marrazzo shares the latest on the u.s. response to the pandemic. and howard university president dr. wayne frederick discuss the -- discusses the racial and health disparities involving covid-19. "washington journal" is next. ♪ good morning. it is friday, april 17, 2020. president trump yesterday released new federal guidance for reopening the country that allows governors to decide when to restart the economies in their states. the plan does not set a hard date for reopening, but means some states with low numbers of coronavirus cases could begin to reopen for business . his morning on "the washington journal," -- for business. this morning on the washington journal, we want to hear from you. if you are in the central or eastern time zone, (202) 748-8000. if you are in the mountain or pacific time zones, (202)

748-8001. if you are recently unemployed, special line for you this morning --(202) 748-8002. you can also send us a text, (202) 748-8003. if you do, please include your name and where you are from. otherwise catch up with us on social media. on twitter it is @cspanwj. on facebook it is facebook.com/cspan. a very good friday morning to you. president trump released his new guidance yesterday as the labor department announced another 5.2 million americans have filed for unemployment last week as the washington times notes that raises the jobless claims for the month to about 22 million. not since the great depression of the 1930's have so many people been thrown out of work so quickly. reason, the white house argues, to get a plan in place to open the economy. this was president trump yesterday. [video clip] believesam of experts

we can begin the next front in our war, which we are calling opening up america again, and that is what we are doing. we are opening up our country. and we have to do that. america wants to be open and americans want to be open. some timesaid for now, a national shutdown is not a sustainable long-term solution . to preserve the health of our citizens, we must also preserve the health and functioning of our economy. over the long haul, you cannot do one without the other. it cannot be done. to keep vital supply chains running, these chains have to be taken care of so delicately. they are delicate, the balance is delicate. we want to deliver food and medical supply. we must have a working economy, and we want to get it back very, very quickly.

and that's what's going to happen. i believe it will boom. was president trump from the white house yesterday. the white house also releasing an 18 page guidance document that talks about how the economy could be reopened, noting that states must first achieve gatekeeping goals for things like symptoms and cases and hospital readiness. on symptoms, it would have to be a downward trajectory of influenza like illnesses reported in a 13 day -- 14 day period for states to even start this three-phase process the white house has laid out. a downward trajectory of documented cases of covid-19, hospitals within the state would have to show they could treat all patients without having crisis care in the state. dr. anthony fauci was available yesterday at the white house briefing to talk more about this three-phase opening up process. [video clip] >> first of all, in order to

even consider getting into the phasing, you have to pass a hurdle. that is the hurdle we referred to as gating in. when you think about it and look at the map of the country and look at the differences in different parts of the country, you will see there are some regions, states, locations that are going to be almost already into some of that getting and have all most the fill of those criteria. others, because of the dynamic of the outbreak in their area, will take longer to be able to do that. get through phase one until you get through the gating. surein order to make safety and health is the dominant issue, the design of the phases are just that. you go into phase one. if you get no rebound and you satisfy the gating yet again a second time, then you go to phase two. if you have no rebound and you

criteria forating a second time, you going to phase three. there are multiple checkpoints of safety there. as i have set from this podium when we were talking about the first 15 days of the mitigation and then we extended it another 30 days, i essentially pleaded with the american public to say, let us make sure we do the best that we can to accomplish that. in fact, mitigation works. you saw the chart that the vice president and dr. birx put up. it worked. what i hope and what i believe we will be successful is if we carefully do this again with attention to the safety and health of the american public, we will be able to -- it will be staggered. not every state, not every region will do it at the same time. that is clearly obvious because of the very dynamics of the outbreak. but we feel confident that sooner or later, we will get to

that point -- hopefully sooner with safety as the most important thing, to a point where we can get back to some form of normality. host: dr. anthony fauci from the white house yesterday, and from the other end of pennsylvania avenue, some reaction on capitol hill from members of congress to white house efforts to reopen the federal government, including speaker nancy pelosi. here was her tweet yesterday afternoon, before the official announcement. she wrote on twitter to say "if people will die, so be it. instead of a science and testing based path to open the economy, it is deeply frivolous and wrong. every life is precious, she wrote, each death is heartbreaking. for a family and for a community . this is something we are all in together. adam schiff saying this is barely -- hospitals continue to report experience bottlenecks.

if trump forces a premature reopening, even more and -- more americans will die. one more democrat saying yesterday on twitter, we cannot safely reopen the country until we have adequate testing. we still don't have that. president trump did not listen to scientists and doctors and did not distribute national testing. we are paying for that now. republicans on capitol hill. this is scott perry, congressman from pennsylvania, saying it will be months until our nation can eliminate the threat of covid-19, but with scientific evidence, common sense, and appropriate measures, we can start reopening our country. the president is heading the heading in the right dimension. and governor tom wolf of pennsylvania saying, let's get pennsylvania back to work. another republican on capitol hill, we need a balanced approach to reopen our economy during covid-19. we cannot paint this response with a broad stroke.

trump'sesident leadership, states and governors have a reasonable roadmap to get america working again. that is just a flavor of the reaction from capitol hill yesterday. we want to get your reaction this morning on "the washington journal." opening up our phone lines to you regionally as usual. central or eastern time zones, (202) 748-8000. in the mountain or pacific time zones, (202) 748-8001. of the latest labor department numbers, 5.2 million americans filing for unemployment last week, we want to keep the line open for those that are recently unemployed. we want to get your thoughts on reopening the economy, how that could happen, and when you think that might happen in your community and how your governor is doing. (202) 748-8002 is that number for recently unemployed. jeffrey is up first out of beltsville, maryland. good morning. caller: good morning, how you been? you for atalked to

while. we got things open, but here in maryland we have to wear masks in every store we go in, and even some of the grocery stores, they have lines where you stand out and they hand the food out to you. i do not know why it is so hard for the right-wing people who are going to have a rally about this stuff, michigan, kentucky, north carolina, i don't know why they want to act like a fool about no masks, standing in a crowd, mad because they have their stay-at-home thing -- i do not know if they are not happy at home or what it is, but it is dumb. they should let things go with the flow, because somebody is going to get sick and they are going to sue the governor. understand, i watch your show every day and yeah, we need to open up. but why don't they just make it mandatory that people wear their masks or gloves? host: speaking of governors, how do you think larry hogan is doing? caller: oh, i'm a democrat but i

am proud of larry hogan. i am proud of what he is doing. i am a stubborn person. where no masksme in a grocery store, it is hard to breathe, but i follow the rules. i do not understand why these right-wing people are not following the rules. host: larry hogan putting out his own tweet and video in which he speaks to how a reopening would work in maryland. this was his tweet from yesterday. [video clip] and aggressive actions and because of the extraordinary sacrifices of marylanders, we are now in a position to move from containment and mitigation to a gradual rollout of our recovery phase. our numbers are still rising and we are still heading up that curve, so we are not quite there yet. but we are seeing positive signs of cautious optimism.

over the last several weeks, we have been consulting with experts and developing a roadmap for the reopening of our state and our economy, and consultation with our coronavirus response team of doctors and public health experts. i can assure you that those plans will be well thought out, gradual, and safe. there is clearly a light at the end of this tunnel, but exactly how and when we will get to that light is going to be up to each and every one of us. governor larry hogan yesterday, his tweet he put out after the presidents briefing, after -- president's briefing, after the president spoke with the nation's governors about this plan he has put out, the opening up america again plan. that is what we are talking about on "the washington journal." we have a line for

those that are recently unemployed, and dennis is in lebanon, virginia on that line. the morning, dennis. what kind of work did you do? caller: good morning. i did manufacturing. host: dennis, are you with us? caller: yes, yes. host: what kind of work did you do? i missed that. caller: sorry. i'm in manufacturing. host: and when did you lose your job? caller: i was for load about two furlougo -- for load -- hed about two weeks ago. host: and it is something you think you might get back down the road? when do you see that happening? caller: i have a return to work date, they just furloughed me because of the outbreak. host: what is your return to work date? caller: april 27. host: what kind of manufacturing?

caller: it is farm equipment. host: do you think you will be able to hit the april 27 state, -- date, you said? caller: yes. host: why are you confident about that? caller: i think the cases in pennsylvania have declined, and i think we are beyond the issues. you think it is time that this opening up america again plan, we saw some it is his and that we read from democrats on capitol hill about the need for more testing and more science driven guidance here -- what are your thoughts on that? it is: yeah, i think unfounded. listening to the doctors at the president's press conferences, they are all saying we have hit the apex and are on the downward side of the bell curve, and i think it's time to get back to work. and to the previous caller who andioned about the protests

the things going on at the capitol, i don't want to characterize this as a right-wing thing. i think this is more of an american thing. it is not right or left. people want to get back to work. people want to get the economy back together. this staying at home is not -- it's just not good. looking at the demographics of , it the virus is attacking think we need more information out in the public of who needs , and thaterned demographic needs to be closely monitored. but for the majority of americans, i think it is time to get back to work. host: that is the vulnerable population we heard the president and the white house referred to in their guidance on how this three-phase process would work.

before you go, dennis, have you filed for unemployment amid all this? caller: i have. host: where are you in that process? caller: i'm still waiting on the state to reply to my initial application. wolf is really behind the curve on this. he is not been -- communicating with the constituents. he's really hiding behind the desk, looking for assistance from other democrat governors. i think our president has really showed great leadership through situation. whole i think governor wolf needs to take the lead from president trump and do what needs to be done for the state. host: dennis, thanks for the call from pennsylvania. on the line for those who filed for unemployment. here is the vision from the new

york times today, each one of the dots in all of these fields, orange, field, green, and bluefield made up of individual dots, every dot in 1000 fields represent new unemployment claims. the red bar is in the past week, the five .2 million claims that were filed by the week ending april 11. 5.2 million unemployment claims. for comparison, george's entire workforce is 5.1 5 million people -- georgia's entire workforce is 5.1 5 million people. for comparison, illinois entire workforce, 6.4 million people. theweek ending march 28, orange bar, 6.8 million people filed for unemployment. pennsylvania's workforce, where

the caller had called from, 6.5 million people. just a chart showing a visualization of all those people, the 22 million americans who have filed for unemployment over the past four weeks. we will stay in pennsylvania. this is mary out of erie. caller: good morning. host: mary, go ahead and turn down your television. your thoughts on the reopening the opening up, america again plan is what i guess it is officially called? caller: good morning. my name is mary lee. [inaudible] people want to get back to work because they have families they need to take care of, and trump is doing a marvelous, magnificent job. i feel like tom wolfe is, the more he keeps pushing this whole thing, the more people are going to feel like they don't have

money to take care of their families. i think it is ridiculous. host: the more he is pushing this whole thing. what do you mean, pushing this whole thing? caller: wearing masks and gloves. don't have the coronavirus, you know, that are not being affected by it, you know? trump really is trying to do his best and i am proud of him. tom wolfe is hiding behind his desk. he doesn't care about the american people. if he did, he would have stood up years ago and got on top of this before it got to this point. like, honestly, i think we still need a little bit of work, but i think it is time for us to get back together and get the economy going, because if not it is going to crash. host: do you think the federal government should have stepped up years ago and got not top of this before it got to this point? caller: yes, definitely. this is not safe. people cannot go grocery shopping without being afraid. honestly, i am proud of trump,

