this sunday, why weren't we ready in. >> this is going to get worse before it gets e1better, for su. >> the government'sçó sobering coronavirus i]projection. hundreds of thousands oft( americans dead. under a besttw(páq scenario. toughest week between this week and next week. >> cases and deaths soaring fastest in the u.s., as guidelines are ignored. >> i can tell by the curve and as it is today that not every american is following it. >> should there be a national >> this is too much. i don't know how much longer i can do this.i] >> and states competing with

each other for scarce equipment. >> it's like at( madhouse out there. >> it'se1 like being on ebay wi 50 other states bidding on a t( ventilator. >> my guest, surgeon general jerome adams, governors jay inslee andok asa xdó7!qhutchinse minister giuseppe conte, and michael lewis. plus, what hans when covid-19 hits ruralr doctors, beds, and ventilators? finally, scenes like this. the moments of love,q selflessness and heroism keepin( our spirits up in the face of a once in a century challenge. joining me for insight and analysis are nbc capitol hill correspondent kasie hunt, former republican governor of north carolina, pat mccrory, and helene cooper, pentagon correspondent for "the new york times." welcomexd to sunday. and a special edition of "meet the press.">x@&h(lc% >> announcer: from nbc news in washington, the longest running show in televisionxd history.

this is a special edition of "meet the press" withe/qó[ chu todd. >> good sunday morning. the week began with two national reckonings on the coronavirus. the first is where we're xdhead. as of this morning, there are more than 300,000 confirmed cases in the united states, and well over 8,0006m deaths. the federal government is now acknowledging that in a best-casexd xdscenario, somewhe between 100,000 and çó240,000 americans are likely to die fro1 this virus.ñ["ti ját point of c more americans than died fighting in korea and vietnam combined. as you can see, the united states, thee1 soaring red line this graphic here, trailse1 the world in flattening thexd pandemic's curve. which brings us to the second reckoning, the government's lpe1 performance. like president trump insisting for weeks that the coronik irus was no worse than the flu, like the lack of testing, the big one starting with the botched cdc test kits.

like the government's inadequate stockpile of gowns, masks, and other protective equipment. like the mixed messages on face masks. the cdc recommending them, the president refusing to wear one, like disbanding the national security council's pandemic team in 2018. remember, the sobering death toll numbers hold only if everyone practices social distancing, and as we learned last week,-,mháhat isn't happen %52ávq)e. still, the bottom line is the government has been telling us it's been in control of the virus, when in fact it is the virus which has been in control of us. >> we are afraid for our patients. we are afraid for our families. we are afraidj&$tju our lives. >> in new york and around the country -- >> we are a small, rural hospital. we have no e1ventilators. >> medical providers, first responders, and state officials are pleading with the federal government for more help. >> every state is saying the same thing. i need help. i need assistance.

>> but this week, th"1 trump administration repeatedlyñr sen governors the message, don't look to us first. >> the notion of the federal stockpile was it's supposed to be our stockpile, not supposed to be state t(stockpiles they tn use. >> by friday, the hhs website describingfá the stockpile had been altered, saying it had enough suxpóies to respond to multiple crises simultaneously, to reading isrole it soos+: =iq short-term supplies as a buffer. >> i don't know ifqe1 jared kusr goq knows this but it's called the united states of government. and the federal government which has a stockpile is supposed to be backstopping the states. >> nine governors are still declining toñi enact stay-at-ho orders andñi mr. trump is refusg to make them do so. >> i don't understand why we're not doing okthat. we really should be. >> the government's advice has

changed over time. americans were told not to wear masks. now, the i]ñijfe1cdc is recomme they wear nonsurgicó,÷ masks or face coveringsktz public. on friday, the president immediately made it clear he is not going to follow that guidance. >> you can do it, you don't have do it. i'm choosing not to do it. >> americans were told only americans were told testing was widely available. >> anybody that needs a test gets a test. they're there. >>q even now, there have been just 1.6 million tests conducted nationwide. (is needed.t(%hat experts say in fact, for months, the president played down the virus. misrepq%9 >> one person coming in from china. and we have it under control. >> it looks like by april in theory when it gets a little

