hi, everybody. welcome to our daily program called getting answers. we're asking experts your questions each and every day to get answers for you in real time. today we will talk to a supervisor from santa clara county who worked in the navy with joe biden's son, beau. lariesnanra at we beg wid9 and the search for answers to distribute the vaccine quickly and easily. dr. grace lee, welcome back to the program. >> thank you for having me.

>> don't forget to ask your questions and vaccines, covid-19, anything to the doctor by using the comments section. i will try to get to as many as we can. one of the debates that is happening right now, is if the state should move to an age-based system instead of tier based. everyone would like to sea a proposal. where do you stand on it? >> our goal is to be able to provide vaccines to everybody who wants a vaccine. when we had originally considered different allocations approaches, the two things that came to mind are how with we prevent morbidity and mortality, and how can we keep society functioning. those were goals that were included in every phase that were does cussed as a national

level. and to look at the data in your state or county or the local level to understand how to ensure that we're achieving both of those goals and keeping both goals in mind. what is most important to make sure we are efficiently distributing vaccines and it's clear in the state of california that we had a huge surge in a high number of hospitalizations and one of the concerns has been health care capacity. the other is making sure that we're protecting those who are at high risk of mortality. and the recent data suggests it's the older adult population in the current data. again, the data continues to evolve as the pandemic evolves.

>> and san francisco city college starting today has a mass vaccination site. i want to ask you about former san francisco mayor willie brown. he had written an article about making it similar to the vaccine for polio, where everybody, no matter what background, your age, just go to a site. that sounds like in theory that would be great. but it sounds like there are a lot of factors at play here. >> we are trying to vaccinate in the middle of a pandemic. so again, if we have enough doses, we would love to be able to vax everybody who walks through the door. but we have to make sure we do it in a safe and effective moner. we have to make sure we are protecting the covid precautions, so having everyone walk in at once is a challenge. so the other thing is, we don't

want to -- although it's difficult to have the patients and know that vaccine is coming, we don't want people frustrated because there's long lines. we also want to make sure we are protecting the most vulnerable. for example, i was really sad about the long lines outside -- that we saw early on where we saw elderly sitting outside waiting for their doses overnight. and we know our most frail elders are not able to sit outside over night. so making sure we're protecting those who are most vulnerable will be really important. >> that was heart breaking to see. we had one of our reporters speak to a woman who was tearing. she was crying when she finally got her first vaccine dose. and it says a lot about how people are going about this, and how relieved they are to get a first dose. speaking of vaccines, nationwide, the president's goal

is to get 100 million vaccinations out in 100 days. i asked our medical expert dr. patel how realistic is this? what do you think of the goal? >> it's clearly an ambitious goal. i do have faith in the ability to deliver the vaccine if we have the supply that is needed so our hope is that a national coordinated strategy will give us clarity to how many doses we will be able to have so we can get doses into arms. we are able to get that many doses that quickly, all of us who are on the front line are ready to vaccinate and want to be able to vaccinate as much as possible. >> we are getting good questions in from viewers on facebook. i want to circle, philip wants to know will i will be challenged by cvs to administer

a vaccine or is it free? >> the vaccine itself is free of charge. you should not have to pay for the vaccine. typically, clinics will capture if you have insurance, they will capture insurance information but that is not to charge for the vaccine. so i anticipate your out of pocket shots should be really nothing as far as i'm aware. >> and debbie asks, should you not take advil or tylenol before the vaccine? are there things to keep in mind? >> it's not a problem. we don't recommend that you get that. obviously if you have comp somes, and it's really important to remember we do anticipate that people will have local or systemic reactions. local reactions are pain at the injection site. it's very typical after most

vaccines. be systemic reactions, headache, fatigue, muscle aches. sometimes people do feel they need to take and it's more frequently in younger people than older people. but to be reassured if you do have either local or systemic reactions, that is a normal part of getting a vaccine. and it reflects probably the immune response that you're mounting in that we found the vaccines are incredibly efficacious. not to worry that that's a problem. they usually last one or two days and they occur in one to three days after vaccines. but very short lived, very temporary, and if tylenol helps, thaw is fine. as long as you can take it with all of your other medical conditions considered. >> i'm glad you had that

reassurance. it sounds similar to the flu season before we get the flu vac nations. independe it goes along with lisa who asks, where can we get safely the vaccine and be monitored? >> that is a great question. anyone with any severe allegic reactions, and those are carrying and epi pens, and first of all, if you had an allergic reaction, to the covid-19 vaccine or any of its ingredient that we would not want to administer the vaccine and you had consult your allergist. if you had a strong reaction to any other vaccines or injectables, we do suggest that you think about the benefits,

