Return to Transcripts main page

CNN Newsroom

Americans Struggle to get Tested; New York's Demand for Testing; Dr. Paul Offit is Interviewed about Covid; U.S. Economy Grows by 2.3 Percent; Amy Jo Hutchison is Interviewed about Manchin and Build Back Better. Aired 9-9:30a ET

Aired December 22, 2021 - 09:00   ET

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

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:00:16]

JIM SCIUTTO, CNN ANCHOR: A very good Wednesday morning to you. I'm Jim Sciutto.

No lockdowns. No shutdowns. President Biden being very clear, reassuring Americans he will not close down the country. This as the U.S. does see a significant increase in new Covid infections, largely driven, and very quickly, by the omicron variant. And, at the same time, a major surge in demand for testing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We should all be concerned about omicron, but not panicked.

This is not March of 2020. Two hundred million people are fully vaccinated. We're prepared. We know more. We just have to stay focused.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: That is the good news in this. Despite the virus' resurgence with the omicron variant, the president said vaccinated Americans can celebrate Christmas and the holidays safely while, however, sending a dire message to those who still have not had their shots.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: If you're unvaccinated, you're at a higher risk of getting severely ill from Covid-19, getting hospitalized and even dying.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: The surge in cases has led to a scarcity of hospital beds in some pockets of the country. In Houston, doctors say that infections have tripled there in just days.

To help, the White House is mobilizing 1,000 more troops to deploy to hospitals who may need help. And 500 million tests, they promised, they cannot come soon enough. We are seeing long lines in many cities. Some people even turned away as wait lists for testing grow.

Walgreens and CVS announcing a limit to how many tests can be purchased at once.

CNN White House correspondent Jeremy Diamond, he is at the White House. CNN's Shimon Prokupecz is at a pop-up testing site in New York.

First, to the White House.

Jeremy, so this testing relief, half a billion tests, how soon can folks like you and me ask for these and have them sent to our homes?

JEREMY DIAMOND, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, listen, I was on a call with senior administration officials yesterday and they said that this site will come online sometime in January. And the first tranche of those 500 million rapid tests will also go out next month.

Of course, that will not be of any comfort to Americans who are struggling to find tests right now. And that was something that the president addressed yesterday as well, making clear that he -- he acknowledged that there is not enough testing in this country, but he believes that these 500 million tests will help.

He did get a little bit defensive when he was asked about whether or not this was a failure, insisting that it was not, and claiming that nobody could have predicted how quickly this omicron variant has been spreading.

The 500 million tests, though, was just one of several measures that President Biden announced yesterday. He also talked about sending -- establishing new federal testing sites, with one of those testing sites being established in New York City this week. A thousand military service members being mobilized to be deployed within the coming weeks to states that are dealing with surges. A half dozen emergency medical teams have already been deployed, or I should say emergency medical teams have already been deployed to a half dozen states that are dealing with surges, to help hospitals that are overwhelmed.

But, ultimately, President Biden, yesterday, was also aiming to give a message to an anxious and frustrated nation. The president offering a message of reassurance to those who are vaccinated, saying that they should not be concerned about getting serious illness or hospitalization as a result of this omicron variant, but warning those who are unvaccinated that they do face those serious risks and that they're putting the country at risk as well, telling them it's their patriotic duty to get vaccinated.

SCIUTTO: Well, that's what the science shows.

So, Shimon, New York is a city where there is big demand for testing. That's good. People want to know if they're infected so they can get treated, not expose their family members. So what is the city doing because many of those testing facilities have been overwhelmed.

SHIMON PROKUPECZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Overwhelmed. Some of them shutting down. One of the most popular places that people go to, City MD, today saying that several locates of their locations were closing to help deal with some of the staffing issues and also to protect some of their staffers who have been overwhelmed by the demand and the need in testing.

So many people now going to locations like this. These are vans, privately owned companies, that are now doing testing, have been doing testing here in New York City for the past several months. But certainly they have not been this busy. So, these are one of the privately owned companies doing it.

But, today, the mayor is saying there are 112 sites now across the city that they have opened up for people to go and get tested. The mayor also saying a key point is that if you're fully vaccinated, they don't want you hiding.

