i'm in washington. it's thursday, april 16th, 2020. exactly one month after san francisco and a number of california counties were the first to issue stay-at-home orders beginning that domino effect of city and state shutdowns across america. where are we now? emergency federal funds to aid small businesses have run out. as of today almost $350 billion gone in just two weeks. as 22 million americans have filed for unemployment in the last four weeks. and then the search for a vaccine and treatments to reduce the severity of coronavirus has scientists working overtime and getting creative. looking at vaccines specifically for elderly patients and even at

an ebola drug. we'll talk as well to the mayor of boston where coronavirus is spreading among homeless bostonians who are not showing any symptoms, confirming the worst fears about this virus. and in a number of states ohio, north carolina, virginia, michigan, people are protesting the shutdown of their economies. this is sources tells cnn president trump is pushing back on calls for greater testing before states can re-open. that's where we're going to start today at the white house with cnn's katelyn holland. this was on a call where the president was pushing back on these calls for more widespread coronavirus testing. tell us about this call. >> yeah. it was a call the president had today with senators. it was a bipartisan group both democrats and republicans. this is part of this larger congressional task force that the president is building to help focus on re-opening the country. but one concern that we're told by sources that did come up during that call today was

testing. which is exactly what the president heard from business skp executives. people need to feel comfortable going back to work. senators today on this call told the president their concern was people asymptomatic going back to work, not having the ability to get tested and spreading to it other people and worsening the outbreak that we're seeing across the nation. we're told that the president pushed back on that talking about how they ramped up testing here in the u.s. which got off to a slow start. so it's not clear if the president is heeding those concerns that he's heard for two days in a row. on this call from senators and on that call with business executives yesterday. in a few hours he's scheduled to announce those guidelines he says is the first step to re-opening the country. he'll preview them with

governors first and then formally unveil them at his press briefing here this afternoon. we're still waiting to see capital they will look like, if they are state specific. we don't think they are right now. we don't have a lot of specifics and still waiting on that. >> we'll be waiting on that. the number of confirmed cases is continuing to rise in the u.s. it is now as you can see on your screen well above 600,000. this death toll eclipsing 31,000 as you can see there on your screen. erratica hi-- erica hill is in w york city. the governor, there andrew cuomo, said they brought the rate of infection down but still extending the social distancing restrictions for another month. tell us about that. >> reporter: yeah. he's extending -- he put new york on pause through may 15th. it's interesting to note he often talks about working in

concert with the tri-state area because especially here in new york city so many people who work in new york city live in connecticut or new jersey. he wants to make sure states are coordinating. we heard from the new jersey governor who said schools will be closing in his state through may 15th and connecticut has their own pause in place until may 20th. schools will be closed. non-essential businesses are closed here in new york and we learned a little bit more about this face covering that's going into effect here in just a couple of days. we know now it applies to everyone over the age of 2. you have to have a mask on and specifically there were references made to transportation. if you're getting ainu per or lyft car, riding on the subway or on a bus you need to have your face covered. and anybody operating those vehicles, the train or bus needs to do the same. >> and, you know, it's so interesting when you talk about progress, progress looks like this.

right? the governor gave this statistic on average about 2,000 people still going to the hospital each day with coronavirus. >> reporter: yeah. that's what he was saying. he said we still had yesterday 2,000 people walk into a hospital. 600 people died. and he talks about it -- we hear this from a number of elected officials around the country that each one of those that make up the 600 is a person, affects family and friends and still so personal and while the numbers as you point out hospitalization, the need for icu are coming down this is in no way over and that's why the measures are being extended. >> erica hill, thank you so much. and joining he me now is an infectious disease specialist working on a vaccine at boston children's hospital. he's also a professor at harvard medical school. doctor, thank you so much for joining us. >> my pleasure. >> obviously we want to hear a

