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New Day

Chaos in Afghanistan; Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo is Interviewed about Alabama's COVID Cases; Anderson Cooper is Interviewed about Haiti; Travis Mills is Interviewed about Afghanistan. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired August 18, 2021 - 08:30   ET

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

[08:30:00]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Or they -- I mean they have -- they can rightfully live in America. It's really stunning to see.

You mentioned, David, that, you know, one of the things the Biden administration did back in the spring was basically say, yes, it's -- you get a lot of bureaucratic red tape and that's not really our wheelhouse. But now, with this crisis, we see them circumventing the things. We see them now doing the things that they said even weeks ago, even months ago we couldn't do. Turns out they can do it. They are doing it. Maybe too late.

Why didn't they do that sooner? Is it -- was it an issue of will? Was it missing the threat? What was it?

DAVID SANGER, NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT, "THE NEW YORK TIMES": It's a really good question, and there are probably going to be a lot of congressional investigations and other investigations into that.

I think it was a combination of three things. First of all, from an immigration viewpoint, they were already taking a lot of heat for what was going on down on the southern border. And while these are very different cases, and I think you can argue that people who have, you know, given their lives and gone at great risk for the United States are in a totally different category. In fact, legally, they're in a different category. I think there was a -- in the background, there was a little bit of concern about that.

The second was, you had an Afghan government that made clear that they did not want to see the United States, at least in a very public way, take a lot of people out of Kabul and the rest of Afghanistan because it would seem as if it was an absence of confidence in the staying power of the government. An absence -- it should have been an absence of confidence as it turned out.

In fact, when President Ghani came to the White House in June for his last meeting with President Biden, he said to him outright, can you be in a -- do this, if whatever you're going to do, do it in a quiet way and don't do much of it at one time.

Now, the White House maintains that they moved as fast as they could still, and got 2,000 people out. But we now know the universe is 20,000, 25,000, and then there are an unknown number of American citizens and green card holders like what you saw.

And then I think there was the third factor, which was, they simply had all the timeframe wrong. Now, whether that's their mistake or whether that's the mistake of the Afghan government that didn't put up any kind of fight, I mean, we thought when the -- when the crunch came in Kabul, that's when all of the Afghan special forces would be out there. We didn't see them. And one of the big questions is, why was there really no plan for the defense of Kabul?

KEILAR: Yes. Well, this is not quiet, for sure, what we are seeing. That did not happen.

SANGER: This was never going to be -- you know, it was always going to be messy, but this is really messy.

KEILAR: Yes. Yes. It's ridiculous.

David, thank you so much. David Sanger.

Coming up, we'll be talking to a U.S. combat veteran who lost his limbs on the battlefield in Afghanistan. So what does he say about the takeover by the Taliban?

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Next, COVID cases pushing hospitals past the brink, with, in some cases, negative room in intensive care units. See which states are getting hardest hit, next.

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[08:37:09]

KEILAR: ICU units in five states are more than 90 percent full as unvaccinated COVID patients are pushing hospitals to the brink. It's a dire situation in Alabama. There are no ICU beds available in the state and the demand for ICU care is rising. According to the president of the Alabama Hospital Association, the state is at negative 11 ICU beds.

Joining us now is Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo. She is the director for the division of special diseases at the University of Alabama Birmingham.

Doctor, thanks for being with us this morning.

Can you explain, what is a negative 11 beds? Does that mean they're converting other spaces into ICU units? What is that?

DR. JEANNE MARRAZZO, DIRECTOR, DIVISION OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES, UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA AT BIRMINGHAM: Yes, good morning, Brianna.

Unfortunately, it means several very bad things.

So, first of all, it means that you have patients who qualify for entry or admission into the ICU, but simply can't be accommodated. So where do those patients go? Unfortunately, they stay in the emergency room. They may even stay on the regular floor where you're already stretched for capacity to take care of these people because so many of our staff are out with COVID. And it's really just a domino effect that then clogs up our ERs, clogs up everything else.

