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Trump to Unveil New Federal Coronavirus Guidelines; Unemployment Claims Surge Due to Coronavirus; What China Knew and When; Spain's Total Death Toll above 19,000; E.U. Coordinating a Common European Response; Chartered Flight Brings 150 Seasonal Farm Workers to U.K.; Virus Fears Spread among Nairobi's Poorest; Coronavirus Victims Undercounted Due to People Dying at Home; World War II Veteran Raises Millions Walking for NHS. Aired 10-11a ET
Aired April 16, 2020 - 10:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[10:00:00]
HALA GORANI, CNN HOST (voice-over): Hello, everyone. I'm Hala Gorani. This is CONNECT THE WORLD. We start with President Trump, expected to lay
out a plan for reopening the U.S. economy. But the latest unemployment numbers are once again shocking.
Meanwhile, an emergency meeting in Britain this hour to decide whether to extend emergency measures. And the incredible fundraiser, 99-year-old
Captain Tom Moore has raised $15 million for Britain's National Health Service. I will speak to him later this hour about how he did it.
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GORANI: And we start this hour with Donald Trump's push to reopen the U.S. economy. And soon this is what the president wants. He is set to announce
guidelines later today to relax lockdowns in some areas by May 1st, barely over two weeks from now.
He had falsely claimed that he has authority over governors to decide what happens state by state. Some are saying they are not ready to ease social
distancing measures. Business leaders as well, some of them are telling Mr. Trump that widespread testing must be in place before they send their
employees back to work.
The president, though, sounds undeterred. Listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
TRUMP: We'll be opening up states, some states much sooner than others. And we think some states can actually open up before the deadline of May
1st. And I think that will be a very exciting time indeed.
Governors are looking for it, chomping at the bit. They'll be safe, they'll be strong but we want to get our country back. We want to get our country
back. There is death by doing -- by having this strongly closed country. We have to get back to work.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GORANI: "We have to get back to work."
And the numbers support the notion that the U.S. economy truly is stalling in terms of unemployment figures. I said they were shocking. Today new
jobless claims, 5.2 million. That means 22 million Americans have been left without a job since the U.S. started locking down four weeks ago.
For perspective, that's roughly the population of Sri Lanka and it effectively wipes out all of the job gains since the Great Recession of the
late 2000s. I should say the late -- 2008-2009, not the late 2000s yet.
Joe Johns is at the White House. The president understandably, especially in an election year, very keen to get the U.S. back to work.
Will he get his wish?
JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Anybody's guess, quite frankly. I tell you what, today, we're told the president is going to do
the best he can to at least get this process moving.
He's expressed a lot of eagerness because the economy is in such bad shape, also because as you mentioned this is an election year. What we're told is
the president is going to have a number of calls, very busy schedule today, including calls with the nation's governors, some other elected officials.
And at some point today he is expected to announce what he calls a plan; apparently, from what we have been able to glean, is that that plan is
going to entail first looking at the states you might want to call cold spots, states where there has been very little evidence of disease, very
little evidence of deaths, and then start trying to recommend that they open up, while continuing to work on the medical process in the states you
might want to describe as hot spots.
Now the thing about this is no matter what the president recommends, the fact of the matter is virtually every legal authority will tell ,you at the
end of the day, it is up to the governors of the various states to determine whether or not they're going to open up the economic process in
their states again.
And some states' governors have been very reluctant to do so. Also the president's scientists, the medical advisers suggested to him you have to
go through a process of vetting, a process, if you will, of testing, before you move forward.
That is underscored by the fact that just yesterday the president talked to business leaders on the telephone, from around the country, leaders from
industry.
[10:05:00]
JOHNS: Those leaders also underscored that message to the president that he needs to listen to his science and medical advisers and do what they
tell them to do. Otherwise the process probably won't work -- Hala.
GORANI: And it has really turned into the president against the governors in some cases, right?
He's openly insulting Democratic governors of some states. There is a daily briefing.
How badly has that relationship deteriorated?
JOHNS: It is a work in progress. The president, for example, had a back and forth with the governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, and then they seemed
to make amends, at least publicly in their -- if you want to call them dueling news conferences.
It is pretty clear that the governors understand they don't want to be in an adversarial, you know, position with the president of the United States.
Nonetheless, they have to stand up for the people and the state because those governors are directly accountable to the voters in their states.
And they're the people who are in charge of a lot of the activity that goes on there. They can determine when to shut down, when to open up. They also
know they need the federal government for financial support. And a lot of these states, quite frankly, are really hurting because of the economic
conditions in the country.