lot about these vaccine efforts. i want to talk first briefly on the fact that since we don't have a vaccine and we're seeing the president pressuring to re-open the economy, there's this question of what happens if you re-open it too soon without a vaccine. what does that look like? >> well, first of all, let's identify the deep desire of probably every american to get back to some semblance of normalcy. so that's very understandable. that said the virus is out there. there are still a lot of seof se people out there. if you re-open too soon or without careful consideration to how you re-open, the risk is another huge wave of infection that could potentially overwhelm hospitals. >> so, you are -- we were talking in the break about this. doing fascinating work and doing it basically around the clock, models the human immune system for young people, for basically

babies, children, for grown-ups as well for the elderly. tell us about what you're looking at specifically when it comes to the elderly, because they've been so impacted by the coronavirus. >> right. well thank you for that. typically vaccines development early on at least disregards the characteristics of who you give the vaccine to, whether it's a man or woman, young or old. some of these factors can play a big role in how you respond to a vaccine. typical vaccine development can sometimes take quite a longtime. we at the presiegs vaccine progr -- precision vaccine institute taking a different approach. we're doing the design process early. we have bio banks of white blood cells that have been donated by elderly individuals and we're able to test outside of the body different candidate vaccines to see which may work best in that

age group because until immune system is different in the elderly and they are at greatest risk of severe coronavirus disease. >> so beautiful that you have elderly americans who are giving you those white blood cells to try to forward your research here. i won what you think about something dr. fauci said yesterday. he said he believes a vaccine could be ready for public roll out sooner than that 12 to 18 months we've been hearing. do you share that optimism? >> cautiously, i do. you know, we're very grateful to dr. fauci's leadership and his fashion institute of allergy and infectious diseases which he directs is a major supporter of our seven. i know how everybody at nhi, and the u.s. is working on this. we would all love to have a safe and effective vaccine as soon as possible. in fact woe love to have it yesterday. the fact of the matter is if we manage to launch a safe and effective vaccine in less than a

year, that that sounds like -- we wish we could have it fast per to step back a second. traditionally vaccine development has and the 1020 years. we don't have that kind of time. these are very fast timelines. basically based on using the most cutting-edge technologies, having unprecedented levels of collaboration between medical centers, academia and industry. i want to revisit what you said about just how long this takes. just remind us the different phases this has to go through in order to develop this vaccine. just for people at home who are wondering why does it take so long. >> right. so to remember that vaccines have a key component. we call that component an antigen. why? it generates antibodies. you inject somebody with an antigen and their immune system

remembers that. over several weeks you form antibodies against that antigen that might protect you. in the case of the coronavirus one possibility the antigen might be the spike protein on coronavirus. many viewers have seen what the virus looks like. a ball with spikes interest. the tip of those spikes is a goat protein antigen candidate. antibodies against them will block the ability of the virus from infecting human cells. all vaccines have some sort of antigen. some vaccines also have a second component. it boosts the immune response like rocket fuel to make the up mine response much faster and stronger. that might be important here. even if we have a vaccine that's safe and effective that's a great milestone. but remember we also need to scale it up to hundreds of millions or billions ever doses. that's far from trivial. so an antigen allows you to use less of the antigen and an

adovent allows you to boost the vaccine so populations can respond better to the vaccine. the adovent may allow the response to last longer. if you do form an antibody against the coronavirus it will last longer. for these reasons we think adding an adogent is an important part of the solution for an effective coronavirus vaccine. the thing is that antigens have different effects depending on the age of the individual and that's where our precision vaccine program is models which might look best in the elderly? >> taking care of all the groups especially our elderly. thank you so much for walking us through all this and taking us inside the work you're doing. we appreciate it. >> thank you so much. >> up next president trump wants to re-open the economy. we'll be talking to the mayor of

boston about what that could mean for his city which struggling right now to keep the virus one control. then a navy captain was fired for raising the alarm by coronavirus on his aircraft carrier. there may be a new twist for his future. apart for a bit, but you're not alone. we're automatically refunding our customers a portion of their personal auto premiums. learn more at libertymutual.com/covid-19. [ piano playing ]

a problem in a boston homeless shelter is exposing a bigger issue with talk of re-opening the entire country.

