it. >> that does it for this special edition of the situation room. i'll be back at 5:00 p.m. eastern tomorrow. in the meantime, have a happy easter sunday. thank you very much for watching. hello and welcome to our viewers here in the united states and all around the world, i'm michael holmes. now on this easter sunday, the united states finds itself in a sobering and tragic position. it now has the highest number of reported coronavirus deaths in the world, more than 20,000 people in the u.s. have succu succumbed to the pandemic. think about that number, 20,000, and the number of infections is more than half a million. based on johns hopkins figures, the u.s. has almost a third of the wrorld's reported cases. for the first time in the nation's history, every state is under a disaster declaration at

the same time. in los angeles, employees and customers of essential businesses must now wear face coverings, and in the pandemic's american epicenter, new york, the governor says the curve is still flattening but even the encouraging news is terrible news because so many people are dying. >> terrible news is the number of lives lost, 783 yesterday. that is not an all time high, and you can see that the number's somewhat stabilizing, but it is stabilizing at an horrific rate. >> president donald trump was asked about a timetable for easing back on restrictions and reopening the country. he said he would make that decision, quote, fairly soon, but would mr. trump listen to any of the political business or medical leaders he says will help him make that decision. a new report in the "new york

times" reveals how the president down played or simply ignored warnings about the virus from very early on. cnn's jeremy diamond breaks it down for us. >> according to the "new york times," it was the third week of february when the government's top public health experts concluded that aggressive social distancing measures would need to be implemented in order to slow the spread of the coronavirus, but when that decision was made by those public health experts, the president was traveling in india, and so the experts decided that they should brief him in person when he returned, but that flight from india back to washington was a momentous one. during that flight, the president grew furious at watching the stock market crash after dr. nancy messonir warned that there would be severe disruptions to daily life. so instead of that briefing that the president was set to receive upon his return from india to implement those social distancing guidelines the

president held a news conference putting vice president mike pence in charge of the coronavirus efforts. from there we know that the white house's response began to shift focusing especially on public messaging trying to assure the american people that they had the response under control. now, we also know that beyond that briefing and beyond those conclusions by those public health experts there were warnings inside the trump administration in january as well as in february. we reported, of course, on the memo by peter knnavarro, the president's trade advisory in late january warning of trillions of dollars in economic losses and that millions of americans could be infected with this virus. we also know that the deputy national security adviser was also sounding the alarm back in january about the potential for a global pandemic. the president meanwhile, though, we know exactly what he was thinking at the time because he was telling the public. the president in january and in february repeatedly down playing the threat of this coronavirus pandemic insisting that he had it under control.

jeremy diamond, cnn the white house. and joining me now is cnn's security analyst david sanger. he is also the national security correspondent for the "new york times" and co-author of this extraordinary reporting. really remarkable, david. so much detail. what sort of stands out to me bluntly, the president down playing the risk that it seems he knew about or should have known about as early as january. >> well, that's right, i mean, what we learned in the course of our reporting was that the national security council, part of the white house, of course, was so intent on this issue in january, they were holding daily meetings about it. by january 27th, they held a meeting of what's called the deputies, sort of the number twos in all the different departments but it was such a big issue that everybody else crowded into the room. and of course within a few days the president did do the band of

chinese nationals and others from wuhan coming into the united states. that had huge holes in it. first of all, american citizens were able to come back in, and they weren't particularly vigorously tested, but secondly and perhaps most importantly, if that bought him a few weeks to prepare. he didn't do the preparation, and he didn't get out and tell people, hey, look, there's something comings at us we have to be prepared for and pray it doesn't show up and he didn't use the time to order the ventilators or the personal protective gear or anything else. >> well, yeah, and in fact, quite the opposite. i mean, tlfrs ohere was one quo senior medical adviser in an email january 28th, and he says any way you count it, this is going to be bad. the projected size of the outbreak already seems hard to believe, and yet the president,

the administration kept on playing it down saying it would go away, a miracle, cases would be down to zero and on and on and on. so just how early did the administration know it should be acting decisively yet did not? and by administration i mean the president. >> well, that quote came from an email we obtained that had been written by carter maycher, who is the chief medical officer of veteran's affairs administration or agency, and he, of course, has long experience in dealing with these kind of pandemics, but by the third week of february, just three weeks later, this was pretty much the widely held view inside the white house, the full medical community, and so forth, and yet it took them three weeks until the middle of march to convince the president. the president said three contradictory things here. first he said no one could

