c7news. kristen: hi there. you are watching getting answers live on abc seven. we asked experts your questions everyday to get answers for you in real time. today, we will be looking ahead to the next generation covid booster shots that are coming next month. ucsf's dr. peter chin-hong will describe how this bill impact people who have already had covid and who is eligible. big changes coming for millions carrying student loans. president biden announced his long promised student loan forgiveness plan today. the key components, if you get

pell grant you can be forgiven up to $20,000. if you don't, you can be forgiven up to $10,000. you are only eligible for forgiveness if you make $125,000 or less. loan repayment is capped at 5% of your monthly income. pres. biden: people can start to crawl out from under that mountain of debt, to get on top of rent and utilities, to finally think about starting a family or a business. kristen: joining us live to talk about the plan and its impact on the economy, professor of business economics and public pause -- policy at the wharton school of the university of pennsylvania. >> good to be here. kristen: you are faculty director of the pen wharton budget model, a nonpartisan research initiative that provides economic and fiscal analysis of public policy.

you did a detailed report on biden's plan, based on different options he could have gone with. now that he has chosen, tell us what is the expected cost to the government? >> we are calculating the new updates he released today. what we had previously calculated was that simply forgiving $10,000 of debt for households making $125,000 or less. if they are married, that is doubled. but, that would cost between 300 -- $330 billion over 10 years. depending on if the government keeps this program ongoing. also doubling the amount for pell grant recipients, that will increase the price tag. we are still calculating that. we only got those details a few hours ago.

we are looking at closer to above half $1 trillion. kristen: it depends on how many people have pell grant said how many people are going to apply. what is the average debt? so we have an idea, carried by an american college graduate? >> it is higher than this amount. the distribution of that debt by income matters a lot as well. the average debt is over $30,000 , conditional on being a college graduate. no question this will have a big impact on how much people owe. kristen: during the process and the debate, some people wanted more, saying $50,000 would make a dent. others said no, you are going to add to inflation pressures, plus it is not fair for people who had to pay back their debt. i wonder based on the numbers you are looking at, does the

forgiveness, the money coming out of the government, is most of that actually going to the people who need it most? people on the bottom rung? will this make a difference? >> if you go from $10,000 to 50,000 dollars, that increases the price tag from 330 billion dollars to close to $1 trillion over 10 spirit -- over 10 years. in terms of who benefits, we are going to be rerunning numbers based on the newest change in terms of the pell grant recipients who get double the amount of forgiveness as well as income replacement changes they are making. what we have found is that for a simple that forgiveness of up to $10,000 for those making less than 125 thousand dollars, about 75% of that benefits more the top 60% income. 30% of the benefit is going to

those in the bottom 40% of the income distribution. 20% of the income distribution, poor households, 10% of the benefit is going to them. kristen: that is important to keep in mind. can you quickly explain what is the difference between pell grant recipients and non-pell grant recipients? a lot of viewers if they are not in the game may not understand. >> if your household income is low enough, this means your parent's income when applying for college, you get a grant toward your college bill. that is already free money being paid to the college to reduce your tuition bill. they are essentially using that as a trigger, as a mechanism to identify those who may be lower income and therefore they are

going to get twice the amount of forgiveness. it is mixing up income concepts a little bit. the children of parents of low income parents are not necessarily themselves low income. nonetheless, it is an attempt to try to create more deed -- more redistribution. what we will show soon is that the price tag will go up quite a bit relative to what we previously estimated with this additional pell grant. at the same time, the program will become more progressive. it is not going to be as progressive as targeted programs like the earned income tax credit, but it is not -- you will see the lowest 40% will get more than 30% of the benefit. kristen: sounds like we have to do a follow-up. you were talking about the price tag now being over $500 billion.

is some of that offset by the fact that maybe people won't be defaulting on their loans? >> that is true. we take a lot of things into account when we do this. in particular, one of the interesting things is that there already are existing income based repayment programs. a lot of people qualify and they just do not utilize those programs. part of it is the enormous complexity. some of this is just lack of information. people don't understand you are not really lock -- locked in you start the program. there's a lot of confusion about why do people not take advantage of existing programs. we take all of that into account. some of those programs will actually save money. there will be offset by the fact that some of the debt will be forgiven. the issue about defaults, we take that into account.

