critical component of our responsibility. i want to remind members that our next congressional hearing is on wednesday, february 24, 2021. that is next week. with that, the subcommittee stands adjourned. thank you so much. ♪ >> you are watching c-span, your unfiltered view of government. c-span was created by america's tape -- cable television companies. today it is brought to you by these television companies who provide c-span as a public service. >> the 170 congress includes over 60 members and this diverse group includes television reporters and former college and professional athletes. watch our conversations with new members of congress. tonight, we speak with freshman

members including nancy ray, peter klein, ronny jackson, and tony gonzales. watch interviews with new members of congress tonight at eight eastern -- at 8:00 eastern , on c-span.org, or listen on the c-span radio app. >> president biden's nominee for attorney general, merrick garland, testifies before the sitting judiciary committee on monday. watch our live coverage at 9 a.m. eastern on c-span or c-span.org. or listen live on the c-span radio app. >> the white house covid-19 response team said today there is a backlog of more than 6 million vaccine doses due to the large winter storm in oklahoma, texas, louisiana, and other states. as of now -- they will update

numbers as well as distribution. >> as of now we do have a backlog. some states have been a were -- been able to cover this delay with existing inventory. let me tell you how we as an entire nation will have to pull

together to get back on track. there are plenty of places along the distribution trained -- distribution chain that have been impacted by the weather. first, our logistics and distribution teams have all faced challenges while summer snowden and unable to get to work to package and ship the vaccine. second, road closures have held up livery of vaccines at different points in the distribution process. between manufacturing sites, distribution, and shipping. third, or than 2000 vaccine sites -- more than 2000 vaccine sites are located in areas with power outages so they are unable to receive doses. preservation of the vaccines and supplies and trusted

communication with states. because of 72 hour hold chain constraints, they are sitting at a site where they might expire. the vaccines are sitting safe and sound, ready to be shipped out as soon weather allows. as weather conditions approve -- improve, we are working to clear this backlog. 1.4 million doses are 1.4 million doses are already in transit today, and we anticipate that all the backlogged doses will be delivered within the next week, with most being delivered within the next several days, and we expect we'll be able to manage both this backlog and the new production coming online next week. with everybody's hard work and collective effort, we will be able to catch up, but we understand that this will mean asking more of people. ups and fedex both will support saturday deliveries tomorrow.

we are working with the jurisdictions, to see which ones are able to take saturday deliveries. the packaging plant for moderna vaccines is just now coming online. roads are being cleared for the workforce to leave their homes. they are working today through sunday to package the backlogged orders, and will put the vaccines and ancillary supplies on aircraft on sunday night for monday through wednesday delivery. as we get back on track, we're asking states, sites, and vaccinators to help us catch up and to get americans vaccinated. we know many americans are awaiting their second dose, and many more, their first dose. we're asking vaccine administration sites to extend their hours even further, and offer additional appointments

and to try to reschedule the vaccinations over the coming days and weeks, as significantly more supply arise. states and vaccination sites are going to want to be prepared for the additional volume. whatever reduction we see in our seven-day average this week in vaccinations from the weather, if we all work together, from the factory, all the way to the vaccinators, we will make up for it in the coming week. i want to personally thank the men and women who have continued to keep our operations up and running throughout the storm and have been working 24 by 7 with the states and with local vaccination sites, and my thoughts remain with all of those impacted. i'll be happy to answer any questions about this topic, but before we turn it over to dr.

walensky and dr. fauci, i do want to briefly touch on our work to stand up more federally run sites. even as we manage the weather, on the one hand, we are pushing ahead with plans to get more vaccines to more places to get more americans vaccinated. today, i'm pleased to announce we'll be opening five additional vaccination centers. one in pennsylvania, and four in florida. in florida, we will stand up four major new community vaccination centers in partnerships with the state in orlando, miami, jacksonville, and tampa. the these sites will have the capacity to vaccinate a total of 12,000 individuals per day in total. in pennsylvania, we're announcing a major new community vaccination center at the pennsylvania convention center in philadelphia. this site will have the capacity to deliver 6,000 doses per day. selection of all of these sites

is based on the cdc/fema framework that has been developed to target vaccinations to those who are most vulnerable. the goal is to launch vaccination sites that use processes and are in locations that promote equity and deploy the cdc's social vulnerability index. the federal government will be deploying teams immediately to work hand in hand with state and local jurisdictions to get these sites set up, and we expect -- we expect them all to be up and running in the next two weeks, so that's a brief status from the white house covid response team. here, we'll have more announcements to come next week. now with that, i will turn it over to dr. walensky to overview the state of the pandemic and public health. dr. walensky.