but tom wolfe needs to know people are fed up. this is not ok. we should have got on top of this before we had this problem. we should have dealt with this issue back in 2013, and from 2013 on we would have been on top of it. host: that your point. that is mary in erie, pennsylvania. this is linda out of delmar, new york. caller: good morning. host: go ahead, linda. caller: i was listening to the 5:00 a.m. news. local new york news, and we are still on the pause, so i thought i would listen to the news early in the morning. astoundingast an develop and. a doctor had developed a treatment that would bring about immediate movement to recovery. so we now will have a treatment

says will not only be valueds to the united states -- valued to the united states, but to the entire world. host: we will be talking to helping leadzo, some of the response and the university and the state of alabama. we will talk about the latest in treatments coming up at 8:00 a.m. this idea of reopening america. when do you think that can happen and specifically for new york, your state? yes, we get daily reports from governor cuomo, who is doing a very good job, and although we are pausing until the 15th of may, i believe that if there truly is a treatment that will immediately cure to end we may be able

this whole thing a lot sooner than we anticipated. so that's why i called in. i hope you will be able to bring marrazzo. dr. jeanne it sounds like a very simple treatment. they show the needle and the vial, one drop under the tongue, sublingual, and you are on your way to recovery. i don't know how long it takes, but -- host: got your point. linda bringing up the stay-at-home order brought about by andrew cuomo yesterday. here is a bit from his daily briefing yesterday. [video clip] >> the new york pause has worked. closing down has worked. not there yet. we are at .9. , so we havewn to .3 to continue doing what we are doing. i would like to see that

infection rate get down even more. the new york pause policies, the closedown policies will be extended in coordination with other states to may 15. i don't want to project beyond that period, that is about one month. one month is a long time. people need certainty and clarity so they can plan. i need a coordinated action plan with the other states, so one month, we will continue the closedown policies. what happens after then, i don't know. we will see, depending on what the data shows. what does that mean? tell me what our infection rate spread is -- is it .9? is it one? is it seven? tell me what the hospitalization rate is. the experts will tell us the best course of conduct based on that data.

no political decisions, no emotional decisions, data and science. we are talking about human lives here. host: governor andrew cuomo yesterday at his daily briefing, as we are discussing what was released yesterday afternoon, early evening by the white house. r opening up america again plan, to bring business and production back online, although some companies are taking those steps already. a story out of the new york times, boeing plans to resume marshall aircraft production in washington state by bringing about 27,000 employees back to work. most will return by the end of next week. at athe first attempt large-scale resumption of business activity by a large-scale corporation in the u.s.. 66 currentlyut

confirmed coronavirus cases. boeing employees who returned to work in the coming weeks will find new health and safety precautions, such as staggered start times, spread out work areas. a company spokesperson said boeing would not test employees for the virus, but face masks required and provided to people who do not have their own. floor markings will remind employees to stay apart. conductwill be asked to they comehecks before to work and submit to temperature checks at many manufacturing sites. let's head up to romulus, michigan. this is herbert, good morning. caller: good morning. how are you doing? host: doing all right. go ahead. caller: i just have to dante points to make. the first, going back to work seems to be mostly republicans in this. i think they just want to make money.

they don't care about how many people die. this is unbelievable. the other thing is -- host: why do you think it is a republican-democrat thing here, and when it comes to you, how much longer do you think you could stay in this lockdown phase that we are in? caller: that's my next point. they keep saying this is the greatest economy we have ever had before this happened, but if most people can't last two weeks or a month without a paycheck, they are living day to day. this is not a great economy to me. they seem to be worried about making money rather than saving people's lives. they say the flu takes 40,000 people a year. yeah, but the flu is over a season. this took 40,000 people in a month. host: herbert, how do you think

your governor is doing, gretchen witmer? caller: i think she is doing a great job. she is doing the best she can under the circumstances. i think it is a really bad situation, and i don't think we should be going back to work until this thing plays out. host: that's herbert in michigan. governor whitmer, along with the governors of ohio, wisconsin, minnesota, illinois, indiana and kentucky announced their regional partnership for reopening the economy in the midwest. you've seen these regional partnerships as well already announced earlier this week from the mid-atlantic states. this partnership announced yesterday, the governors saying, we are doing everything we can to protect the people of our states and slow the spread of covid-19, and we are eager to work together to mitigate the economic crisis this virus has caused in our region. here in the midwest, we are bound by our commitment to our people and our community. we recognize our economies are

reliant on each other and we must work together to safely reopen them so hard working people can get back to work and business can get back on their feet. the governor saying we are closely examining four factors n our when to best reopen economies. enhanced ability at testing at tracing, sufficient health care capacity to handle any resurgence, and the best practices for social distancing in the work lace -- -- workplace -- those guidelines as well coming yesterday from the governors of those midwest states. our caller from frederick, maryland, good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead. yes, i want to express my concern around this whole plan of opening up the country again. i don't think that it is such a wise move. the gentleman, i believe he was

that it isan stated being driven by the owners of commerce and manufacturing, the ruling class again, that 1%. feel the crux of the matter right now, they feel their profits decreasing, but they don't want to address the issue testing the masses of people who work in their manufacturing plants, who work in their industries. what needs to be called for to expose that 1% even further and further workers to realize their significance in this country is to call for a general strike. a general strike is going to expose the excess wealth that's right now owned by one half of 1% of this country. the multitudes who do that work right there are the ones that are suffering from this virus. host: what kind of work are you

in? caller: pardon? host: what kind of work are you in? caller: a steel worker, alcoa. host: what kind of job are you doing right now? caller: we are no longer doing operations. host: how long did you stay out of work right now? caller: if the people responsible for maintaining this country understood our significance and we come together, we have the resources, most of us, that we can maintain it. we can't go back to normal because there was no such thing as normal. what we saw as normal was resulting in homelessness, resulted in the earth warming, resulted in jails and prisons -- that is what was normal. we do not want to be turned back to that. we call on a general strike that the bloomberg's of

this world, the bill gates'. we have to challenge their abilities to hold onto this system that results in people truly being miss educated, uneducated, that results in people being unemployed, that results in over a million people in this country that can go to sleep with a roof over their heads. host: cameron is next out of nevada, missouri. good morning. caller: good morning. say, iwould just like to do not know if it is a good idea or not that the president is going to open up the country again or wants to open it again, simply because this virus -- you know, there are so many new things that have come out about it, and not just that, but once we reopen the country again and there are cases out there that are a symptomatic, there are people going back to work that have asymptomatic cases that do not know they are infected.

allill spread the virus over again, and we will be back to square one. i don't think we should do anything with our economy or anything with opening the country again until we have contained this virus and are at controlling it and have some control on it. host: cameron, to start this process every opening, and as you point out, the president wants to reopen the country, but leaving it up to the governors as to when to call the shots on that, but the guidance that came out yesterday in that 18 page document from the white house, that states would have to show a ofnward trajectory influenza-like illness is for 14 days, a downward trajectory of formented cases of covid-19 14 days. they have to show that they can treat all patients in hospitals without crisis in hospitals, so once those things are in place, then states would be able to proceed with the various phases,

and these phases would happen gradually. do you think that is at least a good plan for how to do it? yes.r: i think it is a good plan for that. again, there's -- the virus is so spreadable, even if we have containment levels like that, that would be great. the thing is, you know, how is that going to stop the virus from spreading, because there is no vaccine still. the virus will remain as long as there is a vaccine to eradicate it. host: should we keep things shut down until we eradicate the virus? with that be a smarter plan? the economy, the way it is right now, is forcing the great depression. is all most 18% now, 22 million americans filing front employment. we might as well hold out until

we know for sure that we can get a hold on this virus, because if we don't, it is going to infect people and going to be worse. three months from now, what if everyone gets infected again and people start dying off and it gets worse and worse?\ if you look at the spanish flu in 1918, whenever it hit its curve wind, it had a w and killed triple the amount of people. i don't know. i think we should take focus on effort, as soon as possible to get a cure for the virus. i think we will be better off then, starting the economy. host: just after 7:30 on the east coast. talking about the white house's opening of america -- opening up america again plan. this morning after the game which the labor department noted 5.2 million more people filed for unemployment last week, we have a special line for recently unemployed --(202) 748-8002 is

that number. we want to walk through a little bit more of the president's plan, an 18 page document that is available for you to read at -- whitehouse.gov, the website, states would have to shown ability to treat patients and hospitals -- and hospitals before they enter these phases. it shows that phase one would be all vulnerable individuals continuing to shelter-in-place, wasnon-essential travel still restricted. employees should continue to have a majority of their workforce telework. that is in the guidance as well. schools would remain closed, but large venues, including restaurants and gyms, would be allowed to reopen if they maintained strict social distance and elective

surgeries could resume, but only for outpatient procedures. if the state proves a downward trajectory of documented cases of covid-19 and still the ability to not be overwhelmed in their hospitals and a 14 day period in which influenza like illnesses in the state were on a downward trajectory, then they phase two.ed to social distancing maintained in public spaces and vulnerable individuals still continuing to shelter-in-place, but non-essential travel could resume. groups of less than 50 could convene, employers could begin to return workforces in small batches, schools and daycare's could then reopen in phase two, large venues could reopen but have to maintain moderate social distancing, and elective surgeries could all resume. if the state goes through this process again, the 14 downwardd showing a

trajectory that hospitals are not overwhelmed, the guidance would be for states to move to phase three. in that point, multiple individuals could resume public interactions, but the guidance would be distilled practice physical social distancing. employers could resume unrestricted staffing on their worksites. visits to senior care facilities and hospitals could resume in , and largehase venues like movie theaters and sporting events could operate under limiting physical distancing. bars could operate with increased standing room occupancy. that is just some of the guidance of how this would work, this three phased opening, and that is what we are talking about this morning on "the washington journal," the opening up america again plan. as we said, you can read about .gov.plan at whitehouse that is what president trump focus his remarks on yesterday

during the daily briefing, and it garnered attention on social media as well. we are expecting another white house briefing at 5:00 p.m., and there is a pro forma session expected in the house, that also at 5:00 p.m. eastern time. our next color is waiting in mount holly, indiana. good morning. caller: good morning. good morning. thank you for taking my call. i was very impressed and feel like the president and his working group have been keeping us very informed. believe -- i'm very disappointed in our congress. the house has been out even before this became a problem. they should have been working to see what they could do to represent us. that is what we elect them for. how could anybody be more of an

essential person in our elected officials? host: linda, what did you think about the $2 trillion cares act that congress passed, the stimulus package that they passed? caller: i think it should pass with the information that they were given, that these people should be helped. .'m 82 years old i have been on social security , 65. i was 70 if i get my stimulus checks, but i am not going to worry about that. i do worry about those getting sick. i admirehe doctors -- dr. fauci and dr. birx so much, and our reporters are acting like they have so much more information.

