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Countries Ban Travel From India; Deadly Stampede At A Religious Festival In Northern Israel; Giuliani Says Prosecutors Hate Him, Hate Trump; Biden In Philadelphia To Sell Economic Plan; South America Battling Record-Breaking Virus Wave; Thousands Attend Experimental Rave To Test U.K. COVID-19 Rules; Car Bomb Kills At Least 21 In Afghanistan; Employees Who Risked Lives During Pandemic Lose Jobs. Aired 5-6a ET
Aired May 01, 2021 - 05:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
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KIM BRUNHUBER, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): The U.S. will restrict travel from India in the coming days, in response to a ferocious second wave of COVID infections there.
Also ahead, Israel reckons with an unthinkable tragedy while investigators work to find out what caused a crush that killed dozens of people. We'll have details from Jerusalem this hour.
And scenes not seen in quite some time. Thousands party in a rave in the U.K. as part of a test of how things can reopen safely.
Live from CNN World Headquarters in Atlanta. Welcome to all of you watching us here in the United States, Canada and around the world. I'm Kim Brunhuber. This is CNN NEWSROOM.
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BRUNHUBER: During the past year of the pandemic, just about every part of the planet has emerged as a hot spot at one time or another. But we've never seen anything like what's happening right now in India. It's a COVID crisis that's impossible to overstate.
In just one day, India has added more than 400,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19. We've never seen that rate of infection anywhere before and it's getting worse by the day.
The U.S. and dozens of other countries are rushing tons of desperately needed medical supplies into India's airports and, at the same time, many of those same countries are imposing new restrictions on most travelers from India.
Now today was supposed to be the start of a huge nationwide campaign to vaccinate everyone ages 18 and older. It should have been relatively easy. After all, India is the world's biggest maker of vaccines. But 98 percent of its population can't find a dose. It's all been
exported. The real agony on the ground can be summed up in one word: oxygen. Here's CNN's Sam Kiley in Delhi.
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SAM KILEY, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A sensor reveals dangerously low levels of oxygen, stifled by COVID-19, this canister of gas buys this patient time.
All of these patients arrive barely able to breathe. This isn't a medical clinic. It's a tent on the outskirts of India's capital, run by volunteers.
KILEY: Without the initiative being shown by these volunteers from the Hemkunt Foundation, who are providing oxygen on the street, on the outskirts of Delhi, they say many dozens, perhaps over 100 patients, would be in deep trouble medically now.
They already had one death, just over there, earlier on today. They treated over 100 people who are coming in, desperate for oxygen, unable to breathe. And it's all about this, the supply of these oxygen cylinders. It's a 300-mile drive each way to get one of these filled and brought back to Delhi.
KILEY (voice-over): They cost about $25 when filled.
KILEY: How easy has it been to found oxygen?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh, my God, trust me, this is the toughest thing, we have to say.
KILEY (voice-over): With COVID-19 infections and numbers of deaths breaking records daily in India, many patients in Delhi have given up on hospital treatment, where they know that oxygen is scarce and beds often shared.
Pankaj Chandrawal said he was turned away by three hospitals. He took off his oxygen mask, demanding to be heard.
PANKAJ CHANDRAWAL, COVID-19 PATIENT: They are just not entertaining anything and they're just refusing all things. I cannot tell whom I can believe. It is both government and the hospitals also.
KILEY (voice-over): Bottled oxygen is mostly produced outside Delhi. Neighboring states are prioritizing their own needs. And so the city gasps. And many die, unrecorded, in their homes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (Speaking foreign language).
KILEY (voice-over): Tijinder Gutji (ph) collects the bodies of patients who die at home. He'll pick up three in this one-hour run. Many are even afraid to take their dying loved ones to hospital.
Prashant Sharma's family decided to keep his grandmother at home. PRASHANT SHARMA, GRANDSON OF COVID-19 VICTIM: We were scared.
(INAUDIBLE). So we got scared if we cannot do any nearby hospital, who's going to (INAUDIBLE)? You know, who's going to give us the information, exactly the information what is (INAUDIBLE) in the hospital?
KILEY (voice-over): India's government has promised a vaccination campaign with renewed vigor. But with around only 2 percent of the nation inoculated so far, that's cold comfort here -- Sam Kiley, CNN, Delhi.