So you can imagine, when you're trying to take care of ICU level patients in an emergency department, how are you going to be able to accommodate people coming in, again, not just for COVID, but for all the usual things that people use the ED for? So it's a very, very tenuous situation.

KEILAR: Yes, the ED and other procedures, we've heard of people who need cancer surgery who can't get in, in states that are having this kind of issue. And I wonder, you know, what do you see coming your way in Alabama because Alabama has reported more than 4,000 new cases just yesterday alone.

MARRAZZO: More than 4,000 new cases, which is a new high for us. The other issue is that we have now 2,800 people, as you noted, hospitalized with the ICU capacity issue.

If you project these numbers out, you can expect that we will, at some point, probably around September 1st, have at least 5,000 people in our hospitals. If the ratio of people who have to go to the ICU remains stable -- and I will say it seems to be higher for the delta variant. I think it's going to be interesting to see if this is the case. That means that probably about a third of those people are going to require ICU beds. That is, frankly, untenable given the infrastructure, the resources and really importantly the staff that we have.

So I think it is basically potentially apocalyptic.

[08:40:01]

I do not use that word lightly. We're thinking about creating new spaces to accommodate this surge. But it really is like not exactly like we were talking about in the early days of the pandemic, only worse.

KEILAR: Look, you are here sounding an alarm, worse than the early days of the pandemic in Alabama.

Dr. Marrazzo, I really thank you coming on this morning and talking to us about this.

MARRAZZO: Thank you for having me.

BERMAN: This morning, the death toll from the earthquake in Haiti is growing to nearly 2,000 people. Around 1.2 million have been affected by the quake according to UNICEF. This video shows the state of desperation on the ground. Food supplies so thin people are digging up debris with their bare hands to get -- get to what had been a grocery store.

Joining us now is CNN's Anderson Cooper, who spent so much time reporting in Haiti over the years, including after the 2010 earthquake.

Anderson, it's great to have you on for this.

You know, I've thought about what your impressions of this are, having spent so much time there and just thinking about how much suffering can one country take between the earthquake and the storms and the assassinations and now this?

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR, "AC 360": Yes. Yes, it's really -- it's extraordinary to think about kind of the successive waves of agony that have hit Haiti. The storm, obviously, has just added to the misery of people who have been sleeping out in the street since the earthquake. You've got, you know, some 10,000 people, nearly 10,000 people said to be injured, 60,000 buildings destroyed in the southwestern parts of Haiti and Jeremy (ph) and Lakay (ph).

The thing about it is just the difficulty of -- of getting there. You know, when the -- when the earthquake hit in Port-au-Prince, which, you know, killed the exact number will never be known, but anywhere from 200,000 to 300,000 people, it was at least the capital. There was an airport there. You could directly fly into as soon as the airport was open.

This is in a region that is very difficult, if not impossible right now, to get to by road. The main road from Port-au-Prince to the south, has been cut off by armed gangs for quite some time now. There's also debris in the roads making parts of it impassable, particularly for large trucks. So this is a really difficult task and the -- you know, it's tropical storm pouring, you know, like 10 inches of rain or so on the area certainly hasn't helped.

KEILAR: And with attention, Anderson, focused on Haiti right now, I want -- I want to ask you, because so many people look back, not even a decade ago, they see what happened. And is this just what is going to happen in Haiti every time there is an earthquake? What can the international community do to not have this just be on repeat?

COOPER: Yes, I mean, it's a good question. Look, you know, building -- there's a lot of structures in Haiti which have just been, you know, put up by individuals. There's not zoning codes as there should be in a lot of places. You know, there are -- there are so many layers of things that have failed in Haiti over the years and were really never there to begin with. And certainly a lack of leadership, you know, their parliament has been dissolved after years of paralysis. The president, as you know, was assassinated. There's a new prime minister now.