i don't even like to listen to them. but i am proud of our president. i wish our representatives would go back to work, find a way to be safe. those who are sick, stay home. they should be ready and they should be there so we can see what they are doing. thank you very much. holly, northnd not carolina. this is joe out of hell city, -- --s is jo out of hell city pell city, indiana. caller: hi. host: your thoughts on the opening america again plan? caller: i think it is actually going to work pretty well. host: why? caller: my son-in-law, he just got laid off work couple weeks ago, and i did too. host: what kind of work did you

do? caller: i worked in a factory. what kind of factory? caller: [inaudible] we make car parts. host: is there a job on the other side of this? caller: oh, i don't know. host: this is susan out of hartsville, new york. good morning. caller: good morning, john. i feel this is a big mistake. i feel that the president is motivated because he has to run for reelection and he has to run on the economy, so he is being pressured by his corporate, you cronies to get the economy running. that 3 milliong people have been tested, the most people in any country. country. is 1% of this

we've got to do much more testing before we go into this reopening stage, and the president says we are not going to go -- the cdc is not going to go out and pretend to do the testing. that is exactly what has to happen. the federal government has to pull the trigger on the dpa, get tests out there so that there is enough to test millions and millions and millions of people. once we know, especially with the asymptomatic people, what the amount of virus there is, then maybe we can begin to reopen. i strongly believe that the states that are going to reopen are going to have massive problems, and i'm really grateful that new york is still until may 15, because i would hate to be in those states that are going to reopen. the testing on aspect, do you believe employers

should require testing for all employees before they return to work? what within happen with restaurants and people coming into restaurants when we get to that point? how to you test everybody, every customer coming in the door? caller: you can at least have temperature tests. there has to be some screening mechanism. there has to be much more due diligence than what these phases have planned, and as i said, i certainly -- you know, the states that have not had anything, maybe they haven't had anything because it has not gotten to them yet, because there's a lot of a symptomatically walking around, and i just fear for them. susan, thanks for the call from new york. bruce is next, palm harbor, florida. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i don't see the second wave as being a positive, or the second

things being a positive to put a date on. the reason being, we have people that they homes here cannot get to their families on the outside. to the outside. their food is being brought to them. we don't even know how many people are in the nursing homes and that are dying of covid-19. they start opening things up, and we've got a whole new wave of disease that's going to be wafting in and out of hospitals, it is going to be wafting in and out of nursing homes, rehab facilities, and to put a date on it, i understand they need a date, but they need to know more about the disease. host: bruce, there is not an exact date being put on it in

this plan, what the president is saying is that the governors can call the shots, and this is the guidance coming from the federal government as to how they could do this reopening. the president thinks some states could start as early as early next month, but other states, it will take months and months. work.: i -- that might look what's going on with smithfield, the smithfield situation. that just cropped up out of almost nowhere. they are just starting to see a there, i believe. in florida, we have beaches. as soon as people start to work, they are going to want recreation. through recreation and getting back out in the public again, i think that will open us back up to a bigger second wave. this, wely with

haven't had violence. there has been almost no violence. there has been no smash and grab, no burning, no looting, and that type of thing. if the governors and the president don't succeed with this second phase of their starting back to work, i think people are going to get violent. host: bruce in florida. you bring up the smithfield pork processing plant in sioux falls, south dakota. we are going to talk with the congressman from south dakota, dusty johnson, coming up in about 10 minutes. we will certainly ask him about that. when it comes to governors making this decision and some states moving faster than others , president trump was asked about that yesterday at the task force briefing. here's his response. [video clip] >> i think 29 states are in that opening, but ior

think they will be able to open relatively soon. i think the remainder are just getting better. look, new york, new jersey are having very tough times and they'll be there. they'll be there at some point, but they are not going to be one of the earlier states, they will be later, obviously. i just spoke with the governor of new jersey. we just spoke with mike and a couple of folks and had a great talk with him. phil is a great guy. working very hard. democrat, but we get along. working very, very hard. the fact that he is right next to this big, massive city where everyone is very closely together, and new jersey has , as hit unbelievably hard hard as anybody in the true sense, but they are doing a great job in new jersey. that does not mean they are going to be opening next week, that is not one that is going to be -- but we have a lot of location,t through luck, and a lot of talent, we

have states that through a lot of talent are in a very good position and are getting ready to open. it will be up to the governors. we will work with them, we will help them, but it will be up to the governors. i think you're going to see quite a few states starting to open, and i call it a beautiful puzzle. pieces, all very different, but when it is all done, it is a mosaic. when it is all done, i think it will be a very beautiful picture. very important is what dr. fauci that-- it could be sometime in the fall, there could be some flareups. we will be in a great position with everything we have done and everything we have learned. host: president trump yesterday at the white house. you heard him refer to peter, he was talking to the new york times reporter peter baker, who had the front page story about the president's plan and his call that the governors yesterday. president trump says the governors can make the call

whether to reopen, after saying he had total authority earlier this week. peter baker with michael shear and the new york times today, on their front page. back to our phone calls, this is jonnie anne. caller: good morning. i want a fauci doll. we are open here. we are watching it on tv. this is the tri-state area, and eppers out pr here. we haul our own water, we run off the generator, we are completely off the grid. host: when you say your open out there,- you are open out what does that mean? caller: pardon? host: what does that mean? are people going to restaurants

out there, what does that mean? areer: the restaurants closed. not like we have a lot. i have not been to bullhead, i am just here in my little town, i just -- i think graveyard shifts have been closed, but our those $1.55, and i wish senators would get a real job. if you have a real job and you don't do your job, you are fired within eight hours. within eight hours you don't do your job, you don't have a job. so i wish they would get a real job. i would like to say thank you to the health department and president donald for doing a great job. one thing you don't report is that this is the national emergency. a national emergency. this media that keeps badgering president donald, they were

crying on election night. do you think they could handle a crisis? i just don't think they could. my prayers are with everyone, and the who -- we should dismantle the who. that $5 billion should go to the families of americans that died. host: our caller in arizona this morning. arizona is one of those states with a statewide stay-at-home order. it was governor ducey who issued that order, effective at the end of march, i believe march 31. march 31 at 5:00 p.m. was the date that the order became effective. is in california on the line for recently unemployed. what kind of work did you do? caller: oh, hello, and welcome, c-span. you are a fabulous audience and i think you are a fabulous show

too. i am a substitute teacher, part-time, and had 17 years of full-time before that. i so that a lot of schools, i am popular, i love it and it is great. i like working with the kids and tough, and i miss it -- and stuff, and i miss it. butss my yoga and my zumba, what's important is that we are all following the rules here and it is going down. and our governor -- i did not vote for our governor, but i think he is doing a great job. host: have you filed for unemployment? caller: oh yeah. i did, and it is pending. my best friend did too. host: what have they told you about school in the fall? is school done in california for the rest of the year? caller: school is done in california until september. host: and has anyone talked about planning for september at

this point, or making plans if this goes longer than that you no -- then that? aller: there are schools over the state. it is not really fair to students, students in low economic areas that don't have access to the net. i guess that's pretty much all 50 states, you know? anyway, i really appreciate c-span. you guys totally rock. the call, andor thanks for being overly in california with us. texas, also on the line for recently unemployed. caller: i have actually been discriminated against employment since 2008, and i'm calling because of the health concerns of the pandemic, wondering if it has anything to do with them basically not giving us treatment for something that we

have, not telling us? host: who's them? caller: the health providers. host: why would they want to do that? like in my doctors, paperwork it is stating something about me having some kind of disease, but i have had three children, i went to the doctor several times, and none of them have ever told me this, so i'm just curious why it would be in a computer program that i have a disease when i don't have one. host: that's joni in texas, on the line for the recently unemployed. here is another way of looking at those numbers, four weeks of record unemployment. this is the front page of "the wall street journal" this morning. more americans filed for an employment benefits over the past four weeks than any previous record, outpacing the previous high set in 1982, 2.4% iled forabor force f

ofmployment in the fall 1982, the previous high. about 19% of the labor force has sought assistance since march 15, about eight times since the 1982 record. that is from "the wall street journal." william's next, out of massachusetts. good morning. morning, pedro -- i mean john. you and greta -- host: i will tell him you said hi. and greta, and pedro you are all great. the guy that called from maryland earlier, he is right on the money. there are so many things about the economy, the way it was working before made no sense. for example, nursing homes. have you been to a nursing home recently? host: not since this started, but -- caller: you know what i mean. in the last 10 or 20 years, the standard of the nursing homes that we knew in december or

tanuary, this is when it hi nursing homes hard. but congress and our governors, what did they do, you know? the quality of care at nursing homes and the amount of money, $500 a day to be at a nursing home? they take your house if you live , because you get better quality care at home. we could talk about this for hours. host: william, how long do you think you can go as an czar, and what are your thoughts about when things get back to normal in massachusetts? talking about the president's opening up america again plan. do you think that is at least a good strategy? caller: in massachusetts, they are ramping up testing, so for massachusetts it makes sense,

because they are actually finally testing every nursing home, and they are finally opening up spots where people can go and get testing, and they open it up for more and more different types of workers to go. massachusetts they seem to be ramping up the testing you can get. understand the idea of, you can't go back to work unless you have the antibodies, because you are supposed to stay home to not get the covid-19. there are so many things to work out, but if things don't open back up, what do you think is going to happen to -- what happens july 1? financial budgets have to be funded. there are going to be many cuts to fire, police, and dpw workers if things don't open back up, don't you think? william, thank you very

much. stay safe in massachusetts. we have been checking in with members of congress from around the country this morning. we are joined by dusty johnson, congressman from south dakota, the only district in south dakota, a republican member of the agricultural committee. congressman, good morning. we had a caller 15 or 20 minutes ago specifically mention the situation at the smithfield pork processing plant. can you explain what is happening right now in the statement on's? -- and the state's response? guest: 3800 employees, this is about x percent of our whole nation's pork processing capacity, and it was -- 6% of our whole nation's pork processing capacity, and about 600 of them have come out with covid-19. the government told the operator of the plant that they want to

the plant shut down. it has been shut down for almost a week, and that is obviously causing big ripple impacts through the agricultural community as well as the economic environment in sioux falls. host: so much so that you have asked the secretary of agriculture, sonny perdue, for help with the pork industry here. what are you looking for the federal government specifically in their response to the few change issues here? -- food chain issues here? are 500 independent family hog farms that sells the smithfield. they do not have a market for their hogs anymore, and that will cause serious economic and emotional damage for them. , servingsn portions of pork in a week. that's 20,000 pigs every single day that are processed at that facility. these family farms, they do not know how their bills are going to get paid in the days and weeks to come. we need to make sure that we don't abandon them.

in the cares act, i and a number of my colleagues thought really hard to make sure we secured [inaudible] and we need to make sure the usda delivers that support in a way that is meaningful. host: we saw last week the processing ability of the dairy market, not to be able to keep up with all the milk that was being produced around the country, and dairy farmers not able to get their milk processed and having to dump millions of gallons of that. what was done for them, and is something similar, could something similar be done for pork reducers here -- pork producers here? guest: there is recent president, but i do not think you go back last week. you go back to last year. our country for a couple of years has had disruptions with our relationship with china from a trait perspective. the congress came together with the president and the usda and putthat provided $16 billion to

producers who were impacted by trade disruptions. that is the kind of mechanism we need usda to put together for people who have been impacted by covid-19. with the charge along congressman marshall from kansas of making it clear early on that we could not abandon our act producers. i talked to top officials today. they are busy putting together with the details of that third round would look like. those dollars cannot hit the streets. for the past 60 minutes, we have been talking about the president's opening america plan. your thoughts on that plan? guest: we know that we have to be thoughtful and deliberate in

getting america back to work. we want to be careful about it. there is a balance. we are smart enough, hard-working enough that we can balance economic health with public health. some people want us to pick a date and stick with that date come hell or high water. to dictates goingdate and stict the terms of this reopening. i want to make sure america gets back to work. that is going to take longer than many of us want to dictate the. this is having tragic impacts across the globe. host: you are saying you don't want to be careless. i'm wondering your thoughts on the stay-at-home order in south carolina. south dakota does not have an official statewide declaration. it clear,ant to make the governor has imposed a limited stay-at-home order in this area where the smithfield plant is.

