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New Day
U.K. Ends Self-Isolation Rules and Free Coronavirus Testing; Global Health Giant Dr. Paul Farmer Dies at 62; Closing Arguments in Trial of Three Officers for George Floyd's Death; Russia at the Edge of War. Aired 8:30-9a ET
Aired February 22, 2022 - 08:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[08:30:00]
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JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Boris Johnson is ending COVID restrictions in the United Kingdom.
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BORIS JOHNSON, U.K. PRIME MINISTER: We will remove all remaining domestic restrictions in law. From this Thursday, 24th of February, we will end the legal requirement to self-isolate following a positive test.
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BERMAN: The prime minister declared that England is now the -- the United Kingdom is now one step closer to a return to normality. Joining us now, CNN chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
Does the science, the medicine line up with the politics here, Sanjay?
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CHIEF MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, I mean, you know, we have seen this before. The numbers are heading in the right direction. It is a question of sort of when do you sort of take your foot off the accelerator in terms of mitigation strategies.
If you do it too early, we have seen what might happen in the past, where you start to plateau and the numbers start to go up. I think the truest measure, you know, as we have been talking about this for a couple of years, is hospitalizations. So if you look at hospitalizations in the U.K., they are trending in the right direction. You see that on the right side of the screen, they're going down.
But you know, they're still pretty high. If you do the measures, in particular the testing, not making testing more voluntary, not requiring self-isolation, you run into the risk of plateauing and, potentially, you know, making it really challenging for people who have not been able to get vaccinated in particular.
If you compare vaccinated versus unvaccinated, this story has remained true. The unvaccinated far more likely to end up in the hospital -- and people may be unvaccinated because they have been unable to get vaccinated because of their age or because they're immune compromised and don't have as effective a vaccination.
So it is a concern. It is a decision matrix countries all over the world will be entering over the next several weeks.
BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN HOST: One of the big concerns we had with kids and COVID has been this multi-inflammatory syndrome or MIS-C.
What has that been displaying during Omicron?
GUPTA: Well, I think, like we have talked about with severe illness and Omicron, there has been what we call a decoupling; so not as high a percentage likelihood of people getting sick with this virus as with previous strains. And that's true with children as well.
So if you look, we can show sort of the trend lines between cases in kids and the MIS-C in kids. And, first of all, it is worth pointing out that over 4 million children have been diagnosed with COVID in this country.
The blue line is MIS-C, a smaller scale and cases is the sort of check line. There has been a significant spike in COVID cases over the last month in kids. And MIS-C, blue again, is still low.
But that typically tends to lag behind by a few weeks. So I think unquestionably we're going to see more children with this multi- inflammatory syndrome over the next several weeks. But again, percentage-wise, I think it will be lower than what we have seen in the past.
BERMAN: Sanjay, I want to ask you about something that I know is deeply personal. Dr. Paul Farmer, a physician, anthropologist, humanitarian and angel who gained global acclaim for his work delivering health care to some of the world's poorest people, he passed away. I just want to show people a video to remind them of who he is.
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DR. PAUL FARMER, PHYSICIAN, ANTHROPOLOGIST AND HUMANITARIAN: It's proof that it was the right thing to do. Please observe a rainbow that just appeared over your left shoulder --
(LAUGHTER)
FARMER: -- clearly a sign from God.
GUPTA: Somebody is listening.
FARMER: I'm always saying that to you.
GUPTA: From Harvard to Haiti to heaven.
FARMER: I'm probably not headed to the third destination. GUPTA: I think you've done enough good in your life.
FARMER: Well, I'll keep trying.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
[08:35:00]
BERMAN: Oh, man.
Sanjay, just tell us what he meant to you.
GUPTA: Yes, it is tough to hear that, right?
You have these conversations with people and you don't think that you'll actually be reflecting on it this way.
He really was a saint on Earth. We've had dark times over the past several years. He's the guy that I always thought of as a big burst of light. Very simply put, he was a guy who believed health care was a right, anywhere in the world.
And there were people who thought, look, you could not offer up health care and create health care systems in some of these really impoverished nations like Haiti, where that clip was.
And yet, long before the earthquake, he had created this organization, Partners in Health, and was doing exactly that, bringing world-class health care to the most impoverished places on Earth.
There is a great quote, he said he used to go to bed worried that he wouldn't be able to deliver on the promises that he's made and he would wake up in the morning worried that he hadn't made enough promises.