and many individuals still want to proceed and we will give vaccines. but we want to sure that people are aware of the risk, and those who us who had reactions to foods or pets or environmental allergens, we feel all of our vaccination sites, the goal is to vaccinate as safely as possible. we ask you to bring your epi pen with you. anyone with reactions will be asked to wait for 30 minutes to monitor for symptoms on site, and everybody else is asked to wait for 15 minutes. >> can you imagine waiting in line for hours and hours and not having it with you. i'm glad you mentioned the precautions to take before you head to a vaccination site. we are hearing that france san francisco is hoping to vaccinate

all eligible residents by june 30th. how do you they can happen? do you they is realistic awell? >> again, assuming -- i do think all of the varccinators are eagr to vac nate. so i have full confidence in that. i do think it will get easier if there are addition l vaccines. it will increase the number of doses available but it will increase the number of people that can safely vaccinate. the current vaccines we have have very specific requirements or storage and handling requirements that really require us to make sure that we're carefully taking care of the doses and we're not wasting any doses. the other vaccines that are coming through are more table at

refrigeration copies. and we hope to be able to work with all the primary care folks that are typically vaccinating any way, but they will be able to store and handle the vaccines safety. hopefully we will get to that state soon, and i'm remaining omt mystic. >> i have an interesting question coming in from a viewer, edward. he wants to know because it mutates, we will need a new vaccine annually like the flu. that is a good question, especially with the strain. >> thank you for that question. the variants emerge in that all viruss mutate. coronavirus itself mutates less frequently than flu does. so we are going to need be vigilant about making sure we're monitoring what variants emerge. we are going to need to be vigilant ensuring the vaccines

remain effective. and to date, they appear to be effective against the existing variants. i do anticipate over time that it may change, but we're feeling optimistic at least for this season that we can -- if we can get enough vaccines into people and if we can actually maintain the precautions like masking and social distancing and all the public health measures f we can make a dent in the pandemic now, our goal is to ensure that we're protecting and developing immunity as quickly as possible and that will be helpful in terms of reducing the rifsk of new variants. >> something i think you will continue to monitor. let's get through the season first, as we monitor things. dr. grace lee, always a pleasure. >> thank you. moving on now, coming up, we have an up close look at a spike in burglaries in san francisco,

and a friend of beau biden who served with him in the military is a supervisor in santa clara county.

a member of ptd joe biden's family was not at the inauguration. beau biden. he died in 2015 from brain cancer but president biden made sure to keep his mem write in the front of his mind. >> i am proud, proud, proud to be a son of delawarend i am sta here doing this from the major

beau biden. so, ladies and gentlemen, i only have one regret. it's not here. because we should be intro dudug him as president. >> that gives me chills. now, that was from his farewell speech earlier this week at the major joseph r. beau biden national center in delaware. this is a photoof otto lee who served in the navy when beau served in the arm y. it's great to have you with us, otto. >> thank you for having me today. >> right away, president biden, he just took offense. what was going through your mind, your heart when you were watching his inauguration? >> it was a very moving moment, and this is one of the moments when tears comes to your eyes to see when democracy actually comes through despite the riot we saw a couple weeks guy, and

how much has changed in a matter of weeks and the fact i had a chance to meet beau when i was serving iraq. it reminds me who was missing at the ceremony. >> can you tell me about the time line of when you served at the same time? and what it was like serving in that capacity? >> yeah, those who remember during the democratic convention in 2008, beau biden was speaking at the convention at the time, saying that hoe won't be able to help on the campaign because he was going deployed to iraq, he went around september time frame, 2009. i was -- 2008, and i was caught up, in the beginning of 2009. soy ended up in iraq. we overlapped in terms of time for about eight months, nine months in iraq. yes. >> can you give me an idea of what he was like as a person?