[09:05:03]

They don't want to shut down. The mayor saying he wants people out and about, to be careful, of course, but there is no plan in place to shut the city down. He wants people out and about, living their lives, but he wants them doing it carefully.

What's going on here in the city is, is that there is this increase in positivity rate. We're now over 11 percent. The latest number, 14,000 people testing positive just in this city. It's down a little bit from the previous numbers of 15,000. But no doubt, when you look around the city, and you look at lines like this, the demand for testing is certainly going to continue as we get into the Christmas holiday, Jim.

SCIUTTO: It is remarkable, that unanimous message there is, keep living your life, right? No one's shutting anything down. You hear that from the New York mayor. You hear it from the president.

Shimon Prokupecz, Jeremy Diamond, thanks very much.

Well, beginning today, and this is notable, the U.K. is actually cutting the self-isolation period for most breakthrough infections, that is people who have been vaccinated but still get infected, from the current ten days to seven days as long as people test negative for two consecutive days. The British government is hoping this will ease staffing shortages, also allow families to gather for the holidays.

CNN's senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen joins me now.

Elizabeth, this is interesting because Dr. Fauci, for instance, he said yesterday on CNN's air, the U.S. considering shortening that quarantine period, particularly for healthcare workers. But is there a consideration more broadly in the U.S. about shortening quarantine times?

ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: So, you know, it's interesting. So, Dr. Fauci talked about shortening the isolation time, the time that you would isolate after being diagnosed with Covid. Dr. Walensky, the head of the CDC, has also mentioning it. And, Jim, I think you'll probably agree that during this pandemic, when officials come out and say something is being considered, often that means that they are headed in that direction and that it will happen.

So, this is not -- this is of interest not for sort of in a general way what are they telling people to do, it's really because of essential workers. We don't want to run out of doctors. We don't want to run out of nurses. We also don't want to run out of people who keep the airlines going.

So, let's take a look at a letter that CEO -- the CEO of Delta, Ed Bastian, wrote to Dr. Rochelle Walensky, the director of the CDC. He requested that isolation for fully vaccinated people with Covid-19 be shortened from 10 to five days. And he said, of course, there should be a test before ending that isolation, as you mentioned, as there is in the U.K.

And he mentioned that over 90 percent of Delta's workforce is vaccinated. In other words, do we really need to be keeping these people out for ten days. That could, you know, possibly hurt essential services, doing what they need to do.

You mentioned the U.K. Let's take a look again at what they're doing. The U.K. just decided to shorten their isolation time for people who are vaccinated and got Covid from 10 to seven days. Unvaccinated people with Covid still have to isolate for ten days. That's because there's more concern that they could get sicker and are at a higher risk for spreading it to others.

Jim.

SCIUTTO: Understood. Interesting to watch.

Elizabeth Cohen, thanks very much.

SCIUTTO: All right, joining me now to answer your and my questions, Dr. Paul Offit, director of the vaccine education center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. Also, crucially, a member of the FDA's Vaccine Advisory Committee.

Dr. Offit, great to have you back.

First, I want to start, big picture, because you and I talked a couple of weeks ago very early in the omicron wave. I'm curious what you've learned since then in looking at the data from South Africa, Israel, what we've begun to see in Europe and also here about how serious illness omicron causes. Have you learned anything? Is it pointing towards the direction that this might cause less severe illness?

DR. PAUL OFFIT, DIRECTOR, VACCINE EDUCATION CENTER AT CHILDREN'S HOSPITAL OF PHILADELPHIA: Right. So I think we've learned from South Africa, their experience. Well, what happened with -- in South Africa was, initially they had this big wave of what was then called the beta variant or the South African variant, had a dramatic increase in cases, dramatic increase in hospitalizations, dramatic increase in deaths. Then that settled down.

Then they had the delta variant, which, a dramatic increase in cases, dramatic increase in deaths, dramatic increase in hospitalizations. That settled down.

Then omicron came in, dramatic increase in cases, but not a dramatic increase in hospitalizations. About half of what they'd seen before, and very little increase in deaths, which is almost identical to what you're seeing now in New York City.