GORANI: Sure. Joe Johns, thanks very much at the White House. Richard Quest joins me now from New York; 5.2 million new jobless claims, that's
bringing the total to 22 million in the last four weeks of people filing for unemployment claims for the first time.
We're seeing the Dow Jones industrial average there and stocks on Wall Street open lower.
How concerned are investors at this point?
RICHARD QUEST, CNNMONEY EDITOR AT LARGE: I think investors are deeply troubled, not so much by the horribly large numbers at the moment but by
the other economic data that we're getting at the same time.
We can see the direct reason why these numbers of people are filing for unemployment. What we need to look at are the retail sales numbers
yesterday. The impasse state numbers yesterday, the FILI numbers. These are different barometers of economic activity, business inventories. They show
the recovery will come but it will be slow and it will be sluggish.
There will not be an instant bounceback. Hala, a lot of the people who have lost their jobs will get them back because they -- all the companies have
been doing is shifting their workforce and payroll onto the government.
But longer term, they may only take back 30-50 percent of those workers because the other economic data is showing that the economy will be slow
for the foreseeable future. There will be no instant elastic rubber band rebound.
GORANI: Right.
And so what kind of timeline are we talking about here?
I mean, obviously the more these lockdowns go on, the longer the recovery will take. And it won't be an automatic from one day to the next snapback.
But are we talking weeks, are we talking months, are we talking even potentially years?
QUEST: Months or years. The way it will go is like this. The economies will start to be open again by the various governors and the states and
you'll see an initial bounce up. That's just pent-up demand. That's just people doing things that they have been unable to do until now.
But the longer term, so let's say you get back 40 percent of what you had, 50 percent, 60 percent. But that last 20-40 percent of growth, of business,
that could take another year or so.
And what I'm hearing is unemployment won't get back to the levels it was before the crisis until 2022. And you're looking to at least the second
half of next year to see economic growth recover the lost ground. And arguably it will never recover all of it.
So I think -- I think, bearing in mind, for instance, that the mayor of Los Angeles yesterday told Wolf Blitzer that there will be no big concerts,
there will be no big events, no sporting events with audiences, spectators until at least 2021. You get an idea that normality will not arrive until
mid- to late next year.
GORANI: You have big, big chunks of the economy that will not be operating normally for many more months.
[10:10:00]
GORANI: Even when we start easing restrictions, that is going to have a big impact. And, Richard, we'll see you on "QUEST MEANS BUSINESS" later
today.
We hope to be speaking, by the way, to a top economist from Michigan State University a little bit later because the question is since this
recessionary environment was not caused by underlying weaknesses, necessarily, in the economy, that we shut off the switch to try to prevent
this pandemic from being even more devastating than it already has been, will the recovery perhaps be swifter than it was after 2008-2009?
That's a big question out there.
Also what should the approach be in terms of how gradually phase by phase you reopen the economy?
That's the question facing the British government and many other governments around the world. It will hold an emergency meeting to review
the country's current lockdown strategy. The U.K. is expected to extend those lockdowns and safety measures as the number of coronavirus cases
keeps rising.
The government says more than 100,000 infections have been reported now in the United Kingdom. Nick Paton Walsh joins me live from London with more on
what to expect from the U.K. government.
An announcement, we're expecting the lockdown will be extended in its current form or will there be any effort to relax some of the measures
currently in place?
NICK PATON WALSH, CNN INTERNATIONAL SECURITY EDITOR: At this point, all the suggestions are we will have the same restrictions for a number of
weeks going forward, possibly as many as the three that have just passed here in the United Kingdom.
But there has been a little possibility of deviation from that, purely on account of the positive nature of the numbers government officials have
been putting around over the past 48 hours. The fact that over 2,000 spare capacity hospital beds have not been taken up by those afflicted by the
virus.
The fact that we're beginning to possibly think the peak may be behind certainly London if not the rest of the country and we're on the plateau
that slowly goes down now. And also the horrifying daily reported death tolls, 667 yesterday and over 800 today, up fractionally, officials suggest
perhaps, because of the reporting lag over the holiday weekend just past, is in fact lower than the 900-plus we saw at its highest.
Some numbers suggesting things are getting better. But at the same time, officials having to sell a message to people, they need to keep doing the
things they have been doing for the last three weeks for another few weeks to stop a secondary peak. So a difficult message today.
