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First Move with Julia Chatterley
Global Stocks Rally As Moderna Releases Promising Vaccine Update; Biden Team Meets Vaccine Makers, But Still No Transition Talks; Fifteen Asia-Pacific Nations Form World's Biggest Trade Bloc. Aired 9-10a ET
Aired November 16, 2020 - 09:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[09:00:20]
JULIA CHATTERLEY, CNN INTERNATIONAL ANCHOR: Live from New York. I'm Julia Chatterley. This is FIRST MOVE. And here is your need to know.
Vaccine vigor. Biotech Moderna says its vaccine is near 95 percent effective.
Moderna momentum. Global stock soar, the Dow poised to break 30,000.
And the Pacific Partnership. Fifty nations agreeing a major trade deal minus the U.S. and India.
It's Monday. Let's make a move.
Welcome once again to FIRST MOVE. Great to have you with us for another jam-packed show filled with exciting news on the vaccine ventures giving us
all hope during these dark days of the COVID crisis.
As I mentioned, Moderna, just announcing interim data that shows its vaccine is near 95 percent effective in late stage trials and even stronger
performance than we were discussing last week if you remember with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Well, I can tell you the Chairman of Moderna is
coming up shortly to give us his take on all of these details.
We'll also be joined by Dr. Peter Hotez at the Baylor College of Medicine, whose low cost vaccine has just begun early stage trials, a potential game
changer for emerging markets like India, too. It costs less and this is key.
Now, vaccine ventures are triggering another day of vaccine vroom on the global markets. As you can see, the S&P 500 and the small cap Russell 2000,
their domestic focus stocks begin the session at record highs.
The Dow, as I mentioned, too, closing in on that 30,000 milestone yet again as well. Tech, pulling back remember. It's the winners to the losers that
rotation that we're seeing. But I have to say, economic data from Asia is also helping sentiment. Japan posting a record 21 percent annualized growth
rate for the third quarter. The first positive reading the country has had in a year helping the Nikkei hit a 29-year high as you can see in that
chart.
In the meantime, Chinese industrial production jumping in October and retail sales over in China rising for a third straight month, but still, it
should be clear, below pre-pandemic levels.
China also signing one of the largest trade deals ever with 14 and neighboring nations. It's also merger Monday, too. You have to keep up with
me here. U.S. Bank PNC buying the U.S. operations of Spain's BBVA for more than $11.5 billion dollars. That is one of the biggest banking deals in
more than a decade.
U.S. and European bank stocks actually were the big winners last week. Part of that rotation as I mentioned out of some of the pandemic winners into
some of the beaten up sectors as investors look past our pretty bleak present.
Let's be clear, as far as COVID is concerned and begin pricing in the vaccine victories, and it is no exaggeration, the hopes of humanity and the
fate of markets are riding on it.
Let's get to the drivers. Christine Romans joins me now. Christine, more rotation. That's the key out of some of those pandemic winners into some of
the losers. We're so excited about the vaccine breakthroughs that we're seeing. Great for markets. We still need a bridge to that moment for the
real economy, and we'll keep talking about this.
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN BUSINESS CHIEF BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Yes, and let's because when I look at markets year-to-date, I see the NASDAQ up 30
percent, a Dow up more than three percent. The S&P up 10 percent. Those year-to-date performances allow senators, G.O.P. leadership to say we don't
need to do something that's big in terms of a bridge to next year right now in terms of more stimulus.
So in a way, the stock market's success story here really takes away some of the urgency about what is needed on Main Street and I worry about that a
little bit.
Also, I guess when you look at what's happening here, this risk on moment here today, we are flying into stocks, flying out of some of the NASDAQ,
some of the high fliers of the pandemic -- of the pandemic period. One wonders if there's a digestion that will come. There's all these vaccine
hopes, vaccine victories, but at some point, as we're pricing in this new world of vaccines, sometimes there can be some digestion thereto of the
news and setbacks on the news.
So, I don't think you go straight up from here, but there's a lot of optimism. I'm sure you're hearing it, too. A lot of optimism about looking
into 2021 at what will be the post COVID or living with COVID world here and for right now, with the stock market doing as well as it is, it takes
the heat, the political heat off of doing stimulus and that's a real shame for real people.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, but we were talking about it last week as well, this light at the end of the tunnel and we are seeing it and perhaps, given the
success rates that we're seeing, at least at this stage with the interim data for these vaccines, then we're pulling forward to the time when we get
back to some degree of normality.
But, again, we'll go back to the point, a survey this morning saying 11 million to 13 million Americans might face eviction come January because
all the measures, including some bump up in unemployment benefits, just in terms of the programs available run off at the end of the year, too.
