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U.S. COVID-19 Hospitalizations Fall Below 100K; Five Lawyers Quit Trump Defense Team; Italy Easing Some Coronavirus Restrictions; Growing Concern over "Long COVID Syndrome"; Putin Tries to Discredit Navalny; Losing a Son to Suicide; Biden Administration Inherits Numerous Middle East Crises; Part of West Coast Highway Collapses into Pacific Ocean. Aired 12-1a ET
Aired January 31, 2021 - 00:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Hello, everyone, and welcome to Studio 7 here at CNN Center in Atlanta. I am Michael Holmes. Appreciate your company.
Well, from COVID-19 to Donald Trump's impeachment trial, we're following several major stories for you this hour.
First, a glimmer of hope in the battle against coronavirus. For the first time in nearly two months, current COVID-19 hospitalizations in the U.S. have fallen below 100,000. The U.S. reporting just over 97,000 hospitalizations on Saturday.
But the numbers, of course, are still grim overall. The U.S. has now surpassed 26 million confirmed infections since the pandemic started and, of course, leads the world in its numbers of cases.
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HOLMES (voice-over): This is extraordinary. Anti-vaccination protesters in Los Angeles on Saturday, another reminder that some people oppose COVID-19 vaccination efforts, even as case numbers rise around the globe. There were some reports the protesters temporarily halted operations at the Dodger Stadium vaccination site.
But the Los Angeles Police Department says that's not the case.
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HOLMES: And in the world of politics, former president Donald Trump's five impeachment defense attorneys have stepped aside with little more than a week before that Senate trial is set to begin. Sources familiar with the matter tell CNN the lawyers pulled out amid a disagreement over his legal strategy.
Let's talk more about this surprising development in the impeachment case. Harry Litman joins me now from La Jolla in California, a former U.S. attorney and is legal affairs columnist for the "L.A. Times." Harry, this was mind-blowing. It started as news of two senior lawyers
leaving. And within a couple of hours, it was an exodus, five of them gone. The trial's a week away.
Where does this leave the defense?
HARRY LITMAN, FORMER DEPUTY ASSISTANT ATTORNEY GENERAL: It's a disaster for the defense. And five is all that there are. It's not simply that they open a week from Tuesday; he has briefs due with his basic legal position on Tuesday.
It's inconceivable to me that he could get any kind of halfway professional lawyer and get together his basic claim to submit by Tuesday, especially since he seems to be insisting on staying the course with the sort of Big Lie fraud claim that actually was the source of the problem in the first place.
It was his sort of insistence and, at all costs, clinging to that claim that's what led to the insurrection here. So if he were to go in it would be the ultimate leading with his chin.
But now that all his lawyers have deserted him, I don't know what any litigant, much less the former president of the United States in an impeachment trial, is going to do, when there are really 72 hours until he has to state his basic legal position.
HOLMES: Yes, Trump, as you pointed out, the reporting from Kaitlan Collins is that he wanted the attorneys to argue that there was mass election fraud; it was stolen, rather than focus on, you know, proposed arguments on constitutionality or guilt or innocence when it comes to insurrection.
As a legal strategy, does that even hold water, to make that argument in this case?
LITMAN: It not only doesn't hold water, it's one big leak. I mean, really, if he were to go in front of the Senate and repeat the Big Lie that essentially no one, short of Marjorie Greene, believes anymore, that would really just be, in essence, actually going halfway toward pleading guilt. So it's a disastrous legal strategy.
It's also completely untenable for his lawyers, who are not able, for ethical reasons, to stand up and support a lie. It would normally be a prestigious engagement to represent the former president. He already couldn't get any top-drawer lawyer.
And now these others are abandoning him en masse. So it's really -- it both shows he's asking them to lie, which is a big problem, and that it's a -- on the merits, as it were, a disastrous defense.
HOLMES: And real quick, Harry.
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HOLMES: Maggie Haberman of "The New York Times" is reporting that Steve Bannon is telling Donald Trump to represent himself in front of the Senate. It may come to that.
