jersey city council and his slogan was simple. serve the people. he was also a devoted dad, grandfather, and a husband. michael yun was 65 years old. our thoughts go out to all of their families, and all families right now impacted by the coronavirus. the news continues. want to turn things over to chris for "cuomo prime time." chris. >> well, it is so important for you to remember those who are lost. but, i cannot let go, the amazing gift that you gave all of us, who are separate for signs of a better tomorrow. and i'm not going to give you some hollow congratulations because i'm uncle mo. how many hours are we putting a night? what's wyatt given you so far? >> well, you cut out. but how many hours awake? he actually -- last night -- >> how long is he asleep during the night? >> oh. you know, last night, he was up quite a bit after like 2:00 a.m. but, he's been sleeping a lot, which i appreciate. but it's, you know, it's day

four. >> and what is the -- what's the nurse telling you about how is he sleeping? is he colicky? like when you're watching him sleep, does he seem to have some good time down? >> he had his first pediatrician appointment. he's healthy, thank goodness. so, yeah. you know, i'm just amazed by him. i spent a good two hours today with him sleeping on my chest, in a rocking chair and me just watching him and listening to him squeak. >> yes. >> he squeaks in his sleep. >> it is normal for you. well, he gets that from you. i've heard you on airplanes. and it is normal for you to watch him with a small anxiety of whether he is breathing or not. we all do. >> yeah, i did that. >> and that's okay. and the first amazing pleasure that you're going to have is when you get to do, not bath time because they're squirmy and you're squared, early on, because they're so small. but putting lotion on him

afterwards and stretching out his little arms. you know how he's like this now? you know, he's all tight, right? his arms are in like that. that's -- for them. so when you pull his arms out a little bit, very gently, stretching them straight, and stretching his legs straight, he will open his eyes and start to coo because you will be giving him a little massage. >> did you say coo or poo? because there's a lot of poo these days. >> coo. more of a straight-line smile. whenever you see this, not a smile. and you are learning the first lesson now. when you take that diaper off wioff, with a boy, it is go time as soon as the cold air hits. you have to move the diaper, and you have to pretend you're putting out a fire. the hand has to come down and hold everything down, or you will see a spray effect that will really astonish you and

change your world. >> you should write a daddy book for kids. >> it was a daddy don't book. but i'm telling you, the lotion on the legs and the arms. remember i told you and you'll say i saw it in his face. i'm here for you, brother. the misses is already making an inventory of all the stuff we have for a little boy. >> all right. well, thanks. i appreciate that. >> you've given us a gift. you gave yourself a gift. you gave your family and your memories of them but you gave us a gift, too. >> i keep wanting to wake him up and just like, i don't know, i don't know what. just wake him up just to see his eyes. >> never, ever, never, ever do that. never. if they are sleeping, leave them alone. any position. and don't reposition him. don't get sids crazy. if he is asleep, leave him alone. i love you. congratulations again. >> thanks, chris. bye. >> listen.

it was a big day. there is a lot of news. there's no question about it. but, let's be honest, new babies, somebody you care about bringing life into this world. what that invites is symbolism to the rest of us. what matters more than that. let's be honest. it's worth the time to remember. welcome, everybody. it's friday night. i hope you have a good weekend coming. i hope the week has taken you here, in a good way. we have the teleprompter back. we can do the show. i'm chris cuomo and welcome to prime time. now, if you want the reality of where we are right now, i'll give it to you in a snapshot. the senators are coming back monday. okay? they have been told there are not enough tests for all of them. think about it. the government, that has been telling you, we got it with testing, there's more than enough for everybody, everywhere, who wants one, they can get it. they don't have enough for 100 senators. that's the reality. it is time to end the disconnect

between that and these reckless rationales for reopening. it has to end. get us more tests. more people making them in the united states. get a plan to fund manpower for tracing where people want to open up. this is a war. treat it that way. you are right to risk money on the vaccine and manufacturing. why? because it's a good risk. if you get it right, you're ready and you've cut a ton of time off it. if not, hey, scared money never wins. okay? experts are going to argue tonight that pandemic mode could last as long as two years, even with a vaccine. the biggest facilitator of our freedom remains what this president fights the most. testing and tracing. and i know i say it a lot. and i know i get attacked for it, and that people say we've done so well. it's a lie. okay? i will not stop pressing this point because i know, someday,