There's just no time, and we don't have that bridge, even if it's an earlier point upon which that the vaccines become available.
[09:05:35]
ROMANS: And we know, we know that people when they got their $1,200.00 check earlier this year, or they got $600.00 extra a week in unemployment
benefits, it's very clear, they saved some of that money. They saved some that money and they have been using that money this fall. That's why we've
seen retail sales so strong. We've seen the consumer spending part of this picture so great.
That's kind of masking what's really happening in the economy. That's the money that the government injected into consumers to keep them whole. They
are spending it down and these other -- these other really important supports are expiring in the next days and weeks. You won't have an economy
at a hundred percent on January 1st or January 20th, or maybe even March 1st.
So really, here, there's an important leadership discussion to be had about helping Main Street. You're going to hear a lot of people talk about Dow
30,000. Look, that's great. I like it when stocks go up. But I have a terrible feeling that too many Americans have no difference in their life
when the stock market is at 30,000.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, and even when we get the growth numbers back and when the retail sales numbers recover, there will be still millions of Americans
that are struggling. And to your point as well, I mean, that stimulus check was agreed, I think 234 days ago. I think that works out to just over $5.00
a day support.
So some of it may have been saved, but more support still needed. Christine Romans, thank you so much for that.
Now effective distribution of any vaccine and all the debate we were just discussing there about Congress acting key to the recovery of the economy.
President-elect Biden's team meeting with some of the vaccine companies but his future plans, hampered by the lack of formal transition talks.
Joe Johns joins us now. Joe, we could substitute economic talks, vaccine distribution talks, all hampered of course, by the lack of transition. We
did get some tweets from the President that seemingly suggested that he now sees Joe Biden as having won this election. But of course, it was then
swamped by further accusations of fraud and the need for recounts and the legal issues here, too. Joe, where are we?
JOE JOHNS, CNN SENIOR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT: Well, I can tell you just a few minutes ago, the President tweeted that he won the election once again,
and it creates a serious problem when you think about it, because vaccines, Operation Work Speed. This is about the one thing this administration can
point to that says they did something very well on the issue of coronavirus. A lot of the other things, not so much.
But on vaccines, they appear to have done well. However, the administration seems to be snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, because they will
not acknowledge that Joe Biden is the rightfully elected next President of the United States and sort of open up the doors to cooperation between the
transition team and the current administration.
So what does that do? Well, number one. It forces Biden to sort of go to Plan B and work around the edges, including doing things like meeting with
the vaccine makers, meeting with others who used to work in the government working on personnel and appointments.
But the thing the incoming administration cannot do, at least at this stage, is something called Agency Review. And that is when a team from the
Biden transition goes into various agencies. In the case of vaccine, it would be the Department of Health and Human Services, and try to figure out
where everything is, how the vaccine deployment is going to work here in the United States.
So that creates a critical problem because as Dr. Anthony Fauci has said, they could start trying to distribute this vaccine by the end of December,
a very short timeline. And of course, the new administration comes in in January. It means Joe Biden would walk into a position where he doesn't
know what's going on with the deployment of this vaccine at a very critical time -- Julia.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, legal issues, recounts must be set aside, allow whoever is going to take over to be prepared to do so. And that's how we need to be
behaving. Joe Johns, thank you so much for that.
All right. Let's get more details now on Moderna's big announcement, this interim result show its vaccine is near 95 percent effective. Elizabeth
Cohen joins me now. Elizabeth, wowsers, is all I can say. Give us all the details. What does this mean and what more do we know?
ELIZABETH COHEN, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Julia, I think that's a very appropriate word. People were expecting maybe we'll get 60 percent
effective, if we're lucky 70 or 80, but 94.5. That is way higher than even what people were hoping for and in the same neighborhood. It's right at the
same mark as Pfizer's vaccine.
[09:10:14]
COHEN: And another advantage is neither vaccine seems to have terrible side effects. People had headaches or body aches, but that was about it. And in
addition, Moderna's vaccine, unlike Pfizer's, Moderna's vaccine does not need to be kept at those super low temperatures. They can be kept in
freezers that pharmacies and doctors' offices at least in the United States already have.
So let's take a look at Moderna's specific numbers. So what Moderna did was they gave 15,000 study participants a placebo. That's a shot of saline that
does nothing, and over a period of months, 90 of those people became sick with COVID-19, and they gave 15,000 -- a different 15,000, a different
group -- they got the vaccine and over a period of months, only five of those people became sick with COVID-19.
So you can see that huge difference. That's where you get the 94.5 percent.