But is it a good idea?
LITMAN: Can you imagine?
No, it's obviously the catastrophe of catastrophes. He very cunningly avoided saying anything on the record through the whole Mueller probe, et cetera. The normal adage, "Someone who represents themselves has a fool for a client," applies in spades where Donald Trump is concerned.
HOLMES: And again, if he is going to argue election fraud -- which, of course, is not a defense -- I mean, what can happen in the Senate?
Can they bar that defense, declare it an improper argument?
LITMAN: They can do whatever they want. We found this last week. It really is the law of the jungle there. They can say it's unconstitutional, even though the Senate has held otherwise.
But, wow, would that be a poke in the eye, even to his supporters?
And who knows whether it would be flirting with an actual conviction?
Right now it seems relatively safe that the Republicans, hiding behind this constitutional defense, will acquit him. This would be tailor- made to actually try to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
HOLMES: Extraordinary times. Harry Litman, thanks so much. Appreciate it.
LITMAN: Thank you, Michael.
HOLMES: OK. Here in the United States a record number of COVID-19 deaths were reported in the month of January. CNN's Natasha Chen now reports on the latest efforts to curb this virus.
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NATASHA CHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The C.D.C. says starting Monday night, everyone over two years old using any form of public transit must wear a mask, even if one has already had the COVID vaccine.
It's a mandate that comes a year after the first reported U.S. case of COVID-19, a virus that has killed more than 437,000 people in the U.S.
ZORA BRENGETTSY, BEREAVED FAMILY MEMBER: We didn't expect to lose any of them. To be honest, we all thought they were going to bounce back.
CHEN (voice-over): This family lost three loved ones.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: To wake up and know that he's not there, I can't call him.
CHEN: January was the deadliest month of this year-long pandemic, more than 90,000 people in the U.S. have died this month alone and to give you some perspective, that's about 20,000 more people that could fit in this entire NFL stadium.
CHEN (voice-over): The Mercedes Benz Stadium that hosted the Super Bowl just two years ago is now a vaccination site.
DR. LYNN PAXTON, DIRECTOR, FULTON COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH: We can actually get more vaccines out given the resources that we have or that are shortly coming to us. But if you don't have the vaccine, then we can't do it.
CHEN (voice-over): Johnson & Johnson is expected to apply for Emergency Use Authorization for its vaccine next week. Its global Phase III trial results showed the vaccine is 66 percent effective, but 85 percent effective specifically against severe disease.
DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: This is a single shot vaccine in which you start to see efficacy anywhere from seven to 10 days following the first and only shot. It is very, very good with regard to cold chain requirements, namely requiring only a refrigerator.
CHEN (voice-over): Meanwhile, a new study suggests children are safer from the virus in schools than out of them. The author of the first detailed study of two K-12 schools said in order to reopen schools safely, they need Federal centralized guidelines and better access to testing.
Health experts are also eyeing new variants of the virus including the first domestic cases of the variant first identified in South Africa and more than 400 cases of the variant first identified in the U.K. Experts believe these variants will be more dominant by the end of March.
DR. ROCHELLE WALENSKY, CDC DIRECTOR: I believe that we should be treating every case as if it's a variant during this pandemic right now.
CHEN (voice-over): A pandemic that's far from over. The virus killed nine nuns in a retirement home in Michigan, all within a few weeks.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is numbing. And we have -- I do -- a much deeper appreciation for all the other families who have gone through this, the hundreds of thousands of families and until it personally touches you, I don't care how much we can have a sympathetic heart, it is different when you've already been there.
CHEN (voice-over): Natasha Chen, CNN. Atlanta.
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HOLMES: A quick look now at the state of the pandemic outside the U.S.
A Brazilian official says nine children with COVID-19 symptoms have died in some of the country's most remote areas. We're talking deep inside the Amazon. He also says that multiple health clinics have shut down and he's urging the government to send in help. Now in Europe, France has closed its borders with countries outside of
the E.U. in an effort to stop new variants from spreading. Travel is banned even for citizens except for essential reasons.
