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Capitol Rioter Says He Was Following Trump's Directions; Ground Rules Still To Be Set For Senate Trial; U.S. Democrats Pave Way For COVID-19 Relief Bill; U.S. Vaccination Ramps Up Ahead Of Super Bowl; European Countries Ease Restrictions As COVID-19 Cases Fall; Thousands Protesting In Myanmar; Locations Around The World Become Mass Vaccination Sites; Chinese New Year 2021; Super Bowl Host City Under Tornado Watch; Super Bowl LV Set To Kick Off. Aired 3-4a ET
Aired February 07, 2021 - 03:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE (voice-over): Live from CNN Center, this is CNN NEWSROOM with Robyn Curnow.
ROBYN CURNOW, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Hi and welcome to our viewers here in the United States and all around the world. I'm Robyn Curnow. This is CNN.
Today is Super Bowl Sunday, arguably one of the biggest entertainment events in America. And it literally kicks off an even more eventful week. Super Bowl LV between the Kansas City Chiefs and Tampa Bay Buccaneers will be unlike any other. The stadium will only be about a third full, due to the pandemic.
The game comes as recent trends show an encouraging decline in new COVID cases and hospitalizations across the U.S. But health experts are warning the crisis is far from over. Meanwhile, people watching at home are urged to avoid parties that might spread the virus. And the traditional postgame parade at Disney World has been canceled.
In Washington, U.S. lawmakers on Monday will begin crafting President Biden's ambitious COVID relief bill. House Democrats aim to have it done in two weeks' time. But overshadowing everything is Tuesday's historic second impeachment trial of former president Donald Trump.
There's also startling new video that shows just how closely some who stormed the Capitol building last month were listening to Mr. Trump and what they believed he wanted them to do. Listen to this man who calls himself the QAnon shaman and what he said about Trump after the riot.
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UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How did you get out?
JACOB CHANSLEY, CAPITOL RIOTER: Get out of what?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How did you get out?
CHANSLEY: The Senate?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Yes.
CHANSLEY: Cops walked out with me.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They just let you go?
CHANSLEY: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: What's your message now?
CHANSLEY: Oh, Donald Trump asked everybody to go home. He just said it. He just put out a tweet. It's a minute long. He asked everybody to go home.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Why do you think so?
CHANSLEY: Because, dude, (INAUDIBLE) day (INAUDIBLE) won.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: How did we win?
(CROSSTALK)
CHANSLEY: -- by sending a message to the senators and the congressman. We won by sending a message to Pence, OK, that if they don't do as their oath to do, if they don't uphold the Constitution, then we will remove them from office one way or another.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This guy is recording (INAUDIBLE)?
CHANSLEY: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE).
CHANSLEY: I'm fine with being recorded. All I can say is we won the (INAUDIBLE) day. Donald Trump is still out president.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I have another question. There's a lot of people that doubt that you would be able to go in and come out.
What do you say to them?
CHANSLEY: Well, a lot of people doubted a lot of prophets, sages. A lot of people doubted Christ.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CURNOW: We don't know yet just how this impeachment trial will proceed or how long it will last. What we do know is House Republicans that voted to impeach Mr. Trump are facing major backlash at home. Jessica Dean has details.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) JESSICA DEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The Wyoming Republican Party voted to censure congresswoman Liz Cheney in response to her vote to impeach former president Donald Trump.
That resolution had a number of inaccuracies in it. Congresswoman Cheney did respond, saying that she was compelled by the oath I swore to the Constitution when she took that vote to impeach former president Trump.
Now all of this, of course, coming on the eve of former president Trump's second impeachment trial, which is scheduled to start on Tuesday. There's still a number of unknowns surrounding that trial, namely how long it will take.
We don't know exactly at this point how long this will go on and also if witnesses will be called. In this case, it's a very unique situation in that the 100 senators who will be serving as jurors were also witnesses in this case. They experienced the insurrection here on January 6th.
House impeachment managers have also requested former president Trump to testify. He said he will not be doing that. And right now there's just not an appetite for a subpoena to compel him to testify.
We're told that House impeachment managers instead intend to say his refusal to testify here for the Senate impeachment trial underscores his guilt as being singularly responsible for the insurrection on January 6th -- Jessica Dean, CNN, the Capitol.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
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CURNOW: CNN political commentator Errol Louis joins me now from New York, the host of "You Decide" podcast.
What do you expect from the impeachment, any surprises?
[03:05:00]
ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Yes, there will be surprises. We've never had this before. This is history being made here, we've never had an ex-president the subject of an impeachment trial in American history.