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BRUNHUBER: CNN's Vedika Sud is living in the midst of this crisis and joins us from Delhi.
With the crisis getting worse and vaccines critical, how are people reacting?
And is there anger at the government that things have got this bad?
VEDIKA SUD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: There's anger, frustration, dejection, desperation, panic, fear. We are living it in Delhi and across India and there is no reliance on the government right now. The government is busy getting their act together.
And we're so glad in a way that there is oxygen supplies coming in from other countries at this point in time because that is what they need, along with a lot of medical equipment.
Now this is the second time I'm talking to you here and another ambulance came by. So you can imagine what I'm talking about when I say every 20 to 25 minutes we're hearing the ambulances going by.
Coming back to your point, it is just that silver lining right now, community helping each other. We have people lining up at Sikh temples, trying to provide oxygen 24/7. People are trying to come together.
And I speak from personal experience right now. In my condo, there's 70 people who are actually down with COVID-19. We've lost one person to the battle as well. And at this point in time, my people are coming together, trying to offer them small medical room in this community we live in, in the residential community to make sure we can provide immediate oxygen.
We can provide immediate medical help because we know beds are not available in hospitals. This is a war, Kim. Let me put it to you straight like that. In a war, you know who the enemy is.
In this case, this enemy is invisible. It's lurking behind doors. We aren't even safe in our homes right now. People sitting at home, trying to stay away from walking out, even to get groceries, are catching this infection. It is that strong. It is that deadly. Young people are dying from it. And if it wasn't for these people who
have been working 24/7 through social media, we would have more deaths today, to be honest. You have to go through social media right now, Facebook, Twitter or any other stream.
People are reaching out, can you help me, my mother needs a bed, I need an oxygen cylinder, can you come by and drop it off and so many responses, people are sharing it, retweeting it. And that's how someone gets help, a mother, brother, sister, anyone breathing for an hour or two, until more people come to help them with cylinders. .
That's the situation on the ground. People are fending for themselves right now. There is no hope otherwise. You can see how this stands out over days. You're talking 400,000 cases today. This figure is going to go up really. It's not going to come down in the coming days, is what medical experts say. It's going to get really bad.
And if this isn't bad, imagine what it is going to be in the coming days, because these numbers are just spiking by the day. The deaths are spiking by the day. I'm not sure if people are even recording the deaths taking place at homes.
And that's what people are dying of COVID-19 as well. You have others who come out and say, we're learning, this is the second phase, this is the second wave, we're learning right now. You've seen the U.K. suffer. You've seen the U.S. suffer.
A lot of people ask, what are you waiting for, the second wave had to hit?
And now when you talk about the wave and the U.K. wondering, you know, it's like an experiment?
Learn from India.
Why do you even have to experiment with something like that in the U.K.?
Learn from us. We've had the biggest festival take place and thousands were there and people have died.
Do you need an example?
Just look here. Look at India. And you'll get it here.
BRUNHUBER: Well, you paint a real picture of devastation and desperation there, thank you, Vedika Sud, reporting from Delhi, stay safe, your crew stay safe, thank you so much.
SUD: Thank you.
BRUNHUBER: New U.S. restrictions on travelers from India will begin within days. Officials say the surge in case numbers were just part of the reason the Biden administration decided it had to take action. Kaitlan Collins explains.
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KAITLAN COLLINS, CNN CHIEF WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: As we are seeing rising cases in India, the White House is now saying that, starting on Tuesday, May 4th, at 12:01 am, they are going to restrict travel from India to the U.S. to deal with not only the rising cases but also concerns that federal health officials say have over those variants that are present in India.
They say there are multiples at least. And until they know just how powerful they are, against the vaccine, they are going to restrict travel from India to the U.S. for now.
Now it's not clear how long this is going to last.
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COLLINS: But what we do know is that it doesn't apply to U.S. citizens. So if you're a U.S. citizens, you can still come in and out of the country. You will have to take a negative COVID test before getting on that plane and quarantine when you arrive, if you've not gotten the COVID-19 vaccine.
But this also doesn't apply to humanitarian workers. That's been a big subject of conversation, as the White House has been sending PPE, oxygen, other testing supplies, to India, to help them deal with the rising case number there.