I mean, that was the kind of guy he was, which is still hard to talk about him in the past tense. But you know, I traveled the world with Paul and I think I speak on behalf of a lot of people, everybody in the public health community, we're going to miss him tremendously.
BERMAN: He was a decency warrior. I mean, he was a warrior for goodness.
GUPTA: Yes, right.
KEILAR: Yes. Well, look --
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GUPTA: No question. He brought it out in everyone around him as well.
KEILAR: -- and so young. And may he inspire others to follow in his footsteps and complete his mission and make those promises as you described, Sanjay. We certainly hope that is what they do.
GUPTA: Yes, me, too, now more than ever. KEILAR: Yes. Sanjay, thank you so much.
United States women's national team finally settling a long-standing lawsuit over equal pay. We have the details of the landmark agreement.
BERMAN: And Michigan's basketball team will be without its head coach, Juwan Howard, for some time after he struck an opposing coach in the head. We'll talk more about his punishment ahead.
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[08:40:00]
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KEILAR: Time now for 5 things to know for your new day.
Russian president Vladimir Putin ordering his troops into two regions of Eastern Ukraine, just hours after he signed decrees recognizing their independence.
The U.S. is calling this a clear attack on Ukraine's sovereignty and has promised swift sanctions but has stopped short of -- or I should say has called this the beginning of Russia's latest invasion into Ukraine.
BERMAN: It is day two of jury deliberations in the federal hate crimes trial of three white men, already convicted in the murder of Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia.
Closing arguments are set to begin today in the federal civil rights trial of three former Minneapolis officers involved in George Floyd's death.
KEILAR: And the House Select Committee investigating January 6th now asking for a former assistant press secretary from the Trump White House to voluntarily cooperate. A source tells CNN that Jalen Drummond attended a meeting with the former president on January 5th as well as the rally the day of the deadly Capitol insurrection.
BERMAN: Michigan head basketball coach Juwan Howard paying the price for his post game altercation with a Wisconsin coach on Sunday. He's been suspended for the rest of the regular season and fined $40,000.
KEILAR: And U.S. Soccer and U.S. Women's national soccer team settling their long-standing equal pay dispute. The agreement includes a lump sum of $22 million to the players plus an additional $2 million into an account to benefit their post-career goals and charitable efforts.
Those are 5 things to know for your new day. More on CNN and cnn.com and don't forget to download the 5 things podcast every morning, go to cnn.com/5things and find it wherever you get your podcasts. Vladimir Putin ordering troops into Eastern Ukraine, sparking promises
of more sanctions from the U.S. Why our next guest says unleashing full sanctions too early could play right into Putin's hands.
BERMAN: And we needed this story today. Super Bowl champ Van Jefferson announcing the name of his son, who was born shortly after the Rams won the Super Bowl. The name is more than appropriate.
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[08:45:00]
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BERMAN: Vladimir Putin orders troops into Ukraine. Germany announces the cancellation of a major pipeline. The United States, just moments ago, an official telling Brianna, significant sanctions about to be announced.
Joining us now, CNN political and national security analyst David Sanger, White House and national security correspondent for "The New York Times."
David, if we can, I want to look big picture here, take a step back to figure out where we are this morning, because it keeps changing by the minute here. I suppose start with Nord Stream 2, start with the fact that there are now very real ramifications for the moves that Vladimir Putin is making.
How big of a deal is this?
DAVID SANGER, CNN POLITICAL AND NATIONAL SECURITY ANALYST: Well, they're the beginnings of ramifications, just as you heard earlier from your guest, that in spite of -- that there were -- this was the beginning of an invasion.
The -- what the Germans have done -- and I'm in Munich today -- is basically suspend the licensing of Nord Stream 2, the gas pipeline that went around Ukraine. That is a long-term cost to the Germans.
But remember, it is not operating yet. So it would not necessarily cut their gas supply, unless Vladimir Putin cuts their gas supply. And currently that supply runs through Ukraine, much of it.
I think what has happened here big picture, John, is that we're in the land of what the president called minor incursions, right, that Putin is testing the system, just as the president told us at that press conference in January he would.
And they are beginning to roll out sanctions. But they don't want to do all of them for obvious reasons, because they want to deter Putin, if they can, from moving in on the whole country.
KEILAR: And do you think that will work, the staggering of sanctions? SANGER: It is a great question, Brianna. It is a real roll of the dice. This is the really hard question that Biden and his advisers are going to have to go consider. And they have been considering overnight. And they had mapped this possibility out before.
