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Quest Means Business

SpaceX To Launch Four Tourists Into Orbit; Biden Discusses Vaccine Mandate With Business Leaders; Top Gymnasts Testify On FBI To Investigate Nassar Abuse; British Prime Minister Boris Johnson Shuffles Cabinet; Interview With Imran Khan, Pakistani Prime Minister, On Its Future With Neighbor Afghanistan; "The Wall Street Journal:" Facebook Knows Instagram Is Harmful To Teens. Aired 3-4p ET

Aired September 15, 2021 - 15:00   ET

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

[15:00:11]

MAX FOSTER, CNN INTERNATIONAL HOST: The Dow trying to call back its losses from Tuesday, it's been up for the entire afternoon. Those are the markets

and these are the main events.

It is a countdown to take off in Cape Canaveral as SpaceX prepares to send four civilians into space. I'll talk to the former astronaut Chris

Hadfield.

Joe Biden hosts the chief executives of Disney, Walgreens, and more to talk vaccine mandates.

And here in London, Boris Johnson changes his Foreign Minister in a major Cabinet reshuffle.

It is Wednesday, the 15th of September. I'm Max Foster and this is QUEST MEANS BUSINESS.

Hello to you tonight. The next frontier in the billionaire space race is almost upon us. A few hours from now, four tourists are scheduled to be

strapped into one of Elon Musk's SpaceX rockets. They're set to be blasted into orbit, more than 28,000 kilometers per hour for a three-day trip

circling the Earth without any professional astronauts on board.

In doing so, SpaceX will begin a new era in space tourism, and volt ahead of rivals Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic.

Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson have traveled into space ahead of Musk, but those were comparative joy rides in comparison. Their flights back in July

lasted only a few minutes and didn't fly high enough or fast enough to enter orbit and deliver the full experience of outer space.

Rachel Crane is at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. How would you put this in this great space race we've re-entered?

RACHEL CRANE, CNN BUSINESS INNOVATIONS AND SPACE CORRESPONDENT: Well, Max, as you just pointed out, you know today's launch Inspiration 4 is

inherently much riskier than those suborbital flights of Bezos and Branson we saw you know, just a few months ago because you know, they're going --

as you pointed out, they're going much faster, orbital velocity, we're talking 17,500 miles per hour, they're going much further into space.

In fact, this is a new orbit for SpaceX. They're going about a hundred miles above the International Space Station, so this is farther than

they've ever gone before for SpaceX. So that's a first for them.

Also a lot more propellant on board, and there's also another first here for this mission in SpaceX. They've added a new window onto the spacecraft

that has never been tested in space, but SpaceX says they are fully confident in their vehicle and the crew and all systems are go and as you

pointed out, this is an all civilian crew, no professional astronauts will be inside the spacecraft, no NASA employees so they certainly don't have

you know, the quote-unquote "right stuff" of astronauts of the past.

In fact, two of the crew members won their seats via an online raffle. Another Hayley Arceneaux. She is set to become the youngest person to ever

go into orbit. She is a cancer survivor. She also has a metal rod in her legs, so she will become the first person with the prosthesis to go to

space and this whole mission is being bankrolled by billionaire Jared Isaacman, and he is serving as the Mission Commander.

But this mission has been months and months in the making. The crew climbed Mount Rainier to bond with one another. They've flown in fighter jets to

get accustomed to the G Forces. And they also took a ZERO G flight and I had this opportunity to go through that same training. Take a look, Max.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

CRANE: Oh my goodness. Wow. I'm feeling like an astronaut that's for sure.

Where are we? And what are we going to be doing today?

MATT GOHD, CEO, ZERO-G CORPORATION: Here we are Newark Airport and we're going to be going up and zero gravity on G Force One, and you're going to

get the same experience as people on the ISS have.

CRANE (voice over): Zero-Gravity Corporation that uses a modified Boeing 727 flying in parabolic motion to create multiple spurts of weightlessness.

Richard Branson acclimated himself to Zero G's on one before he went into space, as did the crew of Inspiration 4, the first all civilian flight into

orbit.

GOHD: You don't want your first experience in zero gravity to be in space. It's a very unique feeling and this gives them the framework to understand

that.

CRANE (on camera): I'm a little nervous.

We all know that flying on a rocket ship is dangerous. But how dangerous are these flights?

GOHD: There's no risk or danger and what we do. We've flown 17,000 passengers over the last 16 years, not one injury, and not one issue. So,

we have all the same regulations, safety, everything as that United flight does.

[15:05:10]

CRANE: Wow. Oh, this is amazing.