imagine this happening. of course they did, they even ran exercises in the situation room of what this would look like. the second thing he said is i knew it would be a pandemic all along. well, then why didn't he act on it? and then the third thing he said is you know, i wanted to be a cheerleader for the country. it's fine to be a cheerleader for the country, but if you think something's coming that's going to kill a good part of your populous, before you're a cheerleader, you have to get up there and do some warning about the preparations that need to be made. >> being a cheerleader while keeping the public in the dark about something he knew was coming. another quote was that the president was slow to absorb the scale of the risk and act acc d accordingly focusing instead on controlling the message, protecting gains in the economy and batting away warnings from senior officials. it is hard to believe these delays did not cost lives. >> it's hard to believe that

they didn't. it will be impossible to assess, i suspect, what might have been. the president has always been driven more by what the stock market does than anything else, and his first big moment of rage here came on his way back from his trip to india, which he took in february, and he was at that time incredibly upset that the head of the centers for disease control had given a pretty blunt statement about how americans are going to have to prepare for something that could change their lives out here for a while, and certainly their habits. and so when he landed from india, he called the secretary of health and human services and chewed them out for the way the head of the cdc had described this. well, of course it turned out she was exactly right, and that became the message that the administration turned out but only three weeks later, and you can imagine how many more people were infected in the interim.

>> thousands, tens of thousands more. i mean, the president is notoriously suspicious of what he likes to call the deep state, but in this very situation, what he sees as the deep state are, in fact, long-time government experts, scientists, medical professionals. >> well, you know, this combines two characteristics the president has. one, as you point out is he doesn't like the deep state, and he went into this year, of course, beginning with impeachment determined that he was going to root out the deep state loyalists who he thought were trying to bring him down. that was a theme both during and after impeachment, you saw it in what he did with the state department officials. you saw it in what he did with the inspectors general. there's also a deep and abiding mistrust with experts, scientists, data driven decisions that he can't particularly manipulate or spin, and i think that made him even more suspicious of the doctors

and scientists here. and he did not have a whole lot of experience in thinking about epidemiology before, so he was learning on the way as well as we all have been in the course of the past few months. >> yeah, unfortunately a suspicion of things like the deep state can be political in other situations. in this situation, a matter of life and death. got to leave it there, david. thank you, david sanger, terrific reporting you and the team. >> thank you, great to be with you. so precious time squandered in the u.s. response to the coronavirus, that's time that could have been spent, of course, stocking up on vital supplies, identifying short falls in testing and establishing mitigation efforts sooner. much sooner. all of which could have helped the country turn the corner sooner in this pandemic. joining me now is dr. amy compton phillips, cnn medical analyst and chief clinical officer of providence health

system and dr. compton phillips also oversees clinical care at 51 hospitals including the one near seattle where the first u.s. covid patient was treated. it's great to have you back, doctor. let's start with what you were seeing in terms of trends in the u.s. the president has been sounding a very optimistic note, but is it too early for that kind of talk? >> i think it -- we really are seeing glimmers of hope. here in seattle, we actually think we're past the peak. in new york we think we're in the flat part of the curve. in other parts of the country, we're starting to see a slowdown, so we really think we're starting to see benefits from social distancing. that said, that doesn't mean you get to immediately turn on the economy and make everything go back to normal. >> yeah, a lot of people think, well, i think one "new york times" analyst said it would be 200,000 within a few minutes. speaking of the "new york times," there's a report out showing that the warnings given and concerns raised were brushed off or ignored by the white

house. cnn does confirm that includes an agreement by the government's top public health officials in the third week of february that mitigation like aggressive social distancing should happen. it did not happen as we know it. how might delays like that have impacted what has subsequently happened in the u.s.? >> you know, there was a great article in national geographic a couple of weeks ago looking at what happened in the 1918 flu pandemic, and there they found that in cities that had sooner and longer social distancing many, many lives were saved, that places that did social distancing later after the infection had gotten a toe hold in a community, a lot more lives were lost. and so the longer we went without having social distancing, without closing the schools and impacting the economy, the more people were affected by this virus. >> yeah. so quite literally, it would have cost lives. i wanted to ask you about the testing issue because everybody's talking about that

