Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Nearly Half of Texas Residents Hit by Water Crisis on Top of Power Crisis; Biden Meets Virtually with G7 Leaders for the First Time as President; Winter Blast Disrupts Vaccine Shipments Nationwide; New Study Shows Pregnant Women Are At A Significantly High Risk Of Contracting COVID-19; Pfizer Doing Their First Trial Run On Pregnant Woman And How It Affects Them And The Baby; House Democrats Are Preparing To Take The Coronavirus Economic Relief Package On The House Floor. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired February 19, 2021 - 09:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[09:00:42]

POPPY HARLOW, CNN ANCHOR: Good morning. I'm glad you're with me this Friday morning. I'm Poppy Harlow.

A new crisis is emerging this morning in Texas. Nearly half of the state is without clean drinking water. That means about 13 million people in addition are under these boil water advisories as the state restores power to most of its residents. Texans are angry and they're tired.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are boiling bath tub water. Any Texan, every Texan's blood should be boiling. That this is even the reality that we're living in right now.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's all about survival right now until it starts getting warm.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: People are dying. People are being poisoned by carbon monoxide as they try to heat their homes so their kids don't freeze.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

HARLOW: There are five straight days now of record-low temperatures causing water mains and pipes to leak or burst across the state. It's pushing the water supply across Texas to the brink. The situation is so dire that there are firefighters in San Antonio right now that had to truck in water because the hydrants were frozen and some hospitals are turning away patients due to no running water.

The head of FEMA says he's meeting with President Biden today to talk about what the federal government might be able to do here for Texas. This extreme weather is also causing major delays in vaccine distribution across the country. White House officials now say the nation is going to need to work double time to make up for this critical time that's been lost.

A lot to get to. Let's begin this hour with our Natasha Chen. She is inside a Houston furniture store being used as a shelter, trying to keep people safe, keep them warm. It's been amazing to see, really, you know, small business owners stepping up in this moment.

NATASHA CHEN, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, Poppy. This is a place, Gallery Furniture, that's usually open to people during hurricanes. But this is so unusual for people in Houston to deal with these freezing temperatures. Folks have been fed breakfast this morning. You know, and when we got here just a few hours ago, there were still folks asleep in the showroom on these beds.

And in one sign that things are improving here is that there were fewer than 100 people staying overnight tonight as opposed to the last several nights when there were several hundred. So that's showing that more people's homes are coming back online. The water, as you mentioned, is still such a critical issue. It's just come back into this building but it's still just trickling.

Now a lot of the attention is going to turn now to ERCOT, this agency that manages the power flow for 90 percent of Texas. And it's unique in that the grid is not connected to the national grid. So they said they were just seconds, minutes away from a catastrophic failure the other night. Here's the CEO talking to CNN about answering some of those questions.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BILL MAGNESS, PRESIDENT AND CEO, ELECTRIC RELIABILITY COUNCIL OF TEXAS: We're accountable to the people and the leadership of Texas. We're going to go and explain the steps we took. Whether people have confidence in me or not, the grid operators who have to make those tough decisions in real time as critical conditions are right in front of them, they should have the confidence in those folks because they made some good decisions.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CHEN: And Governor Abbott has urged state lawmakers to mandate weatherization of equipment for these power resources. In the meantime, people here just still trying to stay warm and waiting for that water to come back, Poppy.

HARLOW: We hope it comes back soon for them. Natasha, thank you very, very much for being there.

So there are hospitals across Texas dealing with this disaster. You can imagine what it means for them. They're trying to care for patients, carry the weight of this pandemic. Some hospitals are now being forced to try to do all of that with no water.

I'm joined now by Dr. Ben Saldana, medical director of emergency medicine at Houston Methodist Hospital.

Doctor, thank you for being here. I can imagine, you know, you've been up most of the night all week trying to help everyone there. So thank you, and good morning. As of yesterday --

DR. BEN SALDANA, MEDICAL DIRECTOR OF EMERGENCY MEDICINE, HOUSTON METHODIST HOSPITAL: Good morning. Thanks for having me.

HARLOW: Of course. Your hospital network, Houston Methodist West and Houston Methodist Baytown Hospitals were still operating without water. Is that still the scenario this morning, and if it is, how do you function?

SALDANA: You know, it is, and if we -- some hospitals do have water, the pressure is quite low. And so we're functioning like we have all year, by being agile and getting our leadership together and within an hour, standing up spaces that are not normally housing patients to keep them warm and evaluate whether there's critical illness or not.