You know, it's -- it does, it seems overwhelming, the obstacles, and there are a lot of people, a lot of organizations on the ground trying to do what they can and making a difference in people's lives. I mean, obviously, it would be far worse if the -- all the, you know, the commitments that had been made, the people who hadn't been working there for years weren't there. But it's certainly -- it's, you know, it's easy to just look at Haiti and say, you know, what -- why does this keep happening? And, certainly, there's a lot of, you know, a lot of people who have played a role in it and a lot of systems that play a role in it. And it's tragic.

Nevertheless, you have hundreds of thousands of people in need right now, and it's a -- it's a desperate situation.

BERMAN: What has stuck with you the most, Anderson, about the Haitian people after these years?

COOPER: You know, everyone talks about the resilience and certainly I mean, that is -- that is an absolutely true statement. You know, it's -- it's almost -- I don't know, it's hard to even talk about that at this point. I mean how much resilience can anybody expected to be -- expect -- be expected to have. We're talking about a level of poverty in this hemisphere, the poorest country in the western hemisphere. You know, it's got an incredibly proud history. They overthrew the French and, you know, gained liberation, and yet it has been beset in modern times by just repeated tragedies and mismanagement and corruption and dictatorship.

[08:45:07]

You know, you -- it is -- it's an incredibly -- the people are incredibly strong there. But, of course, it's -- it's not fair to ask people to, you know, be this strong all the time.

BERMAN: Yes. No, resilience is great. No one should have to be this resilient.

Anderson, thanks so much for joining us this morning and having this discussion.

COOPER: Thank you.

BERMAN: More now on our breaking news out of Afghanistan.

CNN's Clarissa Ward on the streets of Kabul as the Taliban opened fire to disperse crowds at the airport. Clarissa has been speaking with Afghans trying to get out. People brave enough to say on live television broadcast around the world that they worked with the Americans.

Stay with us.

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BERMAN: So as the world witnesses the breakdown of the two decade U.S. effort in Afghanistan, thousands of desperate Afghans remain stranded and the U.S. and its allies still desperately trying to evacuate personnel from the city's airport. People can't even get to the airport.

[08:50:02]

Joining me now is retired U.S. Army Staff Sergeant Travis Mills. In 2012 Mills was on his third tour of duty in Afghanistan when he was critically injured by an improvised explosive devise while on patrol, causing him to lose portions of both legs and arms. Travis, it's great to see you this morning.

One of the reasons we like speaking to you is you are relentlessly optimistic. That's hard this morning as you look at what's happening in Afghanistan.

TRAVIS MILLS, QUADRUPLE AMPUTEE VET WHO SERVED IN AFGHANISTAN: Yes. Well, I mean -- you know, it is. It's terrible what's going on there. Unfortunately, we all knew this day had to come. And, you know, my main goal and concern is with the people of Afghanistan that helped us and getting them out. And, obviously, it was the right decision to leave Afghanistan. I still think we should have held onto Kandahar and Bagram Air Bases. It would have made a lot more sense to fly people out that need to get out. But I wasn't part of the planning. I'm just a lowly enlisted guy.

But, in truth, you know, it's important that the veterans that did serve and the families that lost loved ones over there understand, like, we did good. We did make a change. And an impactful one at that. And we were able to build the schools, dig the freshwater wells and give education to little girls and women.

And I think, hopefully, you know, that continues on. I know it's probably not going to, but you can't unteach people things. So we did make an impact. And I -- I just -- my heart goes out for the people right now that are trapped there, but, at the same time, unfortunately, we had to let them stand on their own and see what happens. And I -- and it just didn't go the way that we would -- we would have hoped.

BERMAN: So, Travis, you seem to be trying to answer the question that -- that I know a lot of veterans are asking. And some feeling, you know, mixed emotions, which is, you know, was it worth it? Was it worth it? Is that what you're trying to answer?

MILLS: You know, for me, like I said before when I was on with you guys and grateful for the opportunity, I don't look at the past and this why this happened anymore. I don't wonder if it was worth it. I just know, this is my life. This is the way it is and let's keep pushing forward and doing good in the world.

