction to it.
Everything here is clean.
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Let me tell you what my daddy always told me. Son, don't never believe anything you hear and only half what you see.
DR. WILLIAM SCHAFFNER, PROFESSOR OF PREVENTIVE MEDICINE, VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY: I think it's entirely human to be a little skeptical and a little hesitant. After all, this is a new virus in the human population. This vaccine uses new technology. It's been developed very rapidly and that makes people cautious.
REEVE: Based on our interviews and recent polling, Pastor Locke represents an outspoken minority. Surveys by Pew Research Center found that Republicans are less likely than Democrats to see COVID as a major threat to public health, but also that there's a growing acceptance of the vaccine nationwide, including among Republicans. 60 percent of Americans say they'd take it and nearly half of those who are reluctant say it's possible they'd get it after others do so.
Dr. William Schaffner, who has been working on infectious disease at Vanderbilt University since the 60s, says that in order to overcome vaccine hesitancy, public health officials have to build trust.
SCHAFFNER: You have to respect people. You have to respect where they're coming from, hear what they say and then try to respond to their concerns.
SMITH: We give shots to cows all the time. And you do get reactions to shots. So, you know, we have given a shot to an animal and it walk out there 20 feet out of the shoot and drop dead. Everybody is going to respond differently.
REEVE: After the first responders take it, when it's your turn, will you take the vaccine?
SMITH: I'm probably going to go and take the vaccine.
REEVE: How do you feel about the vaccine?
GWEN SCOTT, FIDDLERS GROVE COORDINATOR, WILSON COUNTY FAIRGROUNDS: Anything new that has not been proven, I'm not sure I want to be the guinea pig. And I really wish there was time for more testing, but there's not. And we're losing too many people too fast, so we have got to do what we can.
I know it's become a political issue at times but it shouldn't be. This is a health issue. SCHAFFNER: The approach to COVID has had substantial political overtones. People have attitudes about this and it will not be easy to change those attitudes.
REEVE: Are you going to tell the members of your congregation not to get the vaccine.
LOCKE: Members of my congregation will do what they want to but they'll watch my videos and know that I'm not getting it.
REEVE: So, you expect them to model your behavior?
LOCKE: I expect them to use their bible and use their brain.
REEVE: Elle Reeve, CNN, Wilson County, Tennessee.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BOLDUAN: Elle Reeve, thank you for that reporting.
Still ahead for us, college football has been upended by COVID but the Army-Navy game is a go this weekend. But it's going to be different. That's next.
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[11:50:00]
BOLDUAN: Nothing has gone as planned with college sports so far this year because of the pandemic. So many college rivalries have seen games postponed or canceled, but one showdown is still a go. The 121st Army/Nay football game will kick off Saturday afternoon. This year's match up will be played at West Point for the first time since World War II.
CNN's Coy Wire is on the ground at West Point. Coy?
COY WIRE, CNN SPORTS CORRESPONDENT: Hi, Kate. The Army-Navy game, its pageantry, its deep tradition is dated back to 1890s. It's one of America's greatest sporting spectacles. But this year's game, like so many traditions and past times in our lives right now, will be a lot different. We asked players and coaches what it is been like playing during this pandemic.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's definitely been challenging football-wise but we're not complaining because there are a lot of people that have it a lot worse.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It is easy to get down about everything that we're missing out on, you know, not being able to play in our home state in front of a sold out crowd, going on the road.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What we could control was having a great attitude. And I'm just really proud of West Point and proud of our program, our players in particular on how we have continued to forge ahead.
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WIRE: Now, this rivalry, Kate, istraditionally played in Philadelphia, a neutral site. But tomorrow's game for the first time since 1943 is going to be played here on campus at West Point due to the pandemic.
Now, inside Michie Stadium, there will only be about 8,000 attendees, just the West Point cadets and the Naval Academy's midshipmen coming up from Annapolis.
Back to where it all started, Kate, 1890, the very first game, was played here on this plain at West Point.
BOLDUAN: I will be watching. Love that game every year. Thank you, Coy. I really appreciate it.
For -- and now to this, for many, this holiday season is about giving back. But this year's CNN Heroes is about all the people that put others first throughout the year. CNN Heroes airs Sunday at 8:00 P.M. Eastern. Take a look.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It has been a year of challenges and change but it's also been a year of hope.
This year's CNN heroes is a celebration of everyday people doing extraordinary acts during two of the biggest stories of 2020. Join Anderson Cooper, Kelly Ripa, and celebrity guests.
KELLY RIPA, ACTRESS: Tonight is about hope, it's about decency and it is about compassion.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And a salute to the people who keep our spirits lifted.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We need to see the world differently.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Anyone can have impact, no matter their age.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Plus, the viewer's choice for this year's most inspiring moment and a special musical performance by Tony, Grammy and Emmy Winner Cynthia Erivo. CNN Heroes, an all-star tribute, Sunday at 8:00 on CNN.
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