We've only had four impeachments in American history and two of them were of Donald Trump. So there's a lot of unusual things happening right off the bat.
What I am expecting is that we'll see a reliving of the attack on the Capitol on January 6. And ironically it will be taking place in the Senate chamber that was overrun by the rioters and seized for a while by them. There are a lot of people who are going to be acting technically as jurors. That's what an impeachment trial is.
The Senate sits in judgment of the president now being impeached or the ex-president. But there are also witnesses and the chamber where it's being held is a crime scene, where much of this happened. And we've never had a president or ex-president accused of insurrection, which is what the impeachment article states.
So a lot of unusual things happening here. I think it's going to be a traumatic reliving of something that has been just a wound in our democracy here, the fact that, at the time, a sitting president spoke to a mob, that mob then stormed into the Capitol while votes were being counted and tried to overturn an election.
And five people died in the process. Those are the inescapable, uncontested facts and they will be laid out.
The only question is, does Donald Trump deserve to be convicted of having incited that insurrection?
CURNOW: No matter how traumatic it is, we are expecting the majority of Republicans to punt any decision on casting judgment on him.
Do you think anything will change that?
LOUIS: You know, anything can happen. This is a test of our institutions, our democratic institutions. And it may be an imperfect process by which to hold Donald Trump accountable.
But it's the only process that we have. There are, by most estimates, about 17 Republican senators that would have to vote against the president for them to reach the two-thirds majority needed to actually convict him. It's unlikely that they have that many votes. I think they're about 12 short.
Let's assume the senators keep an open mind. But even if they don't convict, the record will be laid out. The transparency that people seek, the final accounting of what actually happened in the president's exact role, is going to be debated in public, very publicly, and we'll have a better sense of what happened and who should be held accountable.
CURNOW: While that plays out in the coming week, the past week has also seen a real -- a real insight into what the Republican Party is, the sort of tug for the soul of this venerable old party.
What do you make, as the impeachment trial moves forward and this real fight for what is Republicanism right now and how much of a hold Donald Trump still has on it, how do you think that will play in within the impeachment, at least politically?
LOUIS: I've got to tell you, there's not really much of a fight. The Republican Party is beholden to Donald Trump. Every poll that you look at, the behavior of the elected officials, everything that you can measure tells you that they're either in full support of him or, in the case of elected officials, they're afraid to cross him and afraid of his followers coming after them.
We're talking about 60 percent, 70 percent, 80 percent of Donald Trump, even after everything we've seen, even after the party suffered the loss of the White House, lower and upper house of Congress, even after all that political destruction that happened on Donald Trump's watch.
There are people still publicly saying we don't know if he really lost the election, we're not going to cross him, we're going to decline to criticize him, even after that attack on the Capitol.
And so, you know, I don't know if it's that much of a fight. But there are a handful of Republicans saying we need to go in another direction. We can't keep suffering these political losses. In the end, that's supposed to be the self-correcting mechanism that draws the party in a different direction. But it hasn't begun.
CURNOW: What has begun is this new presidency. And what we have been seeing is Joe Biden furiously going ahead with his priorities, with his order of business. Seems like a man who knows that he's running out of time or that he doesn't have enough time. The speed at which he's implementing his agenda is quite awesome,
isn't it?
LOUIS: Absolutely.
(CROSSTALK)
LOUIS: Democrats control the Senate and the House and the White House. And if historical patterns hold, Democrats are going to lose control of one of those institutions in the next two years when we have midterm elections.
So both for substantive reasons, because the economy is flat on its back and we are still suffering through this pandemic, the president knows he has to move quickly, that he has maybe 24 months to enact not just a turnaround in the economic disaster that Trump left him and a turnaround in the pandemic that has claimed 500,000 lives.
But if he wants his agenda to get passed, he has to do it while Democrats control the House and Senate. So he has to move very quickly.
And he is under no illusions that the Republicans will cooperate in any way, shape or form. As deadly as the pandemic has been, as bad as the economy is, as high as the unemployment rate is, you still have Republicans saying they do not want to spend money to try and revive the economy.
It's mind-boggling in a lot of ways. But the White House is not going to waste time trying to bring them over. They have the power, they have a very thin majority; they're going to make the most of it.
CURNOW: Errol Louis, live there from New York. Thanks for your expertise and opinion.
LOUIS: Good to see you.