And I think the reason that that happened in South Africa and the reason it's happening in New York City is now with -- between people who are naturally infected or people who have been vaccinated, or both, you're seeing a blunting of serious infection caused by omicron. Not so much mild infection, because even if you've gotten two doses of an mRNA-containing vaccine, for example, I -- we're at higher risk of mild infection than you were for the previous variants. But -- and I think the booster dose offers you additional protection against mild disease. But know that two doses of an mRNA vaccine does offer a pretty significant protection against serious illness. The answer always is, get vaccinated.

And talking about Israel, Israel tells you what the future is because Israel now has a population immunity of 91 percent.

[09:10:03]

Ninety-one percent of people in Israel are vaccinated. They average one death per day, which in this country would be 35 deaths per day. Get vaccinated. People are tired of talking about this pandemic and I'm tired of talking about this pandemic. We can end this all by just dramatically increasing the percentage of people in our country (ph) who are -- who are vaccinated.

SCIUTTO: And I know that advice holds because we are still seeing it, an enormous disparity between the experience of the vaccinated and unvaccinated, including with omicron. But it sounds like you're saying, and I don't want to push you too far in a corner because data can change over time, but that the initial indications are some good news around omicron.

OFFIT: Right. I think here's the data you'd like to see generated. Rochelle Walensky, a few days ago, said, look, we have 40 people in the United States who have omicron, ten of them have never been vaccinated, 30 of them have been -- either received one or two or three doses of the mRNA vaccine. Great. That 40 people is going to become 400 people, is going to become 4,000 people, it's going to become 40,000 people and more. Let's see, of people who have never been naturally affected or vaccinated, what is the nature of their illness? Is it as serious as delta? Or if you've gotten two doses or three doses, did it matter whether you got a third dose in terms of protection against serious illness or mild illness. It's easy enough to generate those data, so let's generate them.

SCIUTTO: OK. So, in response perhaps to some of this good news, you are seeing the U.K. shortening the quarantine period from 10 to seven. You're seeing Dr. Fauci saying, certainly for healthcare workers, perhaps for others, we shorten it here in the U.S. Perhaps even from ten days to five days. Is that smart? Is that going to happen? OFFIT: I think it's smart and I think it is going to happen. If you

look at -- there was a study done in Singapore a while ago where they looked at people who were vaccinated, who had mild disease, and they compared them to people who were unvaccinated who had mild disease. And what they found was that although the amount of virus that was shed in that first day or so after the beginning of illness was the same in both groups, that those who were vaccinated shed less virus for a shorter period of time. Now, that wasn't looking at omicron and we can certainly generate those data for omicron, but I think it certainly makes sense.

SCIUTTO: OK, final question. When we spoke last time, you raised the possibility that omicron could prove to be a good thing, becomes dominant very quickly, but dominant in a way that causes less severe illness. And I wonder what you've learned in the last couple of weeks, and granting that it's early, do you feel that way, are you more confident, perhaps, that that's an outcome here?

OFFIT: Right. Well, illness is never a good thing.

SCIUTTO: For sure.

OFFIT: But what I would say is, if it ends up being that there is -- that omicron just causes a lot of mild disease, what that does then is it sort of then naturally boosts your immunity, broadens your immunity. And if it's doing it with a very small price, meaning very little in the way of hospitalizations or deaths, that's great.

But, again, the people who are going to suffer this are the people who are unvaccinated.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

OFFIT: I mean if our hospital is any indication that it is, considering what's going on in the world, the people who are hospitalized and die from this are the unvaccinated.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

OFFIT: So, please, get vaccinated.

SCIUTTO: That rule has remained the same throughout.

Listen, Dr. Paul Offit, it's always good to have you help us weed through all this.

OFFIT: Thank you.

SCIUTTO: Well, one new study has found that breakthrough Covid infections may lead to so-called super immunity for vaccinated people. I'm going to speak to the doctor behind that study who says this could be the endgame of the pandemic.

Plus, just in, the U.S. economy grew by 2.3 percent last quarter. That was actually better than expected. Still down significantly from the first six months of the year. We're going to break down the numbers, what they mean.

And, President Biden says he still thinks he can, in his words, get something done on Build Back Better with that man, Senator Joe Manchin. A woman who fights for the poor in Manchin's home state of West Virginia joins me live with her message for the senator.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[09:17:27]

SCIUTTO: All right, low and behold, some good economic news. New data shows the U.S. economy performed slightly better than expected over the summer. GDP grew by 2.3 percent on an annualized basis between July and September. It had been expected to be around 2.1 percent.

