on al-jazeera. be the hero the world needs right now. washington. al-jazeera. hello i'm barbara starr this is the al-jazeera news hour live from london thank you for joining us coming up in the next 60 minutes. joe biden paints a grim picture of america's battle with the coronavirus signing executive orders and blasting the dismal failure of his previous us.

twin suicide blasts at a crowded market in the iraqi capital baghdad killing at least 32 people and leave more than 100 wounded. at least 100000 people were forced from their homes after rebel attacks in central african republic following last month's disputed elections . i'm german ash with the sports news the doubts remain about the terri lympics but the head of the i.o.c. thomas back once again insists they are going ahead as planned in july. u.s. president joe biden has used his 1st full day in office to sign a raft of executive orders designed to bring the coronavirus pandemic on the control the disease has already claimed more than 400000 american lives and biden

warned that that number could reach 500000 next month among the measures signed into law all passengers flying into the u.s. will have to present a negative coronavirus test and undergo a mandatory quarantine period by that is also invoking that the fence production act to ramp up supplies of the vaccination testing and personal protective equipment but he warned it will not be a quick fix. we didn't get into this mess overnight it's going to take months for us to turn things around but let me be equally clear we will get through this we will defeat this pandemic and to a nation waiting for action let me be the clearest on this point help is on the way today today i would believe the national strategy on covert 90 and executive actions to be to spend any. well mike hanna joins us live now from washington d.c.

so mike why there has obviously wasted no time in trying to get to grips with the pandemic tell us a little bit more about these executive orders that he signed. what is building on the 1st executive order that he signed off to taking office and that course is posing a federal mosque wearing mandate all federal properties now he's expanded on that and one of the executive orders that he signed here making more specific about how mosques must be worn and where and stressing his appeal for all americans to wear mosque for the next 100 days saying that this is an absolutely critical issue among other measures here its executive measures concerning safety in the workplace how to reopen schools safely and very importantly how to improve the flow of vaccines absolutely critical another executive order dealing with expanded testing and

a federally based system of ensuring that this testing is done and rolls out in an effective way so this is very much drawing up a national strategy something that and mike let me stop you there let's go straight to the white house where the press secretary genset he is holding a media conference let's listen in on the president's commitment to have public health experts clear communication with the american people about the pandemic just to give you a bit of a run of show here. she will speak at the top about the state of the pandemic the status effects eans i help take some of your questions i will play the role of the bad cop when it's time for him to go and get to the work of the american people and then i will do a tapper and i'll answer a bunch of your questions as well so there's lots to come after this but that i will turn it over to dr phelps. thank you very much and i'm going to just spend a couple of minutes just summarizing the status of where we are and then maybe

addressing some of the things that i know are on people's minds so 1st of all obviously we are still in a very serious situation i mean to have over 400000 deaths is something that you know is on for. really historic in the very in a very bad sense when you look at the number of new infections that we have it's still at a very very high rate hospitalizations are up there are certain areas of the country as i think you're all familiar with which are really stressed from the standpoint of beds from the standpoint of the stress on the health care system however when you look more recently at the 7 day average of cases remember we were going between 3400002300000 right now it looks like it might actually be but knowing in the sense of turning around now there is good news in that but you have to be careful that we may not be seeing perhaps an artifact an artifact of

the slowing down following the holidays so when we see that we think it's real but one of the things and it's interesting i'm sort of getting a deja vu standing up here because i said something like this only just a little bit less than a year ago when we were talking about the the acceleration of cases in the late winter early spring of 2020 when we were having in new york city metropolitan area being the center of what was going on that there always lags so please be be aware of that that when you have cases and then a couple of weeks later you see it represented in hospitalizations intensive care and then a couple of weeks later in deaths so you have almost a paradoxical curves where you see something plateau ing and maybe coming down at the same time as hospitalizations and deaths might actually be going up so this is something that i just put on your radar screen it is not an unusual thing to see that sort of thing the other point i want to make is one that we're getting asked

a lot regarding questions of it that is what is it about these mutants that you're hearing about the mutants in the u.k. which we know are in about 20 plus states. yes the u.k. mutants that we're seeing in south africa and in brazil. first of all we need to understand that r.n.a. viruses like corona virus is mutate all the time most of the mutations don't have any physiological relevance with regard to the function of the virus itself however every once in a while you get mutations either singly or clustered in combinations which do have an impact so what have we learned thus far and i want to emphasize thus far because we're paying very very careful attention to this and we take it very seriously at least from the experience that our colleagues in the u.k. have had the one that is in the u.k.