(END VIDEOTAPE) CURNOW: President Biden is spending the weekend at his home in Delaware while he remains focused on a $1.9 trillion COVID relief package. He admits that one of his signature campaign promises will probably have to wait a little bit later.
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CURNOW: Here's Arlette Saenz.
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ARLETTE SAENZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: As the push to get his COVID relief package passed continues, President Biden is acknowledging that one element of that proposal may not ultimately make it into the final deal. That is the $15 minimum wage.
That is something President Biden promoted during the presidential campaign and something he wanted to include in this COVID relief package. In an interview with CBS, the president said it may not survive due to the Senate rules process.
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NORAH O'DONNELL, CBS NEWS HOST: You also want to raise the minimum wage to $15.
Is that something you would be willing to negotiation on in order to get Republican support?
JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Well, apparently that's not going to occur because of the rules in the United States Senate.
O'DONNELL: So you're saying the minimum wage will not be in this.
BIDEN: My guess is it won't but I do think we should have a minimum wage, stand by itself, $15 an hour and work your way up. It doesn't have to be boom and all the economics show, if you do that, the whole economy rises.
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SAENZ: Now if that proposal does not make it into the final package, the president indicated he does want to pursue the $15 minimum wage as a stand-alone measure down the road.
He's spending the weekend at home in Delaware, where he visited the doctor's office to receive an X-ray on his foot, which he fractured in November. The doctor says those fractures have completely healed -- Arlette Saenz, CNN, Wilmington, Delaware.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CURNOW: Only a small percentage of Americans have received a coronavirus vaccination but numbers are ramping up dramatically. We'll have that, along with plans to get even more vaccines into arms. And find out why a top British doctor is warning of easing lockdown
measures too soon and why he says the U.K. could be in the thick of a pandemic a little while longer.
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MARY DONEGAM, VACCINE RECIPIENT: I'm 89.5 and I don't want to die young. And I want to go out and eat in a restaurant without being afraid that I'm going to catch COVID-19, whatever it is.
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CURNOW: Similar scenes are playing out across the U.S. as officials work to ramp up these vaccination efforts. In fact, more people now are getting vaccinated than are getting the virus in the U.S. by a factor of 10:1.
As of Saturday, nearly 40 million doses had been administered. As you can see here, cases are falling across the country. Not a single state is in the red. That is good news. But health experts are warning that upcoming events like the Super Bowl could set the country back. Here's Natasha Chen.
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NATASHA CHEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the past week, more than 9 million COVID vaccines were administered in the U.S. That outpaced the number of new cases 10:1.
In the last two days the number of people hospitalized came under 90,000 for the first time since November. Despite the trends health officials are warning us not to let our guard down.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We're at halftime and things seem quiet in the locker room. But when we come out, the team we're facing is going to be a lot tougher than the team we faced in the first half of the outbreak.
CHEN (voice-over): As both the pandemic and the Super Bowl are on people's minds this weekend, a source tells CNN Joe Biden will take advantage of a large national audience Sunday to thank health care workers.
An administration official says the White House also hopes to combat vaccine hesitancy and speak to the African American and Latino and white rural non-mask wearing communities in particular.
Meanwhile, Americans are being discouraged from doing what so many people do this weekend, attending Super Bowl parties.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's the Super Bowl, not the stupid bowl. Let's try and keep everyone safe. Don't drink, don't drive, don't bring multiple households together and create a superspreader event in your own home because, I guarantee you, it's going to be your own family who's the ones going to be jeopardized.
CHEN (voice-over): Speaking of the NFL, the league this week offered the Biden administration every one of its 32 team stadiums as mass vaccination sites. Seven are already in operation and the 49ers Levi Stadium is about to become California's largest vaccination site.
The Yankee Stadium's vaccination site opened Friday but only for people in the Bronx, an effort to reach underserved communities.
MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D), NEW YORK CITY: This is about equity, fairness, protecting people that need the most protection, because the Bronx is one of the places that bore the brunt of this crisis.
CHEN (voice-over): Mayor de Blasio and other officials say the problem continues to be supply.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Other than me just running up there and sitting on somebody, I -- we are doing everything. It's coming from all fronts.
CHEN (voice-over): A third vaccine made by Johnson & Johnson could help increase supply. But the U.S. Food and Drug Administration advisory committee isn't scheduled to discuss it until February 26th -- Natasha Chen, CNN, Atlanta.
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CURNOW: There's some troubling news on the vaccine front. AstraZeneca says its coronavirus shot seems less effective against the variant first spotted in South Africa when it's a case of mild disease. But it still believes the vaccine could protect against severe disease.