[09:05:11]

HARLOW: Yes. Of course, as you said, as we have been all year, you're referencing COVID. I mean, how does the very real threat of the COVID pandemic for every person that walks in your doors, patients and employees alike, how does this complicate mitigating more spread of that?

SALDANA: Yes, as you can imagine, you know, as more of our area hospitals were without power and water, many of their patients ended up at our facilities. And so, like we have all year, kind of bifurcating the E.R. into an area where COVID is unlikely and an area where it could be possible. As the volume of dialysis patients increased, this became very difficult.

I will tell you that five out of six patients that need dialysis three times a week had no place to go this week. And we are still struggling with that as central slowly come up with water. It's become a very difficult proposition for those patients.

HARLOW: That sounds like it could potentially be life or death for them. Is that where you are this morning?

SALDANA: Absolutely. And so, you know, every hour we go into the waiting room and ask who is here for dialysis, most of them raises their hand. And we kind of explain, this is what we're going to do. We're going to evaluate your blood work, an EKG, chest x-ray and decide like we do with all diseases some risk stratification around, you know, is this a life-threatening disorder at this moment or is this something we can treat and get you dialysis in the next day.

So we've set up kind of an outpatient dialysis center in our hospitals to make sure that patients are getting some portion of their treatment so they can get through the day and possibly to the next two.

HARLOW: I'm sure as the leader there, you're also thinking a lot about, well, what about next time? I mean, every indication is that weather like this will come to Texas again. You know, especially with the progression of climate change. And it doesn't seem -- it seems like there are more outstanding questions and finger-pointing among politicians than there are answers or mitigation plans. SALDANA: Yes, unfortunately, we don't have the luxury of finger-

pointing in the medical community. I think this year you've seen that, you know, all across the country, people have stepped up and made things happen. We are the safety net for our public emergency department, our hospitals and doctors or nurses getting together to make sure patients have a safe place and are cared for. I think our state leadership should take our example and run with it.

HARLOW: Yes.

SALDANA: I think it's time to kind of make sure this doesn't happen again.

HARLOW: I think you're right. Dr. Ben Saldana, thank you for the time this morning and we're wishing you luck and we're praying for those patients.

SALDANA: Thank you.

HARLOW: We've got a lot more information, if you're watching this and wondering how you can help all of the victims of what's going on across Texas, just go to CNN.com/impact.

Right now, President Biden is holding a virtual meeting with the G7 leaders. This is his first major international engagement as commander-in-chief. Later today, the president will go to Kalamazoo, Michigan. He's going to tour one of Pfizer's vaccine manufacturing sites.

Let's go to our Jeremy Diamond. He joins us this morning with more on what we're going to see from Biden.

Obviously, it's important for him to show support of these essential workers on the front lines helping to cure really the world. That is the Pfizer part of it. What's his message to the international community this morning with so many big headlines, namely, Iran?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes. What we will see from President Biden this morning is his most extensive foreign policy engagement to date. He's participating right now in that virtual G7 summit of the world's largest economies. And what we're going to hear from President Biden is, first of all, that the U.S. has officially as of today rejoined the Paris Climate Accords. He's also unveiling a $4 billion American commitment to COVAX, the global vaccine initiative aimed at helping lower income countries get their populations vaccinated as well.

But really the overarching theme of his engagements both at the G7 as well as in his remarks to the Munich Security Conference will be reaffirming the return of American leadership in the world. After years of more isolationist policies from former President Trump, President Biden in his remarks at the Munich Security Conference, I'm told by a senior administration official, he's expected to vow that the United States has returned to the world stage and reaffirm America's commitment to global alliances, in particular that transatlantic relationship between the U.S. and our European allies. The president also expected to address the fact directly that American

democracy and democracies around the world have been under strain.

[09:10:05]

A reference there to what happened in the United States with the January 6th insurrection and everything else that ensued. But he will also reaffirm the fact that he believes that democracy is the best model to advance humanity in the world, and really talk about the fact that these U.S. alliances with democracies around the world, it's so important that the U.S. and these other countries work together to confront the challenges and the threats posed by countries like China and Russia.

So that will be the message that we will hear from the president both at the G7, as well as in his remarks at this Munich Security Conference, both happening virtually.

HARLOW: Yes. Really important obviously ahead of the official G7 Summit that is not today but is ahead. In terms of Michigan, what's the goal? I mean, obviously he needs to show support, right, for these folks. But what's the message with this trip to Michigan?

