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CDC Data: 11.7 Percent Of U.S. Has Received 1st Vaccine Dose; Pelosi: "9/11-Type Commission" Will Investigate Capitol Attack; WH Pushing COVID Stimulus Ahead Of Biden Town Hall In Wisconsin. Aired 12:30-1p ET

Aired February 16, 2021 - 12:30   ET

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

[12:30:00]

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JOHN KING, CNN HOST: We asked for and received some great questions about COVID from you today. We'll get to those in just a second. First, let's take a quick look at the numbers to set the stage. Where we are right now does look better, remember from a horrific starting point, but things are improving.

You see right now 42 states in green means heading in the right direction, fewer COVID infections now than a week ago, 42 states trending down, seven holding steady, only Nebraska reporting more new infections now than a week ago. If you look at it this way, the case trend line, follow the red line, 53,000 plus, 53,883 new infections yesterday. It's a high number when you compare it to the beginning or even the summer peak, but if you've been through the horror of the winter, starting this trend line starting to go down now finally, 53,000 starting to trend down.

One reason is masking and social distancing. Another reason is there are vaccines now getting into arms, 70 million distributed to the States, just shy of 53 million actually shots put in arm. So, some progress being made here as the Biden administration takes over the vaccine rollout, if you look at the seven day average of vaccines, again, back on January 20th, just before this graphic began, it's just shy of 900,000 a day. Now it's up to above 1.6 million vaccinations every day on a daily basis, the new administration trying to push that number up even higher.

And if you look at it this way, 12 percent of Americans have received their first dose. Remember the vaccines on the market now both require two doses, 12 percent just shy of that have their first dose, but only 4.3 percent, so shy of 5 percent of Americans have been fully vaccinated. That's why the challenge is there for the new President as he has his town hall tonight.

Here's another way to look at it here. This is the percentage of the population with its first dose administered. Alaska setting the pace at 17 percent, West Virginia 14 percent, you see some twelves, some elevens, some tens. This is first dose, most states now, every state, yes, just Rhode Island at 9 percent, all the other states in double digits in terms of a first dose.

Now you're looking what about vaccinated fully? That's when the numbers drop. People waiting for their second dose, again, Alaska just shy of 8 percent, West Virginia just shy of 8 percent. Most states in the 3 to 5 percent range of people who have their first dose now waiting for their second dose, you want to get back to work, you want to get kids back to school, you want people to feel more safe moving about, restaurants open. These percentages have to jump up.

Dr. Anthony Fauci says we know it's coming. Be patient.

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[12:35:01]

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, CHIEF MEDICAL ADVISER TO PRESIDENT BIDEN: When you hear about how long it's going to take to get the overwhelming proportion of the population vaccinated, I don't think anybody disagrees that that's going to be well to the end of the summer and we get in the early fall. When are we going to be able to start on that process? It's probably going to be in the springtime, because the whole process is going to take a few months to actually get implemented. We have a good plan, how to get those doses into people's arms. We just need more vaccine.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: With us to share our expertise and our insights, our CNN medical analyst, Dr. Leana Wen. She's also an emergency room physician at George Washington hospital, a former Baltimore City Health Commissioner. Dr. Wen I have some great questions from our viewers from Twitter. But let's first just start with what we heard from Dr. Fauci. It is hard to have a tight -- have an aircraft carrier do a tight U turn. So we have to give the new administration some grace as they inherit this challenge. But do you see proof that they get it, that they are wrapping this up in a way where the numbers from day to day are getting better at the pace that you find satisfactory?

DR. LEANA WEN, CNN MEDICAL ANALYST: Well, I definitely think that we're ramping up. And I like what I hear from the Biden ministration that they are clearly listening to the issues that states and locales are raising the need for more resources, the need for predictability of supply, and they're trying to address each of these bottlenecks. I still think that they need to be aiming a lot higher. We need to be getting to the place of having 3 million vaccinations a day. That's what will allow us to get to some level of some chance of having herd immunity in 2021.

KING: So let's get to these questions. And they're really great questions. This one's from Juan Abbas. Do you think it's possible for kids to be back to school late autumn in realistic terms, fully vaccinated and without masks?

