and please join us when our trumpet sounds again ne sunday morning ♪♪ [trumpet] ♪♪. captioning sponsored by cbs >> brennan: i'm margaret brennan in washington. and today on "face the nation" a powerful show of support for ukraine from top congressional democrats as the biden administration pushes for tens of billions more in aid for that war-torn country. we'll have the latest on the military maneuvers and diplomatic efforts in the war that is now entering its tenth week. the head of u.s. agencyratic sem mccain will both be here. and the committee investigating the january 6 attack on the capitol is preparing for what they hope will be critical public hearings next month. we'll hear from adam kinzinger about what to expect. and, finally, a vaccine for the very young guest youngey

be just weeks away. we'll talk with dr. paul burton, the chief medical officer. and we'll check in with dr. deborah birx. her new book is entitled: "silent invasion." it is all just ahead on "face the nation." ♪♪ ♪♪ >> brennan: good morning, and welcome to "face the nation." we awoke this morning to a stunning sight: house speaker nancy pelosi being greeted by ukraine president volodymyr zelenskyy in the streets of kyiv. she and six other democrats made a surprise visit to the region to show support and discuss the president's proposed additional $33 billion u.s. aid package to

ukraine. >> i'm here to say to you that we are with you until the fight is over. >> we will win together. >> brennan: we begin today with cbs news forn correspondent charlie d'agata who has the latest from eastern ukraine. >> reporter: good morning, margaret. this is what is left of an industrial site destroyed by the russians after learning it was being used as a base by ukrainian forces. from beneath the smoldering ruins of this plant in mariupol, a hint of hope. ukrainian fighters said around 20 women and children made it out of the hundreds of civilians g frotlinesneast fht for the donbas region has become a battle of artillery and attrition. russian forces have greater numbers and a longer reach, place

popazna have been flattened. the town of liman is expected to be among the next to fall. volunteers shuttle the few remaining residents in a mini bus. alena described the shelling as constant, day and night. her 87-year-old mother, lydia, escaped with little more than her wheelchair and her cat, dosha. right after we left town, a russian airstrike destroyed that railway bridge leading out of town. it is part of a wider campaign of russians trying to stop u.s. and western weapons from reaching ukrainian forces fighting on these fr frontlines. and everywhere we have gone we have found freshly dug positions, fallbacks for retreating ukrainian forces. it is where we found volunteer joshua, a marine veteran from wossila, alaska. >> it is nothing i've

experienced before. i wish they had more nato experience, more nato training -- >> reporter: mor nato weapons? >> more nato weapons. but their heart and conviction are in the right place. >> reporter: heart and conviction only goes so far. the battalion commander says they have yet to receive any of the promised u.s. weapons. showing us a machine gun that jams every two rounds. just up the road from us, battle-weary soldiers take a break after nearly two months of heavy fighting. the ukrainian government said the russians have suffered heavy losses for modest gains, yet the intensity of the fight has only worsened by the day. the next few days here will be critical. the ukrainian defense ministry says there is evidence that the russian military is building up troops and weaponry in order to step up the assault on this region. margaret?

>> brennan: charlie dagang, thank you. we have received word from the international committee of the red cross that the evacuations are indeed taking place in mariupol. and we hope they can continue safely. we turn now to national security correspondent david martin. david, always great to have you here. this is, on the calendar at least, supposed to be a key week driving towards may 9th, a holiday in russia that vladimir putin apparently puts a lot of weight on. what wins will his military actually be able to eliver to him? >> well, i don't think they're going to get all of the donbas, which is what he has said he wants by may 9th. on saturday, russian forces made no advances on any fronts. earlier in the week, their progress was being described as plodding, slow, unequal, pick your word. but it was progress. if you look at a map of

ukraine before the war started and the frontlines today, russia has seized a lot of territory in southern and eastern ukraine. now, he still has a ways to go in order to get all of the donbas. and he is extremely unlikely to get that by may 9th. but if the russians keep up with these steam-roller tactics of using artillery to level everything in front of them, and advancing a few kilometres and doing it all over again, the fact that the russians aren't able to produce a victory for putin by may 9th is going to be small consolation for the people in the path of that steamroller. >> brennan: we know u.s. diplomats this week were sharing information about the strategy diplomatically or politically to go along on the battlefield holding