DIAMOND: Well, look, we'll see the president actually touring this manufacturing plant where Pfizer is producing all of their coronavirus vaccines. 200 million doses of which are expected to be delivered by the end of May. But it also comes at a time where the U.S. is experiencing delays in the delivery of vaccines because of so much of the severe weather that we're seeing across the country, with vaccination sites shutting down in the state of Texas and also delays to vaccine deliveries in states across the country because of the impacts of this severe weather.

Remember, the U.S. earlier this week wise at 1.7 million vaccines administered per day. A huge increase from where we started when President Biden came into office, but that has already scaled back to 1.6 million. And now Dr. Anthony Fauci making very clear that the U.S. will have a lot of ground to make up.

And again, even though vaccine deliveries have increased under Biden's administration, we still have so few of the U.S. population that has actually been vaccinated. And so you can expect to hear President Biden talk about the efforts that his administration has been undergoing to increase vaccine deliveries and administration in the U.S.

Again, remember, he's talked about 600 million doses being delivered by the end of July. But a return to normal won't be until next December, meaning that it's going to take time to get those shots into arms -- Poppy.

HARLOW: Yes, and every day my 4-year-old says, when is this going to be over? And I tell her about 300 sleeps. That's what we're looking at.

Jeremy, thank you very much. Severe weather across the country has caused serious delays in these

vaccine distributions. The White House senior adviser on COVID response, Andy Slavitt, says the administration will ask everyone to work double time to catch up next week.

Our Pete Muntean is following the latest.

Pete, you know well how hard it is to get these across the country, especially quickly and freezing, freezing cold, which the Pfizer ones need to be. FedEx, what are they doing?

PETE MUNTEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: You know, it's a complicated dance, Poppy. You know, the bad weather really having a big impact on getting these deliveries through on time. Two companies really central to that. FedEx and UPS, and FedEx says it's now bypassing its Memphis distribution headquarters because of the bad weather there. Now instead leaning on smaller distribution facilities like at Indianapolis and Newark to try and get those deliveries through.

UPS says it's still able to make deliveries where the roads are passable, but the real trick is the air game here. It actually had to close down its World Port Air Operations Center on Monday because of the bad weather there. A first in company history. All of this means vaccine delivery delays across the country.

One example, Maryland says it has not received Moderna vaccine shipments since before Monday. And the White House says this really means that states will have to buckle down when the deliveries do ultimately come in to get vaccine out the door.

Here's what the White House said.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANDY SLAVITT, WHITE HOUSE SENIOR ADVISER TO COVID RESPONSE: The best thing to do here, respect the weather, understand it. Not put people in harm's way. Keep the vaccine safe and sound, and remind people that if they have a second appointment and it's delayed by, say, a week or so, it's no problem. They will get their vaccines. And then we're just going to have to ask everybody in the country to work double time next week, presuming the weather improves. That's going to mean longer appointment hours, it's going to mean more shipping hours and we're going to ask everybody to do their part and pull together.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MUNTEAN: You know, Poppy, not only is this complicated, it's also highly technical. UPS has a GPS tracker on each individual vaccine shipment, and it says it can know pretty much up to the minute when a problem does occur. The big thing here is the gap between the first and second doses, 21 and 28 days, depending on the vaccine. And the White House says that's really not all that much of a concern. Even if things do get delayed by a week, vaccine will still be effective -- Poppy.

HARLOW: OK. That's good news. Pete, thank you so much for the reporting.

We have a lot ahead this hour. Pfizer says 4,000 pregnant women have now received their first vaccine dose in a big new Pfizer trial. This as a new study shows that infection rates of COVID among pregnant women are 70 percent higher than among nonpregnant women at the same age.

[09:15:00]

We'll have details on that next. He presided over Formers President Trump's latest impeachment trial and now he's calling for a criminal investigation; Senator Patrick Leahy will join us.

(COMMERICAL BREAK)

HARLOW: There is a new study and it says pregnant are at a significantly higher risk of contracting COVID-19. The study was conducted in Washington State and what it shows is that infection rates among pregnant were 70 percent higher than women who aren't pregnant around the same age. It also found infections among pregnant women of color were two to four times higher than expected.

[09:20:00]

Let's talk about this and a lot more with our Global Health Expert, Dr. Ashish Jha, he's Dean at Brown University School of Public Health. Dr. Jha, I'm so glad you're with us, thank you, thank you.

DR. ASHISH JHA, CNN GLOBAL HEALTH EXPERT: Good morning, thank you.