we will look back and remember, what mattered most in determining how long we suffered with covid-19 was testing and tracing. and how long it took to get where we needed it to be. why? testing and tracing tells us the truth. together, as ever, as one. let's get after it. >> hard to believe. may 1st. may day. often, a cause of celebration as the beginning of spring. but, now, may day sounds as much like a call of desperation and help. this has been a long, long, grueling haul. and it is just the beginning. if you look at these new predictions about what this could look like for months, and years, by this trusted group of health brains. all right. what is the latest in the state of play?

cnn's nick watt tells us. >> limited testing. the continued influx of infected travelers from overseas hotspots and cruise ships and large events, like a conference in boston, a funeral in georgia, and mardi gras in new orleans, all, fuel the devastating early spread of this virus. here in the u.s. this, according to a just released report written by the cdc's deputy director. apparently flu season also made it hard to detect some early clusters in the early introduction of this virus into nursing homes, meat-packing plants in dense urban areas, like new york city, accelerated transmission. this virus might circulate among us for another two years, says one new study. until 60 to 70% of us are infected. >> this is going to be -- continue to be a rolling situation throughout the world. not just our country. for these months ahead. so expect many more new yorks to occur. it's very likely they will.

>> the u.s. death count doubled these past two weeks and one newly-updated model from northeastern university now suggests 100,000 people, in this country, will die by midsummer. but, this morning, in cady, texas, a line at snappy's cafe and grill. today, restaurants, movie theaters, and malls can reopen in the state at a quarter capacity. >> beginning to see the beaches open. beginning to see guests on the beach. >> but up in dallas county yesterday, nearly 180 new cases, the biggest single-day spike they've seen since all this began. >> we're reopening today, and it does feel like a bit of a gamble. >> partial opening now underway in at least 32 states. but it doesn't appear any of them meet white house guidelines that states have a downward trajectory of documented cases within a 14-day period. >> there are some states, some cities, or what have you, who ever looking at that and kind of leapfrogging over the first checkpoint.

and i mean, obviously, you could get away with that. but you're making a really significant risk. >> meanwhile, with ongoing outbreaks at meat-processing plants slowing production, some military commissaries, now, limiting how much meat shoppers can buy. down in florida, they'll start reopening monday, with restaurants and retail. but the state's three largest and hardest-hit counties are excluded. >> i don't know that we're going to be able to open up our beaches, really, before june. >> meanwhile, in michigan. the governor in the shadow of armed protestors at the capitol extended her state's stay-at-home order through may 28th. >> yesterday's scene at the capitol was disturbing, to be quite honest. swastikas and confederate flags, nooses, and automatic rifles do not represent who we are, as michiganders. >> nick watt, cnn, los angeles. >> look. again, thank you to nick watt

for the piece. you see the disconnect. we all want to reopen. we want to reopen yesterday. and there's good reason for that, and it's not just about a burger and a beer. it's about people being in economic desperation. but, still, the answer is the same. whether you want to go and get a tan or whether you're desperate to work for your family, the answer is the same in both cases. testing and tracing will tell us the truth. it will keep us safe, by letting us know what is working and what is not. it will give confidence to the consumer, that is just as necessary as the reopening, for the worker because these places won't make money if people aren't confident to go out. and that confidence comes from testing and tracing. if you fight that, you're fighting the truth. and i do not apologize for making the argument, once again, that this president has fought

testing and tracing, from jump, because the truth of the situation is believed by him to be bad for his political aspirations. it's as simple as that. and it's also as simple as that for us. and, once again today, you saw the tweet from the president today. calling those armed protestors, who stormed michigan's capitol, very good people. he wants the governor to give in to them. how about that? he says, talk with them, they're good, cause he's so inviting of dissent, right? the man who condemns everyone and every institution that does anything but what he wants. good people, with ar 15s in toe because you need that to protest. just like charlottesville. this president is forgiving of bad actions because he thinks it is good for him.