boston nonprofit tested everyone entering one homeless shelter. out of almost 400 people, more than a third tested positive for the coronavirus. but most stunning of all, they were all asymptomatic according to the nonprofit. no fever, no reported symptoms. i want to bring in boston mayor to talk to us about this and, you know, mayor, this speaks to the difficulties we've been hearing a number of mayors talk about, treating the homeless population and mitigating their risk. but this speaks to the challenges you're facing generally when you talk about re-opening your city. how do you do that knowing you can have a lot of people coming back to participate in the economy and they are silent carriers? >> well, i think on that question, i think that's why before we open our cities we have to have a plan for massive testing ability in the city of boston and every city of america. i think having these conversations about re-opening

right now, they are important conversations to have and i think they should be planned out in city halls and state capitals all across the country. but i think having an open conversation like this and taking our attention of what's first and foremost the most important thing, continue talking about social distancing, continue talking about isolation, staying six feet away from each other, washing your hands, covering your face, those are things we should be focused on because if we don't stop the spread of the virus if we decide to come back to work whenever we decide to come back to work what's going to happen we could have another spike and that could cause another whole slew of other issues. >> yeah. i want to ask you about something the mayor of los gatos is saying. he's saying the gatherings such as concerts and sporting events these may not come back until next year. do you think that will be the case for boston as well? >> i think he could be right. when you think about, again, depends on the data and the information we have available to

us and where we are with the coronavirus, what cases are still active. how much testing do we have? how many people are immune to the virus. all those questions can't be answered right now. i know very smart people are trying to figure that out. i think as we get this information he some of our decisions we make moving forward we'll be clear. >> you have a number of universities in your area there. do you think that they are going to re-open in the fall as scheduled? >> i think they will. but i think what might be a different type of learning, colleges and universities have the ability to have social distancing in the classroom. they are able to spread it around. do some online learning as well. i think biggest issue will be people living on campus, a lot of the dorms with two or three room mates in a room that's where the challenge will be eventually. but i think certainly they have the time right now to plan out what it looks like and what a college campus could look lying. it will be a lot different than maybe the freshman and sophomore

experience this year at least until the shutdown. but i think they can come up with plans to safely put people back to school. it goes back to the testing and where we are in testing. the white house in washington keeps talking about all these tests coming down. we haven't seen them yet. we've tested in massachusetts about 125,000 people. we're a state of about 6.5 million people. that's a small fraction of who we need to get tested to really get an understanding of what we look like in reality. >> i want to ask you about a measure that you have taken because i think a lot of people have anxiety when it comes to grocery shopping. you reversed the plastic bag ban in boston out of concern reusable grocery bags could carry coronavirus more than normal bags. can you tell us what the basis of that was? what kind of science because you have so many people all over the country trying to look towards best practices. >> it was access to the bags.

a lot of us run out of bags and get plastic ones were quicker to get came down to a safety concern. a lot of people are still recycling. we figured this was one thing we could do to get more bags in the hands of people, in out of the supermarkets. as soon as this crisis is over we'll go back to recyclable bags in our stores because we do a lot of work here on the environment and environmental justice here in boston. we're proud of one of the leading cities in america and we look forward to going back to that. it was just about getting the opportunity to get people out of these towards as quickly as possible. >> mayor, thank you so much. the mayor of boston. we appreciate it. >> thank you very much. stay safe. you as well, sir. we're going talk about why the trump administration is now looking into a theory that claims the coronavirus may have originated in a chinese lab. we'll take a look at that next.

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secretary of state mike pompeo today says the u.s.

government is working diligently to figure out the origin of the coronavirus. sources tells cnn they are specifically looking into whether the virus spread a chinese laboratory rather than a market as previously reported. now while those source say it's premature to draw any conclusions china don't deny this accusation. cnn's kiley atwood is joining us live from the state department. tell us about this. this is coming as the administration is also focused on deflecting blame and focusing on the chinese. >> reporter: yeah. that's right. that's extremely important context here. we have seen the trump administration and allies of the president try to deflect criticism by criticizing others for how they have handled the outbreak of this pandemic. it is a distracting mechanism but at the same time there are remaining questions about the precise origin of this novel coronavirus. so national security and intelligence officials have told us that the u.s. government is