WEN: Well, I think the first part is definitely, we definitely need to get kids back in school, fully back in school by the autumn. And I think there's a good chance of us doing that if we get a lot of adults. The majority of adults ideally vaccinated at that point. But children are probably not going to be vaccinated, children above the age of 12, I hope we'll be able to get the vaccine starting in late summer, depending on the results of the clinical trials. Younger children may not be able to be vaccinated until late 2021.

And so I do think that schools when they come back in the fall are still going to require masks. But we need to put in these mitigation measures. That's what will allow us our kids to get back in school and learn again.

KING: That's a great question. Thank you for the answer there. There's another great question from Lisa Reily. What transmission rates for communities do you consider safe for reopening schools?

WEN: So there isn't one number. And here's the reason, there are two factors that determine school safety. One is the level of community transmission. And the other is the level of mitigation measures that you have in place. So if you have a low level of transmission, you need some mitigation measures, but not everything. Versus if you have a very high level of transmission masking, distancing ventilation alone is not enough. Maybe you also need to reduce class sizes. Maybe you also critically need to make sure that teachers are vaccinated. So it really depends on the level of transmission, then you also will add on additional mitigation measures depending on what that transmission rate in the community is.

KING: Here's another great question. I need to note, I met John King CNN on Twitter because this next gentleman took my preferred handle their meatloaf on social media here. Here we go. How long does protection last? Are we going to need to get an annual vaccine for the foreseeable future? If so, how does that work with the rest of the world being far behind the United States in pace?

WEN: Well, we know that the vaccines that we have developed thus far, they last at least three months. They're probably going to last quite a bit longer than that. But we just can't say definitively because they are relatively new. As to whether we need regular boosters, probably. So we are seeing that there are vaccines that are -- these that their variants developing, that may not be as susceptible with the vaccines that we currently have.

And so it may be that we need to develop boosters that specifically target these variants. And it may be that we need to get an annual shot the way that we get for the flume. But I still think that this is terrific news, because essentially we can turn COVID-19 from the severe disease that it is into something like the flume if we're able to get enough people vaccinated because we know this vaccine provides people such extraordinary protection from severe disease and hospitalization and death.

KING: That's an excellent, excellent point. One last question here, this is from Matt Sassy Dubs. There wasn't much research on elderly patients to study. After a few months of vaccinations, does the data show any issues for that age group?

WEN: It's a great question. And actually we have some preliminary results from Israel. There was a study that involved more than a million individuals who received or half of them received the vaccine, half of them did not. And they actually found that in the real world, that the efficacy of the Pfizer vaccine is duplicated based on what we're seeing in Israel. And critically, the effectiveness of the vaccine for older individuals over 70 appears to be about the same as the effectiveness in younger people which is very highly effective and this is very reassuring data.

[12:40:07]

KING: Dr. Wen, thank you for your time and your patients going through, they were fascinating questions. I really appreciate your important insights and appreciate everybody for sending in the questions as well. We'll keep doing this. It's very helpful and we will learn as we go through it. Thank you Dr. Wen.

Up next for us, the Speaker of the House announces plans for a 9/11 style commission to look into January's Capitol insurrection.

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KING: The House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pushing ahead now with calls for a 9/11 style commission to investigate the Capitol insurrection. There has been talk of such a bipartisan review since the day immediately after the attack. The Speaker now writing her Democratic colleagues wrote that letter yesterday promising to get to work on the legislation needed to create such a panel. It will in her words, quote, examine and report upon the facts, causes, and security relating to the terrorist mob attack. CNN's Jessica Dean is with us for more on what comes next, Jessica?

[12:45:20]

JESSICA DEAN, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, John, I spoke to a source not too long ago, who told me that legislation to form this commission could come as early as this week. So they are looking to move quickly on this to get this commission formed, they're going to need to pass legislation both in the House and also in the Senate. And then it's going to need to be signed by President Biden, which we just heard from the White House briefing room that President Biden would be supportive of forming a 9/11 type commission like this to look into the events of January 6th.

And as you mentioned, it would be examining facts, causes, security, all of these different issues, but very much in depth. We also know that it would be made up of nongovernment figures and people who are not elected officials, who would have, you know, depending on how they shape all of this could potentially have subpoena power to get all of this information put into one place and make recommendations. So it remains to be seen exactly what the language in that legislation will be. But we are certainly waiting to hear more on that.