still despite what we hear from the white house, it does appear to still be woefully inadequately. in terms of testing enough people, those who are asymptomatic but spreading in order to be able to properly, you know, identify, isolate contact trace, is that still a concern for you? >> it's absolutely a concern, and it's how we're going to get the economy back moving again. not only do we have to get the number of infections way down to a handful, but we have to have the testing capacity once we are able to start ratcheting up our ability to go out of our house again and get back to our lives. we have to be able to start testing and isolating anybody who does have the virus, which means we have to have much broader access to testing than is available today because despite what's promoted at times from various quarters across the u.s., it definitely -- there are bottlenecks in terms of getting everybody we need the testing. >> yeah, yeah. it certainly seems to be the case. i wanted to ask you a sort of

broader question. we have an international audience, you know, i certainly grew up in a universal health care country, lived in a couple of others. health care in the u.s. is by and large an employee benefit, in most cases if you don't have a job, you don't have insurance or the ability to buy your own. i'm curious with a pandemic like this, what holes, perhaps, in the u.s. health care system have been exposed? >> many holes unfortunately, and it may come up in several different ways. one is if people are uninsured, they're homeless, if they have no papers, they're not here in the country illegally, they don't access to health care insurance. if people like that don't feel the capacity to come in and get tested but they have a fever and a cough, they're out in the community infecting others. the fact that we don't have universal health care can make this epidemic go longer and be worse. it really is time to start looking at our health care system and understanding what we can do to patch those holes.

>> yeah, good points as always, thanks so much. it's great to have you on. >> thank you. well, it is easter sunday, of course, in much of the world, the holiest day on the christian calendar and with millions of people around the world hunkered down at home celebrations look much different than last year. pope francis offering a message of hope saying do not be afraid. do not yield to fear. he spoke inside an empty basilica on saturday night. in just a few hours he will consecrate easter mass in front of a symbolic congregation of around 20 people. we're going to take a short break. when we come back, we'll have an update on british prime minister boris johnson as he continues to recover from coronavirus, and we will have his message for the workers who are caring for him. also iran beginning to ease coronavirus restrictions on some of its businesses. we'll find out which ones are reopening. stay with us.

we'll be right back. ♪

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i owe them my life, those words from the british prime minister boris johnson to the workers at the london hospital where he is recovering from

coronavirus. mr. johnson sounding very grateful there in his first public statement since he was brought in a week ago, and what a week it's been for the prime minister. cnn's nick paton walsh is live in london for us, so after time in the icu, the pm on the mend and grateful, tell us about it. >> certainly, and obviously as you're mentioning one of a number of european countries that has entirely free health care for most people, and obviously he was pointing out that the nhs, the national health service there were those who brought him back from a condition frankly, which i think many underestimated initially when he was first admitted into what was suggested to be precautionary circumstances, possibly tests as well, that radically worsened over 24 hours to the point where he was said to be receiving oxygen treatment inside an intensive care unit. only, though, i believe three nights spent in the icu. then he was out again.

as he was leaving the icu he waved at nurses. this is the first statement he's made to say to those nhs staff i can't thank them enough. i owe them my life. that brings forward the gravity of the situation that prime minister boris johnson was facing. obviously no government wants to admit their leader into the hospital unless it's absolutely necessary. i think most people were shocked that both the prime minister himself had not been protected from this disease but also reminded as britain hit the peak about a week ago when he was put into hospital about exactly how indiscriminate and grave the situation is for the united kingdom, startling that yesterday 917 people lost their lives putting britain as it new year's what we believe to be the plateau of the peak here according to uk officials, pretty much parity with it sli a -- italy and spain in terms of the death toll. some figures have suggested these daily tolls that count positive cases in hospitals that have subsequently died may be