CRANE (voice over): Unlike Jeff Bezos or Richard Branson's flights, this plane isn't on a rocket aimed at space, an airspace of 10 miles by 100

miles is cleared for G Force One flight.

CRANE (on camera): There's a lot of talk about these suborbital flights democratizing space. But is this experience the closest thing that you

know, a normal ...

GOHD: A normal person --

CRANE: ... will ever experience?

GOHD: Absolutely. Absolutely. Yes, the price point. I mean, no one would say $7,500.00 is cheap, but it's accessible.

CRANE: It's a lot less than $28 million.

What is the value of the weightless NASA experience like? Is this just for thrill seekers? Or is there real research value to these flights?

GOHD: Right now, I would say half of it is research, and then the other half is consumer facing.

We've done things that are literally on the cutting edge for space, testing out how to do 3D printing in microgravity. We've done experiments in in how

to animate freeze dried blood to go out and test things in zero gravity or microgravity in space prohibitively expensive and not realistic.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

CRANE (on camera): Now, Max, I don't know how this is the case, but I spoke to the crew yesterday and they say they are not nervous at all. As

you can see, I was nervous just to fly on that Zero-G flight. They say that they have the good kind of butterflies in their stomach right now.

Now, this mission will last three days. Inspiration 4 crew will be in orbit for about three days before splashing down off the Coast of Florida and

they will be launching off of that historic launch pad 39-A just over my shoulder here. Now that is the location where Apollo 11, astronauts were

launched to the moon, the site of many shuttle launches as well, and also where SpaceX has restored America's capability of launching astronauts from

American soil.

So today, hopefully, will once again be the location of a new historic first in spaceflight history -- Max.

FOSTER: It's amazing how fast things are developing really, isn't it? Thank you so much for joining us with that. You looked like you're having

fun, at least at one of those points.

Tonight's launch will be the culmination of years of planning and test by SpaceX. It's also a carefully scripted, made for TV moment.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ELON MUSK, CEO, SPACEX: The reason I started SpaceX was to get humanity to Mars. You're trying to make the dream of space accessible to anyone and

ultimately making science fiction nonfiction forever.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FOSTER: Four crew members have been the subject of a popular Netflix documentary allowing people to get to know them and they're atypical

journey into space. In reality, the rest of us are still a very long way from leaving Earth though.

This crew has been preparing over the last six months through intense full time training. And according to a government report, one seat on the SpaceX

capsule costs around $55 million dollars.

Chris Hadfield is a former astronaut and an adviser to SpaceX. His latest novel is "The Apollo Murders." He joins us from Sarnia, Canada. Thanks for

joining us.

I mean, it's great that people are going into space having won a raffle, but isn't it a bit crazy sending civilians into space without a

professional like you on board?

CHRIS HADFIELD, FORMER ASTRONAUT AND ADVISER TO SPACEX: Yes, just civilians is a weird choice of word to me, because there been lots of all

civilian crews. I mean, I've been on all civilian crews. But I think the real change here, Max is there are no professional astronauts on board.

That's the real difference.

And I think it's a wonderful demonstration of the evolution of our technology. I mean, I wonder what you would have asked me back in 1921, you

know, when they were just trying to start airlines if it weren't had been the Wright brothers and then World War I and all that investment in flying

was crazy, and to try and turn that into some sort of more regularized thing.

You know, you have to make that transition eventually, and this has been the summer in history where that is happening.

FOSTER: Just explain why the risk is relatively low for them. Obviously, there's an amount of risk with any space flight, but you've reduced the

risk because all the control is on the ground effectively.

HADFIELD: I didn't say the risk was low, by any means. They're about to fly a rocket ship in five hours. That's immensely dangerous, and it

shouldn't be dismissed or taken lightly. Rockets blow up, occasionally.

We lost to space shuttles and all the crews on board. It's a dangerous business. But SpaceX has a terrific record. They're the safest or one of

the safest currently flying rocket companies in the world. The big difference here is it doesn't just rely on years and years of skills like

what I have in my background of being an engineer and a test pilot, and then training for years to be able to compensate for a more primitive

vehicle.

[15:10:17]

HADFIELD: The Dragon that they're flying is right on the edge of completely automated and that makes it much, much safer. There's still lots

of stuff that could go wrong. But hopefully the few months of training that these four people have had, that'll be enough to be able to deal with any

of the foreseeable emergencies.

FOSTER: For people that don't fully understand this, obviously worry that the connection with Earth could be lost, and they're left in space, unable

to take control of the vehicle. But as you say, this is a risky project.