And there's sort of a second note here, which is that those five people who got the vaccine and did get sick with COVID, in other words, the vaccine
didn't prevent them from getting ill. It seems to have prevented them from getting severely ill. None of those five people became severely ill with
COVID. But among the folks who got the placebo, 11 of them did get severely ill with COVID.
Now Moderna, this is news to us, and it also is really news to Madonna. They just found out this data yesterday afternoon. They heard about it from
an independent data and safety monitoring board. They had a phone call with them yesterday. I spoke after that with Dr. Tal Zaks, who is the Chief
Medical Officer at Moderna. Let's take a listen.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COHEN: Tell me, how did it feel to hear that number, 94.5 percent?
DR. TAL ZAKS, CHIEF MEDICAL OFFICER, MODERNA: Elizabeth, it's one of the greatest moment of my life and my career. It is absolutely amazing to me to
be able to develop this vaccine and see the ability to prevent symptomatic disease with such high efficacy.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
COHEN: Now the next step is that Pfizer and Moderna need to apply to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for authorization in the United States.
That's expected to happen next week or the week after and then the F.D.A. has to review it.
Last night Dr. Anthony Fauci told me that he expects that vaccinations in the United States will begin in the second half of December -- Julia.
CHATTERLEY: It's just so incredible, isn't it? I think his smile said it all, Elizabeth. Yes, we have to try and curb our enthusiasm here. But it's
tough. It's -- what an incredible achievement. Thank you so much for that update there, Elizabeth Cohen. Thank you.
COHEN: Julia, I will add that these were early results. And so this isn't the right number. But still, it was a lot of people.
CHATTERLEY: Yes.
COHEN: Right. It was still a lot of people.
CHATTERLEY: Thank you so much. As always, there's the moderating force. Thank you.
All right, stay with FIRST MOVE for more on Moderna's vaccine. I'll be talking to the company's Chairman later on in the show.
Now, before Joe Biden gets a chance to set his administration's trade policies, just one of the set of policies that we're talking about China,
and 14 other Asia Pacific nations forming the world's largest free trade bloc in a deal covering around a third of global economic output.
John Defterios joins us on this. John, I don't believe in coincidences, quite frankly. But we know this kind of thing takes months, in fact, years
of organization, but oh boy, the timing here and excluding the United States and India, of course, too.
JOHN DEFTERIOS, CNN BUSINESS EMERGING MARKETS EDITOR: Yes. It's a concrete example, Julia, if you leave a void there, somebody will fill it. Donald
Trump turned his back on the Trans-Pacific Partnership and basically pivoted away from Asia. China's Xi Jinping comes in and does something
that's rather comprehensive.
It's from the north in China all the way down to the south in New Zealand, as you suggested, covering almost a third of GDP, a market of 2.2 billion
consumers and investors like what they hear, in fact. You talked about the Nikkei going into a 29-year high. We have the Asia MSCI at a 33-year high.
It's extraordinary, the growth that we're seeing out of it.
And what's the playoff here in terms of what happens next? It's interesting, the Chinese were suggesting this is a vote of confidence for
multilateralism and we can have a win-win. That was a message to Donald Trump and perhaps to Joe Biden coming in at the same time, Julia.
And it's also fascinating to see that this is the first trade agreement that includes China, Japan and South Korea. They are bearing the historical
strains for the betterment of growth here in Asia. Japan getting this growth on quarter-on-quarter of five percent, 21 percent of the year of the
manufacturing sector in China zooming ahead above expectations in the month of October.
The one complaint is, it is short on details right now. They wanted to get this out before the transition to Joe Biden, it looks like, and how about
the name? It doesn't actually roll off the tongue, does it, Julia? Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership or RCEP, right? It's not something we'll
remember for a long, long time.
[09:15:10]
DEFTERIOS: But the message is clear from Asia, it is on demand. It's growing, and now, they have something, a tray framework, if you will that
is working for them.
CHATTERLEY: Yes. And all of these nations have had their own individual hassles and troubles, I think with their trading arrangement with the
United States, like, guys, you can join but you're joining rather than you arranging and being at the forefront of coordinating this time around.
Fascinating on the timing. John Defterios, thank you so much.
All right, these are the stories making headlines around the world. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is self-quarantining for 14 days after coming
into contact with a lawmaker who tested positive for coronavirus. He says he has no symptoms and will continue working from Number 10 Downing Street,
leading his government's pandemic response.
The head of the International Olympic Committee says he is confident that crowds will be able to attend to the Tokyo Games in July. Thomas Bach said
he hopes that the COVID vaccine will make the venue safer. The games were postponed last July because of the coronavirus pandemic.