underestimating those who die in care homes and elsewhere, possibly by a factor maybe of 50% or so, shocking to think. michael. >> wow. and i think a lot of countries are now sort of realizing that, too, that they're probably underestimating the number of deaths caused by this. on the nhs, you know, it's long been said that it's sort of been under funded and things like that. what is the state of nhs staff? how have they been affected? are they well supplied enough? >> well, there's been great controversy in the united kingdom about personal protective equipment, frankly as there has been around the world. there is a global shortage, partly because nobody ever anticipated this extraordinary bulk need of protective gear. it's government who gets the key focus, and there has been consistent criticism for the last two weeks as to whether or not adequate protective gear has been given to the front line nhs workers dealing with covid-19 patients. the health secretary matt hancock was asked 48 hours ago

how many had died while working to fight this virus. he wasn't able to give an answer himself until the following morning where he said 19 had lost their lives. the home secretary said that she was, quote, sorry if people felt there hadn't been enough done for supplying ppe to front line workers. officials here consistently saying they're doing all they possibly can to get as much as they can to the people who need it, but there's been discrepancy, frankly, in the minds of workers as to what guidelines permit them to wear. i remember speaking to one doctor ten days ago who had gone to a hardware store and purchased for himself a visor to put over the surgical mask and also a hazmat suit. he had been told to go home because those protective equipment didn't fit the guidelines. things have since been eased and more protective equipment been permitted or encouraged at the front line, but you have to have some degree sympathy for a government here that is struggling to deal with a global competition for these kind of items. but at the same time, too,

occasionally possibly overworked to the point that their messaging around how this can be dealt with often comes off -- some criticizing the statement from the home secretary yesterday saying that she felt sorry about -- she was sorry that people felt about the delivery of ppe not being adequate as being a half apology, not really what people needed to hear. a real struggle for the uk, but really we are at a point now where we may be getting near to a thousand deaths possibly a day, which is a startling number frankly for anyone to behold. >> yeah, very sobering. nick paton walsh good to see you, thanks, nick, there in london for us. we're going to take a quick break. when we come back, some world leaders are acting like the global pandemic isn't a big threat. in a moment, how some are down playing the virus. also, the u.s. president wants to send americans back to work and jump start the economy, but is it his call to make? we'll talk about that as well after the break. that the world needs.

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welcome back, the united states now reporting the post coronavirus-related deaths in the world, the number of fatalities now more than 20,000, and there are more than half a million reported cases of infection. all of this according to johns hopkins figures. from one death to more than 20,000 deaths in 42 days. in los angeles it is now mandatory for employees and customers of essential businesses to wear face coverings, and in new york the governor says the curve is starting to flatten, but the number of deaths is still staggering, and for the first time in u.s. history, every state is under a disaster declaration at the same time. never happened before. the u.s. president eager to reopen the economy as soon as

possible, his advisers urging him to consider the deadly consequences, though, of sending americans back to work too soon. mr. trump says he will weigh their advice but still isn't sure what choice he will make. >> i'm going to have to make a decision, and i only hope to god that it's the right decision, but i would say without question it's the biggest decision i've ever had to make. >> joining me now, katherine rampel cnn economics commentator and "washington post" opinion columnist. a lot going on. we've been hearing the president on the subject of reopening the economy call it the biggest decision i've ever had to make. firstly, let's clarify this. it's not really his decision, is it? it's up to the governors, the mayors, individual business owners, right? >> right. if you look at who's actually been issuing the orders to shelter in place, to engage in social isolation, close down

schools, businesses, that sort of thing, it's not the president, right? it's governors. it's mayors, other municipal officials who are making those kinds of decisions. so trump can issue guidance, i suppose, that would encourage these local and state leaders to reopen the economy, but it doesn't seem like it would have force of law at this point, and even if they decided to listen to him, of course, beyond that just because businesses are allowed to operate does not necessarily mean that customers are going to feel comfortable going out and eating at restaurants or attending concerts or other things that continue to be high risk. >> yeah, yeah, i think 60% of americans think it's a good idea to stay indoors at the moment. it was interesting, too, when the president was asked directly what metrics he would use in deciding whether to reopen the economy, which we've established isn't his decision, i mean, he just pointed to his head, and he said that's the metrics there.