HADFIELD: Well, the vehicle is not controlled from Earth. It's directed from Earth, but it's self-controlled. It's got all sorts of computing power

on board. You know, the shuttle had such primitive computers onboard, a tiny little bit of memory and we've come a long way since the 70s in the

80s.

So, I think it's a good natural progression. I think it opens up kind of like we're peeking through the door of what's coming now and it is still

complicated and expensive. But you know, most things are when they're first invented until they get proven and the ability to go through a three-day

flight, just like the first woman in space, Valentina Tereshkova, a three- day flight, largely automated and safely come home again, that'll be a terrific demonstration of what's to come.

FOSTER: How close are we to buying tickets on these sorts of things?

HADFIELD: Well, that's what just happened. We're there. We've already bought tickets and there had been people who have bought tickets --

FOSTER: A billionaire bought them and then gave them to someone else, so ordinary people as it were.

HADFIELD: Well, people have bought tickets to fly on the Soyuz in the past, Guy Laliberte, the head of Cirque du Soleil, Mark Shuttleworth, and

Charles Simonyi of Microsoft, they paid to fly on the Soyuz. It was still very expensive.

The real question is, where can you make the tradeoffs so that the safety stays high, and the predictability stays high, and so the cost can come

down? And it's come radically down.

Bf you look at what's going on down in Texas, right now, with SpaceX's next vehicle Starship, it should drop the cost by another factor of 10, and that

just opens it up even more. And that's the trajectory that we've been on since Gagarin and Al Shepard flew in 1961 and I've been a big part of it my

whole life. I'm really excited to see where this is taking us.

FOSTER: You're on TV now. This big Netflix show has been very keenly watched, hasn't it? What do you make of all of that, and how people are

very engaged in this story, partly because they can relate to the people on board in a way that they haven't been able to in the past?

HADFIELD: Well, I think it's the natural way for things to go. You don't have to be a qualified test pilot to go flying on British Airways. You

know, you just buy a ticket and get on board, and you have a very strong expectation that it's going to be a safe and successful flight.

And so that is very liberating, and it has opened up the whole world to firsthand experience, and to trade and travel, and you think of all that

has come from safe aviation. And so I think that's what people are seeing.

Also, you know, astronauts have been -- it's been sort of sacrosanct up until now, even the name "astronaut." What is what does that really mean?

These people, when they get to orbit, they are astronauts, obviously, by definition. There's just going to be different degrees, you know,

professional astronaut, and just like on British Airways, but I think people see that they are now able to go do something, and it's still early

days, but up until now has taken a lifetime of work to do and that that's a good transition and --

But the real role now, Max, will be what do these four people do when they get home? How do they not squander the experience? Can they take that same

inertia of excitement and share it in a really effective way? Feel the responsibility of being one of the first and really work hard to educate

and inform other people of where this is leading us?

FOSTER: Chris Hadfield, thank you so much. It is a huge responsibility. And you've really carried that message forward from your work in space. So

hopefully they will, too. Thank you so much for joining us.

Now, President Biden touts his vaccine mandate as he meets U.S. business leaders. We will discuss the meeting and the measure that will affect a

hundred million workers.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[15:17:08]

FOSTER: U.S. President Joe Biden has been meeting today with top execs from some of America's biggest employers. The heads of Microsoft, Disney,

and Walgreens participated. All have expressed support for Mr. Biden's vaccine mandate. President Biden said it'll help the economic recovery.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOE BIDEN (D), PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Vaccination is key to getting the pandemic under control and keeping -- and keeping the economy

strong. And first part of the plan is to vaccinate the unvaccinated. This is a -- this is a pandemic of the unvaccinated, not anything else right

now.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FOSTER: Jeff Zeleny is at the White House. I guess, Jeff, the challenge here isn't necessarily the companies that were there at the White House,

they already support this. It's convincing the other employers that are wary and perhaps are worrying about recruitment right now.

JEFF ZELENY, CNN U.S. CHIEF NATIONAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: Max, that's right. I mean, these CEOs who are meeting with President Biden here at the

White House today, they largely have implemented vaccine requirements or mandates, but what the White House is trying to do is send a message to

other companies indeed, to follow the vaccination mandates that this White House has steadily put in place.

And really at issue is the one for private businesses with employees of 100 or more to vaccinate their workforce or submit to weekly testing. That was

an announcement that came last week. All of the technicalities are still being written and worked out how to do that.

But the White House is hoping that companies sort of see other companies move this direction. And they say it brings down healthcare costs and other

matters. So, they hope that people start organically doing it themselves. We'll see how much that happens.