what the u.s. calls sham elections, actually physically moving people out f areas they decided were key. what do we know about where the focus is? i know we hear a lot about the east, but is it that kirson area? is it odessa? where should we be focusing the most? >> reporter: in the east. i think, and the pentagon thinks, that the strikes on odessa are just a diversionary tactic. nobody believes that russia has the troops to go and take odessa. and i think the russians will be very leery of putting ships in closer to make an amphibious assault on odessa simply because that's how they lost their flagship in moscow, when it was hit by a ukrainian anti-ship missile. >> brennan: we've seen a lot of images of the

weapons going into ukraine, not just from the u.s., but from the u.k., from poland. they have a lot of equipment going on, and they have some u.s. intelligence as well. this looks more and more like the west is becoming party to this conflict in some way. >> reporter: they have a lot of u.s. intelligence. the u.s. is basically giving the ukrainians everything they have on ukrainian troop movements -- excuse me, russian troop movements, russian battle plans. so the ukrainians have a very good picture of what the russians are up to. and, you know, at the end of big battles, you usually read a history in which intelligence turned out to be decisive in that battle. i don't think you can say that yet, but you can certainly say that the ukrainians are going to have an intelligence advantage. the issue is going to be whether that intelligence gets down to the units

that need to act on the intelligence. >> brennan: david martin, great insights and reporting. thank you. >> reporter: sure thing. >> brennan: we go now to senator tim kaine who joins us from richmond, virginia. good morning to you, senator. >> great to be with you, margaret. thank you. >> brennan: we woke up to the images of speaker pelosi and top congressional democrats walking around downtown kyiv. it is a statement of support. i know president biden has asked for that statement to be backed up with $33 billion of funding from congress. how quickly do you think this will get done? >> um, margaret, we'll turn to it as soon as we get back to the senate tomorrow. and i think we need to push it very, very quickly. obviously we just sent an aid package for ukraine about a month ago that was about $13 billion, thunder is a dramatic escalation over what we did in 2021 and even before that. but this additional aid is

necessary to help ukraine win and beat russia's illegal invasion of their country. >> brennan: well, when that last $13 billion package was passed, republican leader mitch mcconnell was on this program, and he said if the ukrainians want more money, we'll give it to them. you don't hear republican leaders saying, ask me to spend more, but that is exactly what is happening here. so for democrats, when you try to push this through, can there be a commitment to just having this be a stand-alone aid package to ukraine or does it have to be paired with things like covid funding? >> i don't think it does, margaret. you follow the help pretty carefully, and the procedure where you put bills together and where you separate them is quirky and sometimes unpredictable. but we need covid aid, we need ukraine aid, and we should do them together or separately, but we shouldn't wait around.

we need to get both of those done. i think those three big bills, ukraine aid, covid aid, and the competitiveness bill are the three big tasks ahead of us in may. >> brennan: but the bigger it gets, the slower it goes. ukraine says they don't have time. so why not make this a stand-alone bill? and if it is just a defense-oriented bill, do you need to have food security funding in there and global vaccine funding in there as well? >> again, we can break it into smaller pieces or larger pieces. we do need to do this quickly, but remember, margaret, in the aid package that we put in a month or so ago, it was about $6.8 billion for military and equivalent for medical aid. virtually every week, president biden is releasing 500 million, 800 million of the aid. and we still have more of that first package to release to ukraine.

we need to get it when they need it with the weapons they need. and we still have some time to ask for this next package. i think my colleagues in congress on both sides, with very few exceptions, they understand how significant this is. there is quite a bit of pipe resolve on the ukraine aid package. >> brennan: senator coons was on this program a few weeks ago, and he said there at least needs to be a conversation about when the united states would use force, potentially, in ukraine. do you think there needs to be a discussion of authorization of use of force? >> i think that would be pre-mature, margaret. i think there is a shared sense first if russia were to take action against any nato ally -- >> presi >> brennan: why would be it premature if president biden already said he won't send troops -- >> but he also said that

use of chemical weapons or nuclear weapons could alter that. we are providing massive amounts of aid to ukraine, both the u.s. and nato allies and others. if there were to be an invasion of a nato country, or even a cyber attack or the use of chemical or nuclear weapons in ukraine, that would change the equation. for now, i think the right plan is to flood the zone with humanitarian and hill military aid. >> brennan: this has gotten fairly tangled, but what may happen at the u.s. border, and the end of title article 42, which allows for asylum seeking migrants to be denied immediate entry -- is there a way around this roadblock? do you see it inevitable there will be a vote on title 42? >> i think it will,