CNN's chief business correspondent Christine Romans joins me now.

I was explaining to folks, this is during that quarter at an annualized rate.

CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Right.

SCIUTTO: It was faster earlier in the year. The average would probably be above this.

ROMANS: Yes.

SCIUTTO: Tell us what it shows about the direction of the economy.

ROMANS: Well, it shows, in that quarter, in those three months, you had the delta variant rearing its ugly head, right, late summer, and you also had the expiration of all of those cash payments to businesses, the forgivable loans to businesses and then the cash payments to people. You know, the Covid stimulus. So -- and extra jobless benefits. All of that went away. So that's why you see the economy didn't grow as strongly as it did earlier in the year.

But, Jim, it's all about the trend. You and I talk about this all the time. That first quarter, 6.3 percent to start the year, was very strong growth. That is an aggressively growing economy. And then 6.7 percent for the second quarter. Again, very strong growth. And then this hiccup in the third quarter and we're expecting growth probably picked up in the fourth quarter again.

On average, for the year, you're still looking, Jim, for the best year of economic growth, the best year since the Reagan administration. Now, the big headwinds are economists say Build Back Better may be dead, so they're trying to downgrade their expectations a little bit in the beginning of next year. Omicron, we still have a lot of concerns and uncertainties about what happens with the omicron virus. And whether people pull back a little bit, consumer spending and businesses have to pull back again. Not restrictions, government restrictions, but people and businesses pulling back because of the spreading virus.

So, we still have Covid to deal with. But on balance, this is the strongest economy since the Reagan administration. Inflation is the problem the Fed is worried about. An economy growing so fast they need to cool it down next year.

SCIUTTO: Yes, people still rate the economy as the worst since the Carter administration. I mean the disconnect between the numbers and how folks are feeling and are perceiving it, just dramatic.

ROMANS: It's Covid exhaustion.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

ROMANS: Covid exhaustion, I'm telling you, and those grinding higher gas prices that just really weighs on people. But I'll point out, gas prices are down 11 or 12 cents since the peak. So gas prices have been coming down a little bit.

SCIUTTO: Yes.

ROMANS: So maybe people will feel better.

SCIUTTO: We'll see. Christine Romans, thanks very much.

ROMANS: You're welcome.

SCIUTTO: President Biden remains confident that the center really of his domestic agenda is still on the table, expressing optimism that Democrats will, quote, get something done on what's known as the Build Back Better Act. The White House holding out hope after Senator Joe Manchin announced he would not support the sweeping spending bill, which aims to reshape the social safety net and Democrats say lift millions out of poverty.

[09:20:14]

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: You strip away all the dignity of a parent, looking at their child. I'm not joking about this. Imagine being a parent, looking at their child, and you can't afford, you have no house to borrow against, you have no savings, it's wrong. But all the things in that bill are going to reduce prices and cost for middle class and working-class people.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

SCIUTTO: Amy Jo Hutchison is a community activist in Joe Manchin's home state of West Virginia. She advocates against poverty and for working single mothers in particular.

Amy, good to have you on this morning.

AMY JO HUTCHISON: Good morning, Jim. Thank you so much.

SCIUTTO: So let me ask you this. On the ground, how do, in your view, the provisions from the Build Back Better Act, particularly things like the child tax credit, the subsidies for the Affordable Care Act, the prospect of universal pre-k. I mean how does that impact families and how does having that taken away, in your experience, impact them for the negative?

HUTCHISON: You know, Jim, the big talk here in West Virginia is that the child tax credit payments actually elevated approximately 50,000 children across the poverty line. And so we're devastated and heartbroken that Senator Manchin decided to not support that. And, you know, he just single-handedly put all 50,000 of those children back across the poverty line. You know, it was -- it was a devastating blow, to be quite honest.

Here in West Virginia, we lack an infrastructure of care, you know, and so we hear a lot of talk about how people should pull, you know, pull themselves up by the bootstraps. So -- but we don't have an infrastructure and care for great child care. It's not affordable. It's not accessible.

You know, just from the mere geography of West Virginia, there are people without child care options there in their state. This would have been life changing for so many West Virginians.