Italy, though, easing restrictions in most regions.
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HOLMES: Starting this Sunday, the health minister says all but five areas will now be in yellow zones, where risk is considered moderate.
More and more people are coming forward with long-term COVID-19 symptoms, way beyond the average of a few weeks. Rebecca Meyer is an American mother, who caught COVID-19 last month -- March, rather. She tells us she's been battling symptoms ever since.
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REBECCA MEYER, COVID-19 LONG HAULER: It's important to know that this is can happen to anyone. I'm 31, I was healthy, I was an active mom of four. And now I don't get out of bed. I don't eat, I don't spend time with my children like I need to. This can happen to you, this can happen to your loved ones. and don't wait for it to hit close to home to take it seriously.
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HOLMES: Now some of the symptoms experts are mentioning include severe fatigue, headaches and what they're calling brain fog, neurological issues. In a recent survey from the Body Politic COVID-19 Support Group, more than 3,700 people described themselves as what's being called long haulers.
And nearly half couldn't work six months after their long-term symptoms developed.
Dr. Allison Navis names joins us now from New York. She's an assistant professor at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
Doctor, thanks so much for being with us. This is a huge problem. A lot of people are concerned that these long-term COVID sufferers are a potential serious long-term issue globally.
How worried are you and how many patients are you seeing at the facility you're at?
DR. ALLISON NAVIS, ICAHN SCHOOL OF MEDICINE MT. SINAI: Yes. Well, thank you for having me. And I definitely think this is a topic or area we need to be concerned about and focusing more attention on.
At our post-COVID center in New York City, which was, I believe, the first one in the country to open up, we've seen about 1,400 patients so far, 1,400 intake visits. And then 60 percent of those patients have been referred to neurology, which is my subspecialty.
We're in the top three referrals, along with cardiology and pulmonology, which received a little bit more than 60 percent of referrals. And I know there's many more people on the waiting list to get in. So there's quite a demand for this specialty clinic and our services.
HOLMES: Yes. I mean, "The Lancet" medical journal, I'm sure you're familiar, they recently published a study of hundreds of patients six months after hospitalization; 76 percent of them still have at least one symptom, months later.
And you touched on a couple there, neurological issues, what they call brain fog, but lung issues.
What are the most common symptoms you're seeing?
NAVIS: I think the number one most common symptom is really fatigue and that sort of spans multiple specialties. Following fatigue, it's probably respiratory issues, so shortness of breath or decreased exercise tolerance.
We're also seeing cardiac symptoms like chest pain or palpitations, heart rate fluctuations and blood pressure fluctuations. And then neurologically, as you mentioned, the brain fog or cognitive changes is the number one thing we're seeing, followed by headaches and disturbance of skin sensation.
HOLMES: It's very worrying. One report suggests perhaps as many as 10 percent to 15 percent of people who have had COVID have lingering effects. I mean, if there's 25 million positive tests in the U.S., 100 million globally, that is a massive number of people impacted going forward.
What do you see the impact on health systems and so on?
NAVIS: I think it's a major impact and something that we need to be on the lookout for. Many hospitals right now are being overwhelmed with patients with active COVID infection.
But many of our patients with post-COVID symptoms are still requiring ER visits with their chest pain or shortness of breath. They're seeing multiple doctors with different specialties. It's requiring a lot of diagnostic workup, different tests.
So it's definitely sort of adding another stress to the health care system and something that we need to sort of learn more about and understand what's going on.
HOLMES: One interesting thing that I read -- and correct me if I'm wrong -- it seems that the likelihood of developing these lingering symptoms is not related to the severity of symptoms necessarily and it's actually quite common in younger individuals.
Are you finding that?
NAVIS: Absolutely. So a lot of my patients are younger. I'd say the majority of my patients were not hospitalized. So they would have what's called mild COVID, meaning they don't require hospitalization. Many of them were previously healthy.