warmer, it will miraculously go away. >> this week, he reversed course on his rosy projections, acknowledging the u.s. death toll could be staggering, while attempting to claim -- >> 100,000 is, according to modeli modeling, a very low number. >> models show hundreds of thousands of people are going to die. you know what i want do? i want to come way under the models. the professionals did the i] models. i was never involved in a model. at least this kind of a model. >> joining me now is the u.s. surgeon general, vice !eairal jerome adams. welcome to "meet the press." let mew3 start with, you're the

we always recommended that if people had symptoms, that they wear a face mask toxd prevent spreading th/ease to other folks. here's what's changed. we now know that about 25% inu some studies even more of covid-19 is transmitted when your asymptomatic or presttamic, so the dcd hase1 recommended people recommend you wear cloth coverings whe10=u$r' public. here are the important points. number one, you need to make sure you're not substituting social distancing with face u$ing is still to stay awam people.ing is still to stay awam make sure if you put on a face mask, you don't touch your face and your wash youre1 hands befo your utilize it, and number three, save the masks for the medical health care workers. theye1 need them. i made a cloth face mask out of a t-shirt and rubber bands.

bwe all need to do our part to get through this. >> i'm curious, i know you made the warning, you're sayingfá specifically, you don't want people to make a run on!u clinl or surgical masks. two questions i have on that front. number one, if you are care eing for somebody infá the vulnerabl age group, should that person be wearing a surgical mask? and second, if there were enough around the country, would that (urjì(lc% and is it thelpq only reason we saying do homemade ones is we just don't have enough masks? >> well, the reason why we're cau protecting you from me. remember, i'm wearing a mask to protect you, chuck, and you're wearing a mask to protect me. that's what you fáneed. we want to make sure we're saving the medical masks for the health care workers and we still wouldn't recommend people wear an n-95 even if we hó$÷ enough. hospital, i have to get speciallyfá tested to we an n-95.r they'rer

if you're taking care of a loved one, very important you wash your hands frequently, do everything possible to prevent spreading disease to them,e1 ani w/áf" encourage folks too$ @&h(% consider wearing a cloth face covering when you're withiix feet to them. >> the president made it pretty clear he's not going to wear one.ok would you recommend people wearing onee1q at work? >> that, again, what you have to know, if you go to the cdc website, number one, this isw3 voluntary. we're ask people to think about doing it to protect their neighbors andxd family. number two, it's not a substitute for social distancing. if you're at work and six feet away from someone,q there's a minimal chance you're going to spread disease. if you're in a work environment where you're within six feet, you're close to someone, that's something to consider, and that's what the cdc guidelines 1 say. á+ey're based on the science. we always try to evolve our . (urjjui] based on the best available science. >> admiral, i knowq you're

hesitant to back-seat drive other officials and the calls they have to make, and i'm very aware of that, but i am curious. if you were advising the nine governors who have not issued stay-at-home orders, what would you advise them to do? >> well,ñi i would advise them follow our 30 days to slow the spread guidelines. i ran a state department of health. i talked to many of these governors, and here's what i say to them. here's what i would say to them right now. the next week is goingok to be r pearl harbor moment. it's going to be our 9/11 moment. it's going to be the hardest moment for many americans in their entirew3 lives, and we really need to understand that if we want to flatten that curve and get through to the other side, everyone needs took do thr part. 90% of americans aree1 doing thr part, even in the states where they haven't had a shelter in place. but if you can't give us 30 days, governors, give us a week, qe1 we don't overwhelm our health pj+ç systems over this next week and let's reassess at that point. we want everyone toó7! understa

you have to be rosy the riveter. you have toe1 do your part. >> at a minimum, you wish every governor would issue at least one week? >> i wish every governor would encourage the people in their states to follow these guidelines for 30jf á@5ey that's what i want, but i want them to do what they can withiv their states. we knowi] from a public health perspective, and i ran a public health department, whether it's smoking or opioidg% there are all sorts of different rules and different regulations in states. ñ actually said it would be declaring war on the states tol issue a federal quarantine.ko governors are rightly protective of their ability to determine what's best for their citizens. we want them to have the science to make the best recommendations. >> i want to put up a quote from amy actin, the director of public health in ohio. she said this on march 13th. and admiral, it's been haunting me ever since. this is what she said, onokt( t1 end of a pandemic, you look añi little bit like an alarmist,