But other than that, if you are a non-U.S. citizen and you have been in India in the last 14 days, a similar timeframe to those other travel restrictions in place around the world, you will not be permitted into the United States starting on Tuesday.
This is a call that the White House has been facing for several days from many people, saying that this is something that should have already been in effect.
But I was told that the White House had been discussing it, they wanted to make sure they were pursuing the right option here. And they also didn't want to cause a panic by putting this travel restriction in place immediately and having a scene play out, where there's mass chaos in airports, like what we saw last year when some of the travel bans first went into effect.
So this is it for now. It does start on Tuesday. We do expect President Biden to address it before then -- Kaitlan Collins, CNN, the White House.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BRUNHUBER: The U.S. isn't the only country imposing restrictions. Australia says it will jail anyone entering from India, including its own citizens. Starting Monday, anyone who's been in India during the past 14 days will be shut out of the country. Violators face up to five years in prison under Australia's Biosecurity Act and civil fines.
Australia's treasurer says the restrictions will be reviewed in two weeks.
An investigation is now underway into what triggered a deadly stampede at a religious festival in northern Israel. The country is grieving, as families begin laying their loved ones to rest. The prime minister has declared Sunday a national day of mourning.
These were some of the scenes showing the moments the joyous celebration turned to chaos; 45 people were crushed to death and some 150 others were injured. We've learned at least five U.S. citizens are among the dead. CNN's Hadas Gold has been reporting on this tragedy from Mt. Meron and joins us now.
What more have we learned since yesterday's horrible tragedy?
HADAS GOLD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Kim, now shock has turned to anger here as people start questioning how this happened, how so many people, tens of thousands, were allowed to cram onto this mountain, especially during the coronavirus pandemic, as it is still happening.
How they were up there and how the infrastructure was set up in a way that potentially allowed this to happen, because critics have said that, for years now, there have been warnings that something like this could happen, that something that was so joyous could turn so tragic.
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GOLD (voice-over): A crumpled pair of glasses. Water bottles, flattened and scattered on the ground. These are the trampled remnants of a festival in Israel, where dozens of people were crushed to death in a stampede, according to the Israeli health ministry.
Tens of thousands of ultra orthodox Jews, gathered at Mt. Meron for the religious bonfire festival Lag B'Omer. The witnesses say the night quickly turned into a tragedy, when packed crowds crammed into a narrow passageway.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): I was there exactly when it happened. Now there on the side. It started when a few paramedics started to run and then there was some kind of mess, police screaming, big mess.
And after half an hour, it looked like a scene of a suicide bombing attack.
GOLD: What happened around 1:00 am when tens of thousands of worshipers were celebrating the Lag B'Omer holiday, crowds of people were trying to exit and enter along this ramp right here. They started to slip and slide all over each other, turning into a table of bodies.
GOLD (voice-over): Officials say, some people were asphyxiated, others were crushed.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE (through translator): Most parts of my body got pinned down under several people, except for my head and chest. So I can still breathe. I think it is a miracle I survived. GOLD (voice-over): Funerals began Friday afternoon for the victims,
some of whom, were children. Israeli media says bonfire areas were cordoned off as a COVID-19 precaution. And this may have created bottlenecks in the walkways. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu says it's one of the worst disasters in Israeli history.
BENJAMIN NETANYAHU, PRIME MINISTER OF ISRAEL (voice-over): We will carry out a comprehensive, serious, detailed investigation, to ensure this kind of disaster never happens again.
GOLD (voice-over): The prime minister saying, this Sunday will be a national day of mourning.
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GOLD: Kim, the former head of the local regional council here was telling Israeli media that, when he was in charge, every year, he was almost expecting something like this to happen and said the writing was on the wall.
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GOLD: And that every year, when he was in charge, that something did not happen, he breathed a sigh of relief.
So now, there are many questions here about, if people knew, if people were worried that something like this could happen, why was nothing done before?
Why was nothing changed?
And the attorney general is launching an investigation and the police commander for the northern region has taken responsibility. But there will be lots of questions, if the festival happens again in the same way next year, what will be different about it to prevent such a tragedy from happening again. Kim?