appears to have a greater degree of transmissibility about twice as much as what we call the wild type original virus the one that is in south africa is a big difference and i'll get to that in a 2nd so it does look like it increases the transmissibility. they say correctly on a one to one basis it doesn't seem to make the virus more virulent or have a greater chance of making you seriously ill 'd or killing you however we shouldn't be lowed into complacency about that because if you have a virus that is more transmissible you're going to get more cases when you get more cases you're going to get more hospitalizations and we get more hospitalizations you ultimately going to get more deaths so even though the virus on a one to one basis isn't more serious the phenomenon of a more transmissible virus is something that you take seriously the next thing is does it change enough to interfere with the efficacy of

a whole group of monoclonal antibodies that many of you are aware of the monoclonal antibodies that are being used for treatment in some cases and prevention since monoclonal antibodies bind to a very specific part of the virus when there's a mutation there it has much greater chance of obliterating the efficacy of a monoclonal antibody and we're seeing in the much more concerning. mutations that are in south africa and in some respects brazil which is similar to south africa that is having an effect on the monoclonal antibodies the real question that people are quite clearly interested in is what is the impact on the vaccine and so forth literally we have this new phenomenon that our pre-print journals where where people get data and they put it into a pre-print server where it hasn't yet been peer reviewed but you have to pay

attention to it because it gives you good information quickly ultimately it gets confirmed and we're seeing them coming out over the last few days and what they're saying is that what we likely will be seeing is a diminution more south africa than u.k. . u.k. is that diminution in what would be the efficacy of the vaccine induced anybodies now that does not mean that the vaccines will not be effective and let me explain why there is a thing called a cushion effect so if you have a vaccine like the moderna and the pfizer vaccine that can suppress the virus said a dilution let's say of one to a 1000 and the mutant influences it by bringing it down to maybe one to $2800.00 or something like that you're still well above the line of not being affected so there's that cushion that even though it's diminished some want it

still is affected that's what we're seeing both certainly with the u.k. which is very minimal effect we have while we're following very carefully the one in south africa which is a little bit more concerning but nonetheless not something that we don't think that we can handle what is the message because someone could say now wait a minute if you have the possibility that the vaccines are diminishing in their impact why we vaccinate people no it is all the more reason why we should be vaccinating as many people as you possibly can because as long as the virus is out there replicating viruses don't mutate unless they replicate and if you can print suppress that by a very good vaccine campaign then you could actually ovoid this deleterious effect that you might get from the mutations bottom line we're paying very close attention to it there are alternative plans if we have

a have to modify the vaccine that is not something that is very on an onerous thing we can do that given the platforms we have but right now from the reports we have literally as of today it appears that the vaccines will still be effective against them with the cabbie out in mind. you want to pay close attention to it so you want to just stop there and then maybe just answer some questions on anything else that i said so yeah how helpful would it is then amazon got involved with the federal response to calling the team before fire took off and you know that any plans her discussions had yesterday you know i don't think i could answer that question i'd be waving my hands about that very well you know one of the new things in this administration is if you know the answer don't guess just say you don't know the answer yeah yes sir have a couple of questions. for you to follow. up on just about this

strain in south africa has demonstrated made its way to the united states in the listening concerns to how mr lee understand that's a great question thus far it does not appear at all 'd that the south african strain is in the united states however we must be honest and say that the level of comprehensive sequence surveillance thus far is not at the level that we would have like so we're going to be looking very very carefully for it but given the information we have today it doesn't appear that the south african strain is here. just ask you about the difference you distribute to the field because of course that's what these people want to do i mean going to get to see these 5 units tradition starting from scratch with the maps in distribution and print who are picking up in terms of distribution laptop no i mean. we certainly not scrounge

starting from scratch because there is activity going on in the distribution but if you look at the plan that the president has put forth about the things that he's going to do namely get community vaccine centers up get pharmacies more involved where appropriate get the defense production act involved not only perhaps with getting more vaccine but even the things you need to get a good vaccine program for example needles and syringes that might be more useful in that so it's taking what's going on but amplifying it in a big way i don't think the most likely is simply is there anything actionable that you are seeking from the previous administration. well that the ranger efforts to get enough enough you know i mean we're we're we're coming in with fresh ideas but also some ideas that were not bad ideas with the with the with the previous administration you can say it was absolutely not usable at all so we are continuing

but you're going to see a real ramping up of the final push in unison to move the policy middle of the party under way that still your expectation yes it is i mean i believe that the goal that was set by the president of getting 100000000 people vaccinated in the 1st 100 days is quite a reasonable goal and when you get to the point and one of the things that i think is is something we need to pay attention to and i quite frankly been spending a considerable amount of my own time is out reaching particularly to minority communities. to make sure that you get them to be vaccinated and you explain why it's so important for themselves their family and their community if we get 70 to 85 percent of the country vaccinated let's say by the end of the somebody middle of the summer i believe by the time we get to the fall we will be approaching a degree of normality it's not going to be perfectly normal but one that i think