hindsight, you're going to wish you had done e1more? >> 20 years in public health, and i know director actin, those words couldn't be truer. we're always telling people we would rather prevent disease than treat i]disease. i tell people we aren't going to treat or supply our way out of this problem. there is no magic bullet or magic cure. it's public health and prevention. everyonee1 coming together, practicing good hygiene, staying at home, doing the things we have always told people to do to prevent the spread of infectious diseasesá >> whent( are we going to have website that was advertised where we can get a test, where we canfá finde1 out about antibodies. it seems clear we're never

really opening the economy fully until we're able to gps this virus. where are we? >> 1.7 million tests. that's about 1 in 200 americans. that's where south korea was with their initial testing surge.lpe1 seeing testing ramp up, and we know it's never enough tests fast enough, but i feel q two to four weeks, we're going to be w("xt we want to be to be able to do adequate surveillance and understand where the disease is, where it's ,! and low, and where -- andñ1e1 to have apprope health recommendations. what does rm we want to make sure we're seeing cases go down for a good one to two weeks in places. we want to make sure we have testing, but we want s! make sure we have good public health infrastructure so when we identify a positive test, people can then follow up, isolate, follow up on their case contacts, and make sure a single case doesn't turne1 into ten, 1, 1,000 >> do you think by the end of april, we'll be in ae1 testing situation where we're actually

doing surveillance rather than just trying to playxdcatch-up? >> we are doing surveillance in many places.xdc c1 has a higher testing rate than the average for the rest of the so we're doinge1 surveillance i many places. we're going to get the e1antibo testing which will give us more information and i talked to the a, task force, and he says he feels within a month, we'll have antibody testing more widely available.xd again, 100,000çó tests being do per day, 50,000 abbot tests coming online. testing is becoming more and more available, but it still doesn't replace the fact we want everybody to act as if they have covid-19 right now and protect your neighbor, protect your loved ones. >> very quickly2@!dmiral, the president mused about a one-day reprieve for easter sunday. i understand it from a, you xdscenario. would that be ae1 public health

mistake? >> the president is always hopeful. he's aspirational, and we're tryidgbq= give people the science. the science says right now, this palm sunday, and i'm a catholic, i would be getting ready for church right now, we need you to stay home. this is a hard week, it's going to test our resolve. the hardest week of our lives, but i'm confident =jz the numbers in washington and california and italy and spain, we can get through this. we will get throughok this.]i r do the right thing and stay at home. >> surgeon general jerome adamsk thanks very much. stay he)4vhy. stay clean, and i hope people do watch your video on how to make a mask. thanks for coming fáon. >> watch it. and stay home. if you geout, use one of ñrthes. thank you, chuck. >> all right. thank you, sir. >> joining me now are two governors who have taken different steps intsq face of thei=9y%ium pandemic. it's governorñi jay inslee of washington state, the first state to be hit hard, and asa hutchinson, one of the few governors who has not issued a stay-at-home order.

governor hutchinson, i want to start with you. you heard the surgeon general there. he's pleading, give him a week. he would prefer for all 30 days othis months. your response to the surgeon general. >> great commentshé the surgeon general. in arkansas, we're doing everything that the surgeon general has outlined plus more. for example, i applaud the recommendations onxdok masks. yesterday, we issued guidelines that ifxd you go out, social distance, jááu of all, but bring a mask with you in case you get in environments where you cannot have that six-feet spread. in arkansas, we have a targeted approach$ we have closed bars, restaurants, schools, some of our park lodges. we'reñi emphasizing the socialx distancing. and we will do more as we need to. but let me give you an example of why the masks are so important, and by the way, we have had success int(e1 arkansa