BRUNHUBER: Why indeed, that is the question. Thank you so much, Hadas Gold, from Mt. Meron, Israel.
New details and new denials about what is behind the FBI raid on Rudy Giuliani. We'll bring you what we're learning about the investigation into the former president's one-time lawyer.
Plus, the current president puts a personal touch on his infrastructure push. We will hear about Joe Biden's appeal to the improvements to the Amtrak rail system. Stay with us.
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BRUNHUBER: Sources close to former president Donald Trump tell CNN that his inner circle is feeling uneasy about the FBI raid on Rudy Giuliani, his one-time personal lawyer. One Trump adviser says it has ignited a sense of fear about what else could be coming for those linked with Trump.
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BRUNHUBER: This, as the investigation into Giuliani for his activities in Ukraine is beginning to come into focus. Jessica Schneider has more on what we're learning.
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JESSICA SCHNEIDER, CNN JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): New details about the investigation into Rudy Giuliani and what exactly investigators are searching for.
"The New York Times" now reports at least one of the search warrants served yesterday sought information on the former ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch. The same Marie Yovanovitch former President Trump fired in April 2019 and who testified as a witness in his first impeachment trial.
MARIE YOVANOVITCH, FORMER U.S. AMBASSADOR TO UKRAINE: Our Ukraine policy has been thrown into disarray and shade interests the world over have learned how little it takes to remove an American ambassador who does not give them what they want.
SCHNEIDER: Investigators want to determine if Giuliani worked to get Yovanovitch ousted from her benefit to help Trump or benefit Ukrainian interests as he sought dirt from them on the Bidens. It's all part of the long-running criminal investigation into Giuliani and an inquiry into whether he worked as an unregistered foreign agent for Ukraine while also serving as President Trump's personal attorney.
Federal agents served a search warrant on his apartment and office Wednesday seizing several electronic devices.
RUDY GIULIANI, FORMER PRESIDENT TRUMP'S ATTORNEY: Well, about 6:00 in the morning, there was a big bang, bang, bang on the door and outside were seven, seven FBI agents with a warrant for electronics.
I've offered to give these to the government and talk it over with them for two years. I don't know why they have to do this. The agents seemed somewhat apologetic, I might say.
SCHNEIDER: Giuliani insists he's never acted as a foreign agent.
GIULIANI: I've never represented a Ukrainian national or official before the United States government. I've declined it several times. I've had contracts in countries like the Ukraine. In the contract is a clause that says, I will not engage in lobbying or foreign representation. I don't do it because I felt it would be too compromising.
SCHNEIDER: Giuliani was a prominent figure on the 2020 campaign trail for Trump and repeatedly floated false information about the Bidens' ties to Ukraine. GIULIANI: The amount of crimes that the Democrats committed in Ukraine are astounding and when you say investigating Hunter Biden, I mean, Joe Biden was the guy who did the bribe and Joe Biden was the guy who took the bribe in order to protect Burisma.
SCHNEIDER: And really was repeatedly asked if this criminal probe could be more of just a possible violation of the foreign agents registration act but he says he has not been told anything about the investigation by the Feds. Meanwhile federal officials are anticipating a long legal fight over what's contained in the electronic devices. With Giuliani's legal team likely arguing that much of it is subject to attorney-client privilege -- Jessica Schneider, CNN, Washington.
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BRUNHUBER: It's possible that Joe Biden is Amtrak's most well-known customer. So it should come as no surprise that the U.S. president is putting the train system front and center in the pitch to improve the nation's infrastructure. He appeared at the Philadelphia rail yard to call for billions of to improve the service.
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JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Today, we have a once in a generation opportunity, to position Amtrak and rail and inner city rail as well, in general, to play a central role in our transformation of transportation economic future.
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BRUNHUBER: Efforts to improve Amtrak are just one part of the president's more than $2 trillion infrastructure proposal.
I spoke with Leslie Vinjamuri of Chatham House about all of this earlier and began by asking her, which is the harder sell, Joe Biden's jobs plan or his family plan?
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LESLIE VINJAMURI, DIRECTOR OF THE US AND THE AMERICAS PROGRAMME, CHATHAM HOUSE: It's a really, it's a very big question, of course, both are seeking to be absolutely transformational.