GORANI: All right. Of course, we talk a lot about numbers. But it is about people and we -- when we can put names and faces to the tragedy, we do so
as often as we can. In the United Kingdom, particularly sad story of a nurse who was pregnant who lost her life but doctors were able to save her
baby. Tell us about that.
WALSH: Yes, so, a deeply troubling story that heals hearts a lot of the time toward one of the key risk groups here, which are health workers. Mary
Agiopon (ph) worked at Lt. Dosky (ph) University Hospital, she was admitted on April 7th, tested positive on the virus two days earlier to that.
She was pregnant with a child and sadly died because of that virus. The child, though, did in fact survive and is said to be doing very well,
having been delivered by emergency C-section, said a spokesperson for the NHS.
But a story of great tragedy because this child will now live without their mother. One of possible hope and the darkness the U.K. has seen.
And it's important to remind people that while the U.K. is experiencing the same kind of loss that many other European countries too as well, the sheer
volume of people losing their lives here and in France and in Spain and in Italy, too, is absolutely staggering. Hundreds on a daily basis.
And the NHS here, the free U.K. health service who provide assistance to so many here, are struggling, they say, with getting enough protective
equipment and appear to be losing dozens of lives; 27 was a official number put out recently but it's said to be more at this point -- Hala.
GORANI: Thank you, Nick Paton Walsh at 10 Downing Street. Let's bring in Lisa Cook, on President Barack Obama's Economic Council, she's currently a
professor of economics and international relations at Michigan State University.
Thank you for being with us.
What shape do you think the economic recovery will take once we're able to lift lockdown restrictions across the U.S. and in other countries.
[10:15:00]
GORANI: How long do you think will it take to return to some sort of normality?
LISA COOK, OBAMA'S ECONOMIC COUNCIL MEMBER: You know, that's a really good question. And I think, as good an economist I think I am, I don't have the
answer. I think we have to be humble about that. It really depends on how we're able to and when we're able to tame this pandemic.
And vaccines take a long time; testing takes a long time. We have got to come up with protocols. We have to make it safe for everybody to go back to
work. And we need to make sure that people are safe once they go back to work and once the economy gears up again.
GORANI: But some countries have taken different approaches, Sweden here in Europe for instance; Denmark; even Spain, one of the hardest hit countries
in the world, is making a conscious decision to reopen some sectors of the economy because the calculation, I presume they're making, is this is just
going to be too devastating economically if we keep everything locked down.
And without it being a medical approach, economically speaking, if you're prepared to shut down as quickly as you reopened, could that be a better
approach, longer term?
COOK: I personally would be very cautious because the scenario I see is that we -- if you prematurely open the economy and people start showing up
at businesses and businesses aren't prepared with masks, with protocol that is standard across businesses, somebody gets sick and -- with COVID-19 and
it spreads, they become a hot spot, they are shut down by the health department, what we have is evidence from the Spanish flu that certain
properties, certain parts of neighborhoods that were severely affected by the Spanish flu in 1918, are still -- still have depressed property values.
So I think it would be premature to think about this in the short run. And think about how scared consumers will be, how tainted they will be if there
is an outbreak at a particular establishment. Think of the lawsuits. If you want to, you know, we -- this was a force major so insurance have to pay
out.
Is any insurer going to pay when you were personally negligent?
I don't think so. So this is a much more litigious country than the countries you mentioned.
GORANI: One of the things you talk about and study is how this -- these economic downturns affect disproportionately affect low wage earners,
minorities, women, people in more vulnerable economic positions.
Obviously people who make a good living, have savings, own their homes, you know, are in a privileged position. They can weather these types of
downturns much more easily.
How do we address the vulnerable segments of the population here?
COOK: Well, the first way I proposed was to get them money quickly. Get them a lot of money, money quickly, on a regular basis. So we have done a
little bit of that. And the federal government is getting every adult $1,200.
I don't think that's enough because the economy is not going to open in a month. People missed their rent and mortgage payments before. So I think
that there has to be a lot more done to protect the vulnerable.
This extension of paid leave, parental leave, paid sick leave, clearly there are some gaps in our economic system and the private sector and
possibly other places. And we have got to build a much stronger safety net because we all depend on it.
We all depend on these public goods not just one sector. So I think there is a lot of work to be done to protect the vulnerable and protecting the
vulnerable means protecting the entire population.
GORANI: Thank you so much, Lisa Cook, professor at Michigan State University and formerly on President Barack Obama's Economic Council.
Really appreciate having you on the program today.
