games under way in beijing, elizabeth palmer has a look at how the chinese communist party has tightened control and expanded surveillance, all under the guise of public health. >> reporter: after apparently strag tothe edge of the aprude joan, the ioc says it was an isolated incident. the rules kicked in as soon as athletes and officials ended. they were covid tested and sealed in what is meant to be an feaings-free bubble.

athletes are tested twice a d da monitoring app. the chinese government has stuck to its zero covid policy, placing millions of people under strict lockdowns, even in modest outbreaks. it reports a death toll of just over 4,000 people. but western health analysts believe that number is too low. chinese officials say their success in large measure rests on this tracking app, an electronic big brother that sits on everyone's phone and tracks covid cases and exposure. it's literally the key to entering buildings, taking cabs, or traveling. typical of the people we asked, this couple said they're fine with that. maybe so, but on top of the vast network of facial recognition cameras, it's given chinese authorities a newmoand meddle in

a billion lives. given the power and the reach of a prickly chinese state, u.s. officials have counseled american athletes not to criticize china while they're at the games and to stay safe. margaret. >> brennan: liz palmer, thank you. we'll be right back. lactaid is 100% real milk, just without the lactose. so you can enjoy it even if you're sensitive to dairy. so anyone who says lactaid isn't real milk is also saying mabel here isn't a real cow. and she really hates that.

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there's a place that's making one advanced cancer discovery after another for 75 years. i am here... i am here.... because of dana-farber. what we do here changes lives everywhere. i am here. >> brennan: we turn now to former f.d.a. commissioner and pfizer board member dr. scott gottlieb. good morning to you, doctor. >> good morning. >> brennan: 900,000 americans have died over the last two years from covid. that's the population of indianapolis, greater than the population of san francisco, charlotte, north carolina. where are we now as a country in this fig >> well, look, we're still tragically in this fight. across the country you see cases declining rapidly. so we're a good part of the way through this omicron wave. you look at places like new

york, new jersey, maryland, cases are down to about 20 to 30 cases per 100,000 people per day which is a low level. that's about where we were before the delta surge. other parts of the country are at, north carolina, oklahoma, some are in the thick of it, coming down, but still in the thick of it. new york, new jersey, maryland, boston if you look at some of the leading indicators have come way down, and i think they're through the worst of this particular wave of infection. >> brennan: and we were hearing from governors, a bipartisan group met with president biden in the past few days, saying they want guidelines to talk about moving from pandemic to an endemic stage here. and, yet, we're at 2400 deaths a day. that doesn't feel like we're close to the end. >> no, it doesn't feel like that. and we're not close to the end right now. depending on how you measure

that. i think this is going to be a long struggle. this is a virus that is going to to take measures to protect vulnerable people. i think governors are looking what is the on and off ramp. we don't have a agreed upon set of nomenclature and measures. many public health authority talk about 10 cases of 100,000 people per day being a metric that rates you in being in a low level of spread. that's where c.d.c. defines a low level of spread that would justify removing masks, for example, in schools. i think what governors are sensing is that we need to agree upon a set of metrics when we're going to start to roll back these mitigation steps and give people a light at the end of the tunnel. what is that point when this stuff gets turned off? >> brennan: you talk about

clear steps and masks. the governor of virginia, we talked about on this program, you know, lifted the mask mandates for schools, and he, on january 2-- excuse me, on january 23 when i asked you what should be done here, you said that was too early, but in two weeks we would be in a place where mask mandates could be lifted. so that puts us right where we are right now. can mask mandates be lifted in most schools? >> look, i think you're going to see governors start to do that. we're two weeks out. we've seen prevalence come out. connecticut's mask mandates expires february 15. i would expect that will not be renewed and schools in the state of connecticut will quickly lift the mask requirements for students, i think you'll see the same in new york, new jersey. other states where cases have come down and vaccination rates are high, i think you'll see states do that. that doesn't mean this will not continue to spread.