margaret. we need a vote on the covid aid package, and republicans had made claim they want to vote on title 42 as part of a discussion about covid aid. i am a stronger believer, whether i'm in the maturity or minority, that there ought to be amendments and we ought to allow votes on amendments on the floor. i worry a little bit that sometimes majority parties, democratic or republican, slow-walk legislation to try to avoid controversial amendment votes. but i'm elected by virginians to vote on things, controversial or otherwise. and after 28 years in office if i can't explain a vote on something, i'm not very good at what i'm doing. i think we'll have a covid aid package vote soon in may. and i think the republicans will ask for a title 42 amendment vote as part of it. and we ought to see what the amendment is and vote it up or down based upon whether it is a good amendment or not. >> brennan: but you've also been somewhat critical of the biden administration's plan to allow for that border

health restriction to expire at the end of may. when is the right date? >> margaret, what i've sai is this: title 42 needs to expire. it is an emergency regulation. it needs to be replaced by more permanent procedures and plans to do a better job at the border. so i was confused about the timing. we were going to have title 42 expire on may 3, and have new rules go into place on may 31. i was just confused with the administration's messaging about this -- >> brennan: is it clear now? >> d.h.s. laid out a pretty comprehensive plan, with personnel flooding the border, which they're doing already, preparing for use of expedited removal of individuals who can't make a credible claim for asylum, for example. more work in central americans and help their economies grow so that the push of poor economics leading to migration will ab bad

abade. the right answer is permanent fixes that will help. that was part of our immigration bill in 2013 that passed the senate in a bipartisan way that the republican house refused to take up. >> brennan: i know you suffer from long-term effects of your covid infection. there has already been about a billion dollar effort under way to study it at nna stitutes of health. why is that not enough and how much more money is needed? >> margaret, i would say i'm experiencing long covid. there are people really suffering from it. i wouldn't call myself a sufferer. i have a bizarre tingling sensation that feels like my skin is dip in alka seltzer. we put a significant amount of money in the

american rescue plan, and we're beginning to do major research at the n.i.h. and other institutions. but we need to do more research, spread the results of the research, and provide information to patients, families, providers and employers, and probably we need to supply support to those really suffering under long covid. >> brennan: we will continue to cover that on this p this program. thank you, senator. we'll be right back. stay with us. against thousands of compliance controls with the help of ai. now you're making smarter decisions faster. operating costs are lower. and everyone from your auditors to your bankers feels like a million bucks. let's create smarter ways of putting your data to work. ibm. let's create johnson & johnson is building a future where cancers can be cured. strokes can be reversed. and there isn't one definition of what well feels like.

there are millions. johnson & johnson is building your world of well. see him? he's not checkin' the stats. he's finding some investment ideas with merrill. eyes on the ball baby. digital tools so impressive, you just can't stop. what would you like the power to do? >> brennan: we're joined now by the administrator of the u.s. agency for international development, samantha power, also the former ambassador to the united nations. good morning to you, madam ambassador. >> good morning. >> brennan: we know the last holdout by ukrainian forces in the southeastern city of mariupol has been under constant bombardment, so thas the city. roughly 100 t,000 people believed to be the trapped there, running out of resources. is there truly nothing the u.s. can do accept watch?

>> i don't think that is a fair characterization of what the u.s. has done. it is not my job to talk about the security assistance that has been provided, but that has been the means by which the ukrainians have been able to fight back and hang on as long as they have. we have exerted all kinds of diplomatic pressure, vis-aà-vis countries that have obtained influence with putin, everything from turkey to israel to india to china, and putin doesn't care and is defying the will of the world to allow civilians to be evacuated, to allow food and medicine to get in there. and it is a travesty. >> brennan: the u.s. ambassador to the osce, said russia is going to intensify the forced transfers of people into so-called filtration camps. he said they're abducting, torturing, murdering, local leaders, civil

society, activists, religious leaders. how many people are in these camps? what evidence do you have of what is happening there? >> we're deeply concerned about the ukrainian reports of what is happening to civilians in the east. we know some people are escaping russian bombardment by moving into russia voluntarily. they're gathering lists of those people whose families allegedly are missing who have gone without cell phone contact in some cases for many weeks. it is going to be incumbent upon those organizations working inside russia to press the russian federation, just as we do through our sanctions and global pressure, to account for anybody who has traveled inside the russian federation. but i don't have any information on that. what i will say is u.s. aid is working inside ukraine to help civil society activists, who are