and cnn reporting part of his consideration has been pressure from wall street, friends on wall street. how much influence do you think they have on him in the middle of a public health emergency? >> i think he basically listens to the last person who was in his ear at any given time, so if that was a friend on wall street, if that was somebody -- some sycophant in the white house, that is who he will be listening to or people who tell him what he wants to hear. my concern, of course, about the advice being given by ceo's is that they are not public health experts, and we need to be listening to the public health experts about what we need to be doing policy wise, guidance wise in order to mitigate the spread of this outbreak so that the economy can be on a better footing. because actually, there's no tension between what economists think is good for the economy in the long run and what public health experts say is good for

saving lives. what you need to do is to save those lives and get the spread of infection under control, hospitalizations down so that people can go about their normal economic activities so that this the longer run basically the economy can normalize more quickly and that there will be less damage. >> and without false starts, exactly. is there a sense from those you're in touch with that the president is in some ways willing to risk, at least some element of public health in order to boost the economy in what, let's face it is an election year. >> he's been pretty clear about that, right? he has said essentially that we need to make sure that the cure is not worse than the problem or the cure is not worse than the disease referring explicitly to the fact that he's unhappy that economic activity has been shut down and people are out of work. and of course we don't want those things. we don't want to have record high numbers of people failiili

for unemployment, businesses going out of business, new filings for bankruptcies, things like that. we all want the economy to get back onto a solid footing. but again, there is no actual tradeoff hear. i think that trump seems to think that there's a tradeoff here between doing what's best for public health and doing what's best for the economy, but economists are saying that's not the case. >> you know, i think it's a third of american renters did not pay their april rent. that is a staggering number even before this crisis, also the federal reserve found that four in ten americans didn't have the savings or other resources to cover any unexpected $400 expense. many people just lost their job, in many cases their health insurance as well. realistically it's not a lot of money, is it? i mean, i speak to the economic and social damage being done here. >> no, and people are suffering. again, we've seen record high unemployment claim filings.

we do have these so-called stimulus checks starting to reach people's bank accounts, but not coming quickly enough. it's going to be weeks, if not months before the last group of people who are eligible for those checks gets them, and when they get them, it's not going to be sufficient. we are doing -- in the united states we're doing other things to beef up the safety net including expanding the numbers of people, the types of people who can be eligible to unemployment insurance. starts are not equipped to ramp up quickly enough for all of that. look, congress has done a few things to try to ease the pain. it's not sufficient. there's going to have to be another coronavirus relief bill of some sort even beyond the fact that we've already passed three rounds of relief at this point, including a record $2 trillion, you know -- it's been called stimulus, but it's really not stimulus. it's just relief at this point, it's survival at this point,

there's going to have to be more to be done. >> exactly. always a pleasure. thanks for being on. >> thank you. the iranian government is beginning to ease some of its coronavirus restrictions. it's allowing what it calls low risk businesses to begin opening. according to the health ministry that means takeout services, businesses where people aren't sitting inside, but the easing of restrictions does not include tehran, the capital has to wait another week. all of this coming, of course, as the number of infections in iran continues to rise. for more on this, let's turn to cnn senior international correspondent sam kiley joining us from abu dhabi. tell us about the government's plan. how is this going to work when cases of the flu are going up? >> well, michael, you put your finger on the conundrum the iranians are facing as indeed are governments around the world facing, not least in the west where the calculation is when to lift lockdowns that are doing devastating amounts of economic damage to a country whilest at

the same time trying to contain the spread of this virus. president rouhani said yes today, that he would be lifting the large number of restrictions particularly on economic activity around the country, even in the city of 1.2 million, there was at the beginning of the spread of this virus some weeks ago now very much at the epicenter. there will be no public gatherings, no cinema, no restaurants open, but they are trying to get economic activity going not in the capital. that won't be for another week, michael, and the reason for this, of course, is that the iranians are deeply impoverished, not least because they're facing u.s. sanctions at this time and unable to have much money around to restart their economy, michael. >> and briefly speaking of that, iran heavily, heavily sanctioned. how does that impact its ability

to fight the virus? >> it's been catastrophic, the iranians say. they've kuaccused the u.s. administration of donald trump medical terrorism. this is because even countries in the european union who are trying to help have to do so with gifts in kind. they can't send money because that would violate federal banking systems, and that seems to be also what is snarling up a desperate appeal by the iranians for a $5 billion injection of funds from the international monetary fund, an organization that's never reached out to before, one that is being reached out to of course by other nations around the world who are facing economic reconstruction in the post virus economic dispensation. that is not something that so far the americans are allowing the iranians to have. >> sam, thanks so much. sam kiley there in abu dhabi for us. while most governments around the world are doing everything they can, of course, to curb the spread of covid-19,