I think the question really on -- the broader question, is to what extent there will be debates in Congress about different elements of those plans, because of course, one of the things that Joe Biden wants to do, in addition to harnessing this crisis, really transform America's political economy, is also to build bridges.
And in order to build those bridges, you know, ideally, he would pass both of these bills through Congress, with bipartisan support rather than using a budget reconciliation measure.
But if he wants to do that, there's going to be a lot of bargaining and horse trading about key elements within the proposals. One concern, of course, is what exactly counts as infrastructure. And
I think, you know, there is broad bipartisan support for investing in America's railways and its roads and its airports.
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VINJAMURI: But when you start to talk about things like child care, digital infrastructure, those broader definitions of what really makes it possible to do work on a daily basis and to transform an economy, one that is very digital, that I think is a lot more complicated.
The aggregate amount of spending, of course, is going to be deeply contentious in Congress, not the least because the proposal to pay for it is focused very much on raising corporate taxes, raising taxes on the wealthy, raising capital gains taxes, all of those things that are deeply contentious amongst Americans, not only within Congress.
BRUNHUBER: But a lot of those individual planks are very popular with the American populace, which would have translated into political capital in the -- before times of traditional politics, when things were popular with voters. Often you could bring enough members of the opposing party around to your cause and pass it.
But do those old formulas count for anything?
Does it matter how much voters might be behind those individual proposals that Biden's trying to pass?
VINJAMURI: Yes, I think in the medium term, it matters a lot. If we go back to the American Rescue Plan, of course, it wasn't widely supported in Congress. But it was, as we know, widely supported by the American people.
And it depends what your measure is. If your measure is, do you get bipartisan support to get something through Congress, then that's going to be difficult, because, as you've indicated, America is very polarized.
That's expressed through divisions in Congress and a certain narrative that's currently painting Joe Biden and the Democrats as being socialists and seeking to destroy the fabric of America's individualism and incentive-based economy.
But I think if your measure is the midterm elections, then the key thing is going to be how does this resonate with the American people?
And that's a complex question and, again, it's going to, in the next phase, you know, the American Rescue Plan was one thing, it was temporary, it is temporary. But I think in this next phase of spending, it's going to get more contentious, in part because people are feeling better.
They're back on the streets, the economy is opening up and they will begin to query specific spending items and they will certainly be concerned about the question of taxes.
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BRUNHUBER: Thanks to Leslie Vinjamuri for the analysis there.
The tragedy unfolding in India has shocked the world. Coming up, I'll talk with a scientist there about what went so terribly wrong in a country that thought it had the pandemic under control. That's ahead. Stay with us.
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BRUNHUBER: Welcome back to all of you watching us here in the United States, Canada and around the world.
India has broken another global record for new COVID infections Saturday, reporting nearly 402,000. Experts say the actual number is likely much greater. Shortages have already halted vaccine rollouts that were supposed to start today in several Indian states.
Last hour, I spoke with Dr. Shahid Jameel, a prominent virologist and director of biosciences at Ashoka University. I asked him whether he was surprised at the scale of what's unfolding in his country.
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DR. SHAHID JAMEEL, DIRECTOR OF BIOSCIENCES, ASHOKA UNIVERSITY: Yes, I think most scientists are surprised at the scale of the surge. We knew that something would come.
But in our wildest imagination we didn't dream it would be such a big surge. So clearly, things have gone wrong in doing things at the right time, in not being able to contain superspreader events.
And, of course, the new variants that have emerged in the population, both developed in the country as well as that have come into the country, have now completely taken over the community.
So it's really multiple factors. But to answer your question, no one in their wildest imagination imagined so much.
BRUNHUBER: You said before, everything had opened up and we thought the virus had gone away.
Was it that too few people were sounding the alarm bells or was just no one listening?
JAMEEL: Well, I guess, it's a mixture of both. The work that had been done, consistently showed high levels of antibodies, at least in cities where the population is more dense and the virus moves very quickly. Data coming from the countryside has always been sketchy. So I think
manning something, based on the science that would be projected, that would be available, was obviously not up to the mark. And they couldn't predict this kind of storm surge because all markers are based on available data, trends and assumptions we make.
I would say a mixture of both.