their gripes are legitimate. their right to redress and protest are real. i don't know about the weapons. but it doesn't make what they're doing right. so, then, today, the president's new press secretary was questioned about this. and a lot of other matters, at her very first briefing in the briefing room. remember those? maybe they're back again. she said i will never lie to you. here's what i know. on this show, she said the president has never lied to you. and i gave her many times to qualify it and take it back. it was a lie when she said it. so maybe she'll be better now. we'll see. white house correspondent kaitlan collins is with me. how did that go over? that dynamite notion that i will never lie to you. >> well, i mean, chris, every press secretary since i have been covering the trump white house has been asked how honest

they are being to be with the media at the beginning. sean spicer was asked. stephanie grisham was obviously never asked because she never held a press briefing. so i think every single time they try to make a commitment to what they are going to say. which has been so common during the trump administration is that often he undercuts the people who do speak on behalf of him because of course he often serves as his own best communicator. so really, what people rely on is what the president himself says. the president has been the one holding these daily briefings. and one big question is something happened yesterday after the intelligence community issued this statement saying they did not believe the coronavirus was manmade or genetically modified. they said they're still investigating where it really came from. was it from infected animals and contact with that? or was it from a lab accident in china? the president said he believed he'd seen evidence that it did originate in a lab, which caused a lot of questions about exactly what he's seen.

kaylee was asked about that today during her first briefing, and this is what she told reporters. >> the president's statement is consistent with the other intelligence assessments. while we continue to have very limited and dubious data from china, current assessments indicated that president trump's statement is consistent with what some analysts believe is the epicenter of where the virus began. one, that this virus originated in china. two, that it began through contact with infected animals or was the result of an accident at a laboratory in wuhan. >> that's not -- that's not what the dni said. >> yeah. if you juxtapose what the president said and what the dni said, those statements seem to contradict. and when the president was asked about that statement, he seemed caught off guard by it. he kept asking who it was that had put out the statement when it was out out from the office of the director of intelligence. we should note, a political ally of his. and on it was behalf of the entire intelligence community. so of course she is saying there was no disagreement there,

though there are questions about whether or not the president was awa aware they were going to put that statement out. >> look, maybe he was, maybe he wasn't. that's fine. but unless i'm wrong, and please, kaitlan, let me know if i have it wrong, the dni said they did not have reason to believe that this was about a laboratory. that was the point of the statement because that's what they were asked, was to deal with that conjecture. and they said we're going to keep looking but we have no proof that that's what happened. he said he did have proof. there is no truthful way to argue that those two statements are consistent. or am i missing something? >> well, the question is, have they seen definitive proof? because they are normally incredibly hesitant to put out any kind of statement backing any assessment unless they know that it's happened. we saw that play out with russian interference in the 2016 election. they waited until they had concluded that it happened to put out a statement saying we back this assessment. so that's why this statement that they put out yesterday before the president made his remarks was so rare because they

normally don't put out statements about theories that have not been corroborated yet. and they basically said we are still looking in to see whether or not this was an accident at a lab or whether or not it came from infected animals, which is what one of his top scientists, anthony fauci has said. he cited studies saying it is consistent that it jumped from an animal to a human. so that's still a big question of here because a lot of it plays into the fact how are they going to respond to china? is the president going to try to punish china? so a lot of that is actually critically important to how the u.s./china relationship moves forward. >> 37 times, since april, the president has said things -- or since the beginning of this -- the president has said flattering things about china and the handling of the pandemic. she's going to have a tough job. let's see how she decide to do it. kaitlan collins, you do your job very well and i appreciate your services here to the audience. especially, late on a friday night. have a great weekend. >> always.

you, too. >> all right. thank you. news, today, on operation warp speed. the president says he's not overpromising on a vaccine, but he's hoping to deliver hundreds of millions of doses by the end of the year, and the sky's the limit on the cost. we all hope that this is a good bet. that they have the vaccine right. and, by the way, to be fair to the science, it is easier for them to figure out the proteins and the way to create the preventative medicine, also known as a vaccine, to prevent something like this than it is for them to figure out what's happening with it, in due course, as it spreads of a function of infection. that may seem counterintuitive. but i have now vetted that with like five or six epidemiologists, disease scientists, and doctors, and they say they may have a jump start on the vaccine. and that placing this bet on manufacturing it before all the phases of testing are done, is ambitious. but it's not violative of

scientific principles. so let's remember that. okay? and let's bring in the doctors for how they feel about it, and what they think is still the reality of what needs to happen, going forward. next. brushes to clean all your floors. and with patented dirt detect technology, roomba finds dirt throughout your home. if it's not from irobot, it's not a roomba.