In Italy, health officials are authorizing the use of monoclonal antibodies to treat the virus. The country has clear the therapies developed by U.S. drugmakers, Regeneron and Eli Lilly.
Now a top British doctor says, despite the vaccine rollout, intensive care units in the U.K. are full to the rafters. He told British radio, while numbers are starting to plateau, he believes for a moment that the U.K. could remain in the thick of it a while longer. Let's talk with Salma Abdelaziz in London and Melissa Bell in Paris.
What more can you tell us?
SALMA ABDELAZIZ, CNN PRODUCER: We are in many ways past the peak, according to scientific advisers here. The epidemic is shrinking. That crucial reproduction number, that's down. Things are stabilizing. The key indicators look much better.
[03:20:00] ABDELAZIZ: But -- that's the key but -- there are still so many patients in the hospital with coronavirus, more than during the first week, that is still the case. So this country's health care system is not out of the woods yet.
What does that mean?
We have to stay under restrictions, under lockdown for much longer, potentially months longer, while this country's vaccination program really kicks into gear. That's the only protection here against COVID- 19, particularly because there is this more transmissible, potentially more deadly variant that is prevalent here in the U.K.
It is really only that protection you can get from the vaccine that is going to be able to get this country out of restrictions and out of lockdowns.
Where are we on that?
As of right now, we have about 11.5 million people in this country who have received the first dose of the vaccine, about 1 in 5 adults. The goal is to have the over 50s to get this vaccine by early May.
And it's then, advisers say, we can begin to look at easing restrictions and reopening schools. But these are hard-won gains. The goal is, in the meanwhile, to keep these other variants, like the South Africa variant, out of the country with really tough travel rules and really tough guidance from the government.
Thanks so much, Salma in London. I want to go over the Channel to Melissa in Paris.
Melissa, give us a sense of what's happening where you are.
MELISSA BELL, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Europe is seeing something similar to the United Kingdom, a stabilizing of key COVID-19 indicators. In Germany, for instance, a country so hard hit by the second wave, with much stricter lockdowns than we saw during the first.
We now know for the first time since late October, the infection rate per 100,000 people is at its lowest level. It's taken that long for the restrictions to take their effect. Infection rates falling or stabilizing but ICUs remain heavily overburdened.
We're looking at restrictions being eased in some countries, children going back to school in Denmark, for instance, Italy lowering most of its restrictions in 20 regions. And yet countries keeping a very close eye, just as U.K. is, on other variants.
For instance, the one first identified in the United Kingdom represents 6 percent of infections in Germany.
In France, epidemiologists are warning, if left unchecked, that new variant could be dominant by the month of March.
So European countries looking at lifting restrictions, encouraged by what they're seeing in terms of infection rates but keeping a close eye on variants that could yet get the better of them and their attempts to ease some of those restrictions.
CURNOW: Thanks so much, Melissa in Paris, Salma in London.
Protesters refusing to bow down after a military coup in Myanmar. Coming up, part of my interview with a former U.S. ambassador to the country. What he says the U.S. needs to do about sanctions.
And health experts around the world are coming up with creative schemes to get vaccinations to people who need them. We'll show you a few after the break.
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CURNOW: Welcome back to our viewers here in the United States and all around the world. Thanks for joining me. I'm Robyn Curnow and it is 26 minutes past the hour.
We're tracking outrage and action today on the streets of Myanmar. Take a look.
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CURNOW (voice-over): Thousands of protesters have been out in force again to denounce last Monday's military coup. They're defying the country's powerful generals and demanding a swift return to civilian rule.
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CURNOW: For the latest, I want to go to Selina Wang in Tokyo, monitoring everything that's been going on.
Certainly a lot more people on the streets today.
SELINA WANG, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Witnesses tell us that the demonstrators today are substantially larger and more organized than yesterday's. In fact, Reuters is estimating the people in the streets number more than tens of thousands.
We are seeing crowds of mostly young people, chanting for democracy, for the fall of the dictatorship, holding banners with Aung San Suu Kyi's image, saying, "We want our leader."
These protests are largely peaceful. We've seen the crowds try to avoid any of the roadblocks as well as avoid any direct confrontation with the police. According to NetBlocks, just minutes ago, there has been partial restoration of internet connectivity. But earlier, because of that blackout communication as well, coverage
of this protest has been significantly hampered. We learned that protesters have been largely organizing through word of mouth, through SMS texting, as well as through phone calls.