vulnerable to relocate, whether to safe houses or to neighboring countries in order to ensure that they are not subjected to this level of persecution. >> brennan: the president did authorize diplomats to return to ukrane this week. they haven't reopened the embassy yt. are you saying your staff are already inside and working to do this? >> what we do, margaret, in circumstances like this, especially as we work through our implementing partners, so we have folks who are in a sense indirectly on the ground but who are receiving u.s. taxpayer resources in order to provide everything from flap jackets and helmets, again to those safe houses, or the kind of training that journalists maybe had not had before about how to work in war zones or work together, evidence of war crimes or other atrocities. so we're sort of turning our previous programming, which was very extensive all across ukraine, into

programming that is suited for this moment through our ukrainian partners who are working inside ukraine. we are super eager to get back into ukraine to be able to see that work up close and to be in a position, again, to channel, for example, the new supplemental program that will be coming. >> brennan: that funding that the president asked for this week is about $3 billion. congress holds the purse strings here, and it took them about three weeks to get the aid passed last time around. how long can you wait for the funding that the president has asked for here, and what are you doing in the meantime to prevent things like a global famine? >> first, let me express gratitude for the supplemental funding package. we're spending that money to meet humanitarian needs. there are vast swaths of

ukrainians that are getting everything from demining to trauma kits to food sense the markets are not back up and running. they are feeling these cascading effects of putin's war, like the spiraling food prices, like the lower supplies of fertilizer, wheat, grain. you have as many as 40 million people could be pushed into poverty now just because of russia's war. we're already spending that money, but the burn rate is very, very high as prices spiral inside ukraine and outside ukraine, and that's why the summ supplemental is so important. it involves $33 billion to meet the famine levels, acute nutrition needs, and it includes direct budget support for the government of ukraine because we want to ensure that government can continue providing

services for its people. putin would like nothing more than for the government of ukraine to go bankrupt and not be able to cater to the people of ukraine. putin wants nothing more than to strengthen his bargaining hand as he exerts military pressure and financial pressure at once. >> brennan: ambassador, thank you for your time this mourning. we'll be right back with a lot more "face the nation." stay with us.

>> brennan: we'll be right back with republican congressman adam kinzinger.

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♪♪ ♪♪ >> brennan: welcome back to "face the nation." the chairman for the committee investigating the january 6 attack on the u.s. capitol announced a series of public hearings will be held in june, with the very first one scheduled for the 9th. congressman adam kinzinger of illinois is a member of that committee and he joins us this morning. good morning to you, congressman. do you expect this to be more of building a public narrative or will new information come to light in these hearings? >> well, i think certainly new information will come to light. i think it is important -- we've been talking about january 6 now for a year and a half. it is important for us to lay the whole story out in front of the american

people from both what led to january 6, the lies after the election, the fundraising, the 187 minutes the president basically sat in the oval office and everything since, including the response by d.o.d. it is important for us to be able to put that in front of the american people because ultimately they have to be the judge. the department of justice will make decisions based on information, but the american people are going to be the ones that have to take the work we've done and decide what they want to do with it or what they want to believe after that. >> brennan: we keep hearing from the committee, including the chairman, there will be members of congress requested to come and speak and answer your questions. still none of them have come really. really.are you in favor of subpoenaing members, and if so, who do you need to talk to? >> i won't say who we need to talk to yet. i think everybody needs to come and talk to us. we have requested information from various members in terms of whether wewi suoena i going to a strategic decision

and a question of whether or not we can do that and get the information in time. >> brennan: do you favor one? >> i think ultimately, whatever we can do to get that information, i think if that takes a subpoena, it takes a subpoena. regardless of what some members of congress are going to tell us, we know a lot of information around it. right now we're not even building a broader narrative, but we're going deeper to show the american people. >> brennan: marjorie taylor greene said this week she was not a participant in the january 6 violence. she was a victim. there are text messages revealed this week in which she was discussing martial law with mark meadows. do you need to ask her a few questions? >> i would love to ask her a few questions. we know some things. i won't confirm or deny the text messages.