Here's the problem: if you did everything now and -- then Vladimir Putin may conclude, well, look, I'm paying a price for taking the whole country, even though I've only taken Donbas. So I might as well keep going and do the whole thing, with all of the horrors that that would bring about.
[08:50:00]
SANGER: So there is good logic to not doing everything. But of course, it can look a little weak if you are, you know, not immediately doing the full sanctions. And there have been some Democrats, who we saw overnight, call for him to do exactly that, to basically consider this the final straw.
BERMAN: I will say every Democrat we spoke to gives you the sense they would like to see more and would have liked to have seen more already. I think they're waiting for the next few hours for the announcement to see if the White House measures up to some of the promises I think they feel they will make.
The risk here is that Putin leaves, saying, I got Donbas for virtually nothing. I marched over and I got this at almost no cost.
SANGER: That's exactly right, John. This is a really hard choice for the president. He's got a couple of factors in it.
The first is, if, in fact, Putin does not pay a significant price, then he's repeated what happened when he annexed Crimea in 2014.
Second, the president can only go as far and as fast as his allies do. If the United States announces major sanctions and the allies are not willing to go along with those sanctions, then it is going to be relatively easy for Putin to evade them.
And the third problem is, let's say they do everything now and then he does go in with the much bigger force and he does, you know, end up killing thousands of people as he tries to surround or take Kyiv, the worst case scenario that we have discussed before.
What does the president do then, if he has basically unleashed all of the economic sanctions he has?
He's left with not much, except helping arm an insurgency.
KEILAR: But, what if the staggered of severity sanctions happen and Putin still goes in?
Then what?
Then he faces criticism on the flip side, Biden does. SANGER: That's exactly right, Brianna, because the fundamental
calculation here is, how much does Putin believe that these sanctions are really going to hurt him?
And if you think about that same press conference back in January, the president said he doesn't think that this is going to be as severe as it will be. And so, you know, the president said outright, he's going to test the system.
And you're seeing that test. But remember, once the president was criticized for the minor incursions line, he came back and said, that means there can't be any Russian troops over the border.
And if we determine over the next day or so -- or the next few hours -- that there are in fact Russian troops over the border, the president is going to have to explain what he meant by that.
BERMAN: David, I really do think the next few hours, maybe day, is crucial here, because it seems to me Vladimir Putin has gone about as far as he can go without a lot of people potentially dying, that the next move, whether it be into the Ukrainian controlled part of Donbas, whether it be over the borders and maybe heading to Crimea, that involves serious military action with the risk of huge violence.
SANGER: That's right. And that's why the president may well decide to do this in phases. And I think you were hearing before sort of the hints of that.
This was -- what happened in the past day is terrible. But we have not seen any significant casualties. In fact, we have seen almost none that we know about publicly now.
That's a very different thing from watching missiles and other attacks and air attacks throughout the country that would certainly kill thousands of people. And I am sure the president is thinking right now -- and certainly President Zelensky is thinking -- that's what we got to avoid.
KEILAR: So what we're going to hear today, these significant sanctions, which I'm -- there are so many semantics coming from the White House. But it seems as if they're part of the swift and severe sanctions.
I know these are a lot of words. They do actually mean something, because this is the response that has been outlined by the administration.
Does that mean that what we see today, is it something that will be rolled out in phases over days, over weeks?
I mean, what is your expectation here?
SANGER: I suspect it will be rolled out, according to the pace at which Vladimir Putin moves. I mean, Putin gets a vote here. And so, if Putin keeps the status quo where it is right now, I think the president probably would, you know, announce sanctions today and declare that they're very severe. And I'm sure some of them will be. But it won't be the most severe. And then he's got to reserve something if Putin acts again.
[08:55:00]
SANGER: Remember, the purpose of the sanctions is not just punishment -- although that's an element to it -- but it is really deterrence. It is trying to keep him from doing, as John said, the most violent thing that is going to result in the greatest of casualties.
And, you know, the area that he's in now, the White House was already saying last night, is an area that he has essentially had significant influence in. He's just moving from a covert force in the Donbas to an overt one, the so-called peacekeeping force, if you believe that line.
BERMAN: David Sanger, thank you so much for being with us this morning.
SANGER: Thank you.
BERMAN: Our breaking news coverage, Vladimir Putin ordering troops into Eastern Ukraine, continues right after this.