But it has actually been surprising, for all the controversy from Republican governors across the country and some Republicans here in

Washington, a lot of corporations and the big groups like the Chamber of Commerce, and other big conservative business groups actually have

applauded the White House. They believe the government is giving some cover, if you will, to businesses to have to do this decision. The

government is being the bad guy and that's fine with businesses.

So there definitely is an incremental march toward more businesses doing these required mandates, but certainly so many more to go, still some 80

million Americans who are eligible for the vaccine, who have not yet gotten it.

FOSTER: And it's difficult, isn't it, for smaller companies or companies that rely on flexible labor don't necessarily have like many staff members

may have, you know, freelance members of staff to sign up to this properly. But as long as it gets a certain way there, then it can get to that

critical mass that he needs.

ZELENY: Exactly. I mean, and this is just targeting, you know, it is small businesses, but really, companies have to have a hundred employees or more.

So, we're not talking about mom and pop shops, if you will. We are not talking about, you know, just a family operation necessarily.

So they really are trying to really focus on the bottom line here and encourage these workers, these employees to reduce their skepticism, but

the challenge here of course is, people aren't -- haven't listened to the government up until now at this point.

[15:20:16]

ZELENY: What really is scaring people into getting the vaccine is still the surging delta variant here which is causing hospitalization rates to

soar. So people being afraid seeing their co-workers and family members sick. That is what's actually encouraging at least some people to get the

vaccine.

FOSTER: Jeff Zeleny at the White House. Thank you so much.

New data shows job vacancies in the U.S. that require prior COVID-19 vaccination are surging. The number of such job listings on the website

indeed.com went up by nearly 120 percent in August compared to the previous month. Job postings that require vaccination, but don't specify COVID went

up even more by more than 240 percent. The overall proportion is still less than one percent.

Chris Hyams is the CEO of Indeed, he joins us via Skype from Austin, Texas. Thanks for joining us. I mean, what is the standard way of thinking that's

emerging here do you think?

CHRIS HYAMS, CEO, INDEED: Yes, look, it's an extraordinary time for the labor market and we've had a front row seat with the hundreds of millions

of people who come to Indeed every month to get jobs or to hire and the headline remains with more than eight million U.S. people still unemployed,

the labor market is still incredibly tight.

Employers are eager to hire, but job seekers are still very cautious, and we listen to job seekers very carefully and we hear empirically, the top

two reasons that millions of people are still staying back from the labor force are related to COVID.

Number one is the concern for their own exposure at work, and number two is the access to childcare and school reopenings right now in the U.S. had

been very shaky due to the rise of delta.

FOSTER: It's a difficult one for employers, isn't it, when they have a situation where they don't want to force people to take a vaccine, if

they're genuinely concerned about taking vaccines. They might have a reason to do that. But they also have to consider the other members of staff and

the risk they're exposing them to.

So you know, where does legality come into this? Where does insurance come into this? What sort of commercial decisions are employees having to make?

HYAMS: Well, the, the new directive from the White House gives people the choice between requiring vaccinations and requiring testing. And the big

focus for employers is they need to be able to make potential workers who are staying on the sidelines feel safe. And we know that requiring

vaccinations is one of the things that will get people back into looking for jobs, but the other is being able to actually keep people safer, and be

able to make schools safe for reopening.

So the people who've been staying back, especially mothers, who have been staying back at much higher rates than any of the other groups to be able

to allow them to come back to the workforce safely.

FOSTER: We saw a lot of the benefits that existed during the pandemic have all been stripped away right now. Do you expect that to translate into

lower job vacancies over time, because we've seen when some states got rid of these benefits, it didn't really translate very quickly, did it?

HYAMS: Yes, we did not see any impact at all. So obviously, the benefits mostly lapsed after Labor Day. But when the States first announced that

they were going to be removing them, we saw a very brief increases in searches for job seekers that lasted about three or four days and then went

back to normal. We've seen similar growth in job postings for states that cut off early and those that didn't.

What we are seeing is that employers are incredibly eager to hire. So the benchmark for us of measuring the demand for labor is the number of new job

postings on Indeed and what we just announced this morning, the numbers we're seeing 41 percent more open jobs today than our pre-pandemic

benchmark of February of 2020.

And this is happening in multiple sectors that have been strong throughout, but we are definitely seeing that employers are going to need to be able to

reach out to job seekers and offer them the flexibility that many of them are seeing for the first time throughout the pandemic in terms of being

able to have time to go pick up their kids or take care of family members, and also through increased wages and other things to help incent them to

come back.

FOSTER: Lots of anecdotal evidence as well that people are coming out of lockdown, effectively being told they have to go back to work or just

expecting to go back to work very fairly.

