♪ this is "nightline." >> tonight, brittney griner sentenced to nine years in a russian penal colony. >> i never meant to break any laws here. >> her emotional pleas for mercy. >> i made an honest mistake, and i hope that in your ruling that it doesn't end my life here. >> what does it all mean for a possible prisoner swap with russia? plus monkeypox crisis. why the white house declared a federal public health emergency as cases rise. >> it is a virus that does not discriminate. it will spread to the general population. >> what patients are facing. >> there were multiple nights i wasn't able to go to sleep. the urgent push for more vaccines. and 13 lives.

>> how many of you? >> 13. >> 13? >> they'r all alive. >> hollywood's take on that dramatic thai cave rescue. >> the whole world felt like parents of those children. >> the real-life heroes who led the daring rescue. >> we had to navigate our way not just through the cave, but through the labyrinth of hollywood, of business.

♪ god evening. thanks for joining us. tonight, wnba star brittney griner's future is in limbo now that she's been convicted and sentenced on drug charges in russia. is this potentially the missing key for the u.s. to negotiate her freedom? and that of marine veteran paul whelan? here's abc's mary bruce. >> reporter: this isheoment ntendo nine in anearlier, grine saying she takes responsibility for illegally bringing vape cartridges containing cannabis oil into the country, but stressing it was an accident. >> i made an honest mistake, and i hope that in your ruling that it doesn't end my life here. i want to also apologize to my parents, my siblings, the

phoenix mercury organization back at home, the amazing women of the wnba, and my amazing spouse. >> reporter: moments after her sentencing, back in washington, president biden called for the wnba star's release, vowing to pursue every possible avenue to bring her home. >> there's a deal on the table. let's make the deal, let's get them home. >> reporter: the biden administration is urging russia to accept its proposal to bring griner and former marine paul whelan home. sources tell abc news the offer is to swap the two americans for notorious russian arms dealer victor bout. >> our thanks to mary. now to what some say could be another health crisis, m monk monkeypox. today the biden administration declaring a federal public health emergency after weeks of prodding from health officials. with cases rapidly spreading across the country and vaccine doses in short supply, is it too late to prevent a crisis? here's abc's ashan singh.

>> reporter: for 30-year-old matt ford in california, the thought of dealing with another virus was something he was not prepared for. >> i first heard about monkeypox back in may. my impression was that, you know, it was maybe something to be concerned about at some point in time, but it didn't really seem like anything to be immediately concerned about. >> reporter: within a month, ford came down with a fever and flu-like symptoms and developed lesions across his body. >> at the peak of it i counted more than 25. my feet, arms, shoulders, one on my scalp, on my face, some in more sensitive areas. those tended to be the most excruciatingly painful. to the point there were multiple nights i wasn't able to go to sleep. >> reporter: ford is one of 7,000 people in the united states who hav suffered from monkeypox, a virus that is considered a cousin of smallpox and is said to be transmitted through physical contact. >> around 1970, we saw some of our first cases of monkeypox in humans. mainly it's endemic to parts of

central and western africa and naturally tends to infect animals and crosses over from animal is to humans. >> reporter: after weeks of pressure and calls for resources, the white house declaring the monkeypox outbreak a public health emergency. >> i want to make an announcement today that i will be declaring a public health emergency on monkeypox. not only does it help to increase funding and things like testing and vaccination, but also it's a symbolic purpose. advising everyone that this is something that we all need to pay attention to, and it requires kind of a group work effort in ordr to accomplish in preventing transmission. >> reporter:er? kirsten gillibrand calling on the biden administration to invoke the defense production act. >> with cases doubling roughly every week, it's pair mount that the government prepare a health care system to meet vaccine and testing demands so that americans can remain safe. >> reporter: the biden administration following the w.h.o. which declared monkeypox a global health emergency in late july. >> the global monkeypox outbreak

represents a public health emergency of international concern. >> reporter: as the nation braces for more cases, americans are looking for answers as to how we could be battling yet another viral outbreak featuring unclear messaging and a lackluster vaccine rollout. >> i do not think that the government is doing enough to handle this. the response has been really slow. >> reporter: ford found out he was exposed to monkeypox on june 17th. >> my reaction when i first realized i had monkeypox was kind of a combination of shock and disbelief. >> reporter: for more than three weeks, ford quarantined in his los angeles apartment. >> it was a pretty emotionally and mentally taxing time. and physically. you look in the mirror and you're covered with lesions. you feel like a scarlet letter in some ways. >> reporter: at this point, 99% of confirmed cases are amongst men who have sex with other men. ford, who is gay, says sharing his story and information has been the most effective resource for his community so far. >> i think the lgbtq community

are all taking it very seriously now. it's one thing to hear these numbers and statistics from the cdc. it's another thing to see a human face talking about it. and to hear their firsthand account of what it's like. >> reporter: experts want to be adamantly clear, anyone can contract the disease. >> it is a virus that does not discriminate. what we're seeing now is initial cases where predominant among gay and bisexual men, but depending on the level of infectiousness of that virus and the mode of transmission, it will spread to the general population. >> given what we know right now, how exactly is the virus spreading? >> we see close physical contact as the main primary mode of transmission. also, we know that this virus can possibly live on surfaces. >> reporter: much about this virus and how it spreads is still unknown. but many, especially those in the lgbtq community, aren't taking any chances. ralph peres is a 63-year-old gay man who lives in new jersey.