e5(áu(áp!le to other states. in fact, beating and slowing the spread more thane some states that have actually had a stay-at-home order. but you have at( stay-at-home 1ñtomorrow, e1600,000 u arkinsons will still go to work. it's more important the message, do your social distancing. don't gather in groups of more than ten people, and bring a mask with you. i'm going to follow that instruction. if i can't social distance, i want to have a mask on. we just had last night a breakout in one of our federal prisons herelp in arkansas that have ten inmates that tested positive and four guards. that's a federal facility. but stay-at-home doesn't help there. you have to have masks. our state prison is producing a) masks we can utilize in our state prison environment. those are some of thee1 things we're doing. we'll do more as we need to, officials. >> all right. governor inslee, all week long,

i know you said you're not out of the woods, but do your you have started to flatten this curve? >> yes, the evidence that dr. xdbirx has pointed t+á repeatedly does demonstrate we have had some success flattening the curve. that hasq taken place because w acted relatively early. we had a staged way ">ñ moving forward. we're one of the most aggressive stay-at-home stay healthyxd initiatives in the united k states. and iájjz this has axd reason to believe it's been demonstrably successful. and i'm glad we got on it relativelyxd early while the president was saying thatñi thi was not a problem and that it was a hoax. of our citizens in a number of states, including california and washington state. it's pleasing to know that if

you act aggressively, and if you realize that even though you're looking okay today, it can bqt! you big time tomorrow, i think that's one of the wisdoms, i think it would be good to have a nationalçó stay-at-home order, d the reason is that even if washington gets on top of this fully, if another state doesn't, it can come back and come across ourlp borders twomy months fro. this is important to have a nationalfá lpsuccess. but i want to reiterate, we're a long ways away from being out of the woods. weçó have not got down to anywhe close to where we needfá to be declare victory of this horrendous virus.ñr >> what does -- governor inslee, iñr want to start with you on ts first. g÷rp+e you started the conversation about what metrics you'll be looking for to start lifting some of these stay-in-place orders? >> yes. but those are just only to begin to think abju this because we have been so intent on making sure this is axd successful

stay-at-home order. and so far, it has been. we have had huge complianceñr i our state. washingtonians are responding to the call, and we're really happy about that. but yes, we are looking at the metrics. fortunately, we're very fortunate here in washington, we heç-át university of washington labs, some of the best in the world. they give us the metrics we need. we watch these like daile hourly, and we'll look at them on a mix. there isn't one number. there arelp many numbers we'll look at to see when we canq com out of this. i extended it a month just two days ago to mayxde1 4th. so we're in a very vigorous, one of x" ñrstrongest, probat,ó the strongest in the nation, to may 4th at the moment. we have more work to do. >> governor hutchinson, there was the ceo of the universityñif arkansas for medical sciences, the medical center there, said the state lost an order of 500 ventilators. essentially got e1outbid by another state. should you be in that situation?

should you be forced to be bidding againstfá -- is this something the federal government needs to step in and handle? >> well, it's difficult. andxdñi we have had circumstanc we're trying to collect our ppe, our protective masks, and we have been outbid by another state after w confirmed. dzb5zallenging for us.çó but we recognize that the federal government has said we're your backstop. you have to get out there and compete, and it literally is a global jungle that we'reuar @&hc competing in now. >> you thing that's the way it should be? you think that's the way it should be? look, i know idealogically and philosophically, where a lot of >> no, there needs to be -- ix

and that's why every state, whether we're procuring orlp whether we are determining what's best in our state to reduce the spread, we have to be able toe1 have some flexibility

making those decisions. and that's what we're seeing. we're learning from eache1 othe. >> well, very quickly, governor hutchinson, ie1 wantm=x give governor inslee ar respond. but governor hutchinson, anthonk faucie1 has begged basically foa national stay-at-home order.t( does his -- does his basically

to sayq we're a backup. thee1 surgeonñi generalñir pearl harbor. could you imagine if franklin delano roosevelt said i'll be right behind you, connecticut. good luck building those padp ships. we need manufacturing in ths3 united states, as weok started december 8th, 1941. we need to nationally mobilize tu(urjzt so we can get these companies instead of making cup holders, start making visors. start making test kits. we don't have enough test kitse by far in my state or anywhere in the united states. so we governors, republicank( ad democrats, have been urging the presid"@uz do what he e1should,