For more than 50 years, Myanmar had been ruled by a military regime that brutally stifled dissent, that plunged the country into poverty. But about six years ago, there had been hope when Aung San Suu Kyi had won the election by a landslide, forming the first civilian government.
But now the people of Myanmar are worried that history is repeating itself. Even though Aung San Suu Kyi has fallen from grace internationally over her rejection of accusations of genocide over her failure to condemn the Rohingya crisis, internally, domestically at home, she still has widespread support.
CURNOW: When we talk about support and pressure, there has been some international pressure.
Do you think it's going to make any difference?
WANG: That's a great question. There has been this widespread international condemnation, the threat of sanctions, including from the Biden administration. But experts say that is not likely to deter or to bother the military regime, given that this country has endured sanctions before.
Experts say the challenge here is that a targeted sanction would likely have a limited impact. But a broader one could risk harming the people in Myanmar.
Of course, there's also a big fear here of a further crackdown on journalists, on critics, on human rights activists. In fact, a human rights group in Myanmar estimates at least 133 government officials and 14 activists have already been detained as of Monday.
CURNOW: Selena Wang, thanks so much for that update. We'll check in with you if anything else happens.
You're watching CNN.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CURNOW: Former U.S. ambassador to Myanmar, Derek Mitchell, joins me now. He's also the president of the National Democratic Institute.
Ambassador, thanks so much for joining us. Obviously, you spent a lot of time in Myanmar.
As you watch what's happening on the streets now, what do you make of these protests?
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DEREK MITCHELL, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO MYANMAR: Well, it's steadily escalated there. It doesn't surprise me that people are going to push back. These are a very proud people, a very strong and thoughtful -- a lot of young people on the streets.
It's encouraging and inspiring but it also fills you with some dread, if you know what happens in Burmese history, that the street demonstrations have led to violence.
I really pray it doesn't happen again. But it is -- I think it's inevitable that people will be pushing back against this coup, that, I think, touches the hearts of everyone.
CURNOW: What is China's role in all of this?
And particularly in the aftermath and what happens next?
I know that the Myanmar generals and the Chinese are not natural bed partners.
But what kind of leverage does China have going forward, as well?
MITCHELL: Well, they have leverage in the sense that they have enormous business interests and a lot of investment there. But as you say, the generals don't particularly like the Chinese, they don't like any external influence on their internal affairs.
But they could have some leverage if they chose to use it. It would be wonderful for the U.S. and China to work together. But the Chinese see Myanmar, Burma, as their sphere of influence. They don't want any Western power anywhere near their border.
They talk about not being involved in internal affairs but sometimes they see these things as an opportunity, because there will be alienation from the democratic countries of the world. That means that the military would have to turn to China to support it.
So they may see an opportunity. But I'm sure they're watching very closely, given their historically bad relationship with the military and the good relationship they had formed with Aung San Suu Kyi's party.
CURNOW: Are there any lessons learned from the past that the U.S. in particular, the Biden administration should not repeat?
How should they deal with what is going on?
We've had tweets from the embassy on the ground, we've obviously had some response.
What next there?
MITCHELL: I don't know about lessons learned. We want to distinguish between the people of the country and those who perpetrated this, the military.
I think there's a recognition that the old days of sanctions, which were blanket sanctions that isolated the country, may not be the best way to go now. You want to target this carefully but not hurt the economy or the people. That's a very strong lesson many have taken.
I think also engagement is very, very important, that we have established a very -- a record of engagement in the past 10 years. And even though we've been alienated since the Rohingya crisis, that it's important to reengage and get to the commander in chief. It's very hard at this point.
But work with allies. Work with partners like Japan and others to see if we can find a way to get to the commander in chief to turn from this course he's on, before it's too late.
CURNOW: So I know that many people who have watched this will agree with you, that they prefer targeted sanctions, not blanket sanctions. Another criticism of American policy was too much of a focus on Aung San Suu Kyi, on one person, one leader.
How important is it to look at these protests or the opposition as more broad?
MITCHELL: Oh, you have to. And we always did. We had relations, as we could, even before the opening and certainly after the opening, when I was ambassador, first the envoy, then ambassador.
We had very strong relations with civil society, with the media, with political parties across the spectrum. We just didn't have that ability in the old days, because we were -- it was just a junta and they were isolating themselves and we isolated them further with sanctions.
The reason why there was such attention on Aung San Suu Kyi was maybe twofold. One, she's a charismatic figure. She represents the democratic hope of the country and it created a lot of attention to the country, because she was the representative, the symbol of it.