70% of the cases in that metro area are related to that smithfield plant. that metro area has 95% of the covid-19 cases in south dakota. you look around south dakota, and you see people hunkered in. there are not people dining out at restaurants. there are not churches having in person services. there are not people congregating outside. south dakota is shut down in the way that the rest of the country is. when you talk about places like smithfield, that is an essential business that was going to be open under any stay-at-home orders. we are going to be taking proper actions to make sure we protect public health. johnson,gressman dusty thank you for starting your day with us. guest: absolutely. anytime.

host: that is going to do it for this segment of the program. up next, we will be joined by infectious disease expert dr. jeanne marrazzo from the university of alabama birmingham to talk about the epidemic. and then later we will we be joined by howard university president dr. wayne frederick. we feature the history and literary life of college station, texas, on booktv and american history tv. hear the mayors talk about how their city's history intertwines. [video clip] >> you have two cities, one community. the city of brian started just a couple of years before, right after the civil war. there was a railroad coming from

houston that was marching its way here. after the civil war, it continued on. yan struggled to get itself created after the civil war, but it was able to do that. in 1876, the university got its first students. the city of brian was getting going. todayea you see around us are from the first buildings that were built at that time. was ars ago, this area ghost town. because of the growth of the state and and them, we have seen explosive growth. the line between our cities is blurred not just in how we work together but geographically as well. a&m, founded in 1876, one of the land-grant institutions.

was time, it grew, but it five miles from the nearest town. nobody knew about the town called college station except for the fact in 1938 when some professors and faculty staff got together and said let's create our own city. they were able to charter the city. we are growing somewhere between 3% to 5% and sometimes more every single year, which makes us the 16th fastest growing community in the country. we have the greatest disparity in any city in the u.s. regarding to the number of students and nonstudent population. 160,000just under students on this campus. &m is poised to have 25,000

students on the college of engineering. agriculture, that is what we are all about. bryan is a different town, you can step from one town into the next. there is a compatible trade-off because we both realized we have something to bring to the table for the good of all of our citizens. histories began together. they have been together from the very beginning. we continue to flourish in the future with our histories being intertwined. announcer: "washington journal" continues. host: dr. jeanne marrazzo joins us now on zoom. she is an infectious disease expert at the university of alabama birmingham.

scientists today are learning about coronavirus at an unprecedented speed at a time journals are keeping up with the developments, what has been the most important development in the past week or two? choose one. hard to i would say the most impactful andnot just from science implications for public health and opening things up is a study from china that was published in nature a few days ago that about 100 people and looks at the virus over time before they became symptomatic and afterwards. they quantify the amount of the virus. the most important implication of that study was that about 40% of the transmissions that they

think occurred in that group happened before people developed symptoms. calling the we are presymptomatic phase. we used to call it be a symptomatically, but that did not emphasize enough that people would develop symptoms. if transmission is occurring in the presymptomatic phase, that forces us to thinkwe used to caa symptomatically, but that did about how to prevent transmission to horrible people. host: what does that mean? we used to focus more on checking people's temperatures. now it sounds like there are a lot of other ways and temperatures may not be the way that shows. guest: temperatures are not the thing.

the evolution of widespread practice in trying to keep people safe has been stunning. ago, it turnseeks out that temperature is there he insensitive-- very index. it is not going to be there most of the time. elevated temperature is one of the symptoms that develops after that presymptomatic period. that can help you identify people that are on the way, but they are four to five days into the infectious period. we have to do more identification of people who are infectious before they get their symptoms. the whole concept becomes then tracingesting

that isolating. we can talk about that. that is what we are thinking about. host: phone lines split up regionally. (202) 748-8000 if you are in the central or eastern time zones. (202) 748-8001 if you are in the mountain or pacific time zones. a special line set up for medical professionals, (202) 748-8002. leave symptoms, what of au know about the loss sense of taste and smell being a symptom? studies that the swelling of toes being a symptom. guest: this fire is is really interesting. virus is really interesting if you can separate yourself from the horrible trauma we have

experienced. there are a spectrum of symptoms that we have seen with some respiratory viruses and other viruses, but it is unusual to see a respiratory virus like this cause so many interesting manifestations. what we have seen includes this neurologic spectrum, which includes some of the cranial nerves that feed our sense of smell and taste. a lot of patients have told us that among the first symptoms they had was a surprising and interesting sense of smell. when we get a cold, we often lose our sense of smell. that is associated with being stuffed up and having a runny nose. this is different.

it is a profound sense of smell loss that suggests there is a nerve involvement. there were reports of brain inflammation or encephalitis. this suggests the virus can get into the nervous system and do things we have seen other viruses do in this context. host: does that offer other avenues for treatment? guest: that is a great question. i don't think it does yet. treating viruses they get into the central nervous system is the tory asleep challenging. you need medications -- is notoriously challenging. you need medications that transmit across the blood brain barrier.

not probably a principal target right now because these symptoms, the most serious, brain inflammation, seem to be relatively rare. host: you mentioned how quickly scientists are learning about the coronavirus. since the beginning of february, the journal has received 20 coronavirus related submissions every day. on monday of this week, they received 174 submissions. you are there at the university of alabama birmingham. what advice do you give to the doctors about how to give up with -- to keep up with all of this information and sort through the treatments that are being written about? guest: it is a gigantic challenge. physicians,oup of

six to eight, and across disciplines. doctors, infectious disease doctors, icu doctors get together every week and review the relevant literature. that is a good pace to do it. it is challenging if you are not part of a group like ours to try to figure out not only what is going on but what is reliable and what is not. there are some sources that i recommend. there are some great people to follow on twitter, fantastic science journalists. the coverage of this pandemic has shown a light on how dramatically good science coverage can get out complex ideas out to the general public. what i have told people is to find a group of information

providers who you know are reliable and that you can trust and that are not going to be susceptible to some of the hype. some of the hype has been concerning. the other challenge, when the journals are getting that many submissions, what do they rely on to publish? they rely on peer-reviewed, which means inviting experts to read these papers and provide rapid feedback to give a recommendation on who should be published. the people that do that are really busy right now. getting things turned around for a journal like this is a big challenge when you are relying on people on the front lines. we have to interpret these things with caution. viewers ad you give recommendation of a place to start for people who are trying

to find those reliable sources? organizationliable is the infectious disease society of america. i am a board member for full disclosure. it is a group that has been very involved in working with the cdc for decades on exactly this sort of issue. have theirines subspecialty society. is infectious disease group important because it has had a very close relationship with the nih and the cdc. gone to ourks have meetings. accompanyingnd its material has very good information, particularly for professionals, and also really

good news overviews. people know who is working really hard to keep our funding going and to keep the public safe. the other place i would strongly recommend is the cdc website. excellents an bifurcation, one for the public and one for health professionals. they have done an amazing job of trying to keep up with the torrent of knowledge we have been talking about. i think those are fantastic sources. if you are on twitter, there are some very good people to follow. washington post is excellent. wall street journal. lots of really good outlets have done fantastic jobs. more i would throw one

twitter handle out there, doctorjeannem. about with us to talk your questions on covid-19. the phone lines, we will talk until the top of the hour this morning. jack is first out of virginia. good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to ask dr. marrazzo , there are 670,000 cases in the deaths, which i think works out to around 4%. thatu all keep records of 4% that don't make it, how many of them have pre-existing conditions? 95% of people go through it successfully. the other 4% or 5% do not.

what the percentage of the deaths may be hooked up with some pre-existing condition? guest: that is the billion-dollar question. address two issues with your question. it opens up a pandora's box. what is the true mortality rate? if you look at many databases, and thenwith wuhan going to italy and spain and germany and norway and the u.s. and then individual counties in the u.s., you will see mortality rates that range from less than one per 100,000 population to 70 or so. in china it is less than one. if you go to some of the parishes outside of new orleans or parts of new jersey, it is above 50.

what does that really mean? how does that translate to the percentages you are talking about? part of it has to do with understanding the denominator. this has been a problem throughout the entire pandemic. we don't understand how many people are really infected. that is why we cannot get a handle on what the true prevalence of infections without any symptoms really is. when you look at mortality rates, we have to think carefully about what the denominator is. are these people who come to the hospital? are these people out in the community who die at home and we don't know what the circumstances are? the best estimates related to your question of comorbidity comes from the database out of italy and western europe, to some extent china, but i think the western european countries have started to track this well.

if you look at the database from italy, some of which was published in the journal of the american medical association last week where they looked at people in intensive care units, a lot of the people who were most profoundly affected had cardiovascular diseases like hypertension. the mortality rate and those people was often up to twice as high. how do we extrapolate that to the united states? we are seeing, when we look at the deaths even in places like , that demographic factors predict mortality. we know that race is unfortunately a characteristic of people who have died of this virus. is that because that is linked to a higher prevalence of hypertension, diabetes, other

cardiovascular diseases? we don't know. there are strong signals that any of those comorbidities increase people's risk of mortality. host: the jeffrey out of auburn, new york. get to myfore i question, could you get someone on dealing with the fairness doctrine? host: in terms of media coverage. caller: yes. ramblings, and we need a democratic response. we just went through easter and passover. i am concerned about your previous guest. there has been an outbreak at hormel food processing.