BRUNHUBER: So trying to get a handle on this, I mean, no country makes more than India and now we're seeing vaccine rollout after vaccine rollout postponed and stalled due to lack of vaccines.
How is this happening?
JAMEEL: Well, India actually started vaccinating at the right time and with the right attitude. A pandemic vaccine is supposed to do three things: one is to protect front line workers, who are there to save lives.
The second is to reduce mortalities, so deploy to the highest mortality bracket.
And the third is to control the pandemic. So when they started vaccinating in mid-January, the rollout would be to health care personnel, front line workers and then to people between 45 and 60 who had co-morbidities. So the plan was just fine.
And there was sufficient vaccine available at that time. There was some amount of hesitancy because of the response to narrative that the epidemic is over for us. And also right around that time, we have the scale of blood clots coming from the European countries.
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JAMEEL: So a mix of that didn't really allow our vaccine program to really go up to scale.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
BRUNHUBER: As the crisis continues, there are many ways you can help people in India cope with this devastating COVID outbreak. You can go to cnn.com/impact to find out how.
Brazil has become the second country in the world to report more than 400,000 deaths, the U.S. being the other. Now Brazil's health minister is asking for assistance, as Stefano Pozzebon explains.
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STEFANO POZZEBON, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): A call for help: on Friday, the Brazilian health minister urged other countries across the world with extra vaccine doses, such as the United States, to share them with Brazil, as the South American giant tries dramatically to curb the spread of yet another COVID-19 wave that is wreaking havoc across South America. This week, Brazil became just the second country on Earth to formally
cross the threshold of over 400,000 victims of the virus. One in every 526 Brazilians died since the beginning of the pandemic.
And it's a situation shared with many other countries across the region, from Argentina, to Colombia, to Peru, to Uruguay, all reporting record increases in new cases and deaths this past week as the new wave is really devastating the region.
Some hope perhaps at the end of the tunnel could come when, yet again, from the vaccine. This week, Brazil received the first shipment of the Pfizer BioNTech laboratory with over 1 million doses of the vaccine that will help health officials to front (ph) up the virus.
And here in Colombia, starting next week, citizens aged 60 years old or older will be finally able to receive the precious jab -- for CNN, this is Stefano Pozzebon, Bogota.
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BRUNHUBER: The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is reporting positive news. The spread of COVID is slowing down, as the U.S. vaccination rate is up. And that's despite vaccine hesitancy. As CNN's Nick Watt reports, more and more of the economy is swinging open.
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JEFF ZIENTS, WHITE HOUSE COVID-19 RESPONSE COORDINATOR: Today, we reached a major milestone on the number of Americans who are fully vaccinated. Today, 100 million Americans are fully vaccinated.
NICK WATT, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): That's about 30 percent of the population.
MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D-NY), NEW YORK CITY: The people are getting vaccinated and fighting back COVID and it's working and they are ready for a comeback. I've got to tell you. I think "the daily news" has it right. It will be the summer of New York city.
WATT (voice-over): July 1, everything opens in NYC. May 1 tomorrow, no more outdoor restrictions in Connecticut. In New Orleans, now stores and restaurants are open 100 percent.
Nationwide, many lives are still being lost but the average daily death toll lowest it's been for more than nine months.
DR. MEGAN RANNEY, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: I think that COVID is not going to go completely away, but I am overall quite optimistic for our health care system and country as a whole.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Are you ready?
WATT: The challenge now vaccinating the hesitant and hard-to-reach. This bar in Milwaukee now hosts a pop-up clinic.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Vaccine hesitancy right now, it might be easier for people.
WATT: Emergency use authorization for the Pfizer vaccine in younger teens could come soon. So what about schools come the fall?
JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Based on the science and the CDC they should probably all be open.
WATT: Cruises could be back mid-July says the CDC in a letter obtained by "USA Today" with safety measures.
Tomorrow, Delta will start filling those middle seats again and tomorrow, there will be up to 50,000 fans at the Kentucky Derby. Actual fans.
MAYOR GREG FISCHER (D-KY), LOUISVILLE: People are really pumped up about getting a little bit back to normal. I've always thought as the Kentucky derby as the world's biggest fashion show hand certainly the rites of spring as well for all of America.