But also the people have chosen her. It wasn't simply about her and who she was, she was, in 1990, head of the party that won in a landslide election. In 2015, head of the party that won in a landslide and the same last November.
So she represents democracy. The people have chosen her, so we must invest in the people's choice. But it can't be about just her. It has to be everyone and invest in the future, because she won't be around forever.
CURNOW: Former ambassador to Myanmar, really appreciate you joining me. Thank you for your perspective.
MITCHELL: Thanks for the opportunity.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CURNOW: Health officials in California say they are closing in on administering 4.5 million doses of COVID vaccines. Paul Vercammen went to one site in Los Angeles County, where demand is far greater than supply.
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PAUL VERCAMMEN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: The important heavy lifting of putting needles into arms here in Los Angeles and giving people their first COVID vaccines continued.
And for one 93-year-old man, he was euphoric to be out of the house for the first time since March.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Feels like a different world. I haven't been out -- out of my backyard or the house since COVID started.
VERCAMMEN: Also out here at the Inglewood Forum, helping people through the vaccination process, Dr. Barbara Ferrer, head of L.A. County Public Health. She said it's a monumental task to get people vaccinated but there are just not enough doses available.
DR. BARBARA FERRER, L.A. COUNTY PUBLIC HEALTH: The heartache right now. So many people want to get vaccinated. This site could easily accommodate 4,000 people getting vaccinated a day of and we just don't have vaccine today. We were only able to release 1,100 appointments.
VERCAMMEN: So they administered only 1,100 vaccines. That means late in the day they had to turn away some people who had appointments.
As for the Super Bowl, the doctor flatly advising it's a bad idea to hold a party and mix things up with other households -- reporting from Inglewood, I'm Paul Vercammen, back to you now.
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CURNOW: Thanks, Paul, for that.
Not every community has access to a world-class sports stadium. Authorities are thinking up creative ways to get doses to people. In rural France, there's a vaccine bus. In Sweden, a Nobel prize banquet hall is being repurposed. Take a look at some of the unusual places people are getting their shots.
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CURNOW (voice-over): All aboard this bus in France, the seniors taking their seats inside are not taking a trip.
[03:35:00]
CURNOW (voice-over): But they are taking a big step. Protecting themselves from the coronavirus by getting vaccinated.
Many residents in this rural town do not have the means to travel to bigger cities to get inoculated. The initiative by the local government, this mobile vaccination site came to them.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): It is a very good initiative to have done this with the bus. Because honestly, I wouldn't have gotten vaccinated right now. I would've waited because I would've had to go to the nearest big city. CURNOW (voice-over): The Vacci Bus is just one innovative idea to make
it easier for people to get the shots that are needed. To help slow the transmission of the coronavirus. Another incentive is to transform large places, that people are already going to in their communities into makeshift vaccination centers like cathedrals, cinemas, department stores.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It is nice and open. Plenty of space for everybody. Good idea to use it if the film's not put on.
CURNOW (voice-over): Even some of the grandest places in the world are doing double duty like Sweden's Nobel Prize banquet hall. In previous years the scene of black tie galas packed with patrons, its purpose now is more humble but no less important.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We have this amazing place that is empty right now but is also a citizen's house. I feel like we should use it.
CURNOW (voice-over): Using it is just what people are doing around the world. From this parking lot in Disneyland to Fenway Park, home of the Red Sox, to Lords Cricket Ground in the U.K. Where empty spaces that once filled us with joy, now fill us with hope.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CURNOW: Chinese New Year 2021 will look very different compared to pre-pandemic spring festivals. The holiday that was a mass-travel superspreading event last year is significantly scaled back this year. But as David Culver shows us, some in China are still getting into the spirit of the season.
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DAVID CULVER, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Strolling the aisles of a Shanghai grocery store, Vicky Wang is stocking up ahead of the most important holiday in China, the Chinese New Year, or Spring Festival. Traditionally, the holiday marks the largest mass migration of humans each year. In China, major cities empty out as hundreds of millions travel back to their home provinces.
But last year's outbreak in Wuhan coincided with the start of the Chinese New Year and made for a perfect storm, packed train stations like this one in Beijing, combined with a rapidly spreading virus.
This year, the government urging and in some cases even ordering people not to travel. Wang is among the millions sacrificing precious time with family this holiday, following the government guidance to stay put.
VICKY WANG, INTERNET COMPANY PROJECT MANAGER: We have to make a lot of sacrifice for everyone to keep us safe.