i'm worried about the junk. i'm a cook by profession. to hog and back to bird and backn to human mutation of this virus. now? are you working right jeffrey jumped off the line. go ahead. guest: jeffrey brings up incredibly important points. humanoncept of animal to transmission. governor was talking about the potential for outbreaks. that is a separate issue. when we look back at how

coronaviruses and influenza viruses mutate and get into places where they should be, this animal to human transmission issue is the heart of the matter. we think many of these highly. highly virulent of thatcan mutate out host into other hosts. there is some speculation that this virus, the wildlife trade in wuhan may have been the originator of this process. it facilitated that close quarter transmission of the virus from the host to another host. fluenza virus has involved

route, route, the avian and humans. haveenza was thought to originated in a kansas pig farm. the other question about food safety is huge. talking to people here in birmingham who own restaurants, and they use the term that they when thefied of restrictions are lifted. what does that mean for them and their staff? you cannot wear a mask when you go to a restaurant. the purpose is to go and enjoy your food. i think we have to be very cognizant not only of enhanced hand hygiene but also physical

distancing. we have been talking in some about going back to eating establishments with appropriate physical distance. that does not get you over concerns about hand hygiene because you still have people preparing food, handling food. that is now magnified severalfold. we have to be very supportive .nd listen carefully this,as we work through we spent the first hour today talking about the president's open up america plan. you are at the university of alabama birmingham studying how to reopen the university. what do you think about the

president's plan? what factors are you taking into account before you open the university? guest: another billion-dollar question, maybe even trillion dollar question. the plan we heard about last night has a ton of common sense in it. i think what we have been talking about, many of us in public health, three things need to happen. the first thing is that you really want to have declining rates of new infections and associated consequences like hospitalizations and deaths. weeks,e course of two and i believe the plan uses 15 days, and i believe that is reasonable. if you are confident that you are on the downslope of the than flattening, now

sustaining a downward turn. if you feel like you're there, that is a positive sign. you can start to talk about how physicaleintroduce interactions in society. caveat to that is the testing issue. if you don't test, you are not -- you are not going to find. we don't want a false sense of security by not knowing what is out there. it comes back to the second issue that we really need to have before we get comfortable with this concept of opening things up. that is proper diagnostic testing. i believe it was dr. fauci said we are thinking about two

buckets of diagnostic testing. we need to have access to the kinds of tests that can diagnose acutely infected people. swabs andusing throat saliva, which would be very useful. these are tests that can tell you whether or not you have the virus and you are infectious. those are helpful because we want to get those people out of circulation and try to get them to stay at home, or if they need to get care, get them into care. knowing things are coming down, having a way to measure that in real time as you look at reintroducing things. the other part is antibody testing. antibody testing allows you to see who has been infected and we

think is immune to infection versus who has not been infected and is still honorable. that will be important when we think about mobilizing health care workers. you can imagine that you would like to have health care workers infected and have some immunity in settings where they will be caring for people with the virus. that will provide some measure of safety for those interactions. the third thing that needs to happen before we say we are all good, we need to be sure we have an adequate supply of personal protective equipment for our health care personnel. we do not want to be faced with dealing with recurrent or resurgent outbreaks and have our health care workforce not be

adequately protected from this infection. we have had devastating stories of health care workers dying. those are three things that we have been thinking about that really need to be in place in order to develop and feel comfortable with regionally specific planning to open things up. left inout 30 minutes this segment with dr. jeanne marrazzo of the university of alabama birmingham. twitter, do you believe there is already more than one strain, a mild one and deadly one? guest: that is a great question. the interaction between virus and the host is a delicate stance. you have a virus that we know is

quite virulent. it can kill people. then you have a host, who is the person being infected. we have talked about how the comorbidities like diabetes and cardiovascular disease can modify and make the virus much more virulent. in any infectious disease, there is an interplay between the virus and host. based on detailed genetic sequencing work in seattle and many parts of the world, we do sayknow or cannot confidently that there is a more virulent strain. we have not identified confidently the virulence

factors of this fires. you can use genetic characterizations to trace the virus as it spreads from wuhan to the u.s. and other places. as virusess evolving do, but we don't know that there is a viral characteristic that if you get infected with that virus, you will do worse. oft: this is robert out tennessee. what kind of medical professional are you? caller: i am a retired internist. host: what is your question? about them concerned host infection to this -- host response to this infection.

this was mentioned in the wall street journal today. it may have something to do with the disparity in the average american community. havenursing home patients extremely low levels of vitamin d. i'm curious what your, would be about vitamin d in relationship to community and response to this virus? guest: thank you so much. that is a traffic destined. the association between vitamin and allvere infections kinds of adverse outcomes, including cardiovascular mortality and cancer has been a fascinating evolution in the last 10 to 20 years. find lots of studies that associate low levels of vitamin d with bad outcomes.

have lower levels of vitamin d tend to have some of the worst outcomes for the conditions i just mentioned. been defining a causal pathway for why that is that -- randomized controlled trials have looked at the interventions, and none to my knowledge have really shown that giving people back vitamin d to make their levels normal fixes the likelihood that it is still associated with. you can take the vitamin d, but it does not mean you will get less cancer.

that it is a critical complexor several reasons, and you are right, it is lower and people who live in northern and darker climates. people wholower in are dark skinned across the board. it is lower in people who are and often don't get outside. residents in chronic care facilities. i think it is a really interesting question teasing out whether this is going to be a factor in some of the adverse outcomes we mentioned that are associated with this virus. it is one of the reasons we need good population-based data and another reason why we want to think about looking at these markers in the future as we see how this pandemic of all's.

-- evolves. the headline if you want to read it, coronavirus disparities. it was published yesterday evening in the wall street journal. good morning. i'm a disabled veteran out here near fort meade. i've got a lot of the problems with high blood pressure, ptsd, you name it. i was wondering about those i was wondering how come they are handing those out at the va hospitals? i have been sick and at home.

i am 69. i have high blood pressure. i lost my wife a couple of months ago to cancer. i'm having a real hard time myself. i'm in western south dakota. host: sorry for your loss. when you say the pills they are handing out, are you talking ?bout hydroxychloroquine caller: yes. guest: i'm so sorry about your wife. thank you for your service. thank you for isolating at home. i'm sure it is a very lonely time for you. easy,re that it is not and it speaks to the sacrifice that you have made with your career and also that people are

having to make at all walks of life and doing it beautifully and gracefully. i don't want to miss the opportunity to highlight that. your questions about i want tooroquine and get to the da and have the da has been participating. with therking closely birmingham v.a. to make sure that all of the things that we have access to our being replicated. there is no two-tiered system. question is really important. why are we in this place where we are talking about using a malaria drug to potentially prevent infections and treat infections with the novel

coronavirus? we have known for a long time that hydroxychloroquine has antiviral activity. thes demonstrable in laboratory. you can look at this virus and show that there is an effect. the challenge has been showing in humans that this has an impact on people who are infected. it has not been studied as much for prevention of infection and healthy people. have we studied it in humans? yes. there are a couple of small studies. i emphasized small. they are often uncontrolled studies. that means you are giving people hydroxychloroquine, and you are not comparing it to another standard like a placebo drug, which is what the real old

standard is for the study. a chinese study in particular, when you look at those studies as a whole, most of us want to see a robust evidence race for how we treat our patients. if you love evidence, we love to use guidelines. we want to give our patients the best studies and the most evidence-based arabic. most of us looking at the database are hopeful but appropriately skeptical. that is how you should look at research that is underway, not definitive. that is why we need to study this in real time. are now several studies performed.

another study is doing something similar. another study is enrolling health care workers or people that have been exposed to the aronavirus to give them placebo to see if you can interrupt the acquisition. given how much disease is out have, i anticipate we will answers from these studies on the order of months. i don't think it is going to be weeks. i think it will be within the

year. my feeling is when we have evidence from these studies, we can make recommendations. hydroxychloroquine -- we need these drugs to treat other conditions. this is a major problem. no drugs without side effects. drugs,u combine these you can have heart abnormalities.

host: dr. jeanne marrazzo on twitter this morning. good morning. caller: we are going to put a lot from the scientific community. if you don't know, you don't know. if you don't have the denominator, you cannot come out with models.

why did the models come out so high? you are telling people, this is what the scientific community is saying. out in minnesota. then it went to 72. then it went to 60. now it is 400. if we have to base our lives and fortunes on your professions, on that profession, we cannot have people coming out and saying things they do not know. the governor sent out a deal. know the cause of how is that going to enter into a truthful scientific

study? we really need truth right now. sometimes the truth is we do not know. you cannot police all of them. why would we have people doing this? host: thanks for bringing it up. guest: that's a great question. i know people are really frustrated with the wild models wens in the have heard about. trying to explain this has been a big challenge. i agree with you, it undermines the credibility of the people faith torying in good help us figure out what is coming. your accurateto point, if you do not know, you don't know. what we don't know is the true

denominator. we don't know the true denominator. we cannot figure out what the mortality rate is. if you cannot figure out the mortality rate or the icu bed need or the ventilator need across a representative population, you cannot plan. it is a challenge. the challenge with the models, there is a saying that we like to use that someone has probably heard me say before, but all models are wrong. some are useful. the models are only as useful as the data that goes into them. the first model that came out projecting the very high numbers of death that you talk about used the data that were available at the time. those were available from china. you remember how bad the situation has been in italy.

it has been the same as the new york city situation. those projections were necessarily dire. i am not a modeler. this is my infectious disease person read. it is important to understand that these are very complex mathematical models. the data that went into them probably emphasized the early experience which looked very much like what new york city is experiencing right now. did that play out in places that started to experience this like much of the u.s. or had the opportunity to impose physical distancing measures relatively early? that is critical because there is an incredibly important interplay between what the virus

is doing and what we are doing to counterbalance those effects. a static model cannot account that.l i agree with you. i think they have revised and tried to revise them as accurately as they can, coming back to this torrent of information. we still don't have the really robust denominator data that we need. i think we need to pay attention to the models that. and be open to looking at them as more accurate data is fed into them. we need to advocate for the collection of more population-based representative data on who is really infected. host: that last caller from minnesota on the northwest side of minneapolis. the numbers according to johns

four, 706iversity -- confirmed coronavirus cases. 52 deaths. grab his next out of springville. good morning. caller: good morning. my question pertains to the amount of infection a person would get. say a person gets a massive amount of these viruses at one time in the person standing next to them only gets 50. that have any effect on the severity of the disease you end up with? host: thanks for the question. guest: excellent question. there are a couple of things. define theing to infectious quantity, so how much of this fires you need to get to

established viral infection. i don't know. data with alln the literature that is coming out. i have not seen data that has quantified the minimum infectious dose. i think it is safe to say a couple of principles about the quantity of virus. exposed virus you are to, the more likely you are to get an established infection. that is generally a principal. is other thing you can say from the studies that have followed people over time with infection is we tend to see as you are infected, the virus starts to decline. when you start to get symptomatic, it is probably at the peak, which is one of the

reasons that as you get more symptoms, you probably get infectious. you remain infectious, and then the virus starts to come down. viruseople still have detectable a long time now. don't know the answer to your question, but you could probably say that if two people who were twins, the same host, were exposed to a tiny amount of virus versus the larger amount, the larger amount would likely to get infected. host: this question from karen in virginia. when do you think colleges will decide if all classes will be online? students can come internationally and across many different states.

challenges for colleges and universities is daunting. people dealing with coming from places to these institutions of higher learning. in a way you cannot use that principle that i talked about very early on that was one of the reassuring criteria for reopening. ofember having 15 days sustained decline in the infection curve. how can you know that when you have people coming in from all over the place? you just don't. thoseiteria for reopening institutions is going to need to be different. i don't think people have actually worked that out in as

detailed away as we need to. many places are talking about doing the fall term online. a waitlaces are taking and see approach, which i think both are reasonable. weeks, april and through june are probably going to be so important as we see how things evolve. the one thing i will add is that i don't know that we will go back to anything looking quite the same as it has in the past. to aif people go back physical campus, we will still be in a place in the fall where we don't have a vaccine. we may not even have a clear signal on effective treatment for people who are infected.