for marjorie taylor greene to say she was a victim, it is amazing how folks like her attack everybody for being a victim. she assaulted a survivor's family from a school shooting in d.c., and she stood outside of an office and yelled at her from a mail slot. she is a victim. it is insane. we want the information. history is not going to judge her or people like her that are buying the big lie as well. i firmly believe that. >> brennan: vice president mike pence did the right thing in terms of certifying the election. he is a central player in this story. as a republican, do you want to see him come forward and actually speak to you? >> yes. i would love to see that. i hope he would do so voluntarily. these are decisions i think we're going to end up making from a tactical

perspective in the next week or two as we pin down what this hearing schedule is going to look like, the content, and as we go into the full narrative of this thing. i would hope and think that the vice president would want to come in and tell his story because he did do the right thing on that day. if he doesn't, we'll look at the options if there is information we don't already have. >> brennan: i know you're not a fan of the former president, but he is, in some ways, playing a very large role in upco p oo, j.d. vance he endorsed, other candidates in pennsylvania, herschel walker in georgia. if they end up winning, is this a sign that donald trump is still the leader and king-maker in the party? >> yeah, i think it will be a sign. this primary season is going to be a big moment to figure that out. country is first.

and our focus is on some of those primaries to bring at least reasonable people to the forefront, encouraging people who are going to live in a republican district -- vote in that primary. it matters. i think the primary season is going to tell. keep in mind the former president's tactic here, if somebody starts falling behind in the polls, he always finds a reason to unendorse them -- >> brennan: j.d. vance, when you say "reasonable people" you don't think reasonable people are voting in the republican primary for him? >> from what i've seen, there is one at least reasonable candidate, but, no. if you're j.d. vance two years ago, you're a totally different j.d. vance than you are today. this is a guy who said he frankly doesn't care what happens in ukraine, similar to what people like tucker carlson have said. as a republican, that

doesn't represent what i feel. >> brennan: speaker pelosi and top democrats were in ukraine overnight. do you see impediments to getting this $33 billion that the president has asked to be passed? >> i certainly hope so. for the most part, congress is vastly and largely united on the issue of ukraine. we recognize ukraine is fighting for all of us. that $33 billion is significantly less than what we would have to spend if we took russia on ourselves. >> brennan: senator tim kaine was with us, and he said it is too soon to be talking about potential use of force in ukraine. do you think he is right? >> no, i don't. i don't think we need to be using force. but i just introduced use of military force giving

the president congressional permission to do it if wmds, nuclear or biological weapons are used in ukraine. it says if used, he has that flexibility. it is a deterrent to vladimir putin. if vladimir putin wants to escalate with the west, he will. it is easy for him to do it. i think right now what we're doing with supply, and with the financing, is right, but there may be a point that we have to recognize, this is -- prior to world war ii, there were moments nobody ever wanted to get involved and eventually came to realize they had to. i hope we don't get to that point here, but we should be ready if we do. >> brennan: all right. congressman adam kinzinger, thank you for your time today. we will be back.

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>> brennan: last week moderna asked the f.d.a. to authorize their vaccine for children under the age of six.

dr. paul burton joins us now from princeton, new jersey. doctor, welcome to "face the nation." >> thank you, margaret. good morning. >> brennan: the f.d.a. said on friday it will not delay one vaccine to wait for the other. in other words, they're not trying to put pfizer and moderna head to head here necessarily. each application will be considered when the data is ready. so are you confident that moderna will be ready for the f.d.a. to review your vaccine at their june meeting? >> doctor: yes, absolutely, margaret. so we submitted our data last week. i think the f.d.a. now has all of the core fundamental data they need to be able to begin that application review. so, yes, we're very confident. >> brennan: you have begun it, but you won't have all of it in until may 9th, i had read. you're committed to that date? >> doctor: yes, absolutely. so the data in the study has been completed. we have the data.

typically what we do is package the data electronically, supply to it the f.d.a. that's what were will go in by may 9th, but they have the data they need to begin. >> brennan: full disclosure, i have children in this age group, so as a parent, i'm very interested in the explanations you have for how this vaccine will work. according to the moderna release, the vaccine is 37% affective in kids two to five, roughly 50% in those six months to two years. what is your confidence level in that performance? >> doctor: yes, so, first of all, on safety -- and we can talk about that -- te we see with this vaccine in these very youngest kids are very reassuring. the safety events are even lower than we see in the 6-year-olds to the 12-year-olds. but let's think about the