in the shadow of manhattan. says finding a dose hasn't been easy. have you change the your lifestyle at all? >> yes, yeah. >> since finding out about monkeypox? >> yeah, absolutely. i'm single. i'm single, i'd like to go out and mingle. john. you know. and i can't now. oh, yes, i'd like some information on your monkeypox vaccine should. >> reporter: every morning peres works the phones, desperately searching for an elusive monkeypox vaccine. thegy i spoke to last time, he told me that it wouldn't be for two to three weeks before they get it. >> reporter: new york city, where peres spends much of his social life, has more than 1,600 reported cases. about 20% of all the cases in the country. last week, governor kathy hochul declared new york's monkeypox outbreak a disaster emergency. tonight, opening 23,000 vaccine appointments, but they're only for the first of two shots needed for full protection. >> yesterday, okay, and it's gone? >> reporter: according to the

"new york times," the biden administration missed a crucial window to order bulk vaccines and ship it to the u.s. resulting in a shortage. leaving peres and scores of others scrambling and angry. >> our administration, once again, is not supporting us as the gay community. this isn't the first time. we've been here before with not acknowledging the epidemic with aids. >> the fear of aids has been spreading very rapidly across the country. >> the very fact that aids appeared limited to gays made it a disease of secondary interest and importance. >> reporter: the white house today stated their goal was to end the monkeypox outbreak. the vaccine has been around for years. it was created for smallpox but is effective for monkeypox and has been up to 85% effective against previous strains of the disease. >> smallpox vaccines have been held in storage and used in situations like this because it's been shown that vaccines

that protect against smallpox have cross-protection against monkeypox. >> reporter: the biden administration ordering 6.9 million more doses for delivery by may of 2023. >> we're seeing increase in the rates of available vaccines in places like, for example, here in los angeles and in new york. but there are still many, hundreds, maybe thousands of people waiting and eager to get a vaccine. >> reporter: at this time, the vaccines currently available are predominantly going to the group most impacted, men who have sex with men, or those exposed. a fact that has created a difficult discussion for anyone talking about the virus. >> this is the story. >> reporter: last week, buzzfeed senior writer david mack watched this press conference from the world health organization. >> for men who have sex with men, this includes for the moment reducing your number of sexual partners -- >> reporter: mack, who identifies as gay, wrote an article bill. >> how did people respond to the article? >> fair to say there was a bit of backlash. someone said, this is just homophobic, this person has

accused me of fearmongering against gay men. >> how do you thread that needle between not stigmatizing a group that is being largely affected by this virus, at the same time making sure they get the help they need? >> this is something the w.h.o. is struggling with. they're trying to get the message out that yes, technically anybody can get this. we've seen a few cases of women getting this. we've seen tragically a couple of cases of children getting this as well. but overwhelmingly, 98%, 99% of known cases right now in this current outbreak are among men who have sex with men. so you need to provide that context. >> i think that there is a way to educate and support a community that is marginalized by also using language that is not stigmatizing. we've had community leaders in the queer community that have protested and provided thoughts and opinions about the need for increased assistance with managing this outbreak. >> reporter: dr. sutton cautions that despite the immediate numbers, messaging could have

been improved to alert the public. do you take issue with the report the w.h.o. put out? >> i think the best mode of public health communication is stating we're all at risk and if you're going to have new sexual partners, regardless of your sexual orientation, take an increased level of caution. >> reporter: as the united states prepares for another viral outbreak, it's a fresh reminder with a nation struggling with leaving a pandemic in the past, while reckoning with harm done by the disease, fresh in the minds of many. the goal is simple, let's get it right. >> to anybody who is exposed or comes down with it, try to remember, there's no reason for any shame or stigma in getting it. also, please get vaccinated. >> how worried, in your opinion, do you think americans should be right now about monkeypox? >> i think that they can be aware and cautious. but i don't think that there is a need for panic. >> our thanks to ashan. up next, hollywood's dramatic retelling of the thai cave rescue.