dr. walensky: thank you so much. i'm glad to be back with you. i have new information to share from cdc regarding ongoing safety monitoring of the covid-19 vaccines. but before i go into those findings, i want to provide a brief overview of the latest development on the pandemic. we continue to see a five-week decline in cases, decreasing 69 cases in the seven-day average since hitting a peek on january 11th. the current seven-day average of approximately 77,000 cases is the lowest reported since the end of october, but still higher than the height of last summer's peak. like new covid-19 cases, the number of new hospital admissions continues to drop. the seven-day average of new admissions on february 16th, approximately 7,200, represents a 56% decline since the january 9th peak. as i reported on wednesday, the number of deaths continues to fluctuate. the latest data indicates that

deaths have declined modestly in the past week to an average of approximately 2,700 per day. these numbers are a stark reminder of the thousands of lives lost to this pandemic. another reminder of the devastating impact of the pandemic has had on our country was brought into clear view yesterday in a report released by the cdc on the provisional lisks pectsy in the first half of 2020. -- provisional life expectancy in the first half of 2020. the report found that life expectancy was at its lowest level in 15 years, dropping by a full year compared to the life expectancy in 2019. this represents a substantial decline in life expectancy in our nation. and poor -- and importantly, like the populations most heavily affected by the pandemic, the declines in life expectancy were again pronounced no most racial and ethnic minority groups. the largest declines in life expectancy in non-hispanic black persons, dropping 2.7 years, levels not seen since 2001, and

hispanic persons have lost the second largest life expectancy, dropping 1.9 years. these findings, though not surprising, are sobering and representative of the continued need to take this pandemic and actions to stop the spread of covid-19 seriously. now, more than ever, with the continued spread of variants that continue to threaten the progress that we're making, we must do our best to protect each other, wearing masks, social distance, avoid practicing in crowds, practicing good hand age inand get vaccinated. -- good hand hygiene, and get vaccinated. today, more than 41 million in the united states have received at least one dose of the covid-19 vaccine. but we continue to hear that people might be reluctant to roll up their sleeve because of adverse effects.

-- because they are worried of adverse effects. i will reiterate that the cdc is committed to monitoring vaccine safety and frequently reporting on what we know. today, cdc is releasing a study and the morbidity and mortality weekly report that describes findings from our covid-19 vaccine safety monitoring in the united states from december 14th through january 13th, 2021. during the first month of vaccinations, approximately 1.6 million people enrolled in v-safe. cdc's new phone-based vaccine safety monitoring system. among those enrolled, 71% reported pain where the shot was given, 34% reported fatigue, and 30% reported a headache. these are common with most vaccines, and they typically resolve within a day or two of vaccination. it's important to know that about half the people don't feel very well after getting their second dose. this should not deter you from getting your second dose, but you need to have a light day of

activity after getting vaccinated. there were also rare report of severe allergic reactions, an flaxics, serious but treatable. -- anaphylaxis, a serious but treatable reaction. in fact, there are 4.5 cases of anaphylaxis of 1 million doses given at this time. a rate similar to what we have seen in other commonly used vaccines. in the first month of experience, a total of 113 deaths were reported, of which approximately 65% were among long-term care residents. -- long-term care facility residents. a third of you said these deaths were not related to the covid-19 vaccine, and the death rate in this population, though truly sad and unfortunate, was consistent with the expected background death rate in this demographic. i want to emphasize that we have implemented the most comprehensive vaccine safety monitoring system program in our history, and the data released

from the cdc today are reflective of this effort. we will continue to closely monitor these events and report back, as further data emerge. i want to be sure you know the facts, and not the myths about the vaccine's safety and about vaccine safety. the fact is they are safe and they will save lives. and that is why we are committed to working with state and local public health partners, as well as partners in the private sector, to support getting people vaccinated and quickly and as safely as possible. -- as quickly and as safely as possible. the to help advance our collective efforts to scale up vaccines in communities, on monday, cdc is convening a three-day virtual national forum on covid-19 vaccines. the forum will bring together a broad range of governmental and non-governmental partners to share information and best practices on how to build trust and confidence in covid-19 vaccines, how to use data to

optimize vaccine implementation, and how to provide practical real world experiment on how to increase vaccination capacity in communities, especially for those at increased risk of covid-19 and for those who may face barriers to vaccination. i'm excited about this forum and the rich dialogue it will stimulate, and i invite those who are involved in vaccine efforts to register and attend this important meeting. thank you, and as always i look forward to your questions, but before that, i'll turn it over to dr. fauci. dr. fauci? dr. fauci: thank you very much, dr. walensky. what would i like to do is take a couple of minutes very preferably reviewing the status of the vaccines and vaccine trials that we have, but then as i've done in the past, pick out a question that i believe is being asked more frequently to try and preemptively address it and perhaps generate some discussion. with regard to the trials that we have, as you know, the u.s. government had been involved in the development of and/or facilitation of the testing of three separate platforms