will take a lot of pressure off the american public. if you will be one of the if you hold over from the previous administration this current one what has been your experience with this new team and in your view what would be different in terms of the trajectory of this outreach from the start people like to be in place to begin well i can tell you my my impression of of of what's going on right now the team i don't know if i can extrapolate other things but one of the things that was very clear as recently as about 15 minutes ago when i was with the president is that one of the things that we're going to do is to be completely transparent open and honest if things go wrong not point fingers but to correct them and to make everything we do be based on science and evidence i mean that was literally a conversation i had 15 minutes ago with the president and he has said that multiple times. with you back in your political life kind of phone lines like

you're now with that sort of license to to to amend or clarify i. know i mean i always said everything on the page that's why i got in trouble sometimes. you know you mentioned pharmacies that the c.d.c. director said today that the goal of getting vaccination into pharmacies by the end of my isn't realistic as has been previously suggested we will most americans be able to get a fascination in their neighborhood pharmacy well i'm i didn't hear that comment are you talking about dr wilensky comment i didn't hear that coming. so i don't really want to comment on on the comment but what she may be saying is that for many people in this country who don't have access to a pharmacy they may not be able to utilize getting things in the pharmacy i i'm not sure i'd want to be careful because i'm not sure that's what she said we just had a conversation about how we're going to get vaccines to people who are in pharmacy

desert areas where they don't have easy access to a pharmacy and that's something we're working on and taking very seriously to be clear if you are in an area where you do have access to c.b.s. or all right when will you be able to get that access to this thing might he want to sleep back see you know in the spirit of not guessing i really i'm not quite sure when that will be but we can get back to you on that on the broader timeline you mentioned paul we just heard the president say you know the brutal truth is it is going to be several more months just to be clear you're saying by the fall majority of americans you know you think will be that anybody can say that if we get the majority of americans 75 percent vaccinated by then we could have a degree of herd immunity that would get us back to normal the concern i have and something we're working on is getting people who have vaccine has didn't see who don't want to get vaccinated because many people are skeptical about that so we really need to do a lot of good outreach for that you know i don't know what the best case the best

case scenario for for me is that we get 85 percent of the people vaccinated by the end of the summer if we do then by the time we get to the fall i think we can approach a degree of normality. i mean cases that you're talking about fiction about how sad pretty face piece mr libby is it doesn't take them less exposure time to get there i don't know what it is that you can do in vitro in a in a test tube setting boring being an affinity to the receptor is what you have in your nose in your lung in a g.i. tract the receptor for the virus is called an ace to receptor and the facility or affinity with which a virus binds to that means that it very likely will have a better efficiency of infection and replicate more in the nasal pharynx so that's how you make that determination in the test to then you look at the dimia logically and you see a spike going up in the sense of number of cases and they sort of match each other

a virus that has the inability to easily bind to and replicate with your receptor this is one that likely will spread easier. in that you'd have more my rowing if you could just see it in fact it would mean because if it binds more easily it could replicate in the nasal pharynx more easily and it is unlikely that you would have a high of viral load massless effect in the snow it makes it the reason why you absolutely should be wearing a mask it doesn't necessarily make it less effective if you properly wear a mask then you'll be ok the impulse came to happen here anything that might expand that strain is a theme that well i think this is least 20 states that people have mentioned exactly did the real question that's going to be asked is it going to become the dominant strain well will the strains we already have prevented from flourishing and being the more dominant strain but it is here for sure yeah for cathy.

to. see some state and local authorities are saying that they would be able to distribute more vaccines do they have more is this by the ministry should now trying to increase production by internal problems or in the next 6 weeks as well as to utilize what we hope will be another player in the field the j. and j. jaan center as well as other of the companies but also as the as the president has said in his plan to do whatever he can to expand the the availability of vaccines whatever that is i mean he said that he's going to just use every possibility including the defense production and you know explain the discrepancy between what some states are saying more vaccines in the c.d.c. same a lot of seniors still remaining on people or on their shelf yeah you know i think that that is something that we need to really take a close look at because that is sort of an inconsistency discrepancy and one of the

things we want to do is to find out why that's the case and if it is the case particularly the thing that would be most disturbing if there is a vaccine. late laying around and people are not using it when others would need it but i don't know the answer to that question but we need to look into it from the computer when you choked a couple times today already about the difference is that you feel being kind of the spokesperson for this issue in this is an american versus the previous one can you can you talk a little bit about how creepy how much different do you feel less constrained what is you know i mean you you for so many times you stuck behind the podium with donald trump standing behind you that was a different it was a different feeling i'm sure than it is today you are a little bit about about how you feel. kind of released from probably what you have been doing for the last year but you said i was joking about it i was very serious