All right, still to come here on FIRST MOVE, more on Moderna. The company's founder and chairman joins us next. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back to FIRST MOVE. Call it if you will, Moderna's moment, the S&P 500 is set to rise to new records as the vaccine maker
reports an eye popping success rate for its COVID vaccine. Moderna shares up currently more than 14 percent premarket. Economic reopening stocks are
set to rally hard and stay-at-home stocks are looking softer, a continuation of that rotation into what we call relative value that we saw
last week. We'll call it Moderna's momentum as we did earlier on in the show, too.
Oil also rallying on hopes that vaccines will boost future growth even as new U.S. virus cases rise to new records and trigger fresh economic
restrictions. It is that balance and that trade off of course, but let's bring it back to today's big breakthrough.
[09:20:05]
CHATTERLEY: Interim results from Moderna showing its vaccine has a 94.5 percent efficacy rate. And I'm pleased to say, joining us now, Noubar
Afeyan. He is co-founder and Chairman of Moderna.
Sir, fantastic to have you on the show with us once again. Just talk to me about the moment you got that phone call, I'm sure that told you how
effective the interim results are showing this vaccine to be. It is a huge moment.
NOUBAR AFEYAN, CO-FOUNDER AND CHAIRMAN, MODERNA: Well, Julia, thanks for having me on again. Yes, indeed, we've been working over the past six
months to get to this point since we started our very first human trials back in March.
And of course, it is an anxiety filled moment, because in science, you really can't be sure to predict what might happen. And there's a lot of
variables. But really, hearing yesterday from the independent monitoring board what the final results of this interim analysis were, and hearing
that out of 95 cases that were afflicted with COVID-19 in our trial that were analyzed, only five were on the vaccine, and 90 were in the placebo.
That I must say, exceeded our expectations, in the sense that there's a lot of differences one gets when you get to larger populations and we were very
gratified to see that so far that actually the vaccine has performed in a very robust way.
CHATTERLEY: And the key part of this, too. The five people that had been given the vaccine, they didn't get severely ill with COVID-19 either. How
optimistic are you that that this vaccine perhaps and obviously, we need to see this scientifically proven, but perhaps it can reduce the severity,
even if those that do still catch COVID-19?
AFEYAN: Julia, we are encouraged by the data. In fact, I think it's important to understand we had out of the 95 cases, 11 were severe cases of
COVID-19. And of course, we wanted to find out of those 11, were there cases that were on the vaccine, and it turns out that all 11 cases were on
the placebo.
Now, you know, in scientific or clinical research, optimism is something that you actively keep in check because you have to do the rigorous
experiments. But certainly I can say that we're encouraged by this interim readout. And we do expect based on the numerous studies we did in animals
and prior human analyses, looking very specifically at the antibodies and their levels, that we may well be able to keep in check the very severe
cases.
I'll also say that we had a number of different other subgroups that we are looking actively at. And in general, it looks like the vaccine performs
broadly across all the population groups that we considered.
CHATTERLEY: Because I was going to ask you about elderly individuals and those with preexisting conditions. So, I think that's sort of what you were
hinting at there, perhaps too.
AFEYAN: Yes, we had 15 in the elderly case, above 65 and again, also some 20, that were from diverse populations. As you may realize, some months
ago, Moderna actually slightly slowed down the trial recruitment to ensure that we had a substantial representation. It turns out, 37 percent of our
trial were people -- were subjects that are considered of color and that was a target for us to be able to achieve a high level of representation,
because we really wanted the vaccine to be tested in the most vulnerable populations.
And I can say that when looking at the subgroups, we don't see any difference in the results. That is consistent with our Phase 1 data, where
we showed very specifically in folks over 65, in folks over 75 a robust and equivalent reduction.
CHATTERLEY: Fantastic. And Noubar, talk to me about timing now as far as application to the F.D.A., potential approval from the F.D.A., and then of
course supply. I know you've promised 100 million doses to the United States. What can you tell us about the timing, potentially assuming
everything goes well here with approval?
AFEYAN: Yes, well, of course now, now that we have seen this data, the expectation of going as fast as is safely possible, and in as coordinated
away with the various parties that have to get involved, particularly the regulators is our goal and we're definitely locked in on achieving the best
performance there.
What we expect will happen is based on this meeting already, there will be another safety readout. The F.D.A. had set guidelines that we needed to
have data from two months post the 50th percentile recruitment that is when we get 15,000 folks into our trial and then wait two months. They want to
see safety data from that. That will occur within a matter of days.
[09:25:10]
AFEYAN: In our case, and once we have that data, and we will put together the package, we will then present that to the F.D.A. for Emergency Use
Authorization, there will be as has been announced an Advisory Committee review of that.