represented by six different companies. you are all aware of the data of the moderna and the pfizer/biontech, which had their eua now, having shown a 94% to 95% efficacy. right now, as we speak, the data from the biontech study showed a 92% efficacy in the united states, but was also done in south africa and latin america, and showed a diminished efficacy against the variant, but very good against severe disease, that is being reviewed at the fda for the u.s. data, and on february the 26th, the fda will consult with their independence advisory committee -- independent advisory committee, and we hawed be hearing from them soon. with regard to the astrazeneca and the novavax, those trials are both fully enrolled.

these are event-driven decisions, so when they reach a certain amount of events, they will then look at the data and make decisions as to whether or not to go ahead with a request for an eua. so having said that, let me just now very briefly address a question that is a very relevant question that we are now more commonly being asked. if you look at the existing trials, those that have already gotten an eua, and those we anticipate and hope will get an eua, when will we be able to say we can vaccinate children, children in the high school range and children in the elementary school range? you know from pfizer that they started off with the trial of 44,000 individuals, down to 16-year-olds, and then progressed it down to 12-year-olds. so what they are going to be doing in april, starting in april, they are going to be studying 12-year-olds down to

5-year-old, to 6-year-olds. that will take likely one year to get the information on that, likely not until the first quarter. however, we anticipate data on high school aged individuals, namely individuals 12 years old to 17 years old, by the beginning of the fall, maybe not exactly coinciding with the first day of school, but sometime in the fall, we will have that. moderna, as you know, started off with already 18-year-olds. they are now currently enrolling 12 to 17-year-olds. so let me take a moment to explain the process of how you get relevant information regarding these younger individuals. this is a representative trial, which very likely will reflect other trials. it's a 3,000-person trial, so right off, you're not dealing with the 30,000 and 44,000-person trial that gave

the efficacy signal in the original moderna and pfizer study. what the trial is, is the trial is what's called a non-inferiority by immunogenicity, which is a lot of big words, which is really asking, is it safe in the children, and does it induce and immune -- an immune response that is comparable were not inferior to the immune response that we know is associated with efficacy and the other trials? -- in the other trials? and that's the way that trial will go, and then we're starting by the end of march, they will do what's called an age de-escalation study. we're already enrolling on the 12 to 17. they will go to the 6 to 12, and then 2 to 6, and then six months to two years.

again, we will likely get information for high schoolers at some time in the fall, but it is, i would say, more than likely we will not have data on elementary schoolchildren until at least the first quarter of 2022. similar types of approaches are being taken by the other candidates, the other companies, namely j&j, novavax, and az, so the bottom line of all of this is as follows -- it is highly likely that sometime in the fall, we will have data that will give us the capability of saying the safety and comparable efficacy in children 12 to 17, 18 years old. again, the final decisions, we always leave to the fda. i'm trying to give you a road map of what likely will happen, but then also, with the studies

that i just mentioned, to getting the information to make the decision in elementary school children almost certainly will not be firmed down until the first quarter of 2022. i will stop there and hand it back to andy. thanks, dr. fauci. andy: -- andy: thanks, dr. fauci. okay. we can take some questions. >> all right. >> thanks for taking the question. i have a question about the federal mask vaccination sites and how you're determining where to set this up. how much of this is estates coming to you and saying, okay, we need help with this place, that place. can you come in and set up a fema site? how much is it you saying to the state saying, we think you need some help here, and we see the progress, you are not hitting enough of the underserved communities, so we want to do a

site here, and in general, has there been kind of a 50-state overall assessment at how states -- of how the states are doing a distribution and where they need help? have you done something like that, some kind of comprehensive look? andy: thanks, jonathan, and i may ask dr. walensky to comment in a second on how the cdc thinks about the social vulnerability index and places where we like to target. what i would reflect for you, jonathan, is we have a very healthy ongoing dialogue with multiple participants in a state every week, and there's a good give and take. we are obviously looking for two things as we select these sites. the first is how can we get more people vaccinated more quickly, and the second is, how can we get more people vaccinated more equitably? those are really the two most important criteria, and so having these conversations, these dialogues go back and