which is if he wants to be a war-time president, be a e1 war-time president. show some leadership. mobilize industrial base in the united states. thateo:#4w we i]need. >> governor jay inslee, democrat from washington state. governor asa hutchinson, republican from xdarkansas, tha for coming on, sharing your views. this is going to be a long fight here. good luck tof"q! of you on the front lines there. >> when we come back, italy was the first your peep country hit hard by the coronavirus. i'm going to talk tojf italy's prime ministerw3 about what the prime ministerw3 about what the united states can expect to ótt

to be most successful, connectivity is vital. verizon, really for us, has been a partner for years. allows us to stay connected to our 80 plus locations across the country. we use verizon throughout our entire day. it's an integral part of how our practice runs. we need our project managers and our superintendents to be able to communicate. we don't have to be together to work together. (vo) at verizon, we're here, and we're ready. we're open 24/7 online with tools and support to help your business stay connected at verizon.com/ready. but right now, the world needs all the good that we can do.

to all of our employees and everyone working to keep america strong, thank you. to all of our employees and everyone working wthe natural light is amazing. hardwood floors. there is a bit of a clogging problem. (clog dancing) at least geico makes it easy to bundle our renters and car insurance. yeah, helping us save us even more... for bundling made easy, go to geico.com welcome back. vice president mike pence said

it last week, we have become the next italy. on march 4t on march 4t schools and universities. ctjz march 8th, mo3u italy was laced on lockdown, and one day later, the lockdown was extended to the entire country, something we have not done yet here. did it work?cs c1 since its number of new cases peaked on march 21st, italy has seen an unsteadye1 but a declin nonetheless of new cases. so what can we in the united states learn frome1 italy's experience? joining me now isxd italy's pri minister, giuseppe conte. mr. prime xdminister, welcome t "meet the press." let me simply start byi] asking how you and your citizens and your own loved o."c arefá handlg all this? this has been a veryxd trying time. i know you just lost a bodyguar% to this deadly virus. >> unfortunately, unfortunately, it was terrible news. but let me sayw3 one thing firs. we are sufferingq very much.

a

implement decisions with fulsl transparency. our liberal democracy are built on the contact we have with ourc own people, and we owe to them, through transparency in the same way we provide them with safety and security. this is the italian model. >> do you believe given what we have seen, and it looks like you have flattened your curve, do you believe that you have flattened the curve because of measures you have taken? or doe1 your scientific experts believe the virus just might be running its course? >> in this moment, ii] cannotok when the lplockdown willfá stop because we are foll&ï suggestions of our scientistse1j the scientific community. but you have to consider that italy hast( been the first counó in europe that, of course, faced

thishñpandemic. our response has not been do not go out. and if you must leave your xdho, for example, to go took work oro bye food, alwaysi] respect fell people. we're asking our people a great sacrifice. i'm aware of it, but it's the only way to defeat the pandemic together.e1 the more wee1 respect, the soon we will get out. >> it sounds like there was a story in "the new york times" today that if with testing that you'r

>> wee1 will work for that, butn this moment, we are all in the same battle. we arenb fighting the same powerful and invisible enemy.ok1 and it'se1 strategic internatiol cooperation, and it's ae1e1 strategic çláo that conflicts

around the worlde1 shouldxd sto. italy strongly supports the appeal for a global cease-fire.á it's time for all the parties in conflict to stop fighting each other and unite against an enemy which won't make a difference and we have killed themxd t(all. >> mr. prime e1minister, i know these next couple sundays in particular are going to be really difficult to think of these emptyrc/s churches on pal sunday and onlp easter, it's gog to be difficult. my condolences, e1i]again, to y and stay the fight. keep going. and keep flattening that cue thanks fore1 coming on. >> thank yout( very much. if i can say, i'm really proud to serve my amazing country. thank you very much. >> thank you, mr. primee1 minister. when we g wasn't the government ready for this e1pandemic? the panel is next. >> and as we go to break, the