some countries are acting as if there is no global threat at all. the brazilian president dismissing coronavirus as, quote, a little flu. matt rivers a with more on that >> these three men, the presidents of brazil, nicaragua and belarus would in normal times not seemingly have a ton in common, but these days the common thread here is that while other leaders around the world are taking drastic steps to try and prevent the further spread of this coronavirus, these three presidents are not. start in brazil where president bolsonaro was out and about this week on thursday visit ago bakery, taking photos, drawing crowds, the kind of stuff he's been doing in public for weeks now. brazil has recorded more than 1,000 deaths, nearly 20,000 cases. the health minister has urged lockdown measures be put in place, but the president has said he's more worried about the economy. you don't shut down a car

factory because of car accidents he said. further north in nicaragua, while president daniel ortega attended a virtual meeting last month, he hasn't been seen in public since this military parade on february 21st, so the response to this outbreak has come from his wife, vice president rosario maria who regularly says her country's fate is in god's hands. we don't have community spread she said on thursday with infinite thanks to god. so the government lets life go on normally, state run immedime websites are promoting holiday discounts this weekend at markets markets. this past week president alexander luke schenn coe played in a hockey game saying there were no viruses inside the rink implying that it was too cold. it's better to die standing than to live on your knees, he said. perhaps unsurprisingly, he has

encouraged people to keep playing hockey. >> experts worldwide say that prevention measures must be used to stop the virus's spread, and we have seen country after country tell people to stay at home, but these three presidents seem to be doing the opposite. matt rivers, cnn. the number of coronavirus cases is relatively low so far in africa, but they're rising exponentially, and there is not a lot of testing. we're going to have a look at the unique circumstances on the continent that could pose a real threat to its people. we'll be right back.

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it is not uncommon for leaders in africa to seek medical treatment abroad. the coronavirus, however, is a wake-up call that health systems in many african nations need plenty of work. health officials projecting that by the end of april some african

countries will have more than 10,000 cases. meanwhile, the continent the least equipped to deal with it. joining me now is dr. john cangasong the director of african centers for disease control and prevention. thank you, doctor, you've called the virus, quote, an existential threat to our continent. i mean, it doesn't get much more serious than that. how bad could it be? >> thank you for the opportunity to be on your show. when i said that i meant it. if we see what is happening in europe, when we see what is happening in the united states and we compare and project what can possibly happen to africa, i think it becomes extremely concerning. so we are currently about 10,000 cases reported across the 55 countries in africa with about 740 deaths, but that can change very, very quickly, and our health systems are extremely

fragile. >> is there a way of even knowing how widespread the virus is? i mean, there's not a lot of testing going on. is that estimate of numbers pretty much a guess? >> well, that is a best estimate base on the testing that is currently on the continent. i don't think we are testing enough because we lack the test kits. we work very closely with the world health organization and other partners like the jack ma foundation to scale up. a country that is extremely aggressive in testing so far is south africa, and they've tested about 70,000 tests, which in my opinion is not enough. so i think access to tests is a great challenge for us. >> friafrica has unique circumstances. you've got millions of people who rely on day labor to feed

themselves and their family. how difficult is it to lockdown places like that? a lots of people in slum housing, they're crammed in together. it's not ideal, is it? >> you're right. we try and -- where we knew that circumstances known interventions in public health that would definitely slow down the spread of this virus, but at some time the issues -- the realities of our lives here, so it becomes a huge challenge. so i think what we need to do is put that in our own context and build relationships with those communities and create champions who can actually take this message into their community and help us to inform and educate their population and build that tru trust. we just don't have any options. >> you touched on this earlier,

and let's go back to it. it's hard to generalize across so many nations in africa, but in general, what is the state of health infrastructure capability across the continent? i mean, i know one statistic that south sudan, for example, has four ventilators, the central african republic the same. how bad could it get if those health infrastructures get overwhelmed? >> extremely bad. is what we characterize as an existential threat to us, and it's a looming disaster. those systems and infrastructure do not get fixed overnight. it's supposed to be a process, and it takes time, and you don't go to war. yet, we're at war with the coronavirus in africa. let's be frank with that. we are extremely under resourced. i think this is a global crisis, that will require global action