forth, you know, as an illustration, we may have a -- a governor says we're very interested in this, and then when we work with the cdc and with fema, we may say if we -- if we do something in this state, this is the location that we think works best and makes sense and then we'll have a back and forth. so it's very collaborative. it's very positive. dr. walensky, anything you would add more specifically? dr. walensky: i don't have a whole lot to add to that except to say it's a collaborative. we're doing outreach, and we're receiving and trying to incorporate what states' specific needs are. we do look specifically at the social vulnerability index of where these sites might go. also the population size so we can understand exactly what the needs are in those specific sites. so it's a deep collaboration, and it looks both at social vulnerability index and the outreach that's needed, whether there's, you know, the size as

well as what mobile units might be needed, as well. andy: yeah. jonathan, federal/state partnership is the key to the approach, and we view ourselves hopefully as good partners to the states, and if they bring us challenges, our goal is to help them solve them, not to reward or punish, as i think has been a prior philosophy. let's go to the next question. >> next, we'll go to sheyenne hazlett of abc news. reporter: hi. thanks for doing this. on school openings, my question is about 745 is schools that are -- 75% of schools that are currently located in the red zones, which the cdc recommends be hybrid or virtual, so i'm wondering how in april, just about two months from now, the president intends to make good on that promise of full-time in-person schooling. andy: thanks for that question. i think that question allows to us clarify a few things and i

want to turn to dr. walensky to do that. dr. walensky: yeah. thank you for that question. the first thing just want to convey is there are opportunities for in-person learning hat all stages -- in all states of community spread. as we've seen community spread coming down, and as we've seen our numbers improving right now, what i would invite the schools to do, we have actually seen many more communities leave the red zone and move into the orange zone, which actually has more opportunities for in-school opening and for in-person learning, so our numbers are coming down. i would actually invite schools to lean in and to look at what is needed so that -- in the road map, to try to get more and more children back to school. andy: and i want to just to clarify something you said, because it's so important, dr. walensky. is it possible if you are in the red zone, even if things are improving, is it possible to open schools under the cdc's guidance? dr. walensky: absolutely.

so in the areas that remain red, and there are about two-thirds of districts now though the numbers continue to climb, the numbers that remain way we say with universal masking and there are opportunities for in-person student learning as well as middle and high school learning assuming that you're willing to take the recommended suggestions that we suggest. >> i think that's a great clarification. next question, please. reporter: i have a question about dosing. there's been several studies published in the last couple of days, the dosing of the vaccines, that is, that have suggested that just a single dose of the vaccine might be highly effective after about two or three weeks, and i wonder if that has shifted, dr. fauci, if

it has convinced you that just a single dose of the mrna vaccines might end up being effective. dr. fauci: well, if you're referring to the mrna vaccine, you're probably referring to a recent israeli study that looked at the mrna, because the extension of the time and a single dose with az has also been discussed, but let me refer and just answer directly your question with the mrna. we always look at data very carefully and seriously, and we evaluate it as as it evolves, but if you look at data from the particular study, and then go back and look at why we round up -- why we wound up with a prime and a boost, and for moderna as you know, that's 28 days and for pfizer it is 21 days, and the reason is, even though you can get a fair degree of "protection" after a single

dose, it clearly is not durable, we know that. the durability is not as much as the durability that you would get with the boost. secondly, if you look at the difference between the degree, the intensity of the response after a first dose, and compare it to that of the second dose, the second dose is ten times higher, in the sense of level of neutralizing antibodies, which is one of the parameters of immunity. so, again, although the numbers of a single dose do look interesting, the one thing we don't know is how durable it is, and since it's ten times less than the optimal dose that you would get, you have to look at it from two stand points. you remember we discussed on one of these press briefings before that the reason why you look clinically and see that despite

the fact that there's a maybe five to six fold diminution in the impact of the antibodies that are induced by the mrna candidates, it's still within the range of protection. the reason for that is the response following the boost was so high, that even though you diminished the efficacy down to about 50%, you still had rather good efficacy against severe disease, so it's a variant issue to protect against variant. the other issue that we need to take into consideration is, if you do have a less than optimal, even though with numbers, they look reasonably good, but not as good as the optimal response, what could happen theoretically is that because of the immunological pressure that you see on the virus, you might actually, theoretically, be inducing more variants, so there

are a few scientific reasons why we feel, given the information we have right now, we will stick with the scientifically documented efficacy and optimal response of a prime followed by a boost with the mrna. >> dr. fauci, just a couple additional clarifications. you said something here, which i think is important for the public to understand. if we do see more of the variant present in the country do you -- present in the country, do you feel better with people having two doses of the mrna vaccine or one? dr. fauci: well, there's no doubt, andy, that -- thank you for the question. i alluded to it, but thank you for giving me the opportunity to repeat it. the there's no doubt about that, that you have an optimal