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million. that is the number president trump is hoping to meet for coronavirus vaccines by january.

now, let's get a fair read on what the risk is here, and the reward. insight from friend of the show, the brilliant dr. william schaffner. doctor, thank you very much, and thank you for the quick tutorial, last night, after our segment, during the commercial, you sent me on a hunt today. that, what is the fair criticism of operation warp speed? and a lot of the krit scriticis read seems unfair, which is oh they're rushing the science. i have called people who are involved with it today and are knowledgeable with the process, who say that's not true. that the risk here, is that they are manufacturing what they'll need before the phases of testing are completed. not that the phases are going to be scientific, you know, insufficient. is that a fair assessment? >> that is perfect, chris. that's exactly what's happening. we're putting a bet on a horse, this vaccine, even before the horse has started to run.

though, that's a silly analogy. but we think that this vaccine is going to work. that would be the presumption. and we're, already, going to start manufacturing it before -- before the trial is finished. if it works, then we have a big stockpile of vaccine, ready to go. >> now, another point you made to me last night which, again, was a big help to me in giving me a head start in the reporting today was i said to you, come on. they don't even know what's going on. they're calling me to help understand how my symptoms correspond and correlate to all these different things they've seen. they don't know anything about this virus. and you told me, slow down, not knowing what this virus does in terms of a contagion phase is different than the science behind identifying proteins that are preventative of his replication, also known as a vaccine. and i had five different desi scientists today agree with exactly that.

that it is absolutely plausible that they have a head start from previous vaccines and scientific understanding of what may work as a vaccine, even though they are mystified by how this virus is acting in the body. explain that to the uninitiated, like myself. how do those two things go together? do you agree and why? >> oh, sure, i agree completely. the virologist can study the virus in the laboratory. how it is put together and how it attaches to cells, for example, which is something you would like to block. if you block the virus's attachment to cells, it can't initiate the infection. it's as though the body just brushes it off. however, it's quite another thing to figure out, once the virus does get in, how it causes its mischief within the body. that is he a separate, whole line of investigation. if you can block it from getting in, oh, we've solved the problem.

>> all right. good. i want to be fair about it because i don't like the idea of attacking it cause they're going too fast and it seems like politics. it may seem like politics. i don't think it is politics at this point. we will see how it goes through the phases and where they arrive. now, what is politics, in my estimation and my take on this before i release you to your weekend, doctor, and thank you once again. not wanting testing and tracing has to be a function of not wanting the truth because you don't like what it's going to tell you. because everybody, from the schaffners to the public health experts to the homeland security and the national security people all, point to testing and tracing as that without this nothing, if you want to stop the pandemic. and it is, still, something that this administration has not jumped all over. how do you reconcile those? >> all i can tell you is try -- testing and tracing is the

foundation on which we build the house of prevention. everything rests on that. we have to know who's got the virus, where the virus is, how p penetrant the virus is in different parts of the country. we have to identify people who need medical care, and then get them to that medical care. and then find their contacts and test and kwaquarantine them. standard, public health 101, do it thoroughly, and that's fundamental. and we can add onto that social distancing and the other things that we do. but the testing and tracing are absolutely critical. >> they don't even have enough tests for the senators, who are coming back monday. to me, that tells you everything you need to know about the urgency that the building block, as you just said, of prevention, where we are right now, in this country. dr. william schaffner, you are always a plus.