If you have questions about potential vaccines or just if you want more details on this pandemic, how it affects you, your part of the world, tune
into CNN's next global town hall, facts and fears about the coronavirus with our Anderson Cooper and Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
And joining them will be Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. That will be at 8:00 pm In New
York, 1:00 am In London.
Ahead on the program, a leaked memo reportedly revealing what China knew about the coronavirus and when.
[10:20:00]
GORANI: The details of that report and China's response coming up.
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GORANI: Let's look into a new report from the Associated Press, based on leaked internal Chinese documents, that indicate that China, in fact, sat
on critical information about the scope of the threat from coronavirus for six days before alerting the public.
China has repeatedly denied it suppressed information. And meanwhile, U.S. intelligence and national security officials are also looking into the
possibility that the COVID-19 virus originated in a Chinese lab, not in a wet market as CNN has previously reported.
This is just one theory and many experts don't think that is necessarily the case. The lab theory as well denied by the Chinese government. So we're
still at that stage where we don't know how and when this all started. David Culver is in Shanghai with more.
What do these leaked documents suggest China knew about the scope of the pandemic and when?
DAVID CULVER, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Pretty big stories here, Hala. The first, the AP report is what bases this on a -- characterizes a leaked memo from a
confidential teleconference involving the head of China's national health commission.
CNN has gone through the government's public report of that teleconference, which highlights the worries expressed by health officials to other leaders
six days before officials alerted the public here.
I'll walk you through the timeline of what China knew and when. Back to December 8th, the Wuhan government first notes the first patient symptoms
of the then unknown virus.
On January 3rd, one health official said there is no obvious human to human transmission. That same day China notifies the U.S. of the virus.
On January 7th, Xi's first public awareness is made known and he ordered actions to be take.
Later to January 14th, that's the teleconference we're talking about here, the government release says a, quote, "sober understanding of the situation
was made known to top government officials," adding that clustered cases suggest that human to human transmission is possible.
But here is the concern. Publicly as late as January 19th, five days later, the Wuhan health commission said the outbreak was controllable and
preventable, not contagious.
The next day, a very different narrative. Leading health officials acknowledged cases of human to human transmission and even stressed that
medical personnel had gotten infected.
We know three days after that, Wuhan went on lockdown. China's foreign ministry says that in an open, transparent and responsible manner, China
kept the WHO and relevant countries updated on this outbreak.
[10:25:00]
CULVER: With regards to the lab -- and you mentioned the belief that the origins are potentially in a laboratory in Wuhan, not in a wet market as
originally released by the Chinese government -- this is one of many working theories from U.S. intelligence officials to CNN.
I can tell you the Chinese are pushing back hard against this, saying that there is no truth to it. And interestingly enough the spokesperson here at
the foreign ministry has said that they rely on scientific matters to guide them through here and don't want to essentially get caught up in what they
are portraying as a distraction.
However, should also be mentioned, Hala, that same spokesperson a month ago was floating ideas on Twitter that the U.S. Army brought the virus to
Wuhan. So there is a back and forth here and a bit of contradiction and hypocrisy on both sides.
GORANI: Yes. All right, David Culver, thank you very much.
Unreported coronavirus deaths in Spain could lead to a big jump in the total numbers there. After the break, we'll unpack those for you and we're
live in Madrid.
Plus, we'll speak to the former Danish prime minister about the challenges Europe is facing as a whole as the E.U. stares down the coronavirus
pandemic.
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GORANI: Well, for the first time, Germany is reporting more than 300 coronavirus deaths in a 24-hour period. But that spike in casualties comes
with some cautious optimism. The number of new daily infections, in fact, has been going down. And chancellor Angela Merkel announced plans to
gradually ease lockdown restrictions.
Small shops will begin to open first. And then schools will open in phases. But distancing rules remain in place and people are encouraged to wear
masks in public.
In Spain, the national coronavirus death toll is now exceeding 19,000. The Spanish health ministry says the daily number of deaths was slightly higher
on Thursday from the day before. Now those numbers to not include a huge increase reported by the semiautonomous region of Catalonia, which includes
Barcelona, and is one of Spain's hardest hit areas.
Officials in Catalonia now say the region's totals could be double what was previously reported and that is based on new data.
We have seen this in other countries; once the number of people who have died at home and in nursing homes, once those numbers are added to the
overall totals, of course, that brings the death numbers to much higher and worrying levels. Scott McLean joins me now live from Madrid with more.
[10:30:00]
GORANI: So despite the fact that we are seeing these very high numbers, Spain is still quite comfortable going through with the easing of some of
these lockdown restrictions?
SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, the government is definitely comfortable with the easing of these lockdown restrictions but they have
been controversial considering the number of cases that they are still seeing.
The death toll is especially concerning, considering that today marks three weeks where this country has seen a death toll above 500 every day. As you
mentioned, the true numbers may be much higher.
The Catalonia region offered a revised version of their death toll, including people who died outside of the hospital setting and also released
a revised count of the cases, which would confirm -- which would count people diagnosed with coronavirus symptoms by a doctor but haven't gotten
an official test.
The government says it is doing its counting in line with WHO guidelines. The government is also saying that it managed to double the number of tests
that it has done.
Previously it struggled to ramp up testing, doing just 20,000 a day. Now it says it can do 40,000 tests per day. That's how they're explaining the
boost in the number of cases after a week of fairly low numbers.
There is also some good news when it comes to ICU admissions, the government says those have been steadily declining every day, compared to
the previous day, which may be a good indicator that things are under control here.
But again, this decision to allow some nonessential workers, talking about 300,000 workers in the Madrid region alone in sectors like manufacturing
and construction, certainly is not without controversy.
The government, though, says it has carefully calculated the risk and says there are measures in place to make sure that cases don't spike again.
GORANI: All right, Scott McLean, live in Madrid, thank you very much.
Well, it's quite rare to hear politicians apologize and admit they were wrong, that they were slow. That's what the European Commission is doing.
It is apologizing to Italy in particular for not being, quote, "there on time" at the start of the country's COVID-19 outbreak.
During a European Parliament meeting earlier today, Ursula van der Leyen said too many E.U. countries were too late in giving Italy a helping hand.
And this comes as the E.U. pushes for a more coordinated response.
Helle Thorning-Schmidt is a former prime minister of Denmark and the former CEO of Save the Children International. She joins me live via Skype from
London.
Let's talk about how much of a challenge this is for the European Union. The Commission president herself is saying, you know, we dropped the ball
on this.
How did you react to that?
HELLE THORNING-SCHMIDT, FORMER DANISH PRIME MINISTER: I think that's historic. I never heard a Commission president apologize like this. So this
is an historic apology to Italy. I think it is well deserved.
When Italy asked for help to the other European Union member states on the 28th of February, they got absolutely silence in response. And since then
it has been really hard to make the European member states work together and find solutions together.
And it has not been pretty to see there is also been massive fighting between north and south. Portugal and Netherlands have been in verbal
fights and it doesn't look good. I think, if you look at it, the European member states have not passed this test of solidarity in a very difficult
time.
GORANI: Yes. I remember at the end of February, beginning of March, it was a Chinese plane full of medical supplies that landed in Italy there, to
help Italy out. And I remember that that had raised eyebrows and people were asking the question, why isn't this help coming from E.U. countries
that weren't yet afflicted by coronavirus as badly as they have been since.
What do you make of the different approaches as well?
Denmark, Sweden, other countries are taking a slightly more relaxed approach to either not imposing lockdown restrictions to begin with or
lifting them sooner than others.
Do you think that's the better approach and take the public healthcare risk or to really keep things locked down much longer term?
THORNING-SCHMIDT: First of all, I wish the European member states would have worked more together around this. For example, closing their borders,
without hardly discussing that with each other, that's not a very good solidarity move for the European Union.
But looking at the different member states, they have reacted very differently. And I think they have done so according to how many of their
population was affected.
[10:35:00]
THORNING-SCHMIDT: And Denmark has made a lockdown which is -- which is lighter than the one we have seen in Europe and the U.K. Sweden is an
example that stands out. In Sweden, schools have been open from the outset. Shops are open, fitness centers, restaurants, as long as people spread out
a bit when they're in restaurants.
So that's a completely different example. And I'm really curious to see, a year from now, whether that has actually worked. No one knows now, they
have a little bit higher death numbers now than in other -- than their neighbors, Norway and Denmark.
But we won't know until we have gone through the whole pandemic. And I'm very pleased to see that Denmark is opening today, actually. They're
opening schools and kindergarten so that life can resume again and things can go a little bit back to normality.
GORANI: This is an approach you would support, this kind of middle of the road somewhere between Sweden and currently, for instance, what the U.K. is
doing or what France is doing?
This kind of middle of the road approach, which allows societies to still keep on functioning on some level.
THORNING-SCHMIDT: I'm not an expert in this. But it does strike me that it had -- they have managed in Denmark to keep the numbers down, to make sure
they still have capacity in the health service and make sure that people keep the social distancing.