So this is not something we're seeing with the people who were sick and in the ICUs with multiple other medical issues going on.
HOLMES: It's interesting, this post-COVID syndrome.
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HOLMES: It's really created a whole new medical specialty, hasn't it, which is what you're involved in.
How surprising was that to you?
And what sort of collaboration are you seeing around the country or, for that matter, the world?
NAVIS: I think it's been very surprising. I know when I started at the post-COVID center, I had been working in the hospital, taking care of patients with active COVID infection> And seeing how sick they were, how many complications they had and really expected at the post- COVID center to be seeing those hospitalized patients following up those complications.
I don't think anyone, certainly not myself, expected to see so many people who had had milder infections, to see all the different symptoms that we are seeing.
And I think it's been really great having the post-COVID center open up. And I know many other centers around the country have opened up.
I think the multidisciplinary approach is really critical. I could not take care of these patients on my own. I really need the assistance of my colleagues in pulmonology, cardiology, physical therapy -- and physiatry has been absolutely critical.
So I really think we're going to see more and more multidisciplinary post-COVID centers opening up around the country.
HOLMES: Wow, it's extraordinarily. It started off it was a few Facebook groups of people having these symptoms. And now we're seeing what you're involved with, which is great to see. It's sad to see the symptoms but great to see what's being done. Dr. Allison Navis, thank you so much. Appreciate what you're doing.
NAVIS: Thank you. It's a pleasure being here.
HOLMES: Coming up here on the program, jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny's foundation is reaching out to the Biden administration directly. We'll tell you what he's asking.
Also we'll take a look at the many foreign policy challenges that U.S. President Biden suddenly faces in the Middle East and how he might deal with them. Stay with us.
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HOLMES: Welcome back.
In just a few hours. Supporters of the Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny are planning to protest his detention. Russian police say those demonstrations will be illegal and they will break them up.
Meanwhile, Navalny's anti-corruption foundation is calling for help to crack down on Russian president Vladimir Putin. Matthew Chance tells us who they're reaching out to.
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MATTHEW CHANCE, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: As Russia braces for nationwide protests the demand of the release of detained opposition leader Alexei Navalny, his anti-corruption group is calling on President Biden to put pressure on the Kremlin, to impose sanctions on individuals close to Vladimir Putin.
In a letter obtained by CNN and addressed directly to President Biden, the group lists 35 names, including eight high-profile Russians, it says, are a priority, including billionaire oligarch Roman Abramovich, described as being a key enabler and alleged beneficiary of what the letter calls the Kremlin kleptocracy.
A spokesperson for Abramovich told CNN there is no basis for such claims which are entirely without foundation.
Russia's health minister, Mikhail Murashko, is also on the list for allegedly covering up Navalny's poisoning with a suspected nerve agent last year and then hindering efforts to evacuate the opposition leader to Germany for treatment. The Russian health ministry has not yet responded to our requests for comment.
Last week, tens of thousands of Russians protested after Alexei Navalny was detained on his arrival back in Russia, having recovered in Berlin from that poisoning. A big security operation is now underway for what could be another wave of demonstrations across Russia -- Matthew Chance, CNN, Moscow.
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HOLMES: Jill Dougherty is adjunct professor at Georgetown University and a Wilson Center fellow. She's also CNN's former Moscow bureau chief.
Jill, always good to see you. So more demonstrations getting started.
What impact do you think they are having in terms of pressure on Vladimir Putin?
JILL DOUGHERTY, GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY AND WILSON CENTER: You know, I think basically they're -- Navalny is trying to consolidate his base, which is still a minority. So I think it is motivating people to come out.
Now it will be very, very difficult, with the center of Moscow completely shut down, be very important to see how many people can actually even physically make it out there.
But in terms of any, you know, change in the country, it's very difficult to really measure that. You can't quantify it. But I think there's a sense of frustration and some anger among people, who just feel that this is unfair whether they support Navalny or not.