But, you know, they've had a bit of a life crisis as well, and they don't want to go back into the rat race, if I can call it that. I mean, is that -

- is that a big trend that people are going off trying to change their lifestyles altogether? And is that causing a challenge to businesses?

[15:25:02]

HYAMS: Yes, so clearly, we're seeing some backlog from 2020, when not a lot of people actually left their jobs because there was so much

uncertainty, but what's being called the great resignation right now, you have this pent up demand over the last year and a half. But you also have a

whole host of people who've had really time to consider what's most important to them.

We are seeing an active drop, so from August to September, there was a 10 percent drop in the people who are actively searching for jobs. Almost all

of that drop came from people who are currently employed.

And so the people who are unemployed are still looking at the same rates, but still holding back for those same reasons.

When it comes to remote work. We believe that the people have had the opportunity to see this, that this is really an option that's going to be

here to stay. The total searches for remote jobs is double what it was prior to the pandemic. The total job postings that mentioned this is

double.

It is still a small part of the population, though, just about a third of all jobs in the U.S. allow for some type of remote work.

FOSTER: It's interesting. Chris Hyams, CEO of Indeed. Thank you very much, indeed, for joining us on the program.

Now, some gut wrenching testimony on Capitol Hill today. U.S. Olympic gymnasts recount the sexual abuse by teen Dr. Larry Nassar, and call out

the system they say enabled him.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

FOSTER: Hello, I'm Max Foster. There is more QUEST MEANS BUSINESS in a moment when the Prime Minister of Pakistan tells CNN Joe Biden still hasn't

phoned him nine months after the U.S. President took office.

And a new report claims Facebook ignored research that found that Instagram is harming teens' mental health.

Before that, though, the headlines this hour.

President Joe Biden says he has great confidence in the top U.S. General, Mark Milley. According to a new book co-authored by Bob Woodward when he

took secret action during the Trump administration to limit Donald Trump's ability to launch military action because of concerns about his mental

state. Critics say Milley should resign.

California's Democratic governor will stay in office for the rest of his term. Gavin Newsom defeated the Republican-led recall election with nearly

64 percent of the vote. The recall effort was triggered by conservatives, who were unhappy with Newsom's coronavirus policies.

Haiti's prime minister has ordered the firing of the country's top prosecutor. Bed-Ford Claude is investigating the July assassination of the

president, president Jovenel Moise. He is seeking charges against the prime minister in connection with that attack and tells CNN, he was discussing

possible charges with a judge.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

FOSTER: U.S. Olympic gymnasts gave gut-wrenching testimony today on Capitol Hill. They recounted the sexual abuse they endured at the hands of

former Olympic team doctor Larry Nassar and denounced the FBI for ignoring their complaints and they say allowing the abuse to continue.

In 2018, more than 150 women and girls said Dr. Nassar had sexually abused them over the past two decades. Nassar was sentenced to up to 175 years in

prison. Olympic gold medalist, Simone Biles, told senators she blamed both Nassar for the abuse and the system that enabled him.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SIMONE BILES, U.S. OLYMPIC GYMNAST: To be clear, I blame Larry Nassar and I also blame an entire system that enabled and perpetrated his abuse.

How much is a little girl worth?

I sit before you today to raise my voice so that no little girl must endure what I, the athletes at this table and the countless others, who needlessly

suffered under Nassar's guise of medical treatment.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FOSTER: Paula Reid joining me from Washington now.

Obviously, you listened to all of this. Incredibly hard to watchful.

PAULA REID, CNN SENIOR LEGAL AFFAIRS CORRESPONDENT: It was incredibly hard to watch. Here you have these elite gymnasts, some of the strongest women

in the world, fighting back tears as they not so much talked about Larry Nassar or the abuse but the system and the adults in power, who had allowed

him to continue this abuse.

Now there has been an investigation into exactly what happened here and how, in particular, the FBI mishandled this. In fact, McKayla Maroney

detailed how she spoke with the FBI back in 2015 and she had this incredibly unusual interview.

She was by herself, in her room, sitting on the floor, not in person, speaking to an investigator in the Indianapolis field office of the FBI,

according to the inspector general's report. There weren't a lot of follow- up questions.

And this investigator did not actually document the contents of this interview, which is a violation of procedure, until another 1.5 years had

passed. And there were subsequent efforts to cover up mistakes that the FBI made.

At this point, the inspector general has really focused on two specific FBI officials, one being the special agent in charge of the Indianapolis office

and a supervisory agent underneath him.