if that money otherwise essentially the government would have paid it anyway, we want to account for that as well. kristen: republicans and critics of loan forgiveness say this will drive up inflation, which is already at a 40 year high. explain what is behind that argument and how true that is. >> the theory behind it is that as people feel richer because now some debt has been forgiven, they are going to go out and spend more. spend more, prices get up just because you have more people chasing the same amount of goods and services. in reality, for the more modest package of just forgiving up to $10,000 without this additional pell grant kicker, the impact on

inflation will be pretty small. the reason why is that most of what people are going to get for that $10,000 is not a check in the mail for $10,000, it is a reduction in debt. their monthly payments will go down. if you owed $50,000 and you got $10,000 forgiven, your monthly aim and would go down and that is not the same thing is just getting a check in the mail. as these things are advertised. we think the inflationary impact is not really the big picture here. if you're going from eight point 5% inflation back down to 2%, the impact there is really quite small. that is a relief -- kristen: that is a relief. the president in his announcement today, he said education is the ticket to a

better life. but, is higher education simply too expensive in the u.s.? this loan debt forgiveness is just a small piece of it. a lot of people come out with much higher debt. in terms of looking at the world, how much are americans spending on higher education and -- is there something that can be done? >> he is right in some sense. i grew up in a low income family. i call education life's big reset button. there is no question as to the value to it. there's also evidence that a lot of the existing grants and other subsidies, colleges essentially capture a lot of that benefit in the far -- in the form of their pricing. it does not always accrue to students, especially if the program is ongoing and not a one-time program. the fact of the matter is there

is a reason why the united states is such a magnet across the world. we do have really stellar college level programs. it is one of those things that we pay a pretty high price for. part of that will potentially change if the government subsidies. kristen: wharton is one of the awesome programs. thank you for giving us a free class. >> my pleasure. kristen: a new covid booster is coming soon. should you get it? what if you have already had covid? the do

i was hit by a car and needed help. i called the barnes firm. that was the best call i could've made. i'm rich barnes. it's hard for people to know how much their accident case is let our injury attorneys know he how much their accident cget the best result possible. flex alert! flex alert! a power outage is looming. that's just alert, he's always getting worked up about something. flex alerts notify us of preventable power outages. that way we always know when to help stop one. okay, flex, just drop some knowledge on me again. oh okay, i will. i'll turn our thermostat to 78. i'll unplug the blender. the hair dryer. - my blankie? - yep! - let's taco 'bout it! - nope. ohh, we can save the laundry 'til the morning. yes please. oh, little things like this help save our power and help save us from outages. with flex alerts, the power is ours. learn more at powersaverrewards.org.

kristen: jill biden is the latest high profile covid rebound case. her offense announcing she has tested positive again after being negative for days. there are new details on the next generation booster that covers omicron. it will roll out sooner than expected, but who will be eligible? joining us to answer your questions you can ask on facebook dr. peter chin-hong. thank you for joining us. >> my pleasure. >> big news day. jill biden tested positive again and is going back into isolation. didn't she test negative two consecutive days? >> we are trying to call it covid rebound now instead of paxlovid rebound. you can see this phenomenon with covid.

we are not -- to look at it in people who have covid. when you look at the trials, is about 1% to 2%. both in the paxlovid group as well as the placebo group. studies show it is higher, maybe in the order of 10%. it seems that everybody is getting it, but that is not the truth when you look at the studies. kristen: the same thing happened to president biden. i understand we should maybe -- but given that it can make you recover more quickly and you are not fully over it and you are contending with it still, does this change who you think should be taking paxlovid at this point? >> i think that the absolute group that should be taking paxlovid is those unvaccinated. particularly if you are older. the next group would be somebody who is say 65 but with

comorbidities. if you are immune compromised at any eight age. -- any age. for a younger person it may not be in the cards because there would be a chance he would have recurrence of symptoms even though the symptoms are mild, it doesn't send you to the hospital. it is still a drag if you have to reset the clock. kristen: jill biden spoke to people, saying she is saying no symptoms at all. it does seem like that falls under the less of your category. let's move on to the booster. news organizations are saying the fda will authorize the updated pfizer and moderna boosters, may be labor day. tell us about these boosters. >> the booster that is slated to be in the u.s. is version 2.0, which is the original, plus ba.4

and ba.5. it is called a bivalent booster. the ancestral strain. it is meant to be updated. it is closer to what is -- people listening to this, ba.5 is dominant. more than 90% of cases in the u.s.. it seems to be holding out on its own. kristen: what is the eligibility and age for the pfizer and moderna? >> it is slated to be everyone over the age of 12 would be eligible for this new and improved booster. i think the government has bought 105 million doses of the new and improved pfizer and about 86 million doses of the moderna. pfizer submitted paperwork on monday. modernity submitted paperwork tuesday. kristen: if you are age eligible, are you able to get it if you only recently got the old

booster? let's say you got it over the summer. >> i think everyone will be eligible, regardless of when you got the booster. kristen: you don't have to wait four months? >> we have not seen guidelines yet. you may not get the bang for your buck by getting it immediately. if you just got it a week before it is approved. some people are being strategic because right now we are kind of quiet on the covid landscape. we may get a surge. most people are thinking, in the late fall. it made the -- it may be that people time it like they time the flu shot. the flu is most predominant in january and february. some people wait around thanksgiving or late october to get it. kristen: i was just going to ask you about that. some people like to space them out and not get the covid and the flu shot at around the same time.