So we're looking at early December to take the important next steps. And as soon as we get the authorization, we are ready, together with Operation
Warp Speed which has been a really a key partner for us in this whole logistics aspect to get the vaccines out to the first cohort who is slated
to receive it.
CHATTERLEY: I want to talk to you about the platform as well, that messenger RNA platform, which is a revolutionary piece of science, and
we've never used this platform before to produce and to distribute vaccines in this way. What came to light, I think in the past week, specifically
when we got the news about Pfizer and BioNTech's vaccine is the need for cold storage and incredibly cold conditions and the complications that that
creates in distributing these vaccines more broadly.
Can you just compare the requirements for Moderna's vaccine and whether this makes it easier to distribute than some of the competitors?
AFEYAN: First, let me say that, as I've said in the previous occasions I've had the pleasure to be talking with you, Julia, is that we very much
support and want multiple vaccines to be available and they will each have relative strengths and weaknesses.
So I will say, I'll congratulate our colleagues at Pfizer for having already gathered the data needed to support their advancement because we
think from a production standpoint, the world will need multiple suppliers, and as much volume available as quickly as possible.
Now to your specific question about Moderna's own technology. We spent multiple years pioneering the messenger RNA space and we've been at this
for 10 years. And in the last few years, we actually have been working hard at coming up with more stable formulations of the vaccine that allows us to
avoid the deep freeze minus 70, minus 80 degrees conditions. That is where we were several years ago as well.
I'm pleased to say that the innovations made by our brilliant scientists at Moderna have taken us to the point where we can have our product stored at
minus 20 degrees, which is refrigeration conditions that are available quite broadly.
But more importantly, today, we announced that beyond the fact that we don't need deep freeze conditions, we can also -- and we validated -- keep
the vaccine under refrigeration conditions that is two to eight degrees centigrade for up to 30 days.
That is a massive enablement to be able to distribute much more broadly and much more easily, and we continue to make improvements in that regard.
Furthermore, we've also shown that you can have it at room temperature for up to 12 hours coming out of the storage conditions.
So in many ways, we think that this is an important part of the usefulness and ease of use of the vaccine, which if we're talking about hundreds of
millions of doses will become a very important consideration.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, and I take your point that we are all partners. There are no competitors, ultimately in this game, because we need so many of these
vaccines, but the flexibility allowing for the difference in temperature here, minus 20 versus minus 70, and being at room temperature for 12 hours
gives a greater degree of flexibility, which is the key point here.
Noubar, very quickly, I just want to ask you about T cells. Are you measuring in people that have taken the vaccine, the T-cell response in the
system, because it's something I think that for us, ordinary individuals, we don't necessarily understand enough, but we know it provides us with
longer term degree of immunity in people that will become very interesting on whether we need this vaccine every year, perhaps, we don't. Are you
measuring this?
AFEYAN: We certainly and everybody else is measuring it. I should say, Julia, because the whole world has become now educated in Biology concepts,
most people wanted to forget when they were in high school.
The reality is that there aren't one kind of T-cells, there are many. The primary ones we think about are what's called CD4 and CD8 T-cells.
We have shown in our data that the CD-4 T cells are highly activated due to our vaccine. Those are the T-cells that are important to be able to
generate a robust antibody response.
The data in the vaccine world overwhelmingly supports the fact that a robust antibody response which is enabled by CD-4 response is what is
protective for future infections.
[09:30:07]
AFEYAN: There is interesting new research in the immunology field of which we are at my firm Flagship Pioneering participants with some of our leading
edge companies such as Repertoire that actually looks at T-cells and Moderna certainly will measure that in the CD-8 category, but what is not
at all shown is that that is a an essential part of protection.
So through the COVID work, we will all learn how important CD-8 T-cells are, and if they are important, there is ways to increase them.
But there is an oversimplification out there through experts of some vaccines that have a lot of CD-8 positive cells, some don't. And therefore,
one is going to work better. There is no data that supports that.
The only data that exists is that a robust antibody response is what vaccines have delivered against infectious diseases, and that's what we and
Pfizer have demonstrated.
CHATTERLEY: Fantastic, Noubar, great to chat with you. The founder and the CEO of our Flagship Pioneering, you mentioned the company, come back and
talk to us from your perspective, too, today in your role as the co-founder and chairman of Moderna. Thank you to the team at Moderna for all the hard
work and effort.
AFEYAN: Thank you so much.
CHATTERLEY: Phenomenal to chat with you, sir, once again. Thank you.