response when you're dealing with variants. you want enough of a height of a response that even if you diminish it, you don't diminish it so much to get out of the realm of protection, number one. number two, if you do have a less than optimal response, you could theoretically and inadvertently be selecting immunologically for variants. andy: thank you. so just a couple of things to emphasize here. one is, we want the public not to be confused. the recommendation from the fda is two doses, just as it always has been. number two, and i think this is a sort of more macro point, i invite either dr. fauci or dr. walensky to comment here. there are studies all the time. there are pre-prints all the time, and real world evidence comes out all the time, and it will continue to happen. the people at the fda led by peter marks, people like dr. faucher, people like dr. walensky, love looking at this data and these studies, but it's also important to understand

that -- that one study, even though it may look attractive, if it's in the public domain, and may capture a headline, isn't always what it appears to be and it is only one study, so i think we've got the best people in the world looking at this. i feel very confident, and they will look aggressively at these studies, but i think it's important that people understand that we're not going to be persuaded by one study that happens to grab headlines. we here at the white house will of course listen to whatever the scientists have to say and adjust accordingly. anything you want to add to that, dr. walensky or dr. fauci? dr. fauci: yeah, andy, you know, thank you for bringing that up, and with regard to the specific study and, again, i'm not criticizing the study because it's an interesting study and we really do want to follow up on this, but, again, this is a study that we -- we were made aware of by press release, so it

wasn't something that we had the opportunity to look at all the data yet, but it's very interesting that it says here at the end, the results might differ from others, getting to the point that andy made. there are many studies. the results might differ from others', because the subjects were largely younger and healthier, said one of the authors. she also said the study couldn't confirm how long the protection from one shot would last as most of the subjects receive the second shot. so the points that i made in my explaining to the person who questioned is actually admitted to by one of the authors. thank you. andy: thank you. next question, please. >> we have time for one more question. pbs. reporter: hi. thanks so much for taking my question. i have two questions. the first is, a lack of pharmacies and hospitals, providers and transportation has emerged in communities hardest

hit by the virus. what's the plan and timeline for getting more vaccinations to areas with inadequate health infrastructure? has the government found that's a problem, an increasing problem when looking at vaccine distribution? and the second question i have is on life expectancy. i'm wondering how lasting this change in life expectancy is. do we expected to bounce back, and when will it go back up? andy: well, let me take the first question, and dr. walensky can get the second question on life expectancy. there are a number of issues that you point out that are access barriers including transportation, including the clinical infrastructure, and it's important to point out, that even when there is a local availability of vaccines, people from outside of these communities, outside of the

hard-hit communities come in and make appointments and often come in and take some of those doses, which we shouldn't be surprised about. that happens in a shortage, but we have to act on it, because we are purposely setting up both sites that are located in these committees conveniently. there will be a series of announcements over the next week to 10 days about major things we are doing about transportation. about appointment reservations, and ensuring that those appointment are kept, certainly bringing mobile vans into communities, bringing federally qualified health centers, which are ideally located into communities. and then assuring that we have all of the things that end up becoming barriers, which are the hours people are open, the ability to get there and back,

and some of the other things that are getting in the way. so i could tell you that we are working these in detail, along with the states, along with local communities. they are -- i think it's safe to say that if you don't do these things, you naturally end up with the people who are getting hit hardest by the virus, also getting the least access to the vaccine. there are some success stories. i think it is too early to report that we've figured this out. i think it is a constant battle, to be honest. dr. walensky, anything you want to add to that and also the life expectancy question. dr. walensky: i agree with you entirely. the report from cdc only reported the life expectancy loss from january to june, the first half of 2020. quite unfortunately, i think we will see again a decrease in life expectancy once we start

looking at the entire year, because we know the highest mortality rates have been in the older populations. i think we're going to have a lot of work to do in this country over the years ahead to try to make up for losses that we've seen with this pandemic, and that's going to be including investing in our public health infrastructure and improving the health of the entire nation, and especially in improving the health of the ethnic and racial minorities that took the hardest hit. andy: thank you, dr. walensky. i want to finish where we started, which is to thank everybody who will be working over this weekend to catch up from the weather-related events, to thank our partners in states and local vaccinators for extending their hours and increasing the access to folks to get their vaccines, and to assure people that if their vaccine, because of the weather -- their second shot has been delayed for a short period of time, it is not a problem. that will be accommodated

completely. thank you all, and i hope everybody has had a nice weekend. announcer: president biden went to michigan today to visit a pfizer plant in kalamazoo. that creates and packs the covid-19 vaccine. he was joined by the pfizer ceo and governor whitmer.