HARLOW: Good morning. Let's start with pregnant women concerning to say the least. But then you've also got good news from Pfizer that they have now completed the first shot, the first dose of their trial of the COVID-19 vaccine on 4,000 women in the U.S. And what is also interesting is they're going to study not only the impact on women - pregnant women but on the baby and when the baby is born.

But what should women that are pregnant do until we know the results?

DR. JHA: Yes, so again, good morning, thanks for having me on. You know, pregnant women are at higher risk of getting infected, that new study shows that. And then we know that from other studies that pregnant women who are infected are higher risk of complications than other women of similar age.

So COVID is a real risk for pregnant women. And, you know, even though pregnant women weren't included in the initial clinical trials all the data we're seeing so far suggest that these vaccines are quite safe in pregnancy. And so when I've been asked by pregnant women whether they should get vaccinate, especially if they're let's say healthcare workers in high risk situations.

My advice has been yes the evidence so far looks good on safety. And obviously protecting pregnant has got to be a top priority.

HARLOW: OK. I've had so many friends and family ask that question and you know I don't even know what I would do if I were in that situation. You wrote what I think is a really important opinion piece in "The Washington Post" a few days ago, trying to instill confidence in people and the Johnson & Johnson COVID vaccine if it gets U.A. authorization from the FDA.

And you wrote this, "The most important data point is that the Johnson & Johnson vaccine is 100 percent effective at preventing hospitalizations and deaths from COVID-19." What is the most important thing people need to know?

DR. JHA: Yes, you know, people look at headline numbers, you know, 85 percent, 95 percent and they get I think -- what I think are really not fair impressions of what's happening. Remember the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was tested in South Africa against the South African variant. Moderna and Pfizer weren't.

I think all three of these vaccines are really terrific. Personally I would not know how to choose between the three of them for my family. The key here isn't that we want to prevent infections though we do. The most important thing is we want to prevent people from getting really sick. And obviously we want to prevent people from dying.

And all three of these vaccines appear terrific for that goal.

HARLOW: That's really important what you just said because the different locations in which they conducted their trials had a significant impact on the headline numbers that all us, you know, see across the television screen or on the top of our newspapers in the morning. Why does that matter so much? Like does it man they're basically equally effective here in the United States for people?

DR. JHA: You know there may be minor difference and part of it is we haven't done a head-to-head. I'm not sure we will end up doing a head- to-head but all three of them when I look at the data and I look at what's happening in the U.S. and other countries. All three of them are way, way better than I think any of us had even hoped these vaccines would be. I had hoped these vaccines would give us 60, 70 percent effectiveness.

They're all way better than that. And, again, they're all pretty close to 100 percent. Nothing in life is 100 but pretty close to 100 percent on hospitalizations and deaths. So for me it's hard to tell which one is meaningfully better and that's why I recommend that anybody who can get any of the three, obviously J&J needs to be authorized, should go ahead and get that vaccine.

HARLOW: OK. Final very quickly, so you've got this new study that shows one single dose of the Pfizer COVID vaccine reduces symptomatic COVID at least by 85 percent. And that makes me wonder should we talking about everyone getting one shot before people get two?

DR. JHA: Yes, you know, this is something a bunch of us have been talking about. I proposed this back in early -

HARLOW: I remember. DR. JHA: -- January, yes. I got a lot of push back. But I think it's reasonable strategy especially right now with the variants coming. I want all high risk people to get vaccinated as quickly as possible; people over 65, people with chronic diseases. I have been in favor of getting those people their first shot and then coming back and filling in with second shot. Everybody does need two shots and then moving on to the younger and healthier population.

HARLOW: OK. Thank you, Dr. Jha, have a nice, healthy, safe weekend. Thanks, very much.

DR. JHA: Thank you.

HARLOW: Next week is said to be a big one for the economic COVID relief bill. Democrats are beginning their all out push to try to push this thing through reconciliation maybe with no Republican support. We're going to discuss that attempt and a lot more with Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:25:00]

HARLOW: Welcome back. Well House Democrats are preparing to take up President Biden's Coronavirus Economic Relief Package on the House floor. It looks like by the end of next week. Law makers working to pass the stimulus deal through the Budget Reconciliation process that would allow the bill to pass if they get all the Democrats on-board without any Republican support.

Speaker Pelosi expects the bill to be on President Biden's desk by March 14. That's when a number of the jobless benefits are set to expire. Democratic Senator, Patrick Leahy of Vermont is with me. He's also newly the Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee. It's good to have. Good morning.

SEN. PATRICK LEAHY (D-VT): It is good to be with you, Poppy.

HARLOW: You know no one.

[09:30:00]