thaty not know hydroxychloroquine works. we may not know that remdesivir works. even if people go back to their physical campus, there is going to need to be a lot of attention paid to ensuring physical safety and adequate room and technology so that people can physically .istance as needed lots of things to think about. dr. jeanne marrazzo from the university of alabama birmingham. this is george from outside of san antonio, texas. good morning. go ahead. caller: yes. a tiger would it take

to identify to develop coronavirus? guest: that is a great question. tests are two different types. i hope this is not too much. it is important for people to understand. there is the type that has been talked about a lot, including in the press conferences, that is being rolled out as part of this test, trees, isolate strategy to make sure that we can find out who has immunity and who does not. there are several of those. at least one has been approved by the fda. there is an antibody that we

think confers evidence of a prior infection. does that antibody that this tests tell us whether that person is immune, we don't know yet. we think that is probably the case based on our experience with previous coronavirus, but we don't know. detect thatt we can antibody anywhere from three to four weeks after the infection occurs and thereafter. testing isial probably going to be targeted to people who are at least a month out after their infections and maybe even six weeks to be safe so you can see people have been infected. illness you experienced in february, was it an early coronavirus infection?

the second point is that there are many scientific laboratories that are working very hard to markers ofre complex infection to look at the antibodies that are protected and confer immunity. we need those to measure whether a vaccine is going to be effective. we don't have those yet. i suspect we will have those in the coming weeks and months and that those will be critical determine what the protective component of human immunity is and whether a vaccine confers that. linda int call from ohio. thank you for waiting. caller: thank you for taking my call. out for the went first time since march 4.

i was at a grocery store, and there was a gentleman next to me. he had no mask or gloves. i said, where is your mask, and he said i had malaria, and i believe i am immune to this virus. i had never heard that, so i feel it was either misinformed, or he misunderstood. if there are any other people out there that have had malaria and feel that they will not get the disease, i want to protect them. thank you. host: dr. marrazzo. guest: thank you. that is a great public service announcement. it is a good example of how withmation gets mutated selective coverage, incomplete coverage, or competing coverage,

or people are just confused because there is so much coming out, and that is understandable. what i think he was probably thinking was, if he had malaria, he might have been treated with a chloroquine sort of drug, and may be thinking that prior treatment protect him from future acquisition of coronavirus. case,rse, that is not the nor does malaria confer any kind of immunity to any kind of virus, including the coronavirus. i think that this conversation brings out is i want to remind people -- this is a virus that none of us has ever seen in our life. that is why we are experiencing a pandemic. we have no pre-existing community immunity to anything resembling this virus. we have some immunity to

coronavirus is that have -- coronaviruses that have been circulating as the common cold, but they are not helping us out, and people are actively looking at that. a member, we have never seen this virus, and that is why we are dealing with such a devastating pandemic. how are yourrazzo, doing, and the researchers at the university of alabama? guest: thank you for asking. we are holding up. we are in much better shape than my colleagues in new york, boston, seattle, italy, spain -- move on. so many -- wuhan. summary places have been overwhelmed with patients. that said, our hearts are broken for everyone experiencing this, and anyone who has to deal with anding with dying patients their families knows how hard this is. you add the layer of social isolation behind the glass in an

familyen you cannot see members, someone who is dying, that has been incredibly hard. so the emotional burden on top of the fear of getting infected, ringing at home to your family -- bringing it home to your family, knowing you have got to physically distance, is potentially overwhelming, people have stepped up, and i could not be anymore proud of my profession and my colleagues and my institution at this time. and you for asking. host: we appreciate your time and your insight. actor jeanne marrazzo is the marrazzo-- dr. jeanne is the director of infectious diseases at the university of alabama, birmingham. after the break, we will be joined by the howard university president to talk about racial disparities in covid cases. first, rhode island governor -- governor ray

ondo gave an update yesterday. cases inondo: the rhode island, and unfortunately anddeaths in rhode island hospitalizations continue to rise. i don't want folks to panic. it is consistent with what we have expected, and it is why we are giving you, i am giving you, the advice i am giving you. i wish we were out of the woods. we are not out of the woods yet. that means the stay at home order in place until may 8 is something we all need to continue to obey. if your family is anything like my family, it is getting harder every day. we are all sick of it. we all wonder, is it necessary? wearing a mask makes it even more difficult. but the answers are it is necessary. it is a critical duty and if we

keep doing the job we are doing, we will be in a much better shape in two weeks than we are today, and that much closer to going back to work, opening childcare centers, opening parks, and getting to the business of life again that we all want to be doing. i would just ask you to continue your heroism, all of you. if you are a health care worker, you are a hero. if you go to work every day, thank you. frankly, if you just stay home, even though it is hard keeping yourself isolated, you are a hero to. -- too. you are the reason we are doing as well as we are doing, our hospitals aren't full, you don't have more fatalities than we do. so thank you. it is brutal, but you are doing it, and i'm proud of you. thank you. "washington journal"

primetime -- a special evening edition of "washington journal" on the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic. wen,uests are lina visiting professor at the milken school of public health, on public health policy and the battle against the coronavirus. join the conversation tonight at 8:00 on c-span. host: dr. wayne frederick is a surgeon and current president of howard university, joining us this morning. thefrederick, we spent first hour of our program today getting fewer reaction to the opening of america plan. can we start with your reaction to that three-phase plan giving the governor's flexibility to reopen their states after this pandemic?

i think it is a thoughtful sign. it is good that we have a plan to begin with. i hope there are some stringent measures set in the plan to make sure we follow the plan, so that if we bend it and need to close back down in a limited fashion, we will all demonstrate the discipline to do so. host: what measures do we need to see? guest: as pointed out, the measure of the decreasing cases over 14 days, the decreasing use of hospitalizations, those types of things -- i think if we see that in any particular municipality, i think we have to be disciplined and willing to go back to the stay at home. i know there is eagerness to open back up the economy, but at the same time, we want to make sure we don't have a second wave that is even worse, especially if we are not prepared to deal with it. when did howard university

decide to shut down and set students home? guest: we put out an announcement around march 9, and subsequently did not open back on march 16, going forward. host: what is it going to take, in your mind, before howard university welcomes those students back? guest: it is going to take a few things. one is our local jurisdiction here in the district, we will have to follow whatever guidelines the mayor puts out, and if she puts out similar guidelines, we will certainly be following that closely. we own and run a hospital as well, so we are getting data every day from the department of health, from the cdc. we are also seeing our own admissions, our own testing, in terms of the direction it is heading in, so we are tracking quite a few things. so we will follow the similar guidelines. fewill probably add on a things for ourselves as well.

there are significant interactions, so what we will do around disinfecting doors and classrooms may look a little will also bed we protecting any vulnerable students within our population interaction,nline especially for those students in particular. host: dr. wayne frederick is the president of howard university, a historically black university chartered in washington, d.c. in 1867. our guest this last hour of "washington journal." our phone lines are open regionally. 202-748-8002 is the line for medical professionals. you talk about data you are gathering at your hospital.

here is some data from the washington post, specifically on washington, d.c. african-americans make up 46% of the population, but 58% of the coronavirus deaths. d.c.at is in washington, in chicago, 32% of the population, 67% of deaths. why, in your mind, is there such a disparity in those numbers? i even answer that, one thing i would like to point out to your viewers and listeners is that if you also of -- ande number some of those states, it is very high. ,f you check on the unknowns the people of unknown ethnicity, i think you will see there are a large number underrepresented in those numbers, so those numbers are probably even worse,

unfortunately. having said that, there are some social determinants of health that are prominent, well researched, well known, and well documented. if you look at social determinism of health, what you will see is that those youlations in those areas have just spoken about have been under significant, what i call health stress. it means their health is significantly worse. here in washington, d.c., in ward eight, each is 95% african-american population, life expectancy is 72 years. in ward three, which is 95% white, the life expectancy here is 87.6 years. just a few miles separate those words right here in the nation's capital. the most powerful city in the world. to kidneyleads disease with a high incidence in

african-americans, high incidence of diabetes, hypertension. all those risks, we know. worse outcomes when you contract covid-19. that is really the source of the issue. there are fewer opportunities for healthy food. less transportation and access to health care. we can see how we got here. host: "the washington post" points at this is perhaps another factor in those numbers, the racial disparity. african-americans are likely to work in jobs that include contact with others that might be in poor health, that make engaging in social distancing more difficult. according to data from the u.s. bureau of labor statistics, like people are overrepresented compared to the overall population in the foodservice industry, hotel industry, taxi , talkingand chauffeurs about the dangers of working in some of the industries now. guest: that is exactly right.

you can add on bus drivers. you can go on and on. their chance of contracting the disease is higher. they are more likely as well to live in multifamily homes, in which the ability to self-quarantine or to self-isolate when one does contract a disease may be more limited. they are less likely to be able to have their elders separated from the rest of the family as well. are again, as we know, they people over 60, 70 years old, far more likely to have a worse outcome. yes, being on the front line is difficult. and coming back home to a circumstance in which you cannot socially distance is difficult. and being in a financial situation where you have to go back out, even when you potentially have symptoms, may be a factor as well.