looking into the possibility that this novel coronavirus originated in a chinese lab instead of a wet market. now they are not saying that there's any reason to believe that this is a bioweapon, this was a manmade bioweapon. but rather it could have spread from a chinese lab accidentally. and it's important to note that in the context of this conversation, the chinese government has not been forthcoming over the last few months with regard to information they have provided to the world about this pandemic. that's one thing that secretary pompeo highlighted when he spoke about this last night and said that the u.s. is working to get to the origin of this virus. let's listen to that. >> the mere fact that we don't know the answers that china hasn't shared the answers is very, very telling. we need the chinese government to open up. they said they want to cooperate. one of the best ways they could find to cooperate is let the world in, let world scientists

know how this came to be, how this virus began to spread. >> reporter: now secretary defense mark esper also this morning said it's inconclusive with regard to what they've seen of the origin of this virus so there are many unanswered questions. we know the u.s. government intelligence officials are looking into this as we speak. >> thank you so much for that report. i want to talk now with a senior fellow at the atlantic council and jamie served on the national security council under president clinton. what do you make of this, this lab theory? >> i think that it seems pretty likely to me. i certainly don't have enough information. it sounds like u.s. intelligence doesn't have enough information to determine whether this is something that was a virus that was being studied, made perhaps very likely with very good intentions in a chinese lab and there are two very high level

chinese virology labs in wuhan and some kind of security breach and they had many security breaches. then there's the other story that, which i don't believe at all, is that it emerged in this seafood market and it was written about this in january. there were cases of coronavirus in wuhan prior to that cluster that emerged in the seafood market. so it's a possibility that there was some keep of natural jump and it didn't go through the intermediary of the lab. if i had to bet just based on what i read and logic i would bet it's most likely this was an accidental leak from a lab. but there's really no way for now for anyone on the outside to prove that. >> and what makes this so difficult, this conundrum of what happened is the secrecy of chinese government, right? >> well, that's the problem. and everybody knows about these do, the whistle-blowers that

were silenced, "nature" had a piece today about the suppression, censorship of all scientists in china seeking to publish anything about the origins of this crisis. everything has to be approved by the ministry of science and technology and ministry of education. there are scientists who have disappeared. this is really, really serious. we have to get to the bottom of this. i'm not one to associate myself with president trump or secretary pompeo or any of these guys and i'm against anything that could be construed as nonconstructive or racist or intolerant. but we need to know what happened not as an act offinger pointing but there could be other worse antigens out there. when there's a plane crash we say wow a plane crashed that's really dangerous. if we don't get to the bottom of this quickly another plane could

crash. that's why we have to look at the failures in china and the failures frankly here in the united states because whatever the failures were in china they were massively exacerbated by the failures of the trump administration here. >> you have seen this "washington post" report on state department cables from 2018 that showed concerns about the safety and management of the wuhan institute of virology biolab. this is really the context in which this is happening. tell us about that. >> yes. so two years ago consular official, one consular official from wuhan the u.s. consulate and one embassy, sipes expert in beijing visited the chinese institute of virology in wuhan which is the only level four bio security institute in all of china. they were aprpalled because thi institute was studying highly contagious coronavirus and they were worried.

there was a great piece about this in the "post." it seems logic dictates that we just look at the facts and that is that china has a lot of break outs. they tend to happen in wuhan province or guangdong and rarely happen here. why here? one option is yes maybe the seafood market was selling bats which seems highly unlikely. or there was a biosecurity lab 300 feet from this market and so i just think that we have to use logic but we have to be rational. we have to be fact based. we have to look at this. china can't just say looking at this question is being nonconstructive or being racist. >> jamie, thank you so much. >> my pleasure. any time.