CULVER (voice-over): While China has touted its strict and seemingly effective containment efforts, recent cluster outbreaks have resulted in the government's travel restrictions. Already, in the first three days of the annual travel rush, passenger
rail trips plummeted more than 70 percent. The normally packed train stations are now eerily empty. It seems many are following the government's suggestion to not travel.
And some state owned companies are even paying their employees a few hundred dollars, encouraging them not to return to their hometown and instead to use the holiday time to explore the cities in which they live and work.
JANE SUN, CEO, TRIP.COM: The staycation is really popular.
CULVER (voice-over): Jane Sun is CEO of China's largest online travel agency, trip.com, showing us customer's real-time bookings. She points out that while flight and train tickets within China are down compared with years past, hotels are benefiting from the staycation effect.
SUN: We are able to ask hotels to come up or create packages for the families, for their children so that our customers who used to travel abroad can spend their time with their family, within the same cities.
CULVER: But some are still determined to travel home. By video chat, we spoke with a 21-year-old Dan Dee. Not his real name, as he doesn't want to get in trouble for criticizing the government.
He just wrapped up 21 days of quarantine, which included heavy surveillance right outside his front door, all to travel home for the Chinese New Year, which he says is deeply personal for migrant workers.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The spring festival is the only chance and the most important chance for them to go home. To stay with their family. That's why I think they need to go home.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: OK. This is good. It means travel safe and comes the good luck.
CULVER (voice-over): As for those who choose to stay, like Wang, they are still finding ways to celebrate.
[03:40:00]
CULVER (voice-over): Asking her parents and sister over video chat for their advice on cooking the Chinese New Year dinner, a meal she and millions of others will eat separated from loved ones as China works to halt a decade long tradition of mass migration so as to prevent a repeat of last year's rapid spread of the virus. David Culver, CNN, Shanghai.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CURNOW: Millions of people in the U.S. are facing dangerously cold temperatures this weekend, from the Midwest to the South and the Northeast. Arctic weather is covering much of the country. The latest in a live forecast next.
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CURNOW: Across the U.S., more than 20 million people will be waking up to bitterly cold weather. Winter storm warnings are in effect. Wind chills could plunge to minus 50 degrees Fahrenheit, minus 46 degrees Celsius. You could catch frostbite in 10 minutes.
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[03:45:00]
CURNOW: The NFL will celebrate the end of a successful season at the Super Bowl.
How did the league keep the coronavirus at bay?
CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta tells us next.
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[03:50:00]
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PETER O'REILLY, EVP, NFL: The fact that we've been able to invite 7,500 vaccinated health care workers to be our guests, get free tickets to the game, two goals there, just to thank and celebrate those people, who have been on the front lines and will continue to be.
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CURNOW: The National Football League's executive V.P. there on plans to honor health care workers today at the Super Bowl. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers take on the Kansas City Chiefs in the big game. "CNN SPORT's" Coy Wire with more now on the finale to an unprecedented season.
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COY WIRE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It is certainly the most unusual Super Bowl we've ever seen. Both teams normally arriving a week ahead of time to get adjusted. The Chiefs arriving the day before the game.
And yet another example of the audibles that had to be called playing a season during a pandemic. Even the players said they didn't think there was any way this season would make it.
But strict COVID-19 protocols and discipline all added up and here we are. There will be about 30,000 cardboard cutout fans in the stands acting as social distancing barriers for real fans, about 25,000 of them. About a third will be vaccinated health care workers, heroes invited by the NFL.
I spoke to one, Belinda Spahn, a critical care nurse manager here and I asked what went through her mind when she found out she was going to the Super Bowl?
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BELINDA SPAHN, CRITICAL CARE NURSE MANAGER: The moment, you know, when you see it, OK, this is awesome. And it is. It's like a dream come true to go to the Super Bowl. And yet it never would have happened if this monster hadn't descended upon us.
And I would -- I would sit in my living room cheering the Bucs on if we could turn back time and not have this pandemic.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
WIRE: She leads about 30 to 40 nurses and her team is as tough as any playing in that Super Bowl. She said she's learned so much about the human spirit, how resilient we are. She said they have huddles every day, they go over their game plan and the mantra is mission possible -- Coy Wire, CNN, in Tampa, Florida.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CURNOW: Whatever happens at the Super Bowl, the NFL has reason to celebrate. It completed a full season in the midst of a pandemic, something no other sport has actually been able to do.
How did the NFL do it and what can we learn?
Here's Dr. Sanjay Gupta with more on that.