But also I think it is important to remember that Sweden, when they return, Denmark, when they return, it will be a slow pacing of return to normality.
I don't think we will get out of this way of living that is so different from how we normally live this year.
I think it will be slow and, in Denmark, lots of shops are not open and it will take months before things are open.
Last thing that will open, so sad, all the cultural things, all the festivals, all the things that are happening in the course of this summer,
all the culture that people enjoy being part of. That's not going to open for many, many months yet.
GORANI: I wonder what will happen with Brexit. You're in the U.K. You're married to a Brit. I wonder if there is any -- if there was ever a reason
to delay, reconsider, have a rethink about something like Brexit, especially for a country like the U.K., that is now flying in Romanians to
come pick fruit and vegetables in the United Kingdom.
Do you think it will have an impact on Brexit, this whole pandemic?
THORNING-SCHMIDT: Well, the funny thing is that, when you are in Britain right now, one thing the Brits are happy about is that they finally --
there was a full stop to talking about Brexit, which is something that we heard too much about. People are saying that's a good thing about this.
But we will return to talk about Brexit. I see absolutely no way where there will be headroom, headspace, for any decision makers in the U.K. or
in the E.U. to find a solution before the end of the year.
So I think they will very soon move into a conversation about how can we not leave the European Union as fast as we were thinking about and how can
we discuss this transition with a bit more space.
And also hoping that when we see a global health crisis, where something is happening in a market in China can impact how we live our lives and the
economy of the whole world that we will finally see that we are so dependent of each other and that will never go away.
So I'm also hoping that from this we'll have new cooperation about health issues and U.K. will be part of that with E.U.
GORANI: All right, well, it is going to change so many things for a very long time. Helle Thorning-Schmidt, thanks very much for joining us from
London.
So we are talking about how this affects politics and Brexit but as usual it is as we -- I like to repeat, this is about people. It is about how it
affects their health, their lives, things that we were taking for granted, being able to go to a concert or an art gallery.
All these things that enrich our lives every day that we're not able to engage in and the really the long-term impact of that on our mental health
as well, that's very important.
So as this coronavirus is shutting down travel between countries, farms in the U.K. are turning to chartered flights to save their crops from
spoiling. A flight from Romania will bring in 150 seasonal workers, the first of many, according to air charter services. Those farms, though, may
have more help.
[10:40:00]
GORANI: There are 30,000 people inside the U.K. that may have lost their jobs in restaurants or other places, that are coming forward asking for
work.
In Germany, farms have already chartered several flights to help with their farms. And Fred Pleitgen joins me now live from Berlin.
Let's talk about this ferrying of mainly Eastern European workers to other countries to try to help with these crops.
FREDERIK PLEITGEN, CNN SENIOR INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I think you put it absolutely correct, Hala, something we need to think about. A
lot of things we may have taken for granted for a very long time are no longer that easy and no longer as safe as they were before.
Getting farm hands, seasonal workers to farms in places like the United Kingdom and Germany as well, it is a problem with the borders closed in
Europe and the coronavirus pandemic going on. One charter flight has come into the United Kingdom with those seasonal workers but they are going to
need a lot more.
There are folks who are volunteering. A lot of the seasonal hands also have a lot of experience with a lot of these crops. You take asparagus, being
harvested now in the U.K. and in Germany as well, good crop workers are a lot faster than people who are just starting out at this.
And so a lot of the farms that you're seeing in the U.K., they have relations with some of the farm workers they're flying in now. I was at an
asparagus farm here in Germany. And I was actually stunned to see the precautions they have to take and the logistics, how difficult they have
become.
Flying in farm workers, it costs them about 200 euros per worker. So that's a little over $100. Before that, with a bus transfer, it was about 100
euros. The costs of getting people to the fields has doubled.
Then you have issues on the fields themselves, fewer people are able to work a field than in the past because you have to keep the physical
distancing measures in place. Housing has to be different with fewer people staying in a room.
Getting people supplied with food is different, with people having to eat separately from one another, than maybe in the larger cafeteria in the
past. They were able to bus people to fields; now they're doing it with single cars, bringing every worker to a field separately.
So the whole logistics of providing food on the table for us has become more difficult. And then with a lot of the farms, in the United Kingdom,
Germany, other European countries, the big thing they fear most is that one of these workers or anyone on their farm could come down with COVID-19.
That could lead to the entire farm getting shut down and that's something that has happened in Germany. There is a seasonal worker from Romania who
died on the farm in southwestern Germany. That happened on April 11th.