with the frontline jobs being overrepresented with african-americans continues to be a problem. host: what do you think the federal government needs to consider when they are putting together not just their response, also testing specifically in black communities in this country? guest: i think you need to bring the testing sites to the community. there have been reports and some major cities where testing sites have been set up in parking lots, the drive-through's. if african-americans do not have cars, they won't be able to get tested. so you have to look at more mobile means of testing you can , by vans andcity trucks. we have a health care mobile tasting,e we do prostate cancer screening, as well as mammography screening and these kinds of screening. those are the kind of things we are thinking of converting so we

can take that to the city and be in the community to deliver that testing. host: any other recommendations that you would make on that front? guest: yes, i think also utilizing more rapid testing in those neighborhoods. and contrary to what we currently do, i would say testing even more in those areas and in those neighborhoods is the other thing i would recommend. you have to take the testing to the most vulnerable population. the sooner you can help with self-isolation and self-quarantine and making sure they don't spread it, because they are more likely to succumb to it, is a better and smarter strategy. it is also a better use of resources in terms of the return on investments you get from making that type of investment, absolutely. host: let's chat with a few callers. dr. wayne frederick is with us

until 10:00 a.m. eastern, the president of howard university here in washington, d.c., north west d.c., not far away from where we are on capitol hill. cynthia is in maryland. good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead. caller: dr. frederick, it is a pleasure to see you on c-span, a fellow graduate of howard university. i want to know the role of schools like howard in getting in theysicians of color united states, seen that we have a dearth of not only african-american but people of hispanic,mericans, asian physicians -- in our neighborhoods to help with situations like this. guest: it is a great question. actually, howard university, if you look at formal medical education in north america since university howard

has produced more african-american physicians than any single institution. we are carrying out those. at the grad level, we send more african-americans to medical school than any single institution in this country. we certainly are playing our role. i would argue actually that we need other medical schools, predominantly white institutions, to really start looking at their makeup and to take in more african-americans and produce more african-american physicians. howard, i think, takes an outsize load. with native americans and hispanics, the same thing. we simply take students with those ethnicities, and we simply are trying to increase that, what i think we have to spread the burden when you look at the number of medical schools in one country that rely on medical school or a couple, such as morehouse, the historically black colleges in existence with

medical schools. it is going to get the country in trouble. why is that important? do you have to have a physician that looks like you? that is not important. what is important is that you have cultural competency. want physicians who understand the circumstances that patients may be in, and you also want to produce physicians who are willing to go back into those neighborhoods. howard and morehouse have led the nation in sending the students into those circumstances that would give back and help with the social determinants of health. i think it is a national problem that needs to be addressed. i think howard is leading the front in that, but we can only do so much as a single institution. birmingham, michigan, this is tom, on the line for medical professionals. good morning. caller: good morning, doctor. my comments are related to something i think affects all of

seems to be having a stark particular effect on african-americans and is really what is driving prediabetic and diabetic epidemics. maybe 80 million do not know they have it. hypertension being such a driving risk factor -- the relationship of that with our basically corporate food network , regarding the high sodium and lifestyle, and how that has a particular effect on not aloneericans, but -- it is affecting all of the united states. your thoughts as to how this might motivate us to work with corporate food, medical, all trying to triangulate on an issue of lifestyle that many people do not want to discuss, but may help us resist and maybe even a short order of time -- my specialty being in therapeutic lifestyle change. i have seen amazing improvements from african-american,

caucasian, asians, having amazing effects regarding hypertension and diabetes, and possibly setting up a resistance to change in lifestyle, for which this may or may not be an impetus. i absolutely think you are right on the spot. theave to look at population from a holistic point of view when we talk about health. we have to think about what are the stressors that lead to some of these issues. nutrition is certainly one of them. ien you think of lifestyle, think we have to put that in context in a holistic manner. living,able to earn a and are you able to afford a shelter, a home? to you able to afford access the right types of things?

it is a holistic approach. definitely, one of those anchors is nutrition and lifestyle. how much exercise are we getting? are we living to work, or are we working to live? factorf the things to into what must be done. the disease that recently has gripped our nation -- trying to make sure we have the types of nutrition you are talking about, that would allow us to make sure people are not overweight, and therefore not at risk for diabetes and those other diseases is critical. -- 95% have to remember black, and the life expectancy is 72 years. maternal mentality -- mortality rates are very high. ward three only has two groceries, and we have 70,000 people in a circumstance where we do not have the fallback of the ability to get fresh foods inside of us. and if you then say, look at how

many groceries are in d.c., the transportation to get to the grocery on the others of town is also a significant burden. it's a holistic approach that must be taken. one of the things i think is if we invest more in those communities to make sure that we ike away that burden, actually think our health course will go down. but that is not the usual thinking about health care in america. we think of the latest people whos and the cannot afford those are the people who are more likely to die from these diseases. host: this is rosemary, edgewater, maryland. what kind of medical professional are you? caller: i am an assistant and i am so, so very proud of dr. fredericks. i'm a howard graduate. think the things that i

we are having health disparities in the community is extremely because of economic disadvantaged population. let's say in maryland -- i live in maryland. i work in a primary care facility in maryland. code, rightthe zip now, they are saying silver spring as [indiscernible] the population there is at least 80% hispanic. code 20745at the zip , it is considered underserved because of lack of health care professionals in that area. considered a hotspot for covid. what is the problem now?

we have extreme economic disadvantage. one of the things i think is a ,olution right now, this moment is to get maryland, virginia, district of columbia two have all those physician assistants -- they are available right now -- to work. get them in the community right now before they expire. host: thank you for the call. dr. frederick? guest: i think getting foot soldiers on the ground to bring awareness i think is important. what i would also say -- because of our health care workforce is already limited and stressed, and stretched as well, what i would also suggest is we have to

engage more community leaders and community organizations. i think there is a great opportunity to have pastors and other pillars of the community get the message out to their constituents, and being even the hosts of some of these testing sites and those types of things that we need. in terms of the broader health goals as well, i think it is also useful to use those community partners as well to get the message out that these communities have a natural and understandable distrust for the government because of what has happened over time. as a result, i think we have to make sure that in order to get the right incentives and there, we really have to rely on pillars of the community to take those messages, as well as deploying the health care workforce the best we can. health care workforce is really, really stretched.

and finding enough participants to get into all of these neighborhoods will be difficult. the mistrust of the medical community -- what would you point to, what you are historically, members of the community .2 as reasons for mistrust? tuskegee, andk at experiment carried out on african-american men, basically giving them the disease of syphilis without their consent, and watching them deteriorate. is part of a large and long history of distrust. the use of henrietta lacks' ce lls without credit has left mistrust. and when you think of the interaction that does occur when you don't have cultural

, there sometimes is a bit of blaming people for the outcome of their disease process. the reality is if you have diabetes and you cannot afford insulin, you are not going to be compliant with taking insulin. if physicians are not culturally competent, they cannot ensure the patients that are serving are capable of the interaction and capable of going out and , basedpating in exercise on the job situation. you are not going to get what you want. that mistrust builds as a result of a lack of that. we have other things that have demonstrated that. you are far more likely to get african-american men to participate in prostate cancer

screening if you do it through a barbershop, and create a dialogue where people are comfortable, meeting them where they are. quickly explaining to them what is, what a digital exam is, asking them to sign up -- i think we have to use methods where we get that trust built and subsequently get them to participate in what we think would be nice in an emergency. host: what would you say to tony and twitter, who writes him, shouldn't the emphasis be on factors that put populations at risk, rather than race? once we put a racial tag on things, honest discussions become nearly impossible. guest: i think that is a fair statement. we can certainly focus on the social determinants, and that is what i am speaking about, let's make no mistake about this. race is intertwined with this and it is a difficult conversation in our country.

what if we take that conversation on its merits, without becoming attached to it, and we attacked the factors, the reality is both things can be addressed with honest conversation. they are intertwined. there is no doubt about this. there are economic factors, social determinants, predicated and based on a system that does divide us by race. brown versus the board of education, which came about as a result of some work by howard lawyers and howard law school, , went about the purpose of desegregating our schools. significant are a number of municipalities in the south where they are greater than 75% or more of one race schools then there were before brown versus the board of education, which says that even with laws on the books, we have

lived our lives and build a system that continues to segregate us. at thoseen go and look education systems, it is disproportionate. we have to break that cycle, and it has to come with honest dialogue, but it also has to come with addressing the systemic issues that got us there. host: about 30 minutes left this morning in our program and in our conversation with dr. wayne frederick, president of harvard university, here in washington, d.c. if you are in the eastern and central time zones, it is (202) 748-8000. if you are mountain or pacific, it is (202) 748-8001. in the special one for medical professionals, (202) 748-8002. tosha is in buffalo, new york. caller: my first comment is i wish that black people would stop using the umbrella "people of color" when we are talking

about black issues. let's say black. from howard university said reaching out to other people of color -- doctors, latinos -- they speak of latino problems, not latino and black problems. native american people, they say native american, not "people of color." black people have got to stop using that terminology for black issues. another thing is -- this is really more of a comment. we keep going around and around instead of getting to the root cause of what the issues are with why black people have disparities. you have got to start putting black people into stem programs. we have to have doctors that look like us. that black shown people even today, with our history, we fear other doctors because we know we do not get the same treatment. black people, stop using "people

of color." we are black. host: dr. frederick? guest: i appreciate the comment. a couple of things. --hink tosha touched upon the difference between race and ethnicity is one that has a large academic discussion around it, and how people identify, and how they socialize and put themselves up in a society. on the second issue of the , inline and disciplines 1978, there were no african-american men who applied to medical -- there were more african-american men who applied to medical school and matriculated then in 2014. that is definitely a tragedy. that is not something we should have allowed to happen, and it is something that does speak to

a crisis in our society. identifyhere to only problems, but we have to be solution builders. three years ago, howard a program started that has since received a gift which has underwritten that program. that program was focused on bringing in high school graduates who were interested in an md or a phd in stem. he would thanksgiving those numbers of who applied to medical school that we would not be able to fill the program. we intended to take 10 students in the first year. he saw over 300 applicants. the first year, the students were so well-qualified we went ahead and accepted thirtysomething students. interviewed and made offers. we have offered 40 young people,

predominantly african-american offer to join the scholar program. i will tell you the average gpa .or those young women is 3.96 remarkable young people with significant advanced credits who can get into just about any institution in america today. they choose to come to howard because of that emphasis on underrepresented populations or dohasis on service, so you not just get a degree, but you get an education. go out and change the world around you. i think even in the darkness, there are beacons of light. if we empower the young people and reach out to programs for see they will join and

they will prove us right, in terms of us having faith in them. howard, in this world of social distancing, what is working for you? what isn't working? what is happening on campus right now? guest: sure, we basically shut the campus down and went online. i want to emphasize distance learning. there are some classes that do not lend themselves to distance education. we have labs with virtual simulation. theater.hings like those things are not necessarily simple to put online. we have stood that up. we did that with a remarkable effort by the faculty. prior to this covid-19 pandemic, we had about 95 courses being

taught online. this switch,e made we had 2500 being taught online. we needed significant effort to get that up. the quality of the instruction is working well. student participation is high. thataculty training to do -- about half of our faculty were trained to do that initially. of the faculty are trained. it is a really remarkable effort. there are things like clinical clerkships, where you want and need students to see patients. distancing, weal don't have that activity taking place. studentstical to have interacting with patients.

there is a social dynamic. we are looking at the opportunity potentially to participate in things like telehealth. one of the reasons students come to howard's for the social interaction. time is goinghe to be spent on the classroom, but 80% of the time is going to be spent living a life -- making friends, listening to other toologies, being exposed different cultures. thethat is ultimately where strength of the education comes from. host: there is a story from your hometown paper, "the washington post." college students are rebelling against full tuition as classes move online. has there been any thought about lowering tuition? that the quality of the education we are providing online justifies that.