when prevalence is low, you have a lot of people who have been infected, have some level of immunity for some period of time, and high vaccination rates, we can take a little more risk and try to make sure students in school have some sense of normalcy. a lot of kids haven't known a normal school day for two years. we need to try to lean forward aggressively to try to restore that and claim that as we can. >> brennan: i'm a parent of a child who doesn't have access to a vaccine yet. i don't want to take a mask off his face. when will he be vaccinated? the f.d.a. said they want to reconsider their earlier guidance. and now they are looking at two doses, first week march. do i go to my pediatrician's office and get a shot? >> it's possible. look, the decision is ultimately going to reside with f.d.a. the briefing documents on the data that the f.d.a. is going to review are going to be out this friday. the agency is going to have an advisory committee, a public

advisory committee february 15. after that. >> expect they'll make a decision on the vaccine for children ages six months to four years old. and they have a lot more data to evaluate. i think when people see that data come out, some of it will be out friday in a briefing document. all will be out in a public advisory committee meeting. i think they'll see the data package has evolved from when they first looked at it back in december. what's happened oaf that intervening time iicron. 11.4 million children have been infected through this pandemic. 3.5 million of them were infected in just the month of january. that was omicron. and there were 1.6 million kids under 5 infected during the course of the pandemic. we now have a lot of experience with the kid in this trial who ugh thomicron wandtoluat that v. >> brennan: i know you used to run the f.d.a., but do you think the f.d.a. made a mistake by not authorizing this back in december when they had the first chance to do so? >> look, i always felt it was

important to get baseline immunity in those children. remember, pfizer, the company i'm on the board of, made a decision to test low closes in children six months to five years old because they wanted to find the lowest dose possible to find an immune response. it's a three-microgram dose compared to 30 micrograms in adults. the sacrifice was the absolute efficacy of the vaccine wasn't as sample as you saw in 16-25. that's the data they were looking at in december. they sought immune response wasn't as substantial and wanted to wait and see how those kids did. i still believe it was important to get baseline immunity in children ahead of the omicron wave. they chose not to do that. i think they now have an opportunity to look at a much richer data, some children got infected, some didn't. the data package will show, and i think it will give a clearer picture

of what the vaccine is in omicron. >> brennan: and the open question is how many parents choose to take advantage of that vaccine being accessible. dr. gottlieb, it's always good to talk to you. and we'll catch up with you next sunday. we'll be back in a moment.

>> brennan: last week, we spoke with a group of parent to get their perspective on parenting during the pandemic and the prospect of soon being able to get very young children vaccinated. >> few of the day care moms and i have made a joke of like waiting in line for a concert. basically, who is bringing the tent? >> my son has had covid. you know, he's been through it,

and it was pretty rough. i know what i felt like when i got the vaccine. feing and if e's ald tocommune e problem, can they actually dwe want to waitan about yo how have you faed and how have your children fared during the pandemic? >> my son is 13 so he started at a new school right when it started. i still think he's sport of playing catch-up trying to get back to some level of normalcy. >> brennan: did the vaccine make a tremendous difference in his life or your psychology? >> absolutely. you always want to do anything you possibly can to protect your child. and, unfortunately, i lost my best friend, who opted to not quiet vaccinated, prior to my son being able to get vaccinated. as soon as it was an option for him to be able to get the vaccine-- he was 12 when he got

it-- there wasn't any hesitation on my part. >> brennan: alejandro, your children are a little older. what was your conversation about the need to get vaccinated or not. >> my kids are-- my kids verge on hypochondriac, so they got vaccinated as soon as eligible. i didn't have to push them at all. if anything, they push me. >> brennan: how did that make you feel as a parent? >> it made me feel safer. we were not worried about them dying of covid, but i was worried about them having the flu from hell and having any long-term consequences of that flu from hell. >> brennan: do all of you and all of your children wear masks? raise your hands. and they all wear masks when they go to school? are any of you-- coany of you hope that they get to take off