given what we know, what is ideal? >> it is best to get the new and updated booster first. the bivalent booster. that will likely surge before flu usually peaks. but, we don't know. flu might peak earlier this --eain australia, new zealand, brazil and argentina. we are going to see flu happen with a vengeance. we tried the last two years, but this is the year. >> a new study suggested most people who had omicron didn't even know they had it. this means that a lot of us probably have some immunity. do you think this argues against many people needing the booster? >> it's not an emergency for many people. the most important thing is that people get the first rooster who are eligible.

tens of millions of americans still have not gotten that first shot. instead of hemming and hawing over the third and fourth booster, making sure most people get the foods that first booster is critical. we are still seeing 450 people die every day in the u.s., which is too much. five to 10 times what a normal flu season looks like. kristen: i think these will be the new boosters coming outcome of the first that after the fda said it's ok if we just look at the results from mice, we don't have to have human results. some people are concerned about that. should we? >> i am not concerned. that's what we do every year for flu. we can't wait for a bunch of human studies because you start with the backbone of the same ingredients. it's like making brownies with a different proportion of chocolate, flour and sugar, but it's the same ingredients.

nothing is really different. if we waited for human studies for flu, we would never get an annual flu shot. kristen: most of our viewers understand that baking analogy. i think i get what you are saying. when us on facebook live to answer your questions during the break.

kristen: we are back with ucsf specialist dr. peter chin-hong who is answering your questions on facebook i want to finish up with daniel. when with the doctor recommend getting the booster shot if someone had a mild case in june? >> a mild case in june, i think getting an updated booster shot when it comes out will be a good idea. if you are older than 65, get it four months after june, at the minimum. that is where we settle. kristen: i want to look at a new study out of the university of hawaii that links climate change

with the worsening and spreading of diseases such as covid or monkeypox. how do we know this? >> they basically looked at the slope of the graph and the number of new cases for more than 300 infectious diseases that we know about. they found that more than 60% of them have an increase over the last several years. they linked to a few factors. the first is extremes of temperatures. too hot and too cold makes certain mosquitoes and animals move in different distributions. too dry, too wet, flooding, fecal matter, dry dust, valley fever we have seen increase more than four times.

these are some of the factors people think about. make no mistake about we are seeing an increase in more than 60% of infectious diseases in the world. kristen: how can we connect the dots here too with monkeypox? >> if you go back to the roots of what -- it is an animal disease. we know it is linked to small mammals and rodents. if we think about those animals changing in distribution because of changes in climate, they carry diseases with them and they may encounter populations where they would not have encountered them before because of this change. kristen: we saw headlines this week that the earth's population is nearing 8 billion. does population growth contribute? >> yes. undoubtedly. when you think about how diseases are spread of the world, it's been people get

closer together. covid is a famous example. even other things you do not normally linked to people getting together like hiv. even though that is not directly linked to climate, when people move, climate refugees, they have more social issues. they may have more hunger move food insecurity. that may lead to behaviors that spread hiv and there are a lot of models showing an increase due to what we call climate refugees. kristen: i'm going to ask you to pack a lot into the next 30 seconds. what can we do? short of an urgent call to control climate change to slow warnings and we may want to -- people aren't going to stop having babies. what can we realistically do to mitigate the disease transmission and spread? >> we have to be aware.

when we see dengue, it is not just southeast asia. even lyme disease in california. the second thing is try to be a little decrease. listen to those pg&e ads. talk to lawmakers and representatives. collectively, we have a lot of power. kristen: don't go away. you can get our live newscast, breaking news, weather and more with our abc7 tv app available with our abc7 tv app available on apple tv, android tv, fire when that car hit my motorcycle, with our abc7 tv app available on apple tv, android tv, fire insurance wasn't fair. so i called the barnes firm, it was the best call i could've made. call the barnes firm now, and find out what your case could be worth. ♪ call one eight hundred, eight million ♪good vibes by moa l.m. munoz & ryan t. short♪ and find out what your case could be worth. ♪♪

♪bout to get down, living it up♪ ♪never touch ground, never enough♪ ♪bout to get down, living it up♪ ♪never touch ground, never enough♪ ♪got me feeling good♪ ♪vibes♪ ♪♪ ♪got me feeling good♪ ♪vibes♪ ♪♪ ♪everything's everything's alright alright♪ get a free storage upgrade and case when you pre-order.

kristen: we will be here every weekday a tonight, breaking news. the flooding rescues playing out right now. seniors pulled from a facility on a rope. the images coming in at this hour. the effort at an assisted living facility in mississippi, under several feet of water. seniors led through those rising waters. the urgent race to get everyone out to safety. highways flooded. stranded drivers rescued. the flood watches at this hour across several states again tonight. trevor ault in the flood zone. rob marciano timing this out. also tonight, the other major headline. president biden planning to cancel thousands in federal student loans for millions of students in this country. 43 million graduates will qualify for this. about 20 million will see the full balance of the remaining student loans canceled. the reaction pouring in tonight. the supporters, the republican