thank you very much for helping the audience, once again, understand some complicated subjects. >> thank you so much, chris. >> all right. and look, all you need to know for the testing is right now feels subjective, right? what do i need for comfort to go to a restaurant? how about when your kids go back to school? you telling me you're not going to want to know how many cases there are, and what the level of exposure is? and how fast they can track down people? you think you're going to send your kids back to school if you don't have that kind of assuredness? that's the context that makes you realize how important it is. now, how do we see this reverberating around the country? is all the randomness is a function of the unknown? some states are opening up but they don't know whether they'll be able to trace and test. they may say they do but they don't know. we know because of the amount of testing they've done to this point. new mexico, however, opposite direction. locking down to stop the spread. roads closed off in the city of gallup tonight. why? they're not even doing that in

albuquerque or santa fe. the rest of the state. why that city? governor michelle luhan grisham made the call and she is here to provide you a window into the reality of reopening. next. you doing okay?

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hey, just a quick thing. a lot of you are saying that this is still a little confusing. let me say, maybe, in a more simple way. a vaccine prevents the virus from ever taking root in your body. a cure stops the virus once it has taken root in your body. so that's why having a vaccine is not as good as having a cure, because it may not work for everybody. you may not get it to everybody. so you need both. okay? a vaccine is very helpful in keeping us from getting sick but

what about once we are? that's where the cure comes in. we've got to look for both. a vaccine is a great, great start to keeping a lot of this population from getting sick, in the first place. all right. now, the state of play in new mexico. you want to go to gallup, new mexico? can't. roads are sealed off. city is home to 25,000, or less, people. but the mayor needed help, fast, in coronavirus fighting. why? gonna tell you. we went to the governor. she invoked the riot-control act. businesses are closed tonight. will be for 15 hours a day. everyone who lives there is told to stay home, unless it's an emergency. this was a tough move to make. let' bri let's bring in the gov, michelle luham grisham. thank you for joining us, governor. first, all blessings to the family. i hope you and all your loved ones are healthy in the heart, healthy in the head.

>> well, that's very nice of you. everyone, doing really well in my family. just got my mom, though, out of the hospital. not covid-19 and she's in that high-risk group. so she's home safe and sound and happy to hear that your family's, also, doing so well and that you continue to feel better. thanks for asking. >> oh no, listen, we're all in it together. i know it's trite but true. let me ask you this, governor. boy, are you in a tough spot. everybody's talking reopen. they don't care about the testing and the tracing. it's too intoxicating to get back to life. people are too desperate. 30 million people filing unemployment. you get this call from this mayor, and they're asking you to do something that is not a popular move right now. what went into your decision-making about invoking the riot-control act and essentially shutting down a city? >> well, i wish that particular piece of legislation had a different title. because we don't want to stoke fear in anyone.

but, honestly, chris, it was not a hard decision. more than three weeks ago, i reached out to that community with a former mayor, and really asked them to think long and hard about ways to do much more aggressive community containment. right? we've got an older population, a chronic-care population. we've got native american communities, who have not had any of the same healthcare services or supports. they have to come in for food and water. and the longer lead time you have to manage an effort like this, because i've got to make sure everyone's got food, water, medicine, toiletries, personal supplies. but i think it weighed really heavy on that community because it is really harsh but necessary. and, frankly, i'm very proud of the former governor, so i got two -- i'm sorry -- two mayors who said one whose term ended yesterday. and one whose term started today. talk about a tough first day. who, both, were on the same page

that this would make a difference. this city has 14 times the amount of cases, in its population, than the largest urban center in new mexico. so it wasn't a tough decision for me. >> but, in context, it's a challenge because this has been going on so long, and people want to see it moving the other direction of the. as a governor of a state where there is acute need here, as you outlined to the audience, you have some very specific traits to your population, and the diversity that creates challenges. the idea of testing and tracing is boring to people now. even the president has said, more than once, i don't even know that it's needed. some governors think, you know, there may be a better way than testing and tracing. how fundamental, to your ability to make judgments about this pandemic, is your ability to test and trace? and where are you on that ability? >> it is critical.