we also, in this city, charge about half of what some of the other institutions charge. we actually charge closer to what you would pay online anyway. so we feel that the value for the money that is being paid is great, and therefore we don't see -- foresee, at least for this semester, changing that. host: to northbrook, illinois, this is bill, the line for medical professionals. what kind of medical professional are you? caller: a physician. host: what is your question for dr. frederick? caller: it is basically a statement and i would just like him to respond to it. prevalentses are more in blacks -- hypertension, glaucoma. get toore you could even the social setting of

individuals, or even whether they are obese, or their lack of exercise, or diet -- for all the sorts of things that impact those -- before we can figure this out, you have to see if we -- figure out, is this virus are blacks more susceptible to it? do they have a higher risk of a poor outcome from it? i think you have to have that question answered first before you can get to other ways these individuals have poor outcomes. etc.have diet, exercise, -- i would like the doctor to respond to that. 2 million people around

the world have contracted this virus. here in the united states, that number unfortunately is rapidly going to over 3000 deaths. we have quite a bit of information that suggests that the people who do worse, and we are seeing that at our own peoplel, are said to be with the following comorbidities or health programs. that includes patients that have any chronic lung issue, patients that have diabetes, and patients that have hypertension. one of the things that the coronavirus infection does is, because of how it affects the lungs, there is hypoxia, a low blood oxygen level. that low blood oxygen level, in and of itself, portends the outcome of potentially having a havingeart attack, of

more oxygenates into vital orders such as your kidneys, etc. it is a meal you of circumstances that ultimately result in the patient's passing. with that in mind, we still are going to come back to the underlying health issues that are going to portend a worse outcome. and those are the ones i listed already, including hypertension and diabetes. if you look at who has hypertension and diabetes, the percentages of african-americans with those diseases is underrepresented, because of those social determinants of health. i think it is that type of circumstance that has seen a confluence of all of these things coming around because of how it impacts the body and your ability to oxygenate your entire body.

host: when it comes to comprehensive data -- when it comes to race and those who have coronavirus and those who have died from coronavirus -- guest: the cdc and department of health are attempting to collect that data. at those numbers, there are a larger percentage listed as unknown. the other thing that is complicating and is supposed to be a very interesting epidemiology study here in the united states is you are seeing more people die at home then we have prior to this disease. the assumption has to be one of two things. people are not going to the hospital because of the fear of an infection. time, there are people dying at home of coronavirus infection because of how rapidly they may have

deteriorated. i think that is going to be very interesting. that is not a coincidence. if you look at all of our hospitals in north america, the other thing we are beginning to report at howard university hospital is we have seen less patients with heart attacks over the course of this pandemic since we had stay-at-home. so you have to ask yourself, are people with hypertension who aren't getting their meds and our surviving heart disease better staying at home, or are they dying at home because they are not getting to the hospital quickly enough? i think as studies begin to communicate and the data is analyzed, there will be interesting findings that come out of this related to those issues. host: about 15 minutes left with dr. wayne frederick from howard university. this is claudia from flint, michigan. question have had a

prior, but i'm going to ask this one because of what he just said. you are telling me -- you are telling me there is more people that are obese in america than caucasians that are obese? there are more caucasians in america and then there are blacks, and you are going to tell me that blacks are fat and overweight and dying from this when there is more of them than us? icond of all, i see that -- am in flint, michigan. i know everybody heard of them poisoning our water here. getting our water poison, no one was ever held accountable for it. they just wanted to be swept under the rug. they took all the water sites away and they started handing out water. they took that away. will the flint water have an effect on the people, along with the covid and the coronavirus

stuff? would that affect people, drinking the water, and the virus, making it worse by having bad water? i see one more thing. host: let's take those two, because we have a lot of calls and a little bit of time. dr. frederick? guest: on the first issue -- just to make sure we are clear as to what we are saying, you look at diseases like hypertension, diabetes, obesity, what we are saying is that the percentage of african-americans who are affected, versus the whites who are affected, is much higher. yes, there are more people in america who are white than are african-american. numbers, therer will be more of them then there will be of african-americans. there will be more white people with hypertension then there are african-americans with hypertension. if wer, as a percentage,

took all the african-americans in the country and said by percentage how many have these different diseases, i percentage, unfortunately, african-americans are overrepresented in terms of the number of us who have this, means that if the same number of people contracted this disease -- we had 100 white americans and 100 african-americans who contract this disease -- the likelihood that you have more african-americans with diabetes, pretension, and obesity would have worse outcomes is higher. that means more african-americans would die compared to white americans. of determination of water, i am not as versed in all the affects contamination will have. the complications from people who may have ingested water -- overtime, those may manifest themselves in a disease pattern. which certainly would make people more susceptible to poor

health outcomes over the course of time. that is why we have to make sure we put safeguards in place in flint, michigan, because you have to study the impact the contamination had on that population. host: eugene out of boston, good morning. you are next. caller: good morning. .hank you, dr. frederick i just wanted to -- three observations of mine. pandemic that came through america, 1918, the spanish flu, african-americans did not die in the type of disproportionate numbers that they are dying now, because at that time there was segregation. there was not as much association with people of other races. and coupled with the fact that there were not nearly as many black people on medications during that time -- which brings

me to another point of mine about the high blood pressure medication that a lot of blacks have been put on. over the last several years, there has been a lot of discussion that the majority of those people put on those medications should not have been put on high blood pressure medication. one of the side effects of that medication is that it destroys your heart, liver, and kidneys, which automatically means that your immune system is compromised. there is a lot that is going on under the surface of this. it is really up to black people to change their diet. that is very easy to do. there is a lot of excuses as to the obesity in the hypertension. early 60's, and i was told by my doctor maybe about 25 me onago he wanted to put some meds for hypertension, and so i changed my diet. i read a line by mohammed, how

to eat to live. i started eating more vegetables, got more active. i have never been on any medications. my mother is in her 80's. she has never been on any medications. with all these black people on medication for high blood pressure or for sugar diabetes, this is something that is in the control of black people, who need to take the bull by the horns, change your diet, do things that are necessary, so that you are not on these medications. i think most of the black people that are dying are black people that are on medications for high blood pressure and for sugar diabetes. host: we got your point. dr. frederick? guest: i think some good points. a couple of those things -- one is the pandemic of 1918. you are absolutely right. the country was still in a state of segregation. the black population was

underrepresented in some of those early deaths. as a matter of fact, i went back into some of the howard archives and there were many statements that suggested that black people were less susceptible although we did not quite understand the disease. black people did die when the contracted that flu, unfortunately, but in terms of exposure, there was some discussion that segregation may have avoided that. an example during one of those semesters howard diversity closed during the flu. there is a lot we have learned since then, and i think that with an example of how social , mandated by systemic racism, that could lead to the disease being less contagious within a certain community. dietary --e of

diabetes, hypertension, and the overrepresented haitian of african-americans -- overrepresentation of african-americans, when you look at clinical trials today, and those are trails where we give these medications and see the outcomes, less than 1% of the participants in many of those major clinical trials are african-americans. that means that we are prescribing drugs to a which the from studies, because of the low participation rate, with the historical context of mistrust, we are not sure medications are going to work just as well. out when largeat numbers of african-americans are taking these drugs for a while. there is an issue there. we have to get more african-americans represented in clinical trials. but that also comes from a

larger ecosystem of having more african-american physicians, or trust in the system, more african-american and health care providers that would help support that. i think changing diets is important, but i also don't want to simply point fingers. it is easy to talk about changing that and exercising. it is different when you are working two or three jobs, and you don't have access to daycare, when you don't have food within a nearby radius, and you may be more likely to have fast food. so i don't want to necessarily assume that african-americans in the circumstances are not interested in better health and better eating, but they may not be in a circumstance where they can. host: less than 10 when it's left with dr. wayne frederick of harvard university. i want to show viewers the scene in fort lauderdale, florida. that is where we are headed after this conversation. in a ron desantis -- governor

ron desantis of florida will be speaking. you see members of the national guard with face masks on. we are expecting the governor soon. in the meantime, more of your phone calls with dr. frederick. roos, denver, colorado, thanks for waiting. caller: thank you for taking my call. i know we do not have much time. i was going to say that first of all i agree with that other lady. i'm not sure how this disease originated in china and has only been here for a few months, apparently is targeting us more, blacks, that is. more than any other race. the university of colorado released findings this past monday showing that whites were actually almost up to 40% being infected, and blacks were only at 7%. i'm trying to figure out how has apparently hit

us more than any other race. i don't see anything about hispanics or asians or anything like that. lastly, i will say that for any blacks out there who want to read about racial disparity and what has been going on in this country, read the book called "medical apartheid." it came out in 2007. i believe the lady who wrote it is harriet washington. this has been around for a while. they were doing all sorts of experiments on slaves, but that is a whole different topic. i just don't really understand how this disease is all of a sudden killing more black people than whites. i will take the answer off the air. everybody, stay safe out there. guest: a couple of things. i do recommend the book "medical apartheid" as well. just earlier this week, i had a call with the author of the book , who gave a presentation. absolutely fascinating piece of

very gooda very, discussion and examination of the history around health care disparities. i'm not familiar with the colorado numbers. one thing i would say is that when you see those types of numbers, the next question you must ask is, who is being tested? -- i don'tpeople know how many of the people overall who tested were white. make sure when we make the comparisons we are clear. we are not testing african-americans at the same rate. that might be one of the things check to make sure we are representative. if we are not getting a wider spread of people who were tested who were ultimately negative as well. host: time for one or two phone calls before the governor of

florida comes out for his press briefing today. this is thomas in kalamazoo, michigan. good morning. caller: dr., thank you for what you are saying and doing, first of all. can you expand on the statement about deaths that are more likely to happen in a hospital than at home? i was wondering about people of color. our people at home having more cardiac events? is that what you said? guest: i will explain. let me repeat what i said. what we have seen since this pandemic has started is we have had less patients with heart attacks present at the hospital. at the same time, there has been an increase in the number of people who have been dying at .ome

as those autopsies are done and we get more data, we have to think about what they are dying from. the theory is that we may be having more people die at home from heart attacks, because they are uncomfortable going to the hospital during the stay-at-home period. it is an unusual phenomenon, to have a pandemic circumstance like this. unemployment, people losing -- we are seeing less people at hospitals with heart attacks and we are seeing more people dying at home in each of these municipalities. -- as we protect these get more autopsies done and get more information from medical examiners -- host: this is charles, in washington, d.c. franklin -- dr.

frederick, my fascination relates to training and earlier students,ith our particularly in middleton high school. school, washington metropolitan -- for two years, -- we are not doing as much that relates to ofwing future generations knowledge and training to be socially and economically successful, and we can see that now. i guess my question -- how is howard doing, or can it do encourage more health sciences in high school students? obviously, everyone is not prepared for college, everyone in high school. host: let me take the question,

because the governor may be coming soon and i want to give a. franklin -- dr. frederick second. guest: washington metropolitan is not a howard campus. it is adjacent to howard campus and we have no oversight. we do have a middle school on our campus, howard university middle school for math and science. we can't -- we call it "ms s quared." as the school has been on howard campus and associated with us, about 95% of the students who attend that middle school go on to college. about 60% of them participate in .tem majors we recognize and participate with that middle school. that is why we have the middle school on the campus, to get our doctors, dentists, engineers.

it certainly likes a flame of interest in them. d.c. thatschools in are focused on stem. we can get a partnership where we get joint ged acquisition and college credits. we do enrollment with a few high schools included. dr. wayne frederick is the president of howard university, howard.edu. we appreciate your time this morning. stay safe out there, not too far from us. guest: thanks for having me. you stay safe as well. host: that's going to do it for our program today. we will of course be back here tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern, 4:00 a.m. pacific. we are going to take the rest of, florida. we are expecting a press conference very soon with the governor, ron desantis. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2020] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its

caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]