But on April 14th, they did a test and found out that that person had been carrying COVID-19 and then found out there was another person on the farm
who came down with the coronavirus as well.
So it is a huge threat to the price of food, to food security and also to the livelihoods of not just the farmers but also to the people who are
working on their fields as well. For the seasonal workers, it was and it is a very important source of income for them as well.
GORANI: All right, thanks very much, Fred Pleitgen.
Red Cross officials say Africa is climbing the curve of this coronavirus outbreak and that the time for action in order to prevent the worst-case
scenario is now in some parts of Africa.
In the poorest communities of Nairobi, overcrowding and poor sanitation are part of life, leaving social distancing out of the equation. Farai Sevenzo
reports from Kenya's capital, which is supposed to be on lockdown.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
FARAI SEVENZO, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Chaos in Nairobi's largest slum as residents rush for food donations. Coronavirus means breadwinners are not
earning, swelling the ranks of the unemployed. As Kenya's lockdown continues, these are now common scenes. Late last week, a food donation
caused a stampede. Some residents are afraid.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You can see how the line is too long. People are not distancing. No sanitation going on. No water to wash hands. You can see no
water to wash hands around. Mothers carrying children. You can see, oh, this one is too much on us. I think the world can see this. Oh, my God.
This is terrible.
SEVENZO (voice-over): That fear is felt across the African continent, as countries impose lockdowns. Kenya has a dusk to dawn curfew to curb the
outbreak.
[10:45:00]
SEVENZO: Here the pandemic has exposed the vulnerability of millions, driving sub-Saharan Africa to its first recession in 25 years, economists
say. Kenya's infected numbers are still in the low hundreds.
In most countries on the planet, not enough people are being tested as the numbers rise. And this is a country of over 50 million people.
Hundreds of thousands of Nairobi's poorest citizens live in informal settlements, in slums like Tiberi. The market, the bars are open, as
traders try to keep the slum economy moving. Community NGOs donated much of the water being used on the streets.
But will this alone stem the spread of the virus among the most vulnerable?
Kennedy Odede is the founder of the charity of Shining Hope for Communities. He says his NGO looks after people in 10 slums across Kenya.
CNN caught up with him.
KENNEDY ODEDE, SHINING HOPE FOR COMMUNITIES: Social distancing, if you have a two bedroom house, three bedroom house, here they live in 10 by 10
room, six children, how do they do that?
So it is going to be difficult. I think we just have to prepare. It is going to be a disaster. Right now this community doesn't care about corona
killing them; they care about them dying from hunger.
SEVENZO (voice-over): With no mass testing, the fear here is palpable -- Farai Sevenzo, CNN, Nairobi.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GORANI: Still ahead, we'll tell you about a British war veteran who raised millions for the National Health Service by walking in his garden. We'll be
right back.
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GORANI: All right. Welcome back. I just need a bit of guidance on where we are going next.
All right. That's OK.
I'm just -- I believe we are going to a story by Brian Todd on the tragedy of coronavirus and how it sometimes leads people to dying in their own
homes and how these numbers are sometimes are not reflected in the official national tolls. Here is Brian Todd with that report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Leonardo Frazier shows CNN the simple-looking device that made all the difference for him.
LEONARDO FRAZIER, CORONAVIRUS PATIENT IN OHIO: You strap it on your wrist here.
TODD (voice-over): It's a finger monitor measuring Frazier's oxygen, heart and blood. The 54-year-old wore it at home alone while he was battling
coronavirus. It was connected to his cell phone and when his condition took a sudden nosedive it let his doctors in northeastern Ohio know.
FRAZIER: It told me I needed to be in the E.R. -- I needed to come down to the E.R. immediately. And so that's what I did.
[10:50:00]
TODD (voice-over): Frazier says he felt so incapacitated at home alone that he doesn't know if he'd have had the wherewithal to get himself to the
hospital.
FRAZIER: And this, right here, saved my life and that's why I'm here today.
TODD (voice-over): But, Frazier's is a rare case. He happened to be placed in a pilot program at University Hospitals in Ohio, designed to help save
the lives of patients who are fighting coronavirus from home, where experts say a victim's condition can plummet in an instant.
DR. PETER PRONOVOST, UNIVERSITY HOSPITALS: It's unpredictable and so some patients will go home and they'll stay well -- their lungs will get
improved. Others may deteriorate. We don't know who will.