HOLMES: Yes. I guess, you know, I keep coming back to this question. Putin has always sort of played down Navalny. He is clearly afraid, though, of Navalny's influence. He's clearly worried.
Why is that?
DOUGHERTY: You know, I think he has a problem, President Putin, because, on the one hand he says -- or the Kremlin says -- that Navalny is an agent of foreign intelligence and that he is trying to bring about a color (ph) revolution and basically bring down the Putin government.
Now if that is what they feel, then that is an existential threat to the country. But on the other hand, the president, President Putin, as you mentioned, doesn't even use Navalny's name.
So which is it?
Is he just a nobody or is he a threat?
And obviously he's a threat. And I think, because he can communicate very effectively and he is tapping into frustration that goes beyond Navalny, I think this is as important to understand -- this is not just about Navalny.
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DOUGHERTY: It goes way beyond that. Prices are higher. Food is more expensive. That's becoming a big issue, food prices. People are frustrated about COVID and the regulations around COVID. There's a lot going on.
HOLMES: Tapping into dissatisfaction. It's interesting, too; Vladimir Putin is on his fifth president. Joe Biden's calling on Putin to release Navalny.
But what leverage does the U.S. have?
DOUGHERTY: I don't think the U.S. has very much, really. I mean, more sanctions, yes; speaking out, yes. But I think it's very difficult for the Biden administration right now because they have to obviously support Navalny because somebody tried to kill him and poison him. That is very serious. But if the United States tries to overplay its hand and treat Navalny
like, I don't know, kind of like the old Soviet days, you know, a dissident, that's not really quite what's going on.
And especially if the United States tries to start preaching to Russians about how to do democracy, that probably, at least in my opinion, will not work and could even backfire. So it has to be handled in a very balanced way. It's not easy.
HOLMES: Great analysis, as always. Jill Dougherty, a pleasure. Good to see you, my friend.
DOUGHERTY: OK.
HOLMES: Coming up here on CNN NEWSROOM, President Biden using the power of the pen to try to tackle some U.S. problems.
But what can he do about the tense relations between the U.S. and parts of the Middle East?
Just ahead, a live report from our correspondent, Ben Wedeman, in Beirut.
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HOLMES: And welcome back to our viewers here in the United States and around the world. I'm Michael Holmes. You're watching CNN NEWSROOM.
A new coronavirus lockdown has just gone into effect for much of Peru. It will be in place for 15 days and includes Lima, the country's capital. Peru expecting to receive its first batch of vaccines February 9 but that is not soon enough for hospitals that have reached breaking point. Isa Soares shows us how bad it has become.
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ISA SOARES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Every morning Dr. Rosa Luz Lopez looks at this list of COVID-19 patients --
DR. ROSA LUZ LOPEZ, ICU HEAD: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): -- and wishes she didn't have to make this difficult decision.
LOPEZ: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): It's overwhelming.
LOPEZ: (Speaking Spanish). SOARES (voice-over): Hospital Nacional Guillermo Almenara EsSalud in Lima, Peru, is one of the largest in the capital. Here, ICU beds have almost quadrupled. But that simply isn't enough.
LOPEZ: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): With no space inside the main hospital, these patients are now being seen in the temporary room in the patio.
Dr. Lopez, who is the head of the intensive care unit here, shows us around.
LOPEZ: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): Back inside the ICU ward, medical staff work around the clock to meet the surge in cases, more than 100,000 in the last month alone.
LOPEZ: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): Understandably, they're beyond exhausted.
DR. JESUS VALVERDE, HOSPITAL NACIONAL DOS DE MAYO: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): Not far away from here, in Hospital Nacional Dos de Mayo --
VALVERDE: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): Dr. Jesus Valverde says they only have 50 ICU beds and they're all full. But even if they had ICU beds they wouldn't have the staff, he says.
VALVERDE: (Speaking Spanish).