. about it i wasn't joking you know actually i mean obviously i don't want to be going back you know over history but it was very clear that there were things that were said. regarding things like i drug see clora quinn and other things like that that really was uncomfortable because they were not based on scientific fact i can tell you i take no pleasure at all in being in a situation of contradicting the president so it was really something that you didn't feel that you could actually say something and there wouldn't be any repercussions about it the idea that you can get up here and talk about what you know what the evidence what the sciences and no that's it let the science speak it is somewhat of a liberating feeling basically vanished for all for a few months there for a while i think you feel like you're back now i think so. my dear don't think. i think i am thinking how different you feel you should and what

happened to get that thing. well thank you everyone as i promised we'll have a full briefing from here so as you know just a few moments ago the president also released a national 1000 strategy and signed 10 executive orders and other directives to move quickly to contain the crisis underpinning everything the president signed today and everything we do every day will be at wiki some highlights of those actions include an executive order to fill supply shortfalls for vaccinations testing in p.p. the president directed agencies to exercise all appropriate authorities including the defense production act to accelerate manufacturing and delivering of supplies such as and $95.00 masts gowns gloves p.c.r. swabs test 3 agents and necessary equipment and material for the vaccine the

president also signed a presidential memorandum to increase federal reimbursement to states and tribes for the cost of national guard personnel emergency supplies and the personnel and equipment needed to create vaccination centers an executive order that established a covert 19 pandemic testing board to bring the full force of the federal government's expertise to expanding testing supply and increasing access to testing and executive order to bolster access to covert 19 treatments and clinical care a stablish in a comprehensive and coordinated pre-clinical drug discovery and development program to allow therapeutics to be evaluated and developed in response to pandemic threats . sorry i had to clear my throat there's a lot here he also issued an executive order directing the department of education and health and human services to provide guidance on safety opening and operating for schools child care providers and institutions of higher education and executive

order on the occupational safety and health administration to immediately release clear guidance for employers to help keep workers safe from quote. one thanks mosher an executive order to require mask wearing and airports or certain modes of public transportation including many trains airplanes maritime vessels and intercity buses and an executive order establishing a coven $1000.00 health at woody test for something we had previously announced but making it official today to provide specific recommendations to the president for allocating resources and funding in communities with inequities included 1000 outcomes by race ethnicity geography disability and other considerations these steps. of course built on the actions we announced yesterday i had an additional update some of you may have seen this come out through last late last night but i wanted to share with you that as a result of one of the executive orders president biden signed yesterday the acting homeland security secretary issued

a memorandum to review and reset immigration enforcement priorities for 100 days beginning tomorrow the department of homeland security will pause removals for certain individuals this pause will loud the administration to review and reset enforcement policies and ensure that resources are dedicated to the most pressing challenges and that we have a fair and effective for enforcement system rooted in responsibly managing the border and protecting our national security and public safety i had one other item i just wanted to flag for you about something the 1st lady as to let me see if i can find that or i will circle back to it a little bit later with that i'm happy to hear questions equal intricacy off base and the summary earlier today about the president's commitment to extend a year really very serious to start to talk about what is right about that for in addition to confirm the president president before. you know right from assessment

or interfere in the fight for your life and then also the summer when. i can confirm that the united states intends to seek a 5 year extension of new start as the treaty permits the president has long been clear that the new start treaty is in the national security interests of the united states and this extension makes even more sense when the relationship with russia is adversarial as it is at this time new start is the only remaining treaty constraining russian nuclear forces and is an anchor of strategic stability between our 2 countries and to the other part of your question. even as we were. with russia to advance u.s. interests to work to hold russia to account for its reckless and adversarial actions and to this end the president is also issuing issuing a tasking to the intelligence community for its full assessment of the solar winds cyber breach russian interference in the 2020 alexion its use of chemical weapons

against opposition leader alexina vonnie and the alleged bounties on u.s. soldiers in afghanistan so that's hopefully answered all of it that was a mouthful and there are 3 years to solve it is it because you how long is the president willing to receive or the democrats are already talking about reconciliation process is there a fear of the british police or some sort of your 1st draft is the return i know which is going to be recalled you know you know this is history for his presidency . i would just say there were due to leave. well i'm not going to set any times on our 1st full day in office but i will say and hopefully i'll have more for all of you on this tomorrow we are going to be increasing our engagements it's already been ongoing even before the president was inaugurated yesterday but hopefully we'll have more to share with you tomorrow on meetings in gauge mince discussions