WATT: Fashion, eh. There will be hats but also still masks.
DR. DIANE SCHNEIDER, DERBY ATTENDEE: I think that people will be very diligent as well in wearing masks. Otherwise they may be escorted out.
WATT: And here in Anaheim, California, Disneyland is open again after 13 months. Lower capacity. California residents only. But it is open -- Nick Watt, CNN, Anaheim.
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BRUNHUBER: Thousands of people in Liverpool, England, are partying like it's 2019, all in the name of science. Have a look at this here.
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BRUNHUBER (voice-over): A large crowd of British music fans gathered in a specially converted warehouse on Friday, to dance the night away. And there were no masks and no social distancing.
The goal?
To help officials determine how night clubs and events might return in the U.K. this summer.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
BRUNHUBER: Let's bring in Cyril Vanier in London.
Partying like it's 2019.
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BRUNHUBER: That's the perfect line there. It seems like a fascinating, if seemingly risky experiment. So take us through what they're hoping to learn here and how. CYRIL VANIER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Sure. Well, Kim, what the heck is
going on is that the government is trying to figure out how to get thousands of people without social distancing, without masks, in indoor settings and let them have fun, without this becoming a super spreader event.
So you've got to figure out the formula to this if you want to allow sports to come back, concerts to come back, et cetera, you name it. And all of that is supposed to come back, by the way, June 21st here in the U.K.
So what they did is, at this particular event, it was a day rave, several thousand people were allowed in. They had a negative COVID test, so it is a group of thousands of COVID-free people. You let them have their fun.
And five days later, so five days from now, those people are going to be asked to take a COVID test to see whether there has been any infection.
Now similar tests have been carried out in other European countries in the Netherlands; Spain had a very encouraging example of that with a concert, wearing masks. But thousands of people and no social distancing. It was a few weeks ago.
So now we know that there were actually, no, there wasn't a higher level of infection during that event than there is normally in the general population, that particular one in Barcelona. So there is reason to be hopeful that this event in Liverpool in the U.K. will also yield encouraging results -- Kim.
BRUNHUBER: All right, still hard to watch, even though I know, you know --
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VANIER: You will be back in the mosh pit before you know it, Kim.
(LAUGHTER)
BRUNHUBER: You and me both, right?
CNN's Cyril Vanier, thanks so much.
We'll be right back.
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BRUNHUBER: At least 21 civilians were killed and dozens were wounded when a vehicle packed with explosives detonated in Afghanistan.
[05:45:00] BRUNHUBER: It happened in the provincial capital of Logar province, south of Kabul. So far no one has claimed responsibility. It comes hours after U.S. and key allies met in Doha with the Taliban to jumpstart peace talks. Our senior international correspondent Ben Wedeman joins us now from Beirut.
People have been warning that we might see a huge rise in violence once the U.S. It certainly hasn't taken very long.
What's happening here?
BEN WEDEMAN, CNN SR. INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, what we're seeing is an uptick in violence, for instance, the United Nations saying that the number of civilian casualties has increased by as much as 30 percent over the last year, compared to the year before.
We've seen an increase in the number of assassinations of government officials, military officials and journalists and civil society activists.
This is really what is inevitable at the end of a prolonged foreign occupation, that the various forces that are at play in Afghanistan and will remain so after the withdrawal by September of this year of U.S. and other NATO forces, is that they are vying for power.
They are preparing for the day after. We saw that in Iraq and we're seeing it today in Afghanistan. And therefore, it was fairly clear that the United States, going back to the final years of the Trump administration, was simply eager to get out.
And the important thing for the Americans and for NATO is that they get out without too much loss of life so that, when it came to the agreement that was concluded between the Trump administration and the Taliban in February of 2020, was that there are basically two major stipulations, that the Taliban not use Afghanistan as a base for attacks abroad and that the Taliban sever ties with Al Qaeda.
Beyond that, there's only the express desire that the Taliban enter into negotiations with the current government in Kabul, for the eventual potential formation of a coalition government.
But that's not binding. And so the United States and its NATO allies want to ensure a smooth withdrawal. And as far as what comes afterwards, Kim, it's anybody's guess.
BRUNHUBER: Absolutely. Ben Wedeman in Beirut, thank you so much. Appreciate it.