FRANCISCO SAGASTI, PERUVIAN PRESIDENT: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): Amid mounting criticism, president Francisco Sagasti is promising there will be more ICU beds. No word, though, on the medical staff needed to run them.
SAGASTI: (Speaking Spanish).
SOARES (voice-over): And while the promise of more beds will be a relief to many, hope may be distant and fading. No vaccine has yet arrived in Peru -- Isa Soares, CNN.
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HOLMES: Here in the United States, a new study suggests the transmission of COVID-19 in schools can be limited if kids take proper precautions, like, of course, masking up. Researchers found just 9 percent of students who brought new infections to school actually infected others. The study followed 3,500 students from two different schools during
the fall semester. One of the study's authors says it supports the argument that schools need centralized guidelines to reopen safely.
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DR. DARRIA LONG, UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE EMERGENCY PHYSICIAN: The 91 percent of COVID that walks in your door, because every school knows some people will walk in with them, because of the protocols and because of testing, 91 percent of them never transmit it to anybody.
And of those 9 percent that actually did transmit to someone else, we could almost invariably trace them back to a violation of the protocol. So with the testing enforced when the protocols are followed, they work. When they're not followed is when you can have a breakdown.
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HOLMES: Meanwhile, there is a heartbreaking and even deadly consequence from the pandemic when it comes to schools and that is the mental health of our kids.
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HOLMES: CNN's Bianna Golodryga introduces us to a father who just lost his 16-year-old son to suicide.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He always had a smile on his face.
BIANNA GOLODRYGA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Sixteen-year-old Spencer Smith was looking forward to playing football but when his high school team announced a scaled-back season due to COVID-19, family and friends began to notice a scaled-back Spencer.
JAY SMITH, SPENCER'S FATHER: He said I don't want to be there. We let him stop. I think he missed it, being with his teammates.
GOLODRYGA: Like so many American students, Spencer struggled with remote learning.
SMITH: He was always on the honor roll. And this was because of the online learning. He was struggling. We noticed that he wasn't working out. He was no longer riding his bike.
GOLODRYGA: Spencer died by suicide December 4th.
SMITH: My wife texted, it looks like Spencer overslept again. I ran down the stairs, knocked on the door. No answer. So I open the door and I saw him hanging there. I asked, Spencer, why?
These are all the cards that have been received.
GOLODRYGA: The Smith family tragedy has become a recurring one for too many American families. Why it is difficult to directly link an increase in suicides to school closures, the CDC reports there was an increase in the number of children's mental health related E.R. visits in 2020 compared to 2019.
KATRINA RUFINO, ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF PSYCHOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF HOUSTON: They see their parents struggling financially because of the pandemic or struggling to figure out child care. Combine that with the social isolation of not being in school, not getting to participate in the extracurricular activities that brought them joy.
GOLODRYGA: No community has been hit as hard as Las Vegas' Clark County School District, the nation's fifth largest. 19 student suicides have been reported over the last nine months, more than double the number reported in 2019. The youngest student just 9 years old, according to the district.
JESUS F. JARA. CLARK COUNTY SUPERINTENDENT: It's heartbreaking as a superintendent when you lose a child. It's heartbreaking as a leader.
GOLODRYGA: Jara says signs of trouble began in early fall when an electronic warning system programmed to detect mental and emotional struggles began to show an increase in activity.
JARA: Kids are Googling or they are surfing how to commit suicide. You get alerts. You get four or five a day.
GOLODRYGA: Getting children back in the classroom became his priority.
JARA: I felt that as the leader that I needed to do what I can and I need to do what I can to get our kids in our campus.
GOLODRYGA: The Clark County school board this month green lit a plan for in-person learning in March for pre-K to third grade.
JARA: I do think they're working really hard. But is that face to face interaction, you can't take for granted a loud lunch room.
SMITH: This is all Spencer's weights he went out and bought.
GOLODRYGA: For Spencer Smith's family, things they will never take for granted again is endless.
SMITH: Check on them, no matter how old they are. And always give them a hug and let them know how proud you really are of them.