that will be going on with leaders on capitol hill and many members over the course of the next several days as i conveyed to all of you yesterday his preference and priority is a bipartisan package and working with members of both parties to come to agreement on that because he believes that the crises facing the american people. as we saw the jobs numbers this morning the unemployment and employment insurance claims i should say we put out a statement by our any see director in case you didn't see that as we've seen and the reports from dr fouty just a few minutes ago this is this crisis is dire and it requires immediate action and we hope and expect members of both parties to work to. to do that we're also not going to take options off the table so what will proceed with those discussions over the next couple of days go ahead kristin i just follow up on that there were some reporting that there was a. good it was a bipartisan group. to give us any indication is that going to happen with divided

economic. well i think the reporting was around a meeting with any c. director brian de book with him earlier today he is definitely going to be engaging with a range of members in a range of different groups of members from capitol hill in the coming days i think we are still working to confirm specific meetings before i came out here and i hope to have more for all of you on that by tomorrow and we're. going to have some republicans who say we just passed the stimulus they're not going to run our business probably among the leases just the program with overnight $1000000000.00 in something that is being sold as if i need to get this passed with bipartisan support because rather than the president doesn't. think it's perfectly into his message of bipartisanship he wants to work with democrats and republicans to address the crises that the american people are facing whether

they live in red states or blue states or democratic democrats or republicans the package was designed based on recommendations from health experts from economists and it's been applauded by everyone from senator bernie sanders to the chamber of commerce and there are specific pieces in there that are meant to serve as a bridge for the american people including a large percentage of it that's for unemployment insurance. funding for vaccine distribution something that is pivotal of us who've already been discussing here today for a reopening of schools so part of the discussion we'll be having with members is what what do you want to cut and this is a plan that he feels addresses. crisis at the moment the follow up on that the work of the senate is being held at this dispute over the filibuster by the leader does he think that there should not be filibusters of the before. well the president

elect spoke just yesterday as you all saw about the spirit of working together and by partition ship to confront the 4 crises facing us seen him work with republicans and democrats and and work toward a bipartisan approach to passing packages that will address the crises we're facing and that certainly is his priority and his preference so that's what he'll continue to work on on day 2 of the administration going make sure they see you can't say that i deceived you learned something right so i want to push you a little bit more on that question because you do there's this call for unity that the president made his speech yesterday but there is so far been almost no physically given to the republican party you don't have a republican cabinet member why president obama didn't promise i think president clinton had you you know the executive orders that he's come out the gate have been largely designed to be received much of the trophy legacy is if you can with

executive orders much of which the republican party likes and agrees with you put forth the immigration bill that has the power to citizenship but it doesn't do much of an arm towards the border security and you've got a $1.00 trillion dollar. covert relief bill that has as folks have said already got all sorts of criticism where is the where is the actual action for this idea of bipartisanship and when when are we going to see one of those you know through substantial reaches that says this is something that you know the republicans want to do to well i guess what i would send back to you there's a lot in there so let me do my best here but mike is is unemployment insurance only . issue that democrats in the country want to do only democrats want their kids to go back to schools do only democrats want vaccines to be distributed across the country that's we feel that that package he feels that package is designed for bipartisan support i will also say that we have also had some positive developments

on our confirmations and our nominees last night as you all saw his not the president's nominee now confirmed leader 1st female leader of the intelligence community was confirmed with a vote of 852-108-4210 you can check me on that but an overwhelming vote we have seen progress today on on the nomination and hopeful confirmation of lloyd austin so there is movement supported by both sides of the aisle members of both parties i think if you talk to democrats and republicans on the hill which i know many of you do they will say they're not looking for something symbolic they're looking for engagement they're looking to have a conversation they're looking to have a dialogue and that's exactly what he's going to do. reached out to michael leaders to sit down and discuss this really. how much personal involvement is he in this process i expect he will be rolling up his sleeves and will be quite

involved in this process mary and he was yesterday was quite a busy day for him as you all know his schedule is minute by minute and his family was here but he was involved even before yesterday having conversations with members of both parties picking up the phone and having those conversations he saw of course members of both parties he invited leaders from both parties to join him at church and he said that wasn't really a discussion about specifics of the bill but they did he did have an opportunity to talk about his agenda and working to for working together on his agenda moving forward but i think you will see him quite involved in the days ahead but you also see the vice president quite involved he will also see. policy leaders like brian d.s. and others in the administration quite involved and having conversations with both democrats and republicans have a sit down with them but i think we will have more to share with you soon in terms of engagement of many of our senior officials with members of both parties and on