Just ahead, a battle over hero pay. A major U.S. grocery chain says it will shut its stores rather than pay its employees extra during the pandemic. We'll explain why everyone isn't happy about it, coming up. Stay with us.
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BRUNHUBER: In Los Angeles, a measure designed to boost the pay of front line workers could cost some of them their jobs. A major grocery chain says it will close stores rather than pay the extra money. CNN's Kyung Lah explains.
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KYUNG LAH, CNN SENIOR U.S. CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): At the Food 4 Less grocery store in East Hollywood, California, the value of the essential worker...
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Their right to hero pay, for risking their lives.
LAH (voice-over): -- is what is on the line. They are trying to keep the store open. It is among the half-dozen Kroger stores the grocer announced would close on the West Coast, after cities like Los Angeles mandated temporary hazard pay, so called hero pay, to help frontline workers for a few months during the pandemic, workers, like Nelsy Cifuentes.
NELSY CIFUENTES, GROCERY STORE WORKER: I have three kids.
LAH (voice-over): She makes $15.30 an hour and, will soon lose her job at the store.
CIFUENTES: It's not fair, for everyone, it is not fair.
LAH (voice-over): Kroger says the extra $5 for L.A. workers will cost nearly $20 million, over four months, saying, it is impossible to operate these stores.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Trust me, if it wasn't for workers, if it wasn't for all of, us you would not be making $21 million.
LAH (voice-over): He is talking about Kroger's CEO, Rodney McMullen, whose salary in 2019 was more than $21.1 million while his workers average around $27,000. That is almost 800 times what his workers make on average.
McMullen and S&P 500 CEOs have made more money on average during the pandemic than ever before. Data from research firm MyLogIQ shows in 2020, while the U.S. hit record unemployment, CEOs got paid a median salary of about $14 million, an 11.5 percent increase from 2019.
Paycom software paid its CEO about 3,000 times more than its average worker.
General Electric?
About 1,400 times more.
Starbucks, 1,200 times more.
While workers say CEOs certainly have tough jobs, they are not the ones who put their lives on the line, working through the pandemic.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Want a sandwich?
LAH (voice-over): Nelsy Cifuentes still fears bringing COVID home from work and infecting her young children. Her union says at least 158 grocery workers, nationwide, have died from COVID. She wishes her CEO would think about that more.
CIFUENTES: Maybe I can hold his hand. It was hard and think a little bit about (INAUDIBLE) workers. We work so hard for the community.
LAH (voice-over): There is little sign that Kroger, which posted a $2.8 billion operating profit in 2020, will change its mind about closing Cifuentes' store. But the CEO class is on track for another record year for their pay --
[05:55:00]
LAH (voice-over): -- Kyung Lah, CNN, Los Angeles.
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BRUNHUBER: As we mentioned earlier, in a few hours, they will run the first leg of the U.S. horse racing's coveted Triple Crown. Thousands of fans, many wearing over the top hats and sipping mint juleps are expected to attend the Kentucky Derby. The mayor of Louisville says there will be COVID restrictions.
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FISCHER: We do that really well, here, obviously, we have done that with different sporting events, whether football or basketball or soccer so part of the culture of people going to events now.
And Churchill is a massive facility, as I said, it holds 150,000 people, so with just 50,000 there tomorrow, they'll be spread out, masking is an expected protocol now. And we've got about 60 percent or so of our adults vaccinated here.
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BRUNHUBER: And spectators might get to see something historic. Kendrick Carmouche on the long shot, Bourbonic, trying to be the first Black jockey to win in more than a century.
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KENDRICK CARMOUCHE, JOCKEY: I can't believe it. Like I made it, man. I'm finally here, you know. I'm here to go run for the roses. It's a feeling that -- you will have to hug me to understand, you know, that's how good it makes me feel, as a young kid coming from Louisiana, making it this far.
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BRUNHUBER: And the run for the roses with the famous call, "And they're off," set for 6:57 pm Eastern time.
I don't think I will get that job, by the way.
That wraps this hour of CNN NEWSROOM. I'm Kim Brunhuber, for our viewers in the United States, "NEW DAY" is just ahead. For everyone else, it's "QUEST'S WORLD OF WONDER."