The agent in charge of that office has retired. The supervisory agent has been fired by the FBI in the last week or so. But neither man is expected

to be charged. What we heard repeatedly throughout the hearing today from these four women is that they want accountability.

They want indictments, they want charges. Now the decision about whether to charge is ultimately up to the attorney general of the United States. His

deputy, Lisa Monaco, was invited to today's hearing and declined to show up.

But CNN has learned that we do expect to hear from the attorney general and the deputy attorney general about this in October, where they will likely

face some pretty serious questions about why no one was prosecuted.

There is not a lot of bipartisan consensus here in Washington. But what was clear from members of both sides of the aisle is that there is outrage

about how this was allowed to happen for so long to so many victims.

FOSTER: And some of these women were describing some of the structural issues, which seem really shocking and existed for a long time. You wonder

how on Earth they were allowed to perpetuate, particularly how the body investigating this affair was having to investigate a body that was in

charge of funding the investigators.

Have any of those issues been resolved?

And just explain where we got to with that.

[15:35:00]

REID: It's a great point. There were two issues. One was accountability for what happened. One was also forward looking, what kinds of reforms are

undertaken?

And they have one program right now, where you can call and report abuse. But these women said, look, that's being supported by the same people, USA

Gymnastics, that allowed this abuse to be perpetrated.

So there are a lot of issues with that reporting mechanism and they want to see something that is independent, where anyone who believes they have been

a victim of abuse, they can call and know their claim will be properly investigated.

Right now, there doesn't appear to be any confidence among these four women that any of these entities have truly reformed and that victims who come

forward in the future will be protected in ways that they were clearly not.

FOSTER: OK. Well, thank you for your insight there. It was very powerful to watch but it hopefully will lead to some change.

Right. Pakistan's prime minister says he'll work with the Taliban and warns it can't be controlled by outsiders. Here's CNN's first exclusive interview

with Imran Khan since the fall of Afghanistan -- next.

(MUSIC PLAYING)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(MUSIC PLAYING)

FOSTER: British prime minister has reshuffled his government. A woman will be the foreign secretary for only the second time in U.K. history. Liz

Truss will replace Dominic Raab. He's been appointed justice secretary and will be the deputy prime minister.

Nina dos Santos joins us from London with more.

All sorts of negotiations going into this; Raab, for example, the deputy prime minister, presumably. Boris Johnson is trying to deal with some of

the issues these ministers have had during the pandemic.

NINA DOS SANTOS, CNNMONEY EUROPE EDITOR: This is purging some ministers that have been tainted by scandal but entirely removing them from the

cabinet table. They've been given pretty senior other positions.

Boris Johnson as we know is a prime minister who likes to reward people for their loyalty to him personally but also to his cause, Brexit, which is

what he got elected on. For that reason, the most high profile scout is the Dominic Raab, the foreign secretary who was much criticized for staying on

holiday in Greece when the U.K. was chaotically withdrawing from Afghanistan.

He's been moved over to the justice secretary role but also taking a few other roles as well.

[15:40:00]

DOS SANTOS: Notably, deputy prime minister as well as the lord chancellor. It is easy to argue that he is pretty well suited for being justice

secretary, considering he is a career barrister, who has spoken on out on various issues, including human rights, which is the cornerstone of the

British constitution. So it may be a good sideways fit, if you like.

The other high-profile political scout is that of the education secretary. Gavin Williamson has been in hot water for quite some time. Obviously, he

presided over children across much of England going back to school just two weeks ago with only testing but not necessarily yet there hasn't been a

decision on whether to vaccinate 12- to 15-year-olds.

And he was much criticized for not just his handling of shutting schools during the lockdown and moving to online learning last year, which

obviously really was difficult for people who were the lower end of the economic spectrum in this country, didn't have access to data or technology

to learn on laptops, he was then criticized for the handling of exams to go to university.

Many people feeling that grade inflation is a real risk here for people leaving high school.

There are some winners here who are taking up those two positions; notably, Liz Truss, the former international development secretary. She's only the

second woman to become the U.K. foreign secretary since the Labour government in 2006 announced that Margaret Beckett (ph) would take that

position.

Liz Truss is well known in diplomatic circles because she's been going around the world negotiating the Brexit deal. So she's replacing Dominic

Raab.

When it comes to education, it was probably felt they needed somebody who had competent credentials to try to help children who have lost out on so

much learning over the last 18 months.

The vaccines minister Nadhim Zahawi, will be taking that role. He's been lauded with how he's rolled out vaccines in the country, which is now one

of the most vaccinated countries in the world.