the defense production just to be clear has the administration actually invoked the defense production and sound to sell out what changes we made because of this which companies are being asked to make while. well let me give you a very specific example that helped really make it clear for me. one area is to acquire more lou loaded volume syringes and what that does is these specialized syringes allow pharmacists in vaccinators to extract an extra dose of the pfizer vials so making more doses available of course it also prioritizes the defense production act raw materials that are used to produce the vaccine so reducing bottlenecks and it enables manufacturers us to. hour and focus and action from manufacturers to make sure we have the materials we need to get the vaccines out the door and in the arms of americans and terms of obviously signed it this afternoon i have to just circle back with you and what it means if

it's officially invoked in this moment or if it takes some time and we can we can circle back with you after the briefing but our interest is the world has a legislator will. be meeting in terms of the what he announced last week last thursday when he announced what his specific ideas will be and what his vision is but right now we're having discussions with members of both parties as we have for the last week about what that will look like ok so no real draft coming out of the white house is a well i'll i'm happy to talk to our legislative team about that i think what was important to the president was to outline what his vision would be this is how the process should actually work right the president outlines here's the my vision here's what i think should be in a package let's have discussions let's have engagements with both parties and let's see what comes out of the sausage making at the other side. sorry. he's going to have don't think about flatter the president for. keeping the

filibuster where he said that he's talked to senator schumer through there a long time what are his thoughts and i think what i was conveying to kristen is that the president has been clear he wants to work with members of both parties and find bipartisan paths forward and i don't have any more conversations to read out for you at this point this is the answer unless i'm not understanding and i am more and more that to my answer just on the petermann i know that there was some talk about through the senate doing both those things at the same time these are ones there's some reporting this afternoon that republicans are pushing down the aisle starting february already you will see i'm still there are you still looking for that both parents and. it is entirely to be probable 1st or are you ok with we are as. well i need i think we have been pretty consistent that we believe the

timing and the mechanisms for congress in the senate moving forward and holding the former president accountable will leave that to them and what our biggest priority and focus is is ensuring that it doesn't delay. the senate congress moving forward in consideration discussion around the code relief package that the president proposed last week. this is critical work i have to myself and then a passion for someone who cannot be here because of the social distancing for my question is this and it's about unity i heard from conservatives who are afraid that the president is going to try to hold back religious conscience exemption for groups like the little sisters of the for president pledge to do that in july when the little sisters one of the case in the supreme court of. health and human services nominee javier basara out pursued not long ago in the going after the exemption says attorney general of california what's the president going to do. i

haven't discussed that particular issue with him i'm happy to circle back with you but i don't there's not a change in his position from what he said earlier this summer did you have a no other question that's in front of you you were saying. he says we saw the president warmly greet american listening to the white house press secretary jay and. roll hall doing a news conference most of the questions of course about the coronavirus. plans all of the new administration a little earlier we heard from sony found she who spoke at length some of the things he said concern to the new variance from south africa brazil and the u.k. . he said the south african brazilian ones were perhaps slightly more concerning but he was confident that the corona virus vaccine can be modified to take account of the new mutations in the virus he also said he believes that most americans will

be vaccinated by the middle of 2021 around the end of summer so let's cross live now to mike hanna who joins us from washington d.c. and was listening to that news conference especially anthony found a little bit earlier i mean it was really interesting apart from the messages that he was conveying we really were seeing almost a completely different doctor at that briefing i don't know whether the word would be relaxed energetic rejuvenated but definitely there was a different atmosphere was in there. well dr felt she was reluctant to comment too blatantly on his experience of the previous regime however he did use the word that actually did characterize how he looked and how he is speaking that word is liberated you said being driven by science and being backed by a president driven by sciences as he put it there liberating and he went at lengths

to explain how his conversations with the president had made very clear that the campaign against the pandemic was going to be truthful and transparent yes this is very important he said to get correct information out to the u.s. people i just got to correct one thing there is that he did not say that most americans would be vaccinated by the summer he said that if the majority or 75 percent of americans are vaccinated by the summer then there could be a way to start pushing the pandemic back and there could be the possibility of a herd immunity being built up but he was choosing his words very carefully attempting to be as clear as possible that many of these issues are not clear that you've got to follow the science you've got to check the data the data sometimes gets confusing you've got to go through it research and look at it again but dr

back in the briefing room of the white house certainly is something that's going to be welcomed by many many americans he was a figure of trust that has been looked to throughout this pandemic and many were deeply disappointed when dr felt she was basically removed from the white house pandemic team under president trump and basically sidelined so many relieved to see dr back in the center of things absolutely mike hanna with the latest from washington d.c. mike thank you. the north korea's nuclear program is one of the major foreign policy challenges facing the new administration washington's approach to dealing with pyongyang changed considerably during donald trump's 4 years in office but that did little to get the country to abandon its nuclear ambitions are diplomatic editor james bays reports. this would you will a new submarine launched ballistic missile on veiled at