reunion between my nbc news correspondent colleague janis mackey frayq and her 6-year-old ÷-c(separated for seven weeks.e1 staying inside saves lives. stay home, please stay home, stay home, we're gonna have to get creative in here. i really think togetherness is the super power of our species. let's do it together. we will keep each other company. i want you to meditate with me. let's get ready together. coming yoga with me each day could be a different thing. hi, guys. welcome back to another studying video. but first, some rock and roll. aghhhhhhhh! i want you guys to stay home and cook with me. this is the one you want to get. ooohhh! like reading what you guys are up too. and i'm real into it. why not turn on the camera? do it as a group, do it together and make some comfort food,

because we all need that right now. you can slow the growth of this and save lives. and i like to question your i'm yoevery move.n law. like this left turn. it's the next one. you always drive this slow? how did you make someone i love? that must be why you're always so late. i do not speed. and that's saving me cash with drivewise. [mayhem] you always drive like an old lady? [tina] you're an old lady. i'm part of a community of problem solvers. we make ideas grow. from an everyday solution... to one that can take on a bigger challenge. we are solving problems that improve lives.

welcome back. the panelfá is joining us from the)áe remote locations. we aree1 practicing ourfá socia distancing. capitol hill hill correspondent kasie hunt, the former republican governor of north carolina, pat mccrory, and helene cooper, correspondent for "the new york times." i think we can best sum up the argument or debate this morning in particularly, who's in charge, ande1 kasie hunt, i wan to play thee1 president on the c

mask guidelines because in many ways the mixed messages he sent here sort of sums up the back and forth between the feds and the state. take a listen. >> the cdc is advising the use of nonmedical cloth face coveringe1 as an additional voluntary public health qmeasur. so it's voluntary. you don't have to do it. i don't think i'm going to be doing it. i think wearing a face mask as i greet presidents, prime ministers, dictators, kings, queens, i don't know. somehow, i don't see it for myself. >> it's worth noting, by the way, the italian prime minister, before he started the interview, before he sat down, he e1actual was wearing a mask. all of his aidesmasks.wearing we thought that was interesting there. kasie hunt, this seems to be this push and pull here. the governors want theq feds to take more control.e1 and the president definitely doesn't want tosn do that. >> and evenñ1 asa hutchinson in your conversation there, he's resisted thatt( state-wide

stay-at-home order, as you pointed out, but he also said in that interview, he was going to be wearing a mask and modeling the guidelines, the surgeon general just a minute earlier putting a face mask on, on e1 camera. clearly, our public health officials believe that this is a message that they want to send to people inçó the strongest possible terms. and this is, of course, an evolution. we were initially all told this wasn't necessary unless you were sick,i] b5)y@@ç this point, wh the president is saying, chuck, we're seeing in any polling that's being done, we're seeing itok in how people are respondi. more people are listening to chat this president has to say presidency because we are all tuned in trying to figure out how to make our way through this together. and so if he wants americans to wear masks, he needs to say that very directly, and we all know, especially those of us who are trying to raise children, you have to model the behavior yourself to convince others to follow. >> that's for sure. pat mccrory, as a fover

governor, as a former mayor, i know you're sympathetic to somebody above your pay grade trying to tell you how to run your state or run your city. i get that. but when is the point as a governor that you actually want the feds in charge? >> well, one thing i have been in the fog of war during hurricanes and tornadoes and winter storms where you're making life and death decisions whilefá balancing the economy a also balancing the turf between not just the federal government and state government but if i e state, government but if i there's turf among the county health directors and thei] governor. and as you get closer to the people and the elected officials )n in the fog of war, you have mixed data. you have mixed communication. and you have evolving opinions based upon that new data. that'sjf contap happening. the one thing i don't like that's happe.rft is the blame game. you know, the washington

what you need to do is go, what do we need to do çónow? and be specific. and we all live in our lanes of responsibility, and some of thosema lanes overlap, and the are gray areas. this is not unusual in a fog of war. ?átju i'm 5aobsessed, i put that quo up for the surgeon okgeneral, t public health official from ohio, amy acton. are you surprised more politicians aren't erring on the side of caution. it seems if you're wrong about this, boy, is that a bad way to be wrong.." if you're wrong and you have been overly alarmist, well, ngkody extra has died. if you're wrong and you have underplayed, boy, you have au t to answer for. >> i had a theme during our crisis and hurricanesu was be overprepared and hopefully be underwhelmed. and that i think should be the goal of every leader. there is this tremendous balance that we all have, and one thing