All right, the market opens next. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back to FIRST MOVE. U.S. stocks are up and running on the first trading day of the week. Eventful already. We've got fresh
records for the S&P 500 and the small cap Russell 2000 as investors applaud stunning late interim vaccine data from Moderna, a success rate of almost
95 percent.
I'll tell you, boy, it doesn't get much better than that.
The Dow also closing in on record highs. It's filled with value stocks that will benefit when vaccines are delivered and economies reopen. As you can
see, the tech sector there, underperforming. Relatively flat, its stay-at- home winners helped drive markets to record earlier this year.
The NASDAQ fell half a percent last week as investors rotated into some of those beaten up names and away from some of the Big Tech winners throughout
the pandemic period.
[09:35:18]
CHATTERLEY: We seem to be making real progress towards a coronavirus vaccine, numerous of them, 12 candidates are currently in Phase 3 trials
developed by companies including Moderna, as we just heard; Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson.
Researchers at dozens of other companies are staging Phase 1 and 2 trials. India based Biological E also entering human trials at Baylor Colleges
COVID-19 vaccine and joining us now, Dr. Peter Hotez. He is a Professor and Dean of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine.
Fantastic to have you on the show with us once again. I want to talk about your specific vaccine and the work that's been done there. But first, just
to get your sense of what we heard from Moderna this morning, in light of what we heard, of course, from Pfizer and BioNTech last week. Lots of
progress here being made.
DR. PETER HOTEZ, DEAN OF THE SCHOOL OF TROPICAL MEDICINE, BAYLOR COLLEGE OF MEDICINE: Yes, absolutely, Julia. I mean, I think what we're looking at is
probably maybe a dozen different vaccines. I mean, for us, the good news is both for the Pfizer and Moderna vaccine, it validates the fact that the
spike protein is the right target for these vaccines.
So all of the vaccines that we talked about, whether it's Moderna, or Pfizer, or AstraZeneca, Oxford or ours, they all work by inducing an immune
response against the spike protein and preventing the virus from binding to our host tissues.
So these findings have high levels of protection, sort of validates what we've been -- what researchers, including myself have been saying for the
last decade that this is the way to go for a vaccine strategy.
And then the question is, okay, well, if that's true, why do you need so many different types of vaccines? Well, the well, the issue is this: we
don't really know for any one different -- any one particular type of technology how long the protection is going to last. We know from the more
traditional technologies that it could last for years. Is it going to be the same for the mRNA or the other vaccines? We just don't know.
So the kind of reduce the risk, it's good to have a portfolio of different candidates and for the reasons as stated by your previous guest that no one
organization can make all of the vaccine for the world, and so this has been kind of a big ecosystem now of a dozen different vaccines. And now we
have ours being tested across India and we are excited about that for a number of reasons.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, diversification is key. Talk to me about why you are excited, because as we were discussing there with the Moderna Chairman,
logistics, the ease of making the vaccine and where you can make it is critically important in addition to the platform, and this is why your
vaccine I think and we'll keep our fingers crossed is so important. Talk us through what you're working on.
HOTEZ: That's right. So in some ways our vaccine is a bit of a throwback, it uses a technology that's almost 40 years old. It's a recombinant protein
vaccine expressed in yeast. And the reason that's relevant, it's the same technology that's used to deliver the hepatitis B vaccine all over the
world.
And one other piece to that, that recombinant hepatitis B vaccine is made locally in many countries in Brazil and Cuba, and India and Indonesia and
Bangladesh. So it offers the potential where we could have scale up production in many countries across the world, rather than the traditional
approach, which is relying on the U.S. or North America and Europe, and then and having filtered down to low and middle income countries.
We can get direct access and our partners at Bio E who are absolutely amazing, are producing 1.2 billion doses of this vaccine. So the hope is
that we can get a good percentage of the world vaccinated, whereas the others which require a freezer technology, it's going to be a bit tougher
to get that into places like Ethiopia and Nicaragua, and you name it.
So I'm hoping that ours can make an important contribution to this vaccine ecosystem, particularly for low and middle income countries.
CHATTERLEY: Timing, Dr. Hotez, give me a sense of timing. I mean, you're talking about a huge numbers if you're talking about more than a billion
doses here, the ability to make it locally rather than to have the issues of cold storage, which is not a problem I'm assuming with this either.
This would be phenomenal. How long will it take assuming everything goes well with the trials?
HOTEZ: Well, if all the stars align, the hope is that by the middle of next year, we can be vaccinating a significant percentage of the global
population. Of course, the stars have to align. There are always bumps in the road, as we've seen with Moderna and Pfizer and AstraZeneca-Oxford, but
I'm hopeful because it is a traditional technology we know what to look for.