a military parade in pyongyang further evidence that north korea continues to develop nuclear weapons and the missiles that could deliver them. appears this despite the trumpet ministrations focus on north korea which amounted to a most unusual 4 year diplomatic rollercoaster ride this was september 27th seen at the u.n. general assembly the united states has great strength and patients but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies we will have no choice but to totally destroy north korea. yet only 9 months later all had changed the historic meeting in singapore between trump and kim jong un after a thorough mainly engineer by south korea. there was a clear report between the 2 leaders we know. the special class which led to

a 2nd meeting in 2019 in her noise though the u.s. wouldn't give ground on sanctions discussing everything and north korea wouldn't agree to give up its nuclear arsenal despite this trump while at the g 20 summit in japan later in the year suggested on twitter he took a detour on the way home the 2 met again in a demille or tries becoming the 1st u.s. president to set foot in north korea. experts believe after all that the mecurio north korean leader will be skeptical about future diplomacy i think it will be much more cautious going forward which is not necessarily good for us the negotiations and i think you know the price of everything has gone up as well because. that the relationship can actually change and that a different outcome is possible and the skepticism it's starting to. for the biden

administration there are no easy answers on north korea they say they're going to work more closely with our allies in the region that approach will help but it doesn't solve the underlying problem which is getting more acute by the day and that is that north korea with toy is expanding its nuclear program james. washington. well p.j. crowley is a former u.s. assistant secretary of state for public affairs he joins us over skype from washington d.c. sir thank you so much for joining us here on al-jazeera a lot to talk about when we focus on the american foreign policy under a new biden administration let's just start with north korea because that's what our foreign affairs editor was discussing there i mean i think there more than anywhere else the difference in tone was highlighted how easy do you think it's going to be for joe biden to kind of roll back all the 4 years of a trumpet ministration. well i don't think it was inappropriate for donald trump to

test the waters with direct meetings after all we've been were wrestling with this for 30 years and nothing else so it worked i think what what you know where he went sideways was his expectation that after one meeting the nuclear issue a soft. you know it and so i think that there needed to be an incremental negotiation and and after 2 meetings or 3 they basically abandon the issue altogether so but but north korea is a perfect example of where you know a missed ration will bring its own ideas into office you know need to kind of assess what are they inheriting in terms of challenges what other actors around the world we're talking about north korea whether we're talking about the bomb blast in baghdad today others will you know by for attention early in the by the administration yeah and i suppose one of certainly that the governments that

started tweeting in discussing and commenting in reacting on the by the administration that was iran talking about nuclear issues a trump famously put the u.s. out of the iran nuclear deal at president biden has made it clear he would like to restart it one way or another do you think that we can go back to how it was a de think i knew deal between the u.s. and iran will be needed will perhaps other issues and also include it. well i think there's a desire in tehran in washington in europe. just to salvage the deal. but even with that desire going back to where we were going to be very difficult if politics gets in the way for example the bite him astray she said you know under the if iran comes back into compliance we'll consider going back into the deal iran starts from a very different place if the united states lift the sanctions that the. trump

administration reimposed you know then we'll move back into compliance and you know so you know that's a that's we even where there's desire there's kind of a froth have to be very difficult to make progress with the and of course the links with iran are also tied in a way to the relationship between the u.s. and israel we know that president biden is not going to move the u.s. embassy back to tell of eve from jerusalem how strong do you think he is going to be with with benjamin netanyahu when it comes to stopping a future settlement expansion in a possible future palestinian state while the 2 leaders know each other very well in fact during the obama administration press the vice president biden at the time you know was meeting with the prime minister when the israel announced a very significant. project it was very embarrassing for the prime minister and it did provide some temporary leverage in terms of 'd getting israel

to be more forthcoming in dialogue with the palestinians so they they know each other but by the same token the ground has dramatically shifted over the past 4 years. i think the biden mr ation for example will try to reopen lines of communication with the palestinians but we may well have to see that there is a change of leadership within israel and within the palestinian authority if we ever are going to see direct negotiations again one of the criticisms coming out of the middle east is that actually yes of course donald trump had a different tone and he often sounded overly aggressive but actually the u.s. interests there where much of the same and when it comes to realities on the ground like settlement expansion maybe in a way with the trumpet ministration that was less hypocrisy what's your answer to that. well interests do not necessarily change from one to mr ation of