about even the stay-at-home policy, i could say it almost discriminates against the blue-collar worker who is watching us do our job from long distance. the blue-collar worker can't stay at home to keep the manufacturing lines open of textile and rubber and cloth that we need in our hospitals rig4qnow, the delivery trucks, thee1 grocery stores, the blue-collarq worker is going, wait a minute, i don't get to stay at home. >> helene cooper, there's been ] lot of chatteri] about the president ought to appoint, you know, ought to deputize, maybe it's a member of the joint e1 chiefs, a general of maybe, you know, somebody of the status of a jim mattis, somebody like ñi that, to basically become the czar here. >> there has been a lot of that. as you know, at the pentagon, the reason people are saying to dofá this, to appoint a general is the pentagon, they specialize in planning. that's what they do all the time, and in a war-time situation. it's just been so fascinating,

though, chuck, seeing the american government response to american govu much we have e to appeared to lag by a goodr days to two weeks this virus days to two weeks this virus with everything that we'rm1 doing. the fact that you have the administration, the white house, finally coming on and saying we should be wearing face masks is something that many, many health officials say should have happened a month ago, and the fact you still don't have the president onboard with that, i think, is hugely significant. i'm not sure which kings and queens he thinks are coming to the white house that he needs to be worried about greeting with a face mask on, but the very idea t;q president trump is talking about appearance, that it won't look good for him to be seen wearing a face maskñ1 at axd ti when you have thousands upon thousands of americans dying and so thee1 numbers are looking li they're about to go shockingly higher saju a lot about leadership in a time of crisis.

>> very quickly, kasie hunt, i@1 noticed we have 6.6 unemployment claims this weec,v and it seems like that number made nancyok pelosi andw3 mitch mcconnell sa oh, we should agree on the next round of spending. this is coming soon, isn't it? >> nancy pelosiñi earlier this week, chuck, was ready to start talking about infrastructure projects, jobs bills, essentially, the next phase of this. it only took 24 to 36 hours for her to suddenly turn around and say, you know whau. actually, we're still in the emergency relief phase of this. and i think you are going to see congress try to act as quickly as possiblew3 in that vein. >> yeah, and it almost will be like a refill the coffers of what wasçó promisedw3 with the t round, which we're still trying to get e1out, the small busines loans, t(unemployment. all week long, you'll see a lot of technical problems on that front. i hope folks are patient on there. >> iok have to leave it there. thank you guys for our shortened

panel. >> coming up, author michael lewis on finding creative ways to fight the pandemic. >> first, the scene at jefferson hospital in philadelphia where health care workers had a message for all of usxd and the tried to do it with a smile. stick around. needles. essential for the sea urchin, but maybe not for people with rheumatoid arthritis. because there are options. like an "unjection™". xeljanz xr, a once-daily pill for adults with moderate to severe ra for whom methotrexate did not work well enough. xeljanz xr can reduce pain, swelling and further joint damage, even without methotrexate. xeljanz can lower your ability to fight infections like tb; don't start xeljanz if you have an infection. taking a higher than recommended dose of xeljanz for ra can increase risk of death. serious, sometimes fatal infections, cancers including lymphoma, and blood clots have happened. as have tears in the stomach or intestines, serious allergic reactions, and changes in lab results. tell your doctor if you've been somewhere fungal infections are common,

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welcome back. data download time. so qfar, coronavirus hot spots havexd primarily been urbant( a like new york city, whereok there's always an icu bed shortage. but access to those beds is likely to get even more limited as the pandemic spreads inland to more rural areas with older populations. let's take new york city as our base line. it's home to numerous top-rated hospitals, but there are still over 1,000e@s60-plus-year-old peop'- for every one icu bed. the rest of the country would seem to be doing somewhat better with one icu bed for over 900

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welcome back. michael lewis has spent his career chronicling people who find creative ways to identify and solve problems. in his latest book,fá the fifth risk, me essentially describes what happens when in his view, the trump administration dumbed down government tmñ@5u! to function properly. so is the trump administration prepared to take all of this on during this current crisis? michael lewis joins me now, social distancing from berkeley, california. ì(lc% long time, first time, as far as i'm concerned.