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DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): This is a sport defined by close contact, an environment ripe for transmission.
GUPTA: There's other people who say it's absolutely ludicrous to even try this.
What do you say to them?
DR. ALLEN SILLS (PH), NFL CHIEF MEDICAL OFFICER: I feel like it's the right thing to do to learn to live with this virus. I really do.
GUPTA (voice-over): Dr. Allen Sills (ph) is the chief medical officer for the NFL. He was brought in as a neurosurgeon, who thought he would be dealing with concussions. And then the pandemic changed everything. I initially met up with him at the beginning of the season.
SILLS: We just have to recognize we're dealing with an unpredictable pandemic, so we have to adjust along the way.
GUPTA (voice-over): On September 10, the Kansas City Chiefs kicked off against the Houston Texans in the first game of the season. At the time, there were more than 6 million confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States.
GUPTA: Now right before the Super Bowl, how did things go?
SILLS: I think what we have tried to do at every step is to make the best and the safest decisions we can and we've tried to evolve and learn along the way.
GUPTA (voice-over): While cases around the country exploded, now, with more than 26 million confirmed, the NFL was relatively untouched with a positivity rate of 0.8 percent.
So what worked for the NFL?
And what can we all learn from it?
SILLS: We had an outbreak in Tennessee. When we went in and really dug into that and tried to understand, how did transmission occur, despite our protocols, we began to realize it wasn't just six feet in 15 minutes.
GUPTA (voice-over): Put simply, Dr. Sills said it wasn't the playing or practices that were the largest concerns but these three things -- eating, greeting and meeting.
SILLS: Meeting inside, even if you're more than six feet apart, if you're in a poorly ventilated room for a long time if someone is positive, there can be transmission inside those rooms.
Eating together is the other very high-risk activity. Most people don't have a mask on.
And the greeting part is the social interactions outside the facilities. When you interact in the community, if someone is positive and you get a haircut or have a massage at your house.
GUPTA (voice-over): How did the NFL know?
They tested daily and they contact traced and tracked the movements of more than 11,000 players and staff, even alerting them if they were too close to one another.
SILLS: If we move closer together than six feet, you'll start to see it blinking red.
GUPTA (voice-over): Keep in mind, the CDC defines close contact like this.
[03:55:00]
GUPTA (voice-over): Being within six feet of an infected person for a cumulative total of 15 minutes or more over a 24-hour period. But the league's data found transmission was occurring with less time
and more distance. These are considerations for anyone, anywhere, to assess their risk.
Ventilation: are you indoors or outdoors?
Are you in a car with the windows up or in a large, open stadium?
The more air circulation the better.
Masks: what kind of masks are being used and do they fit correctly?
And finally, time and distance: the longer and closer you are around someone, the increased risk for transmission.
SILLS: If you're failing in two or more of those categories, that's what we consider a high-risk close contact. I think the biggest thing we learned, universal masking works. It's the most effective strategy we have.
GUPTA: How hard would it be to replicate what you were able to do in the NFL?
SILLS: It wasn't the fact that we tested every single day. It wasn't the fact that everyone wore a proximity fancy tracking device. What prevented transmission was mask usage, avoiding in-person meetings, staying in the open air environments, not eating together, prompt symptom reporting, isolation of anybody that's exposed.
GUPTA (voice-over): The same basic rules we have known since the beginning of this pandemic. With more evidence than ever that they actually work.
GUPTA: So who are you rooting for?
(LAUGHTER)
SILLS: We love all our children.
GUPTA: What is the deal with Tom Brady?
Just as a sports medicine guy, really?
And the Super Bowl again?
SILLS: I think his career has been amazing and outstanding and he's an inspiration to all of us. The closer he gets in age to me, I have thoughts maybe I still got a run at it.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CURNOW: Thanks to Sanjay for that story.
Now a dolphin named Nicholas, of course, at the Clearwater Marine Aquarium in Florida has predicted the winner of the Super Bowl. It's not the Bucs in next door neighboring Tampa. Take a look. (BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: All right. Nicholas has made his choice. And it looks like Nicholas is predicting the Kansas City Chiefs to win the big game this year.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
CURNOW: Nicholas, trainers say, the 18-year-old dolphin, also correctly predicted the Chiefs' win in last year's Super Bowl and is on a six-event winning streak.
That wraps up this hour of CNN. I'm Robyn Curnow. Thanks for joining me wherever you are in the world. I'm going to hand over to my colleague, Kim Brunhuber.