There are many other maneuvers inside this cabinet reshuffle. But those are the big takeaway messages. We should also talk about the people who are

staying, the chancellor and also the home secretary -- Max?

FOSTER: OK, thank you.

Now it's been one month since the Taliban recaptured Kabul and declared victory. CNN's Becky Anderson sat down with the Pakistani prime minister

for his first media interview since the takeover. She asked if frayed relations with the U.S. over Afghanistan is pushing Pakistan closer to

China.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

BECKY ANDERSON, CNN HOST: Responding to the fact Joe Biden has not contacted you directly, your national security adviser recently said, and I

quote, "If a phone call is a concession, if a security relationship is a concession, Pakistan has options," he said.

Is China that option?

And given the current state of relations between the U.S. and China, is that a veiled threat of sorts?

IMRAN KHAN, PAKISTAN PRIME MINISTER: Our relationship with the U.S. is not just developed on a phone call. It needs to be a multidimensional

relationship.

ANDERSON: Do you consider the U.S. pushing Pakistan into the arms of China at present, in an effort to secure your own stability and economic

prosperity going forward?

Are you choosing a side, effectively, at this point?

KHAN: Becky, we -- our relationship with China goes back 70 years. It is a very strong relationship. It was Pakistan which opened the doors of the

U.S. to China in 1970, when we -- when the doctor henrika center (ph) was introduced to China. We were the go-between.

So our China relationship is not dependent on what it is with the U.S. We would like a normal relationship with the U.S., I repeat, like it has with

India.

Antony Blinken suggested that Pakistan's role in Afghanistan has been shaped by its concerns about its enemy and neighbor, India, and its role in

Afghanistan. He didn't elaborate.

Would you care to?

KHAN: Yes, of course. I repeat. We joined the U.S. war, dislodged (ph) a friendly Pakistani, which was friendly to Pakistan and got in a government

that was pro-India. And India conducted a series of terrorist attacks within Pakistan.

They backed the Tariq-i-Taliban (ph), the Pakistani Taliban; they backed the Baloch terrorists and they conducted a series of attacks, a country

seven times smaller of its eastern neighbor, three wars fought with them.

And then in Afghanistan, with 2,600-kilometer border with Pakistan, if they -- if a pro India government comes in, obviously, for the security of

Pakistan, there was this worry that we would be hemmed in from both sides.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

FOSTER: Imran Khan speaking to Becky.

Now 40 countries have so far ratified an agreement struck in January to create the African continental free trade area.

[15:45:00]

FOSTER: The deal came with the target of boosting African exports by $560 billion. In today's "CONNECTING AFRICA," Eleni Giokos asked the man at the

helm how the agreement is progressing.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ELENI GIOKOS, CNNMONEY CORRESPONDENT: So Secretary General, at the end of the day, you are the one helping implement this mammoth task to connect a

single market.

How far are we in harmonizing rules, lifting tariffs and opening up borders, so we can boost intra-Africa trade?

WAMKELE MENE, SECRETARY-GENERAL, AFRICA CONTINENTAL FREE TRADE AREA SECRETARIAT: It will take time. It's going to take a very long time. I

always make the point that it took market integration in Europe over 72 years. It took the Europeans 72 years to get to the point where they are

today.

And so we have a long way to go to build the capacity of our customs authorities, to make sure that our customs authorities, across the length

and breadth of the continent, that they know exactly what the rules require for trade facilitation, for goods in transit.

GIOKOS: Some people don't believe that the continental free trade area will be implemented.

Are you confident it will be done?

MENE: I am very realistic about the challenges that lie ahead. But I believe, with all my being, that this agreement will be implemented. We

have never had this level of political will and legal commitment before for a trade agreement on the African continent.

I know that, like in any other trade agreement, not everybody is going to implement at the same time. Some countries will move much faster than

others. Some countries will have an interest in the services sector. Some country will have an interest in manufacturing. So we have to bear all of

that in mind.

GIOKOS: Do we have any success stories that have already started to see the benefits, or at least, gearing up for what a more connected Africa will

look like?

What are you hearing from executives and the business communities?

MENE: The success stories are there. If you are a big corporation, as soon as that new market is opened to you, you are able to ensure that you have a

commercial presence there.

And so we are going to see that bigger corporations will be the immediate beneficiaries and that institutional investors will be the immediate

beneficiaries. But what we have to work on to make sure that they also see the benefits of the small and medium enterprises. And that will take

perhaps two to three years.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FOSTER: Facebook's own research on Instagram is raising serious questions, according to "The Wall Street Journal." Just how toxic the photo-showing

app can be for teens -- next.