that mask soon, or is it just normal now? >> my middle child is going to college. and at colleges, they really have a health crise, it's not made up. and the covid restrictions have a lot to do with that. it's masking, the social distancing, the asking for-- having to get tested twice a week, and so on and so forth. it's really affecting their social lives. it's driving some of them pretty crazy, i guess. >> brennan: allison, i want you to jump in here, becausening you've got a pretty interesting point of view. you are actually a pediatrician. are you concerned about development with young children, given all the restrictions we're living under? do you think that's a valid worry from parents? >> i do. especially for our teenaged children. as far as the little ones go, i

am not quite so concerned, because these little ones are so resilient, so i think it's less of a concern than the big kids. but, yeah,ening it's definitely an issue. i see it in my own daughter with-- she's in first grade, and in kindergarten, she was wearing a mask all year and it wasn't an issue. at the beginning of this year, they're going to have them wearing masks, and she was thrilled, of course. and when the upsurge and the variant, they had them return to masks and she just cried. she was devastated. it really brought it more perspective to me that this is hard for them. it affects them so much more than we realize sometimes. >> brennan: when you hear the term "children are resilient," do you think that's a positive way of characterizing things or does it anger you a little bit? >> it's not that i don't think children are resilient. i just think sometimes there's

such a focus on them being resilient and having grit, that they don't get a chance to, like, actually feel their emotions, because they're too busy shoving them down to show grit and resilience. the very young, they don't have a lot of memories, but they do have-- there are subconscious things that stick with them. they're going to need to feel their feelings, and we're going to need to give them the grace to do so. >> brennan: that's a really, i think, important observation. cam, what's your feeling on this? >> we have a generation of youth, you know, that are missing opportunities and experiences that they're never going to bible to have again. >> brennan: show of hands, who thinks that we can kind of make up for lost time? no one. who thinks we can repair whatever impact there has been to our children?

caleb, you're hopeful here. >> yeah, i aause with my three-year-old, this is a new thing that none of us have ever had to go through, but i think this is just normative for them moving forward, so they won't know that it's not, like, the same as what we had. >> brennan: sidney, i know your children have experienced things as a stop-start. how has that impacted them? >> they were 12 and 14. that's a really crucial time. so for my daughter who is a little bit more quiet anyway, we had to make sure she came out of her room. and we could kind of see her closing down, tensing up and, you know, so we could go into how can we help her mode? my son is a little bit more happy-go-lucky, so he seemed to be taking everything in stride, so it was clear he wasn't. he wasave 12-year-old who had, like, a three-year-old meltdown one day. he just ran out of the house

yelling. and it was-- you know, we were worried. >> brennan: and, cam, i know you had some difficulty seeing what the impact was of isolation on your son. >> a couple of months into it, he was just breaking down occasionally, and he finally wrote me a letter and said that he was concernedaround, which was shocking. because you see all this, like, death and gloom all around you. it's been much better now that he's back at school. but that first six-nine months, it definitely affected him emotionally. >> brennan: it must have been really hard to hear as a parent. >> oh, absolutely. >> brennan: do all of you feel like your emotional health has been impacted by covid? show of hands. all of you do. do you think that impacted your ability to parent.

>> the c.d.c. kept saying that's how you protect your child is you make sure everybody around them is vaxxed and boosted, because neither of my kids' grandmothers will get vaccinated. so they haven't seen her since she was a year old. it was a hard conversation to have with my own mother, i must say. and then there came omicron, and it didn't seem to matter that we were vaccinated and boosted. it was coming for you anyway. and so now that's part of the paranoia, almost, right now. yes, i'm going to get marcy vaccinates as soon as possible, but now i don't think of the vaccine as the way out anymore. >> brennan: painful conversation. but we hope to have a conversation with h.r. mcmaster, who is finally up on the line, in a moment. so stick with us. we'll be right back.