the next how a government goes about implementing its objectives can change dramatically you know so you know you can say for example united states wants to constrain iran's nuclear ambitions that's a bipartisan objective c. the obama administration thought that that was advanced through j c p a way the trump administration said you know we're better off with no deal than what they perceived as a flawed deal but the reality is today iran is closer to a nuclear weapon that it was 4 years ago. i think the for example the trump administration you know reduced the u.s. military presence in places like syria in places like afghanistan i think the biden ministration will be very cautious of all going further but but this is where i think for the next 3 to 6 months there is its objective will be simply let's assess

where things are and then try to determine whether to continue a particular approach or whatever just means are appropriate if the u.s. for decades has had the volo of let's say the world policeman that the one superpower but a lot of trust has been of roaded in the u.s. now the world knows that actually at every election year about 100000 voters here and there in some swing state in the united states away from having another donald trump so do you think that that trust can ever be regained should it be regained. i it will have to be earned there's no question about that i think the atmosphere excess are a good start you know i think most people do anticipate that diplomacy will return to normal conversations will have meaning they don't have to look over their shoulder and worry about a 5 am tweet that may or may not reflect u.s.

policy so i do think that this is an important start that said these issues are complex for recent. but i do think that that a return to regular. engagement bringing the tone and texture down little bit you know is an important step towards regaining american trust around the world p.j. crowley former u.s. assistant secretary of state for public affairs officer thank you for sharing your views with us a pleasure barbara. at least 32 people have been killed in twin suicide bombings in the iraqi capital. it happened in a market in central baghdad it's the most violent incident there in 3 years no one has claimed responsibility for the attack but the government is blaming eisel. china has expressed concern over twitter's decision to block the account of its

u.s. embassy the embassy tweeted that we go women were no longer quote baby machines thanks the government policies to eradicate extremism twitter says this violates its policy on dehumanization china has been accused by rights group of forcing we get women in the region to have sterilizations and take birth control china denies the accusations. health officials in the u.s. state of florida are climbing down on so-called covert 19 vaccine tourism the move comes after reports of people over the age of 65 traveling to the state to get vaccinated for misfires canada argentina and india and the gallagher reports from miami. with over 1500000 cases in around 25000 deaths florida has been hit hard by the code 1000 pandemic those over the age of 65 a demographic that makes up 20 percent of the population account for

a majority of the fatalities here many are outraged that people reportedly from as far afield as canada india and argentina where vaccine access is more limited a flying in and taking advantage of the state's vaccination program it's especially galling for those facing delays amid reports that as many as 40000 out of state people have already received their 1st dose people are clamoring to get this vaccine one way or the other. where ever they have to go to get it state officials say they're putting a stop to so-called vaccine tourism despite originally opening up the inoculation program to anyone 65 or older now we do have a part time residents who are here all winter they go to doctors here whatever and that's fine but we don't want is people tourists foreigner if you look some of these hospitals have foreign clients and that's why you have a couple of people that were in the news for this. but we want to put seniors 1st we obviously want to put people to live here 1st in line one nursing home in west

palm beach is being investigated following reports that wealthy donors and country club members receive vaccines ahead of residents and staff it's hoped new rules requiring people to prove their florida residency will put an end to the kind of tourism many here don't want the state's governor is playing down the number of people that traveled here to get vaccines claiming it's a sign of florida success in rolling out the program for those still facing delays who have serious health concerns it's emblematic of a rollout many see as too slow and problematic and agalloch are al-jazeera miami florida. that is it for this news hour remember you can get the latest on everything that we have been covering on our website especially is and the gallagher was talking about the vaccine the state of the vaccines around the world for the cove and the pandemic. or you can stay out with me here we're going to be

back in just a few minutes with more of today's news that's watching a bike. from fossil fuels to modern day renewable as societies develop the energy demands increase requiring innovative solutions to meet such to moms as a global power develop into the investment company nebraska power is uniquely positioned to deliver against the stick around we provide business growth promote social economic benefits and provide innovative safe and fire mentally sound energy solutions for future generations the brush pioneering future energy.

freezing winds and rugged terrain and at times seem impossible. but for afghan traders who brave the will concur a door that is no choice. combating the impossible to sell their goods in isolated areas. we follow that daring journeys as they overcome the extremes. risking it all afghanistan on al-jazeera. welcome to down from every one of us. even those working quietly behind the scenes. so you can relax and enjoy the perfect break in your journey.

and when you leave with a smile we know our day's work is down cats are a welcome to our home. paul and untold stories from asia and the pacific i'm out to see if. 'd we can get through this mess overnight it's going to take months for us to turn things around joe biden paints a grim picture of america's battle with the coronavirus signing executive orders and blasting the dismal failure of his predecessor.