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[15:50:00]

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FOSTER: Facebook says it is responding to its own studies that found Instagram can be toxic for teens.

"The Wall Street Journal" says Facebook researchers repeatedly warned that the photo sharing platform can harm mental health and body image,

especially for teenage girls. In response, Instagram said the research shows the company's, quote, "commitment to understanding complex and

critical issues young people may struggle with and informs all the work we do to help those experiencing these issues."

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told Congress in March, the social media apps can offer mental health benefits.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

MARK ZUCKERBERG, COFOUNDER AND CEO, FACEBOOK: The research we've seen is that using social apps to connect with other people can have positive

mental health benefits and well-being benefits, like helping people feel more connected and less lonely.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

FOSTER: Instagram's focus on showing photos makes it particularly sensitive. The internal Facebook report puts it bluntly.

"We make body image issues worse for one in three teen girls."

One slide obtained by the journal summarized, "Facebook is still moving forward on an Instagram for kids version."

We're joined now by Jean Twenge, the author of, iGen: Why Today's Super Connected Kids Are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy

and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood."

Welcome. Thanks for joining us.

I mean, a lot of this isn't surprising, is it?

Sharing photos that people want to promote themselves with does create envy, jealousy, things of inadequacy. What is more concerning is this was

kept internal. It came out because "The Wall Street Journal" revealed it.

JEAN TWENGE, PSYCHOLOGIST AND AUTHOR: I think that's the most stunning thing here is we know from outside research for years that there's a link

between spending a lot of time on Instagram and other social media apps and depression.

But you know, the academic community has debated this. But here we have some very definitive evidence from internal research at Facebook. And they

kept it secret for two years.

FOSTER: But they would suggest they've used that to address issues that come out of it on the app.

Have you seen any evidence of that?

TWENGE: No, though I'm not privy to their internal discussions. But certainly we still see these effects, with teen girls in particular, who

spend an excessive amount of time on social media, three, four, five or more hours a day, are significantly more likely to be depressed or to be

anxious.

As you mentioned, there is this social comparison element, that everybody else's life looks more glamorous. On Instagram in particular, you get

beautiful pictures of beautiful bodies that are unattainable. So that can lead to those body image issues.

Also, Instagram makes popularity into a number because you can say how many followers you have. And that's another source of mental health issues,

again, in particular, for teen girls.

FOSTER: And there's also the FOMO, that you feel like you're missing out on social scenes on Instagram. That's exclusion that some would argue is a

former of bullying as well. So it is quite subtle but degrading over time.

TWENGE: Exactly. These are complex issues. It is true that, if you can use social media for a very small portion of time, maybe half an hour a day,

then it might have some of those benefits.

Even then, though, you still have the social comparison. You can still can see what all of your friends are doing without you. That's where FOMO comes

in. And the other problem is, this is isn't just a level of individuals anymore. This is at the level of the society and our groups of friends.

[15:55:00]

TWENGE: And the schools where the kids who aren't on social media may sidestep some of the negative issues around body image and comparison but

then are left out socially. So it's like, nobody can win. That's the situation that we're in these days, it feels like.

FOSTER: Obviously, we hear a lot about teenagers in particular, switching away from Instagram over to TikTok.

Do you think there's some of the issues here at play, a reason for that transition?

Do you think the transition is even real?

TWENGE: We need a lot more research on this to see not only who is using the platform but also TikTok is so new. There's not a lot of research

looking at links with mental health.

But TikTok at least is a little more active rather than passive. It may sidestep some of those issues with Instagram. However, it is still designed

to keep users coming back as many times as possible and using the app as much as possible.

And if you get sucked into using TikTok hours and hours a day, chances are you're probably not sleeping as much as you should, probably not

interacting with people face to face as much as you should. So it is displacing some of these more beneficial activities, no matter what the

platform.

FOSTER: OK. Professor, thank you very much indeed.

Now there are just moments left to trade on Wall Street. We'll have the final numbers and the closing bell after the break.

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FOSTER: The last few moments of trade on Wall Street. The Dow is in the green. Up nearly 300 points earlier on as well. Expected to close higher

for just the second time in the last eight trading days. We've seen triple digit moves every day this week.

The Dow 30, mostly a wall of green. McDonald's, Goldman Sachs and Nike struggling to get out of the red. Cisco is there at the bottom. All the

U.S. major averages are up today. It was the opposite in Europe, with the FTSE, DAX and CAC in Zurich all closing in the red.

That is QUEST MEANS BUSINESS. I'm Max Foster in London. The closing bell for you on Wall Street right now.

END