We know about its safety record, now, things can move pretty quickly. So even though you can move very fast, using the mRNA technology to get into
the clinic. Given that it's a brand new technology, it can slow you down at the other end and the hope is that even though ours took a little longer to
make and develop just by a few months that we can make up for that lost time by the fact that it's a well-known approach that's been used for
decades.
[09:40:19]
CHATTERLEY: Peter, I have about 30 seconds. The vaccines are coming. There's light at the end of the tunnel, but we're in a pandemic, still, and
we need a bridge of some sort between where we are today and when we get the vaccines.
What do people need to remember, particularly over Thanksgiving, at Christmas, they want to see their families? How should they act?
HOTEZ: So I'm so glad you asked that. Look, you know, in the past, what I've told people about aggressive social distancing and wearing masks, I
wasn't able to give them any end date for it. I would just -- you know, it almost sounded like I was asking them to do this in perpetuity.
Now we have brackets on the right hand side, Julia, we can tell people look, this is not forever. Just hang on a few more months. Protect your
loved ones and save lives because right now, the projections in the U.S., for instance, are especially dire. The number say we can have another
150,000 Americans die between now and a couple of weeks after the Inauguration.
They don't have to die. We just have to not be reckless, look after one or another and keep that social distancing and even though you're not going to
see a lot of family over Thanksgiving and Christmas, you know, you'll see them after you get vaccinated.
So just hang on a few months. I mean, imagine the tragedy of losing a loved one now, when you know that if you just had them hang on just a few more
months, they would get vaccinated and lived a normal life and that's the message I think it's really important to transmit.
CHATTERLEY: Yes. Be brave. We'll get there soon. Dr. Peter Hotez, thank you for that. You're making me emotional. We all have to take care of each
other and ourselves.
HOTEZ: Absolutely.
CHATTERLEY: Professor at the Baylor College of Medicine. Thank you, sir. We'll speak to you soon.
All right, after the break, what's the best foot forward for the traumas in tourism industry directly connected to this? The CEO of hotel giant, Best
Western is next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[09:45:19]
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back to FIRST MOVE. The hospitality industry will be welcoming today's vaccine news from Moderna with open arms. As hotel rooms
stand empty around the world, Best Western is one of the biggest franchises in the business.
As you can see in the blue on this map, it has nearly 5,000 hotels across over 100 different nations. It is an estimated 20,000 Best Western jobs
have been lost since the start of the pandemic. That's on top of 800 layoffs at the parent company.
David Kong is the CEO of Best Western and joins us now. David, it's fantastic news that we're hearing on the vaccine research front, but I
guess it's bittersweet in many ways, because support for businesses like yours is still needed to bridge the divide until we get there.
DAVID KONG, CEO, BEST WESTERN INTERNATIONAL: Oh, absolutely. Julia, first of all, thank you, I appreciate you having me and shining a light on the
plight of many of the hotel owners out there suffering incredible carnage right now.
Since the start of pandemic until now, our industry is down by about 50 percent in revenue, which is fairly significant. And recently with this big
spike, a lot of municipalities and states are shutting down again, which is causing tremendous number of cancellations of late, which is really just
adding fuel to fire to a very bad situation.
CHATTERLEY: Well, what proportion of your franchisees are saying to and you can talk to me about wherever in the world is worst at this moment as
saying to you, look, we're not going to make another shutdown. If we have to close down again or we continue to see these conditions. We're just not
going to make it.
KONG: Yes, well, according to the American Hotel Lodging Association study, which was only a couple months ago. They said that three quarters of the
hotels are planning further layoffs and only half the hotels have enough reserve to last another six months and therefore in danger of closures.
So it's a whopping number. Half the hotels are in danger for closure.
CHATTERLEY: How frustrating is it to watch what's going on in D.C. at this moment and Congress and the inability to agree on a package for --
particularly for small businesses and those that would help perhaps some of the smaller hotels that are your franchisees? There's agreement, but they
just can't reach an agreement.
KONG: Yes, it's tremendously maddening and frustrating. The fact of the matter is, despite the good news that are out there about the vaccine,
which gives us the light at the end of the tunnel. We do need a bridge to the other side for the time being.
And so many other hotels, at least half the hotels are owned by small businesses and other small businesses and they are owned by hard working
men and women trying to make an honest living and they really need help.
Because this whole big stock market rally is happening on Wall Street, it's not Main Street. Millions of people out of jobs. They've been furloughed or
laid off and they need help.