And for me, I want to make sure people real, like, yes, it was definitely worth it. And, unfortunately, if I'm being completely honest with you, after your first deployment when you go overseas, you realize not much is going to change in that country. It's been that way forever. And unfortunately for the mission that we had, we always were going to leave. And the Afghan, you know, population, they had a really tough situation to live in. They were between a rock and a hard place because they had to deal with the Taliban that lived there all the time and then they had to deal with the Americans that were coming over for a year, 15 months, and then leave and replaced with somebody else. Always in the back of their mind realizing one day they are going to leave and we will be left here in this country that we live in with the Taliban.

So what are they to do? I mean we had a lot of corrupt village elders that we knew were corrupt and the people were just trying to survive and live their life to the fullest and do what they needed to do to get their crops, feed their families and take care of their livestock and animals.

So, you know, for me, it was definitely worth the good that I was able to be a part of and I was able to do with my unit and my soldiers that served next to me. But I want people at home that are wondering, you know, what was it all for to know like, we did do a lot of positive things. And the way it's unfolding now just is terrible. But, you know, it's just a -- it was a planning issue. We did have to leave eventually.

BERMAN: So, obviously, there's a now issue, right? How do people get to the airport? How do they get out? And then there's the question of what Americans, not just -- not just the Biden administration right now, the military should be doing on the ground, but what Americans as a nation should be willing to do going forward. You know, you hear people critical of what the Biden administration has done and the choices they made and how they've handle it. People say, oh, look at the mess you've created, all these refugees. You know, how could you let all these people down. But some of the very same people say, we don't want them here. We don't want them here.

You know, what's your message to Americans about trying to accept to bring in some of these people, these Afghan allies that you served with?

MILLS: Well, I mean, you know, we've had some really amazing Afghan national army fighters that I would put next to my men any day of the week that fought hard. We had one gentleman we called Rambo. He wanted to be called Rambo. And he was the person that would fight just as crazy as I was, I guess. And, you know, they fought for their country and they did everything we trained them to do.

Also, the interpreters that risked life and limb as well as their family's own safety to help us. I mean they're really good people. I have a few that are of my FaceBook friends that I still communicate with that were with us that got to come over here on work visas and work their way into being American citizens.

So, you know, I think we've got to put that aside and figure out, you know, who did help us, who is really in jeopardy and danger and bring them here and give them, you know, something for all they've done for us. I mean it -- you can't go to a foreign country and not speak the language and try to get around there and talk with village elders and try to do good without people there believing in us and helping us along, you know, along the way.

BERMAN: Travis Mills, as I said, somehow talking to you even about tough times and when things don't look so hot, it puts a smile on our face. So I appreciate you joining us this morning, I really do.

[08:55:03]

MILLS: Thanks so much. I -- thanks for your time and hope this blue brings my eyes out. I was trying to really, you know, spiff it up today for you.

BERMAN: They're fetching. They're fetching. Travis, thank you.

MILLS: Thank you. Take care.

KEILAR: Yes, he'll always put a smile on your face, even in tough times. But, you know, it's true, the American troops did what they were asked. I think a lot of them -- I know a lot of them are struggling right now. And how quickly, actually, I think Afghanistan fell was kind of a testament to the work that they were doing, right?

But they're having a difficult time with this. It is a hard war to make sense of. It's a hard war to look at the costs and the benefits of.

BERMAN: You know, Travis is a guy who has, I think, dealt with or confronted this notion of futility for some time. So I think that his words on this speak volumes. And hopefully ring true to other veterans who might be asking questions right now and need some support. And he's providing it.

KEILAR: Yes, I hope so, too.

BERMAN: All right, we've been watching it all morning long, shots fired, reports of Taliban fighters turning violence on protestors in Afghanistan. Our reporters have seen it. Our live coverage from the scene after this.

KEILAR: And a programming note to join CNN this weekend for "We Love New York City: The Homecoming Concert." That is Saturday starting at 5:00 p.m. Eastern exclusively on CNN.

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