when you humble yourself under the mighty hand oftie wi exalt you. hi, i'm joel osteen. i'm excited about being with you every week. i hope you'll tune in. you'll be inspired, you'll be encouraged. i'm looking forward to seeing you right here. you are fully loaded and completely equipped for the race that's been designed for you. >> brennan: we go now to former national security adviser retired general h.r. mcmaster,

who is with us from palo alto, california. good morning to you. and i understand you can hear me now. that's good. >> good morning, margaret. it's great to be with you. thanks for your perseverance. >> brennan: let's pick up on the question i put to you, do you agree with the former vice president mike pence that donald trump was wrong in what he claims about the 2020 election? >> absolutely. all americans should agree with vice president pence. it's time, margaret, i think to demand more from our political leaders, demand that they stop compromising confidence in our democratic principles and institutions and processes to score partisan political points. as know, this happens across both political parties and it's just time to stop. >> brennan: and you-- do you believe january 6 was in any way legitimate political discourse? >> no, it was illegitimate political discourse, because it was an assault on the first branch of government. and so i think it's really important for us to come together now, margaret, and, you

know, i mean, i really think it is possible to improve the transparency and the security of our elections, while ensuring that every eligible voter gets to vote. so i think what we need to do is stop posturi across these political parties and begin conversations with what we can agree on. your show has been great. i got to listen to the whole thing here. but it's pretty clear that we are emerging from a number of traumas of the past couple of years, and it's time for americans to come together and to restore our confidence in who we are as a people and in our democratic principles and constitutions and processes. and of course, russia preys on our weaknesses and divisions, and tries to portray democracy as weak. but, you know, margaret, i believe that totalitarianism is fragile and weak. and democracies are resilient. andy woo can work together and come out of these traumas stronger. >> brennan: thank you for your clarity on those questions. general, the trump administration back in 2018 was

the first to give lethal aide to ukraine, those antitank systems. it didn't deter vladimir putin from what appears to be a plan to invade. why not? >> well, who knows what it deterred, margaret. it's hard to prove a negative. of course russia will push, putin will push, until he meets strong resistance. so what we really need and what you're starting to see, i think, is deterrence by denial, convincing putin he had no longer accomplish his objects through the use force.if h obja nato that comes together th angf unity. if he wants to d keep it under its thumb, we will see a rise of national sentiment in ukraine and ukraine is doing ferg they can to strength themselves, not only militarily but economically. what i would like to do is see the whole world amplifies the ukrainians' voices and support

them militarily and economically as well. margaret, i think what you see this past week, some anxiety on the part of the ukrainian leaders because as russia continues to prepare for what looks like a renewed massive offensive against ukraine, it's important to remember they already invaded ukraine. 7,000 ukrainians have already died as a result. so i think we need to help ukraine economically, as well as threaten russia with economic consequences. what can we do to help strengthen ukraine in the face of this crisis? >> brennan: well, what do you think is the impact then of this growing alliance between russia and china? you know, it is china going to be emboldened by what happens next in europe? >> i think possibly, depending on how we respond. and, of course, china already is more and more aggressive in terms of extending and tightening its exclusive grip on r internally. u'w they've ne of eir economy, continuing the genocidal

campaign, extinguishing human freedom in hong kong, persecuting journalists and anybody who might criticize the chinese government during the olympics have been intimidated or imprisoned. and of course externally as well, margaret. we've seen them bludgeon indian soldiers to death on the himalayan frontier, weaponizing the islands on the south china sea. now they're painting some of their naval ships coast guard colors so they can claim really the biggest land grab in history in the south china sea. and taiwan is probably the most dangerous flashpoint. we see how aggressive they've been there as well. it's really important i think for the free world to come together to strengthen, again, our confidence and to communicate to these totalitarian rejemses that they can't accomplish their objectives at our defense. >> brennan: h.r. mcmaster i have much more to talk to you about china. i have to leave it there at that moment. that will be it us for "face the

nation." thank you for sticking with us through some bumps. we'll see you next week. captioning spoor b captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

this is the cbs "overnight news." good evening. thanks for joining us. tonight, there are increasing that vladamir putin plans a full-scale invasion of ukraine. and the biden administration now says that could happen at any time. right now, more than 110,000 russian troops are massed on the border. this weekend, u.s. troops from the 82nd airborne division arrived in poland to demonstrate america's commitment. if ukraine com b