all right. michigan has the third highest rate of the coronavirus. so why is she facing protests over her stay-at-home order? (vo) featuring our latest technology, our hearing aids

are nearly invisible, so no one will notice. call our toll free number today to start your 30-day risk free trial at your locally owned miracle ear. the navy commanding officer fired for sounding the alarm about coronavirus on his carrier may now get his job back. captain brett crozier warned in a march letter the virus was spreading among his thousands of

sailors only to be fired by the secretary of navy. now there are 5655 sailors on the roosevelt that have tested positive for the coronavirus, six sailors in the hospital and one has died. i want to talk now with rear aide mir r admiral gene kirby. i wonder how likely do you think it would be brett crozier would be reinstated? >> well just going on history, the odds would not be good. this is a nearly unprecedented time. i can't article time when a fired commanding officer was put back in charge. there may be case. i can't remember one. exceedingly rare if it happened. >> this discussion about whether this would happen it seems like it's could insiding with the question of how much worse the situation on the roosevelt would have been had the captain not sounded the alarm. there's one dead sailor at this point after all. >> clearly, his letter, his

concerns seemed important given what we know what happened on the roosevelt. any decision to reinstate him would have to take into account his leadership going into that situation. then what effect it would have on the crew and "chain of command" to bring him back. >> i won, admiral, this isn't just one event. right? this is something that a lot of people in the military not even just the navy and other branches as well are looking at. what does this mean for military officers who are trying their best to protect their service men and women from this virus? >> great question. part of the discussion about him being fired was this whole, to which pentagon leadership wanted honest candid feedback from commanding officers and there was a concern that firing brett crozier the way he was fired would have a chilling effect on other unit level cos, o5 and o 6s.

hopefully it won't have that chilling effect. i think what his case does show is how important it is for commanding officers to put their people first and to be honest with their "chain of command" what their concerns are and what they need do to protect their people. >> do you think it will have a chilling effect? >> i don't know. i don't think we have enough evidence to see that it did have a chilling effect. that was one of my big concerns when this happened. that said, since his firing, they have been more proscriptive of what needs to be done. >> admiral kirby, thank you so much. good to see you. stay health and safety.

in michigan democratic governor great chin whitmer is responding to backlash directed to her and her actions to slow the coronavirus cases in her state. operation gridlock right outside of her office they are pushing back on the governor's stay-at-home orders. and that protest may make the governor to take further action as michigan batles one of the highest rates in the country. >> it's been unrelenting. the losses have been devastating. we have had very few successes. >> governor great chin whitmer is listening making her daily check in call with doctors and nurses on the front lines in the fight against coronavirus. >> how are you taking care of yourself? i can't imagine the stress you're under. >> reporter: just outside her window the front lines of another fight. protesters surrounding the capital in a drive by

demonstration. sounding off strict stay-at-home orders she's trying to slow the deadly outbreak. on the job for 15 months whitmer is front and center in the battle between the nation's governors and the white house. >> it's been an incredibly challenging time. >> reporter: she's one of the most visible democratic governors in the country with president trump dismissively referring to her like this. >> don't call the woman in michigan. doesn't make any difference what happened. >> reporter: what went through your mine when you first heard president trump say the woman in michigan? >> i don't think that way. honestly i'm not looking for a fight with anyone frankly. i'm looking for help. and when that happened, i was very concerned that it might undermine ability to get the help that michigan needs. >> reporter: michigan need help with her state recording the third highest coronavirus death toll followed only by new york

and new jersey. she extended her statewide order until the end of april with some of the nation's toughest restrictions including prohibiting people from most travel between their residences and visiting vacation rentals in the state and closing businesses she deemed non-essential including garden shops. her actions sparked a conservative group to organize a protest wednesday. >> it looks like a political rally out there as opposed to something that's about the substance of the stay home order and why it's important we take this grievance stance with covid-19. >> reporter: she knows she will be judged by how michigan weathers the impact and rebound from the economic toll it has taken. a critical battle ground in the 2020 presidential race. in 2016 trump narrowly carried michigan. two years later whitmer was elected. she's now a national co-chair of joe biden's campaign.