if africa has a chance to fight back. >> and very briefly because we're almost out of time, what do you want from the world? what is your message? >> my message to the world is that you cannot -- we cannot fight these battles and win them. it has to be a global victory. the battle is to be fought lo l locally but the victory has to be a global victory. africa has been factored into the battle against the coronavirus. >> director of african centers for disease control, thank you so much. we wish you well, appreciate your time. >> thank you for the opportunity. >> to stop the spread of the coronavirus, states are enforcing strict stay at home orders, but that is not stopping some people from going out. we'll show you how one state is using your cell phone to track your movements. we'll be right back. you're clearly someone who takes care of yourself.

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if you're an allstate customer, go to the allstate app or allstate.com this is what it means to be in good hands. subut when we realized she wasn hebattling sensitive skin, we switched to new tide plus downy free. it's gentle on her skin, and dermatologist recommended. new tide pods plus downy free. safe for sensitive skin with eczema and psoriasis. welcome back. new mexico has more than a thousand cases of coronavirus, and it has begun using people's cell phones to track their movements. the technology lets state officials know if people are following social distancing

guidelines. and new mexico is not alone. sara sidner investigates. >> reporter: official government orders to stay at home stare you in the face. but are you obeying them? a tech company uni cast knows grading the state county by county. nevada was near the top of the list of staying home. how did they do it? by tracking cell phone data. now state governments are hiring companies to do it, too. they develop social distancing models that gauge how well residents are adhering to stay at home orders. >> as we dig deeper using cell phone data. >> reporter: the state of new mexico was one of the first to go public, about hiring a company to get cell phone geolocation statistics. >> we came up with a way to measure statistically how far a

person in a community was going away from where they started the day. >> reporter: so you actually could track cell phones to show people were following or not following the stay at home order? >> yes ma. >> reporter: china goes even further, it's using citizen smartphones to control their movements around their cities. a qr code on their phone determines where they can go. americans are really concerned about that kind of personalized tracking. is that concern addressed by the technology? >> absolutely. i mean, i personally am concerned about that as well. so we've got a number of controls that prevent us from tracking individuals. >> reporter: he says the data sold to the u.s. government is just statistics. anonymous information that does not reveal who the phone belongs to. you play a role in being tracked, too. when you download certain apps and agree to let them use your geolocation on your phone, that

data is being used by third party companies and advertisers, and now some state and local governments. there are plenty of companies buying the tracking data. for example. >> not on spring break. >> not really. >> reporter: remember those spring breakers who flocked to beaches even after the warnings so social distance? ex-mode collected data. tectonics was able to show your those spring breakers ended up. those little points of light are cell phones pinging from the beaches. >> as we zoom further and further out it becomes clear how massive the potential impact one single beach gathering can have. >> reporter: if just a few of those spring breakers contracted coronavirus, they could have spread it far and wide. now governments want this kind of data to see if stricter measures are needed. >> i'm talking about how you do that, and everything on the table, including if we needed to, i would consider curfews.

>> reporter: all these tracking capabilities have brought up the equipme quintessential question about privacy. how much are you willing to give up for security and health of the nation? >> like many things, it can be used for good or evil. >> reporter: sara sidner, cnn, los angeles. thanks for spending part of your day with us and watching "cnn newsroom." i'm michael holmes. do stick around now. i'll have more news in just a moment. that the world needs.

but right now, the world needs all the good that we can do. to all of our employees and everyone working to keep america strong, thank you.

hello, and welcome to "cnn newsroom," everyone, i'm michael holmes. thanks for your company. the unit ed states is now reporting the most coronavirus deaths of any country on earth according to johns hopkins. of the daily 109,000 deaths reported, nearly 20,000 have been in the u.s. and of the cases reported worldwide, 500,000 of those are in the u.s. and, in the pandemic's american epicenter of new york, the governor says the curve is continuing to flatten, but the number of deaths remains staggering. new york city officials reporting more than 4,000 new cases on saturday. more than 300 deaths. president donald trump was asked about a timetable, meanwhile, for easing back on restrictions re