And, again, I'm being told that could come as soon as this week. Also worth noting, we just learned in the last hour that a Senate Joint Oversight Committee including Government Affairs, Homeland Security and Rules, they're going to be holding their own hearing on the security breach and the deadly insurrection next Tuesday. They're going to be zeroing in on law enforcement. John, we know that they are asking the MPD chief to be there, the former Senate sergeant in arms, the former House sergeant in arms, and of course, the former Capitol police chief also to be there. Again, that's coming up next Tuesday. John?

KING: Very important, every single question about this should be asked in an open and transparent way. Jessica Dean, grateful for the reporting there. We'll stay on top of the story.

And up next for us, on day 28 of the Biden administration, the Press Secretary asked if President Biden now owns the pandemic response, this as he about to take his push for relief bill for the first time on the road.

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[12:51:59]

KING: The White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki announcing just moments ago, the Biden administration now increasing its weekly COVID- 19 vaccine supply to states upping it now to 13.5 million doses sent out to the states on a weekly basis. She was also asked if the Biden administration now owns the coronavirus response.

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JEN PSAKI, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: The President of the United States owns the response to the COVID pandemic. That's why he has focused on it every single day. However, it's important for the American people to know what we inherited when the President came into office. And what he inherited was not enough supply, not enough vaccinators, not enough places for vaccinations to happen, communities have been left to fend for themselves.

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KING: Let's bring in CNN senior White House correspondent Phil Mattingly that was a yeah-but, right there, Phil, on a big day at the White House the President's first big trip.

PHIL MATTINGLY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Yes, there's no question about it. And look, I think the reality is White House officials understand that this is on their plate now. This is theirs, they own it. And that's why you've seen on a weekly basis start to announce the increases in the vaccine production, the increases in supply, the increases in what they believe is the biggest difference from what the past administration did. And that's the effort to federalize the response, right, not make this entirely up to states are entirely up to localities in terms of distribution of the vaccine, in terms of infrastructure for the vaccine, in terms of data for the vaccine.

But to really run it out of a central hub in the hopes that that will help kind of quick in the process particularly on the supply area of thing, but they know this is theirs. And I think that's what you're going to see the President acknowledged tonight, when he speaks at that CNN Town Hall. Not only does he understand kind of the depths of the issues that they're dealing with here, dual crises both on the public health and the economic side. But also the reality that his cornerstone legislative proposal, really kind of the most probably most important element of his first 100 days in office is now all at center stage.

This is now all Congress will be focused on over the course of the next couple of weeks. This is now what the country is going to be focused on. And this is a very, very big proposal with very, very low margin for error in terms of how they move it forward, clearly in the House at least probably in the Senate as well, moving forward with Democrats only narrow margin in the House in terms of passing it, no margin for error in the Senate in terms of passing it.

And so part of what you'll see tonight, part of what you'll see later this week when he travels to Michigan, part of what you'll see really over the course of the next several days and weeks, John, is the President making clear, this is my priority. This is what needs to happen. And if you want real solutions to what the country has been dealing with over the course of the last year, this needs to pass whether the people, the American people take that, whether it has any impact on Congress. Well, that'll be answered in the coming weeks.

KING: We will see, important few days ahead. Phil Mattingly live at the White House, grateful for the reporting there.

[12:54:36]

And coming up for us, an inside look at the Trump impeachment defense strategy, guess what, there was in fighting.

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KING: Topping our Political Radar today, one of Donald Trump's defense lawyers during last week's impeachment trial is describing dysfunction on the defense team. Lead Counsel David Schoen criticizing the meandering speech that his colleague, Bruce Castor gave on that first day of the trial. Schoen telling the "Jewish Insider" quote, I thought this guy's career is going to disappear. I don't know how he's going to get up in the morning, Schoen added. But he didn't -- he still thought he did a good job. OK.

And "The Washington Post" reporting that a Republican donor who backed a conservative groups voter fraud probes, now wants his money back, Fred Eshelman donated $2.5 million to the organization called "True the Vote". He's suing the group now. It launched a series of voter fraud lawsuits that were ultimately abandoned. The organization though claims there were no conditions on giving that money and it insists those donations were properly spent.

Thanks for your time today. I hope to see you back here this time tomorrow. Don't go anywhere, a busy news day. Brianna Keilar picks up our coverage right now. Have a good day.

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