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♪ even as it was unfolding, the harrowing thai cave rescue felt like a movie. now it is one. tonight abc's matt gutman goes one on one with the stars of the new movie "13 lives" and the real-life heroes. >> reporter: this is moment the summer of 2018 gripped the world. >> how many of you? >> 13. >> 13? brilliant. >> yeah, yeah. >> reporter: it was the first time we heard from the 12 members of a youth soccer team

and their coach as they were hopelessly trapped deep inside a cave in thailand, setting off what was called a miracle rescue. >> the whole world felt like parents of those children. >> reporter: now, four years later, academy award winning director ron howard, who also directed ""apollo 13"," telling another story about the alchemy of making the impossible, possible, in "13 lives." >> why was there a need for a sort of semi-fictionalized version of this that you did? >> i don't see it as semi-fictionalized. scripted narrative, dramatization. because that creates a pathway to a deeper empathy and understanding. it goes beyond the mind and the heart. >> reporter: at the center of the film are two british cave divers, richard stanton played by viggo mortensen, and john valantin played by colin farrell. in a flooded cave, superheroes in supercuba tanks.

>> you try and guide the kids the whole way, all you'll be bringing out is dead bodies! >> reporter: they were the first to make contact with the 13 trapped inside that cave 10 days after the boys disappeared. >> we found the boys! they're alive! >> reporter: stanton was a consultant for the film. rick, the first time we spoke, right after the rescue -- >> 2018. >> would you ever have imagined that four years later, you'd be sitting between these two schleps? >> these two, no. i mean, clearly that was destined to be a hollywood film. we had to navigate our way, not just through the cave, but through the labyrinth of hollywood and business. >> what was it like watching yourself being played? surreal, right? >> should i leave? >> what was more fascinating was seeing viggo sort of slowly

assimilate my character over the zoom calls. then stuff i didn't realize viggo had picked up. >> like what? >> nuances. just people pointing them out, "that's so you." >> reporter: it was that kind of attention to detail that ron howard says was key for this project. >> can we go out now? >> couldn't get child actors. kids from the north. it's very specific dialect. as we began to audition, i said, we're going to have to teach them. >> why was authenticity such an important thing? not only finding thai actors, but thai actors with the right accent? >> i feel like it's a standard that i would expect of a project like this. >> the details, you know -- % again, i wanted to get it right. kind of almost on a journalistic level. >> reporter: raymond pataviranagun, who is thai, worked closely with howard as a co-producer to get details right. >> there's a presumption when

you make a quote, unquote hollywoodized version of a true story, that they're going to speak in english, there are going to be a lot of inaccuracies. it was important to us to make basically a documentary. >> it's not just the visual side, it's the sound, bubbles, the cave, it really hopes in the claustrophobic phobia of it. >> you have to rely on that sense when you're diving because you can see so little. >> let's have a look. >> reporter: 2018, on the ground in changray province, the world watched that massive multinational operation to extract those 12 boys and their coach from the belly of a mountain known s the sleeping princess. >> many people are coming. >> reporter: defying odds, massive monsoon flooding, rescuers clawed through the flooded passages, the current strong enough to rip goggles off. so murky they often couldn't see their own hands, which were

often cut in the squeezes. >> some of these passageways so narrow, you have to scoot on your butt. or crawl. imagine doing this underwater. >> reporter: once they found the soccer team, the rescuers had to decide how to extract them. the kids had little swimming experience, and they'd have to go through miles of treacherous flooded tunnels. success, rescuers told authorities, would be saving even one or two of the boys. so they decided to sa dade each of them, binding their hands and swiming them out like packages. it was so dangerous, not even the parents were informed. but in the end, miraculously, it worked. joe edgarton, who played richard harris, known as "harry," the australian diver and anes

anesthe anesthesiologist, was instrumental. >> the fact that it worked. if you didn't know it was a true story, you'd almost be laughed out of hollywood presenting this as a script. >> heroes are made in the moment. you can't pull a hero out of the lineup. >> a story where people put a lot of that aside and get something remarkable done what they gave us was an object lesson in what is humanly m possible through that kind of human connection and commitment. without any guarantees of success. >> our thanks to matt. up next, the big delivery at the cincinnati zoo. my a1c stayed here, it needed to be here. ruby's a1c is down with rybelsus®. my a1c wasn't at goal, now i'm down with rybelsus®. mom's a1c is down with rybelsus®. (♪ ♪) in a clinical study, once-daily rybelsus® significantly lowered a1c better than a leading branded pill.

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♪ finally tonight, the famed cincinnati zoo and botanical gardens celebrating the birth of a baby hippo. fiona, the world-famous hippo, is a big sister. the yet to be named baby was born wednesday night, and it's sticking close to mom, bei bei. the pregnancy was a surprise because bei bei was on birth control. both mom and baby are doing well. dare i say happy hippos? that's "nightline." you can watch all our full episodes on hulu.