GOLODRYGA: Bianna Golodryga, CNN, New York.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HOLMES: It really is heartbreaking.
And, of course, if you know someone in need of help, do call the National Suicide Prevention Hotline. That is 1-800-273-TALK if you're in the U.S. For our international viewers, you can go to suicidestop.com for emergency numbers in your country. We'll be right back.
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HOLMES: The Biden administration has had to hit the ground running to address the many crises plaguing the U.S. The president also, of course, inheriting a long and complicated list of problems in other regions, particularly the Middle East.
CNN senior international correspondent Ben Wedeman takes a look at some of those daunting challenges.
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CHIEF JUSTICE JOHN ROBERTS, U.S. SUPREME COURT: Congratulations, Mr. President.
(APPLAUSE)
BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The new resident of the White House faces a Middle East deep in a confusion of crises.
Yemen remains the world's worst humanitarian emergency, followed closely by Syria, where millions are struggling through a brutal winter as their country's agony goes on.
Blood still flows in Iraq, even though the scourge of ISIS appears for now to have been diminished.
Four chaotic years of Donald Trump saw the U.S. cozy up to the region's autocrats, careening close to the brink of war with Iran. Already the new administration is showing it will do some things differently.
TONY BLINKEN, U.S. SECRETARY OF STATE: We will end our support for the military campaign led by Saudi Arabia in Yemen.
WEDEMAN (voice-over): Tensions could recede as the Biden administration tries to revive the Iran nuclear deal, the JCPOA, says the Carnegie Institute's Mohanad Hage Ali in Beirut.
MOHANAD HAGE ALI, CARNEGIE MIDDLE EAST CENTER: Iranians can't continue to bomb and help their allies or support their allies, bomb the U.S. embassy in Iraq or the -- Riyadh's airport or any of these important facilities while they negotiate the JCPOA and as the JCPOA is (INAUDIBLE).
WEDEMAN (voice-over): Have knock-on effects in Syria, Yemen, Iraq and Lebanon, where Iran is a major player. The Trump administration did manage to orchestrate the establishment
of ties between Israel and several Arab states, a move praised by its successor.
Washington also recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital, opened an embassy there and generally sided with Israel as never before, all but killing the two-state solution, which means Washington now needs to come up with new ways to address the conflict, as do the Palestinians themselves.
ALI: Perhaps the one-state solution has a more viable option, calling, asking for their rights as full citizens in the state rather than calling for a second state, which has no now basis on the ground.
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WEDEMAN: Gone are Trump's grandiose regional schemes like the "deal of the century" to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict or the policy of maximum pressure on Iran to force it to halt its nuclear program. In their place are more traditional U.S. approaches to the Middle East, most of which weren't very successful, either -- Ben Wedeman, CNN, Beirut.
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HOLMES: So far, nearly 30 million vaccine doses have been administered in the U.S.' that's according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. And as wealthy nations try to protect themselves against the virus, a program backed by the World Health Organization will soon be delivering coronavirus vaccines to some of the poorest countries.
And that, long-term, helps everyone. The COVAX program has raised enough money to supply 92 developing nations which can't obtain vaccines on their own. The initiative helps distribute vaccines more fairly in the hopes of stopping the spread of the virus more quickly.
CNN's Ivan Watson has an exclusive report for us now, showing us what it is like on the front lines in some of those areas.
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UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Thank you so much.
IVAN WATSON, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In western countries the first coronavirus vaccines arrived with great fanfare, generating excitement and hope. But in most of the world's poorer countries like Pakistan, vaccine distribution hasn't even begun. This hospital in Karachi is so full there aren't enough beds for all the COVID-19 patients.
NASHWA AHMAD, COORDINATOR, COVID-19 SERVICES, SOUTH CITY HOSPITAL: We are full, we have patients waiting, we have families who are suffering, we have patients at home, sick patients at home, patients who are on oxygen who just don't have space in hospitals.