good to have you on. >> go"uz see you, e1chuck. >> let me just start with the premise of your book, which you were looking at the transition. and i say -- i want tow3 connec some dots here. i'm going to put up a screen grab of all of the people who have been ine1 charge of the department of homeland security in the trump administration. five different people. two have been senate-confirmed. three actings including the situation here. it feels as if, i know dhs wasn't a part of your book, but that i]amount -- is that the definition of the fifth risk here, sometimes, personnel? >> you know, the book, the starting point for the book is you really havet( to think abou the federal government as this -- as a manager of portfolio of risks, right? anio many are catastrophic and you don't know what you're going to have to deal with t but ther dealing with it.yú p'zpipá caug reason i wrote the book is we had this process to hand over thee1ñi government. and it wsqu11e by law theñi obama administration was

required toñi spend a great dea of time preparing tovnñ hand th government over to whoever succeeded it. and obama took it really seriously because bush had handed the government over so well to him, he thought. and trump, on his side, had built this enterprise of 500 people he'll roll into the department of homeland security, the department of agriculture, wherever, and he fired them the day after the election. so the transition never happened. that's the beginning of this whole story. the beginning of our response to the pandemic. the knowledge of how you dealt with, i don't know, say, an ebola outbreak was never really transferred to the trump administration. and i think that if you're going to -- when people look back and tell the story of this crisis, they'll start there. >> there's no doubt they will. look, i want to pivot a little bit. you just did a podcast and you noted we're going to learn a lot about our society during this

pandemic that is probably going to surface problems we didn't know we needed to solve. what are a few that you're seeing now that you think we need to be keeping an eye on? >> are you talking about like risks we should be terrified of? you know -- >> yes. >> well, look. this in some ways was not -- the fifth risk in my mind was the risk that you weren't really -- that you weren't really -- you didn't have top of mind. and i came to the idea because i walked into the department of energy and got the briefing from the chief risk officer that the trump administration had not bothered to get. i asked, like, what are the top five things you're worried about just in the department of energy. he said, look, there are a lot of really smart people dealing with things like, one, preventing a nuclear weapon from going off when it shouldn't go off. two, preventing the electric grid from going down or coming under attack. three, north korea getting a weapon they actually deliver to the west coast.

it was like one thing after another. and there were steps being taken to prevent these bad things from happening. now, the question is, across an administration that's being run by a person who is largely indifferent to it, to what extent is this portfolio of risks more likely to happen? and the thing that worried me and the thing that got me interested in writing the book in the first place, was like if something actually happens, i don't know what it is, what's going to happen, but when it happens, they're not going to be prepared to deal with it. now we know what happened. so we're now in the land of second best solutions because we had someone who neglected the instrument, the tool for dealing with the crisis. >> look, we're going to end up having -- something will change in our society based on this. one of the things i have

wondered about is we're learning who's essential. we're finding out the truck driver is a lot more essential than some of us, the person who stocks the shelves, a lot more essential. do you see a reckoning on the economic front that rights those wrongs in time? >> you know, the first thing that might come out of this is an appreciation of the federal government, of what it does. its basic job is to keep us safe. if we don't pay attention to how it's run, we will find ourselves in this situation all over again. so i think that's the big thing. i think that's the big thing that comes out. >> all right. michael lewis, i have to leave it there. also wish i had more time with you and i'll find a way to get more time with you down the road. thank you, and thank you to all of you who have been watching today. please continue to practice that social distancing. doing everything you can to keep your family and neighbors safe. the sooner we do it, the sooner we'll get through this. we'll be back next week because

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. in the days ahead, america will endure the peak of this terrible pandemic. our warriors in this life and death battle are the incredible doctors and nurses and health care workers on the front line of the fight we pledge to them our eternal gratitude and everlasting support. >> as america's surgeon general also said, we're heading into this generation's pearl harbor moment as the surge in coronavirus cases and deaths is expected to reach new heights in the coming days. to the front lines where paramedics are being pushed to the limit.