TODD (voice-over): And often, they deteriorate and die at home with no one knowing. Officials in the areas hardest-hit say they're struggling now to
count those who are isolated with the virus at home and the numbers of people they believe are dying at home, they say, are staggering.
New York City Councilman Mark Levine, who chairs the city's Health Committee, said before the pandemic, 20 to 25 people died at home in New
York on an average day. But in recent days, Levine says, "It's been over 200 people a day who are dying at home. We presume that most of that
increase is due to coronavirus."
Even with ramped-up testing, experts say the numbers of those who died from coronavirus may be well undercounted when all is said and done because of
the massive gaps in monitoring of those who died at home.
DR. ROCHELLE WALENSKY, MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL: I think during this acute period of time where so many people are not accessing medical care --
the folks who are dying at home -- the numbers that you're talking about -- this will definitely, I think, be a blind spot during this period of time.
TODD (voice-over): New York state officials are now scrambling to try to fill those gaps of information, devising ways of counting probably
coronavirus deaths, including victims who were not previously tested and those dying at home whose symptoms fit certain parameters of the virus.
MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO (D-NY), NEW YORK CITY: And it's just horrendous but the numbers speak for themselves. I've been over this with our health
colleagues that this used to be a very, very rare thing in New York City and suddenly, it's jumped up. And obviously, the only thing that's changed
is COVID-19.
TODD (on camera): But experts say getting a truly accurate count of the overall numbers of people who die from coronavirus at home may be near
impossible.
One doctor told us there's another category of people who could be counted as overall victims of this pandemic -- the people who die at home from
things like heart attacks, strokes and other illnesses, who refuse to go to the hospital out of fear they might get coronavirus -- Brian Todd, CNN,
Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GORANI: All right, thanks very much, Brian Todd, for that.
We'll take a quick break. A lot more after this.
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GORANI: Well, I want to bring you an update on this story of a British war veteran who has managed to raise millions and millions of dollars just by
walking in his garden. He's 99 years old, Captain Tom Moore.
Initially he hoped to earn just over $1,000 by doing 100 laps with his walker before his 100th birthday on April 30th. We're happy to report that
goal has been met and majorly surpassed. CNN's Anna Stewart has that story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANNA STEWART, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Many small steps for this 99-year-old man, a giant leap for the NHS.
[10:55:00]
STEWART (voice-over): A whole nation rooted for British army veteran Tom Moore to complete a personal marathon, 100 laps of his garden before his
100th birthday, raising money for the country's health service.
He crossed the finish line with a guard of honor from his old regiment. Moore set out to raise 1,000 pounds but ended up raising over 12 million.
CAPT. TOM MOORE, BRITISH ARMY VETERAN: I think it is absolutely fantastic. It is unbelievable that people would be so kind.
STEWART (voice-over): The money goes to the organization NHS Charities Together, which supports the U.K.'s health workers, who are already sending
messages of thanks.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We think you're amazing.
STEWART (voice-over): He has inspired people across the country and abroad and stunned his family.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He's been on TV in France, we're going to Russia, Israel, America, Australia. Change has been incredible.
STEWART (voice-over): He has a message for all the people staying at home.
MOORE: I think you're also been brave to be hemmed up in such a small space for so long. And good for you.
STEWART (voice-over): The public wants to thank Moore in return.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Why don't we make a card for Tom?
STEWART (voice-over): He turns 100 years old on the 30th of April.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Happy birthday to Captain Tom.
Tad, make a card for Tom.
STEWART (voice-over): And people all over the world are going to make it a birthday to remember -- Anna Stewart, CNN, London.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
GORANI: Well, we hope to speak with Captain Tom Moore on the program tomorrow. Really keeping my fingers crossed for that. Such an inspiring
person. We need those inspiring stories.
Here is one to end the hour for you. A woman battling coronavirus recovered and finally got to meet her baby nearly two weeks after giving birth. Take
a look.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
GORANI (voice-over): She was 34 weeks pregnant when the 36-year old came to the hospital with contractions, having a hard time breathing. Well, she
tested positive for COVID-19. And her condition deteriorated.
She was placed on a ventilator, she gave birth by C-section, while in a medically induced coma. She was eventually taken off the ventilator and
finally reunited with her newborn son on Wednesday. And the baby tested negative for the virus.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
GORANI: A feel good story to end the program. There is so much tragedy and so much heartbreak and then you have these kind of moments of light
breaking through the clouds. We love bringing those to you as well.
I'm Hala Gorani. We're going to take a quick break. Stay with CNN. There's more ahead.
END