And more people are going to get laid off if we don't get some assistance. So it's really disturbing to see that we can't come to some resolution, at
least provide some relief, so we can get to the other side.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, we need an agreement and we need it like months ago. David, can you compare what you're seeing -- I know, we've talked about the
challenges in the United States to what you're seeing in China because we are looking at the data there certainly and it looks like a strong recovery
in comparison.
KONG: Yes, that's absolutely true, and I was just talking to our partner in China just a week ago and he said the contrast is this. When there's an
outbreak in China, and he said, they basically lock down the city, and they do testing on everybody in the city. So within a matter of two or three
days, they're able to test everybody in the city. And then they isolate the problem.
The people that are infected go to the hospital and the rest go on with their lives as usual. And then after three days, the city reopens. So that
massive amount of testing capability to do that is what we need to isolate the problem. Now, they are locking down the whole state.
CHATTERLEY: And the critics would say there's no way Americans or Western nations would stand for the kind of controls that China imposes. But I
think your message here is, we still need far more testing and we need a strategy with regards testing and we're still going to need that for many
months to come.
KONG: That's right. All I'm saying is we're not -- I mean, we are certainly not an authoritarian government like China, but we can increase the
capabilities for testing and contact tracing.
CHATTERLEY: Yes, we can certainly learn their lessons.
KONG: And try to isolate the problem.
CHATTERLEY: I hear you. David, fantastic to have you on the show. I'm sorry for the challenges and we'll keep our fingers crossed that more support is
forthcoming sooner rather than later.
David Kong, CEO for Best Western. Great to chat with you, sir. Thank you.
[09:50:10]
CHATTERLEY: All right. Still to come on FIRST MOVE, a look at Sunday's space launch and why it's one -- another one for the history books. Stay
with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
CHATTERLEY: Welcome back to your FIRST MOVE. All week long, we are going to be looking at firms that have been around for a hundred years or more.
Today, it's Suntory, the Japanese multinational brewing and distilling company that got its start in 1899. Cyril Vanier, now on how Suntory is
growing its business while partnering with the environment.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BILL MURRAY, ACTOR: For relaxing times. Make it Suntory Time.
CYRIL VANIER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice over): Hollywood movie "Lost in Translation" put Suntory whiskey in the spotlight on a global stage for
many. Its story began over a century earlier when Japanese merchant, Shinjiro Torii started to develop western style liquors for Japanese
markets.
NOBU TORII, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT, SUNTORY HOLDINGS: In 1899, my great grandfather founded the company in Osaka.
VANIER: In 1923, Shinjiro Torri built Japan's first whiskey distillery in Yamazaki. A few years later, Suntory's Kakubin whiskey was born.
With success came a desire to protect the natural resources essential to creating Suntory's products.
TORII: We have to preserve the environment, nature and because of the good waters we have in Hakushu and Yamazaki, we benefit from those waters to
produce our good brands.
VANIER: High up in Japan's Southern Alps, Suntory's Hakushu Distillery was built in 1973 to source the region's pure spring water. Its mountain
streams form part of a network of 21 water sanctuaries, the company has established with local authorities across Japan.
MURRAY: For relaxing times. Make it Suntory time.
VANIER: But these aren't exactly relaxing times. The COVID-19 pandemic has provided new challenges. Suntory closed its distilleries to the public
while still working to maintain production levels.
It plans to develop its ecommerce and home delivery services to continue to reach their now global customer base expanded by Suntory's acquisition of
U.S. spirits company, Beam in 2014.
TORII: My dream is that I can drink Japanese whiskey all over the world and believe me, it's very, very possible.
VANIER: And continuing its legacy for future Torii generations.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
[09:55:06]
CHATTERLEY: My favorite news of the day aside from vaccines, a SpaceX craft carrying four astronauts from the U.S. and Japan successfully launched into
space on Sunday after Hurricane Eta delayed Saturday's planned launch. Watch this.
[VIDEO CLIP PLAYS]
CHATTERLEY: Big deal for NASA and for the company, the first fully operational crewed mission using a NASA certified commercial spacecraft.
The Crew Dragon capsule is expected to dock with the International Space Station this evening.
Wow. What images.
Now astronauts not the only one gaining altitude. Take a look at this. We've got green arrows across the board for U.S. stocks as markets applaud
promising new vaccine data from Moderna.
The S&P 500 and the small cap Russell 2000 are sitting at fresh records at this moment. The tech sector picking up a bit of momentum here. We're up
two tenths of one percent. The Dow, I'll have to say, going to need a bit more oomph to hit that much delayed 30,000 milestone. But hey, it's still
early in the session. We shall see.
That's it for the show for now. I'm Julia Chatterley. Stay safe. I'll see you tomorrow.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
[10:00:00]
END