and by his own admission on his list of potential running mates, showering her with praise on his new podcast. >> whitmer is an outstanding governor. one of the most talented people in the country. >> reporter: for whitmer it's created a delicate balancing act. she balanced the state's recovery with the trump white house. >> do you care what president trump cares about you? >> i just care about i'm able to deliver for the people of michigan anticipate i'll work with anyone. who is in the white house in toward do that. >> you held your tongue a little bit. you've not perhaps said things publicly that you may otherwise have. >> yes. >> why? >> because i got to get things done. >> reporter: now governor whitmer and other governors from across the country are on the phone right now with fortunate. he's telling them he wants to

re-open states by may 1st. but governors say they will do it on their own timeline. regional governors including several seven mid-western ones are saying they will form an alliance to open together. >> great report from michigan. new zealand, taiwan, iceland and germany all have relatively low coronavirus death rates and all of their leaders have one thing in common. we'll discuss. i'm searching for info on options trading,

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. most countries seen a low death toll took an aggressive

stance early on, all praised for their quick action and strong response to coronavirus. the data appeared to have saved many lives and helped slow the spread. so what do these countries have in common? well, as cnn's max foster reports, they're all run by women. >> reporter: as the virus spreads beyond china, countries and territories run by women appear to have had particularly effective strategies. she was one of the first leaders to recognize the threat to her island. her aggressive early response included restricting flights from mainland china and ramping up production of personal protective equipment, such as masks. to date, taiwan has reported only six fatalities linked to the virus. amongst its population of 24 million. >> new zealand was more

aggressive. she enforced a massive lockdown before any deaths were reported. she banned tourist, which are the country's biggest source of income. >> from 11:59 p.m. tonight, we will close our border to any non-residents and citizens attempting to travel here. >> reporter: when the virus hit europe, female lead, were similarly proactive. in iceland, they offered free testing to all citizens, whether they were showing symptoms or not. and she used a tracking system so she didn't have to tlok down sand suffocate the economy. compare that to sweden, which has by far the highest death rates and is the only country there that isn't led by a woman. smaller nations are perhaps easier to manage, but that doesn't explain angela merkel's success in germany, a nation of 83 million. this chart compares germany's noticeably low death rate with other comparable european states

and the u.s. so what explains the apparent link between low virus mortality rates and female leadership? >> each of the leaders you mentioned brings a combination of compassion and rigor i think to the way they've engaged the public, fact-based everyday, science-based early. but also really showing empathy and showing and speaking to the humanity of what's at stake here in the crisis. >> reporter: managing a crisis requires recognizing it early on and acting. it shows a disproportionate number of female leaders successfully taking that approach to the current pandemic. it is an empathetic sometime of leadership women are more associated with, it needs to be studied closely breana. it's the ability to get people to buy into the message, something that new zealand has been praised for, for example.

an interesting to see's well as she's just taken a 20% pay cut along with the rest of the cabinet to show they're not isolateed from the economic harm done to new zealand right now. >> study it. bottle it. max foster. thank you so much for reporting on that. president trump doing a phone call with the country's governorser, who we are learning to reopen the economy next.

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this is cnn breaking news. welcome to "the lead." i'm jake tapper in walk. right now, there are more than 650,000 -- 650,000 confirmed coronavirus cases here in the united states. nearly 31,000 people in the u.s. have lost their lives. it's double the death toll from one week ago. more than 2.1 million have been infected with the global death toll topping 140,000. we are told president trump will deliver new guidelines for states to begin to open up their societies and their commission and potentially ease social and physical distancing restrictions. we have some brand if you reporting. moments ago, president trump in a phone conversation with governors said that they, the governors, will call the shots, according to a person familiar with the calm. the president also said the may 1st date to reopen came in consultation with dr. fauci and

dr. birx of his task force. dr. deborah birx said nine states, nebraska, montana, alaska, wyoming and west virginia currently have fewer than a thousand cases each and could begin reopening. of course, these are among the least populated states in the u.s. top health and business leaders are warning president trump testing capacity is nowhere close to where it needs to be to safely and secure will i to begin to send americans back to work, school and society on a much larger scale. let's go straight to cnn's caitlin collins. president trump also told governors that his may 1st goal was a negotiation with the top doctors? >> reporter: yeah, it came in consultation with them. we are still waiting on context of what this negotiation was and if they means they weren't in agreement with that we know based open our own reporting over the last few weeks, they had