you had a unique opportunity to work alongside him for months. tell me what he was like as a human being? >> i'm in the navy on the logistics side, and he was actually a jag. i met him in different times and we meet at the same dining facilities and we had a few meals together. he is extremely down to earth. certainly the stories, that part of the family, the vice president, he would have secret service, he wouldn't need that. he said, it wodoesn't make sens. i'm in the war zone. but he said a buddy system, he always had a few army buddies with him as well. he is extremely personable. and we had a very nice relationship in the sense that we get to know him better. and i remember one time i

presented him -- he received -- he followactually followed me, gave it to his soldiers as well. he is extremely bright, very caring and i'm honored to have the opportunity to have met him. >> really lovely memories to hold on to. on that note, please share with us where you were during beau's funeral and the experience? >> beau's funeral, i actually traveled to delaware to attend so it was a full funeral. not everybody could get inside. ive was outside with the public. but it was really an amazing trib butte to him for what he has done. his life is just cut off way, way too short. there is so much amed of him. he was the attorney general for the state of delaware and i do believe he was ready to run for senator or governor, and he would excel. so for his life to be taken away

by a brain tumor, we were so sad about that. and we could see the president biden -- that was really one of his biggest losses of his life. >> we don't have very much time. but real quickly what are your hope's going forward for the country's future? >> yes. i think the future is very bright. we have gone through a very tough time of covid, and in our county, we have now received vaccinations and we hope with the administration, we will able to receive the vaccines much, much faster so we can be delivering it to our community. until we get the vaccination, we can open up the economy. once we can open up the economy, i think that is when everybody getting back to work will be crucial. i'm looking forward to all that, with the budget deficit that we're facing and we see a federal government will pass a

package for funding, and to help everybody get back on their feet. >> i feel like many people share the same optimism. otto lee, thank you for taking the time. >> thank you having more me.

thank you so much for staying with us. the statistics are sobering. many you have seen them anecdotally, or heard about them. but burglaries are up in san francisco, it was nearly 7,000 incidents and just yesterday, i spoke to a young women whose immigrant parents had in and had $10,000 in items stolen. that opened the flood gates of five more burglaries, and the next guest, is a business owner

himself who shared his own experience having his stores burglarized over and over again. so the owner of the beta brand stores, welcome to the show. thank you for being here. >> thank you so much for having me. >> beta sells innovative products all over the world. you have locations in japan, dubai, but you told me that nothing is like running a business in san francisco. tell me about the kinds of challenges huh to face here? >> beta has three locations in the city. one in union square, one where i am in mission bay. and there is nothing like this city. our stores here have been broken into many, many, many times. they were burglarized pretty much every week. in fact, the union square store was robbed this morning.

in fact. so it's a huge problem. it's completely unique to the city. and it's very hard to understand and figure out what to do. >> yeah, and it's also taking a toll on your employees as well, i can imagine. >> yeah. the burglaries are the easy problem. the hard problem is how often our retail associates get harassed and cussed at and intimidated and all kinds of number of things. it's terrifying to be a retail employee in san francisco. >> i have heard that sentiment ek combed in other stores, union square, where i heard a rash of burglaries that did not get reported. i do want to let everyone see the video we talked about. i know you sent me several clips. we are going to take a look at the surveillance video from your

haze valley store. they are in broad daylight. there is a video of a man smashing through a window, climbing inside. what is it like for someone, something you built, someone who is rooted so deeply in san francisco? >> i think you will see, it's horrifying. and i think anyone that watches it, i mean, it's -- it's brazen. what really strikes me about the videos, every time, is how casual the criminals are. they don't seem to really fear anything. they smash, they come in, and take and there's -- they're not doing it quickly. it's remarkable. >> yeah, and we don't have very much time but i want to know, what made you want to speak out on twitter. this has been happening for some time. i know many people have the same suggestions how to solve this problem.

ho what is your response to that? >> yeah, i had seen, there is a lot of debate happening right now about crime in san francisco, i think because the feeling of living here seemed so different from the data that is presented by the city government and i just wanted to express what i have seen. and like what i shared, you know, over the last couple years. that video you're going to share, i think the glass being broken, that's happened not once, three times, it has happened a half dozen times. >> hold on one second. we're going to hit a commercial break and continue. stay with

commercial. >> absolutely.

sure. once again, thank you so much for joining us on the interactive show called getting tonight, several major ting stories as we come on the air. the alarming news on that uk variant of the coronavirus spreading in the u.s. at least 21 states. the uk prime minster boris johnson now saying they believe the uk variant of the virus is not just more contagious, but could also be more deadly. british experts saying up to 30% more deadly. tonight sicientists say it is to soon to be sure. tonight, the vaccines. will there be enough to have second doses on time? what doctor fauci is saying about the window of time. how much time before you have to get the second shot. also news on masks tonight when it comes to fighting off this more contagious variant of the