SCIUTTO: Well, West Virginia is an interesting state. It's a deeply red state, though it does have a Democratic senator in Joe Manchin. But uses and benefits from a lot of federal subsidies on things like this.

Senator Manchin has made the argument that the child tax credit, for instance, needs to be means tested, there need to be income limits, et cetera, to make sure it's going to people who actually need it.

In your experience during the time it's been in place, and it's about to expire, has it been getting to people who need it or has it been going to sort of anybody who wants it?

HUTCHISON: Oh, no, it's absolutely been reaching the people who need it. You know, it's -- it's a lot of people who will never qualify for any sort of assistance to be able to afford child care. You know, Jim, here in West Virginia, child care for one child private pay costs more than a year's tuition at West Virginia University. You know what I mean, it's ridiculously expensive and it's just one more obstacle for people to join the workforce. And that's just one example, you know?

SCIUTTO: Has -- the senator is hearing some disappointment, not just from his colleagues here in Washington, but from his home state. We heard the coal miners union encouraging him to pass Build Back Better for the climate provisions in there.

Do you see him moving on this from your perspective as you communicate -- you and others communicate the needs to the senator? I mean he's -- he's not dumb. He's been in politics a long time. He knows to listen to his constituents.

HUTCHISON: I think maybe that's the part that I'm most disappointed in. You know, organizing poor marginalized folks. And so one of the biggest struggles has been able to really get Senator Manchin to hear the people who are benefitting from this, you know from the child tax credit. It's just very a difficult task. And I have yet to be able to do that. We've gotten as far as the staff, but we've never had face to face time with the senator, you know. So I think that would be lifechanging.

SCIUTTO: How about -- how about inflation, though, because inflation does hurts the poor the most, right, because it's things like gas going up, or groceries, prices going up. You know, it's a regressive tax in effect by nature. Senator Manchin also concerned, pumping more money into the economy will increase inflation. And I wonder if you're seeing that too.

HUTCHISON: We're seeing higher gas prices here right now. But here's the thing, Jim. You know, the child tax credit payments, whenever we're traveling around collecting stories from folks about how it's really helped them, the first thing to come out of their, you know, out of their story and experience is that -- the ability to buy food. You know, I mean, we have people out here in West Virginia with bachelor's degrees and human services working for $15,000 an hour (ph), you know, and so now they're talking about how they're going to have to go back to skipping meals so their kids can eat because they don't qualify for any of that assistance. They make too much money.

[09:25:01]

SCIUTTO: $15 an hour. $15 an hour, you're saying?

HUTCHISON: No, $15,000 a year.

SCIUTTO: Oh, a year, sorry. Gotcha. OK.

HUTCHISON: You know, I mean anywhere from $15,000 to some $20,000, you know, with bachelor's degrees in the state. Like, you know, one of the problems is low wage jobs. And so whenever you have low wage jobs and families, you know, I don't understand how anyone can assume that you won't need some sort of assistance at some point, you know. But now we have this large pack of people, this large group of people that are considered working poor, and so, you know, this is really a relief for them. They're out here -- they're able -- they're (INAUDIBLE) filling their freezers and they're filling their cabinets with food. You know, they're able to have their kids signed up to play sports and just all these experiences that their children aren't typically able to have.

You know, in that clip from President Biden that you played, when we did speak with Manchin's staff last week, that was one of the things that the moms brought up, you know -- you know, was how exactly is it and, you know, how would you think it feels to have to tell your child no all the time because you can't afford any of those extra things, you know?

SCIUTTO: Well, and I get it, and some folks, beyond the extra things, right, just getting the basics.

Amy Jo Hutchison, thanks so much for joining us this morning.

HUTCHISON: Thanks, Jim. And, you know, I think one of the things that I really like for everyone to realize is that Build Back Better not being passed just took away our bootstraps.

SCIUTTO: Wow. Well, we'll keep talking and we'll see where this goes in the new year.

Still ahead this hour, encouraging news from a study on breakthrough infections that shows that despite getting Covid-19, there may be a super immunity, a silver lining.

And we are moments away from the opening bell on Wall Street. Right now futures down despite that GDP report that just came in higher than expected at 2.3 percent. Wall Street hoping stocks continue the turnaround today despite uncertainty amid the spread of the omicron variant. All three indices on track for double digit gains this year.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)