WATSON (voice-over): Dr. Nashwa Ahmad says she's discouraged at the lack of available vaccines.
AHMAD: The vaccine is not here in this country for the foreseeable future. That means our health care workers still have to continue to do their jobs, endless hours, without the protection of the vaccine.
AHMAD: It's very difficult.
WATSON (voice-over): Help is on the way. The COVAX facility is a global initiative established after the start of the pandemic. It has the ambitious goal of distributing some two billion doses of vaccine by the end of 2021.
AURELIA NGUYEN, MANAGING DIRECTOR, COVAX: This is an unprecedented effort. We have never rolled out this number of vaccines in this short time.
WATSON (voice-over): Most of the doses are to be given to the world's 92 poorest countries for free.
NGUYEN: The COVAX facility is really built around fair and equitable access so that no country and no person who needs the vaccine is left behind regardless of their economic status.
WATSON (voice-over): COVAX is a partnership of several international health organizations. It will distribute vaccines through UNICEF, which has considerable experience leading vaccination campaigns against other diseases in the developing world.
But COVAX distribution isn't expected to start until February, in part due to the long wait for the World Health Organization to approve vaccines for emergency use.
BENJAMIN SCHREIBER, DEPUTY CHIEF, GLOBAL IMMUNIZATION PROGRAM, UNICEF: Countries are looking at COVAX and don't see yet vaccines arriving, while they see some countries are making bilateral deals and that creates kind of a panic. WATSON (voice-over): Some wealthier countries have been scooping up limited supplies of COVID vaccine for themselves.
JEROME KIM, DIRECTOR GENERAL, INTERNATIONAL VACCINE INSTITUTE: Vaccine nationalism is the evil twin of COVAX. A lot of the countries that signed up for COVAX, the high income countries in particular, hedge their bets by putting in pre-orders for COVID-19 vaccines.
WATSON (voice-over): The head of the WHO denounces this practice.
TEDROS ADHANOM GHEBREYESUS, DIRECTOR GENERAL, WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION: I need to be blunt. The world is on the brink of catastrophic moral failure. And the prize of this failure will be paid with lives and livelihoods in the world's poorest countries.
WATSON (voice-over): While it waits for COVAX, the Pakistani government expects to receive a welcome gift of half a million doses of Chinese's Sinopharm vaccine in coming days, a drop in the bucket for a population of more than 200 million. Even when the vaccine rolls out, convincing a skeptical public to take it may be an uphill battle. UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Why would I get vaccinated?
There's no such thing as corona. It's a lie.
WATSON (voice-over): Defeating the virus will also require fighting mistrust of government and the spread of disinformation -- Ivan Watson, CNN, Hong Kong.
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HOLMES: You're watching CNN NEWSROOM. We'll be right back.
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HOLMES: A dramatic scene on the coast of California. A huge piece of Highway 1 near Big Sur has collapsed into the Pacific Ocean. Just have a look at that.
A strong winter storm with heavy rain and snow created a massive mudslide that caused the road to wash away. Thankfully, no injuries reported. Imagine having to rebuild that. At least 25 structures in northern California have been damaged because of the storms.
At least 100 million Americans are under some form of a winter weather alert. That includes those in the nation's capital, which will see several inches of snow for the first time in two years.
Parts of the Midwest are already seeing heavy snow, with Chicago possibly getting 10 inches before it's all said and done. That same system forecasted up to a foot of snow in places like Maryland, Pennsylvania and into New England.
British police are searching for the culprits who vandalized an ancient monument in southern England.
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HOLMES: Officials say a face mask was added to the chalk carving of a giant on a hill known as the Long Man of Wilmington. Historians say the archeological site dates back to Anglo-Saxon or medieval periods. A photographer who has since visited the carving says it's now being restored to its pre-pandemic state.
Thank goodness. I'm Michael Holmes. Thanks for spending part of your day with me. For our international viewers, "LIVING GOLF" is next. For everyone else in the U.S. and North America, I'll be back with more CNN NEWSROOM.