nothing we do will be safe enough without, both, increased testing and the contact tracing. you have to have the kind of public-health surveillance systems that allow you to make meaningful, productive decisions, while you are keeping as much of your population safe as possible. and, given in h1n1, in that flu, we found that native americans had a four times greater than anyone else mortality rate. i think the data could very well show that covid-19 is higher than that. we have an obligation, statewide, we're all in it together, to figure out everything we can do to know about prevalence, density, and strategies that allow you to do something different. without that surveillance, without both those aspects, we can't do it. and we've been a very aggressive testing state. it's still not nearly enough. we've got capacity because we're

a laboratory state and a research state. to do 6,000 tests per day now. frankly, i think we could stretch it, with the right supplies, to 75, 8,000, that's what we're proposing to the federal government. you give us as many tests as possible. we'll run 'em. we can run some in 4 hours, some in 24 hours. we're fast, we're effective. that means i am on the ground, immediately, doing the surveillance and contact tracing. and we're, right now, engaged in hiring up, staffing up, training, and looking at the software packages that allow us to digitize this, to the highest degree. >> governor grisham -- >> years without it. >> say that last point again, governor, i lost you for a second. >> while we're all optimistic, i'm with you. chris, i'm with you. i want a vaccine tomorrow. if i thought that there was a safe way and that we had the right research capabilities to get that, there's not a governor

in the country who's not excited about that potential. and a cure, then, we wipe out this particular virus for the worldwide population forever. perfect. but i have to plan, like every governor, that i'm in this effort for two years. even if you have a vaccine in a year from now, getting everyone vaccinated. focusing on your vulnerable populations which, in my state i is a much higher percentage of the general population than most states. i need as much of that infrastructure as possible or i can't keep new mexicans safe. and i'm going to fight until we have it all. >> i hear you and the scary part is i haven't heard any different from anyone. every governor, every mayor, of any significant population, says they are asking us to fly blind. we're doing the best we can. we're getting as much testing. take my brother as an example.

from 20,000 to 40,000. he's got almost 20 million people in the state. how do you open up the whole state when you're only doing 40,000 a day? he says you don't. you can't. you're being asked to fly blind. it's not fair to you. it's not fair to your citizens. so, governor grisham, thank you for taking the opportunity tonight. especially, late on a friday when you have all this going on in your state. please, remember, this platform is always available to you, left, right, center, i don't care. if there is a message for you to get out to people about the reality in your state, the needs in your state, we're a call away. >> well, chris, i really appreciate that because we all are, in fact, in this together, to save as many american lives as we can. so anytime you ask, i'll be available. >> thank you, ma'am. good luck and best of health to mom. >> thank you very much. i will pass that along. she's a big fan of yours. i fear she might have a crush. >> it's the haircut. she's probably confusing me with anderson. she's trading down if she goes

with me. take care. the cdc is warning of a critical summer. why? because you got to get it right, early, especially when it's easy, it's warm. the virus doesn't spread as much. density is not as much of a must, like it is during the school year. and when people are inside and, therefore, in closer quarters, for a larger percentage of the day. we've got to get it right now, otherwise, what's going to happen when you have the flu? when you have worse weather, when you have more illness, when you have more density? let's take it to a man with the plan in the last administration to combat ebola. what is the reality of where we are and where we need to be? it's a familiar question but we can't get the answer right. so let's keep asking. next.

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let's bring in the former ebola czar under president obama. ron klain. welcome, brother. couple quick questions for you and then i'll leave you alone on a friday night. first, operation warp speed. you like it? you don't like it? >> i think anything to accelerate a vaccine is good. but i think slogans aren't going to do it. what we really need is a real investment in the vaccine and, more importantly, chris, discovery of the vaccine. that's the first challenge. but, then, we need to manufacture hundreds of millions of doses of it. and we need to distribute it, get it to the people who need it, get it in people's arms. so we've got a lot of work to do, on that front. i think anything that speeds that up is good. but, so far, a lot of the administration's initiatives have been more talk than action. we need action on this. this is a life-or-death problem. it's a very complicated problem. and we need to really throw everything at it. >> assuming they put the money into the manufacturing and they make the doses, as they're going through the phases, and the

science is not compromised which, so far, doesn't seem like it has been or that they're planning to do it that way. this could be the first thing that they've actually done right. >> well, i certainly hope it is. i mean, i think all americans do. but i think we have to understand that, even if this succeeds, it's still probably very far away. i mean, i think we're talking january-february at the earliest. and, boy, i think that is superoptimistic. so, really, we have to be focused on what we're doing, right now, to manage this disease to get it under control. because even if that target's hit, and i'm sorry i'm skeptical that we'll be having widespread use of a vaccine in january. even if that's hit, we are a long way from next january, chris. we got a lot of work to do right now. >> counter this argument. shut up, already, with the testing and tracing. we're doing more than anybody else is. we're way ahead of where we were. we had a bad start that we refused to take any responsibility for. i don't care about that part.

let's not discuss it, ron. it's not worth it. you're not changing any minds. and we're way better than anybody else. so stop talking about it. we're okay. what's the reality of tracing and testing for you? >> well, the reality is let's forget about where we started and talk about where we are. we had our best day on testing, we tested 300,000 people in a country of 300 million people, chris, so we're nowhere near where we need to be. i think experts of all perspectives say you really need about, you know, 3 1/2 to 4 million tests a week. so we need to get that up there. and then, as you have talked about on the jshow, testing is just the first step. we need to trace the cases. who has it? who have they been in contact with? that's the barry minimum we need to have some safety, to not fly blind, as you said in the last s segment. look. you can't fool the virus. there's no spin. there's no ideology. there's no politics of this.

the virus is killing people. it's just a fact. we lost 58,000 people in the month that ended yesterday. we're going to lose tens of thousands of more in this month. those are realities. the only way to get it under control, until there is a vaccine or a cure, the only way to do that is to test who has it, and to trace who they've been in contact with. >> best pro tip you have right now to inform the leaders on this situation. >> i'm sorry, chris, i couldn't hear you. >> what's your best pro tip for our leaders, right now, that's not being done yet? >> look, i think the most important thing is to really accelerate the production of the testing supplies. you heard the governor in the last segment say she's got amazing labs in her state. but they just don't have the supplies to get the tests done quickly. we're seeing that all over the country. the federal government needs to use its powers, the defense-production act, to mandate the production to purchase these supplies, to get them wherever they need to be. that is, in the short-term, the thing that could take us from

300,000 tests a day to maybe 5 or 600,000 tests a day before we get beyond that. that is the most immediate, impactful thing that can make this country safer. >> ron klain, thank you very much. have a good weekend. stay healthy. i need you. we'll be right back. >> thank you, chris. appreciate it. you. home instead. apply today. in honor of my dad, who was alzheimer's. i decided to make shirts for the walk with custom ink, and they just came out perfect. - [announcer] check out our huge selection of custom apparel for every occasion. you'll even get free shipping. get started today at customink.com.

in the center of this fight, new yorkers have been doing the right thing. changing the path of the spread, by staying at a distance. okay? it's so important to keep up the spirits of the saviors on the front lines, and they're doing that beautifully, as well. here's a look and a listen.

all to remind you of don't you say you care about healthcare workers, and then go out and do stupid stuff. don't go to the beach and get too close to people. don't go to parties. don't do any of that and tell me you care about healthcare workers. all right? because you're full of it. that's what they want us to do. that's what keeps the cases down, period. so it is a beautiful demonstration of the enthusiasm for the fact that they are working hardest to save us. our heroes. let's do what they need as well. what about the treatment front? where are we on it? this drug approved by the fda today. will it make a difference? two great minds take it up, next. ♪ ♪

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top of the hour. it's friday night. where do you have to go? hey, everybody. i'm chris cuomo. thank you for being here with me, and welcome back to a bonus hour of prime time. so let's talk about treatment here. big breakthrough, right? a drug that may shorten the recovery time for patients with severe covid, who are in the hospital. it's just been approved for emergency use, by the fda. that'll make it more available. the drug's name, altogether, remdesivir. remdesivir. faster. remdesivir. now, you know it. it's the first authorized therapy drug for this virus, so far. it is our first tool in the box. a new report from top health experts is predicting this virus could keep spreading for, at least, another 18 months, maybe two years. perhaps, 70% of the population has been infected.