37%, 51% vaccine effectiveness, what does that mean? it is against symptomatic covid disease, about 10 weeks after the second dose of vaccine, so what it means for parents and care-givers, if they give the moderna vaccine to these little kids, they would basically cut in half the risk of that child getting symptomatic covid. the number, 50%, i know is often lower than we're used to seeing with our vaccine, but it is because this study was conducted during a time of omicron. when we look at the u.k. data that was released just last week, when we look at symptomatic disease, we see vaccine effectiveness of about 50%. but when we look at vaccine effectiveness against hospitalizations, the number is 89% to 95%. so i think we can be very reassured and confident in this result. >> brennan: the 50% 50%

benchmark set by the f.d.a. is key. but when you look at the data, you're doing a vaccine that is 25 micrograms, as i understand it, in size. it is a higher dose than pfizer's vaccine, which is three micrograms, which is still being reviewed. what are the side effects for a toddler of a dose that size? >> doctor: yes. so we give two 25 micrograms shots a month apart. when we looked at the safety, the safety profile was very reassuring. lower events of safety in this very young age group, even compared to the 6-year-olds to 12-year-olds. common side effects are injection side pain and some fever, really what all of us have after vaccination. when we look at the rates of very high fever, a fever over 104°

fahrenheit, own 0.2% of these little kids experience that. and typically in this age rate for other vaccines, we would see rates of 1%. so over all, very reassuring. >> brennan: you mentioned safety, and i know your application for the vaccine for that age group, that has been pending before the f.d.a. since june of 2021. so why do you feel comfortable putting your vaccine in my 3-year-old or someone's 4-year-old if the f.d.a. hasn't approved it to be put in a 12-year-old? >> doctor: we looked at additional safety information to the f.d.a. for the 12-year-old to 14-year-olds. and now we have the data on the very youngest kids -- >> brennan: do you expect the f.d.a. to approve it for those older age groups, is that what you're saying? >> doctor: those applications are under

active review by the f.d.a. and we are approved for over 6-year-olds in many other countries around the world, where it is being used safely and affectively to provide protection for those young kids. i'm very hopefully that the f.d.a. will follow suit for that age rate. >> brennan: i guess the fundamental question here is when we talk about that benchmark of 50%, is putting the vaccine in the smallest of children who don't have any children -- they're too young to even wear a mask, many of them, is just getting some protection worth it? or does it need to meet that standard 50% benchmark the f.d.a. sets? >> doctor: yes, so the 50% benchmark really was in the pre-omicron era. we know now that 50% means to cut in half your risk of symptomatic disease. from the antibody levels we also saw in this study, we can expect high protection against the important thing, which is hospitalization, even death.

omicron is not a mild disease. in kids, we see data from hong kong, the rates of admission of kids to pediatric intensive care units is very high. i think we can reassure parents and care-givers that if approved, this vaccine should be able to safely and affectively protect your ki kids, your youngest kids, again hospitalization. >> brennan: for adults, when do you affected rebooted version, a booster shot, to be available, that would work against omicron, for example. >> even spike vax, the moderna vaccine, does provide protection against severe disease, hospitalization. people are eligible to get boosted, and i would recommend it. we're in this a.b.2 wave sweeping throughout the united states. we announced a new

variant-specific booster we have tested, and we have an additional candidate, our lead candidate, in testing now that i believe will be even more superior. we are confident by the fall of this year we should have manager amounts of that new booster vaccine that will protect against omicron and other variants and really protect americans and people around the world as we go into the fall of 2022. >> brennan: doctor, thank you very much. and we'll be watching closely what happens next. we'll be back in a moment with dr. deborah birx. stay with us.

>> brennan: it's been more than a year since we last spoke with dr. deborah birx, the white house coronavirus task force coordinator during the trump administration, and she told us about the time in the administration, spoke candidly about mistakes that had been made, especially with the c.d.c. and many of those details have been recounted in her new book: "silent invasion." good morning. >> doctor: good morning, margaret. happy to be here. >> brennan: i want to talk about the book. i did see you at

correspondents dinner. these indoor events are happening throughout the country. dr. fauci said it was too dangerous for him to attend. how do you judge risk? >> i have to judge it every day. i have children under five, unvaccinated grandchildren, and i have a 93-year-old that lives in our house. yet i have to work. so i completely masked last night because my assessment was there were probably 15 to 20 people infected, even though everyone was tested in the morning or within 24 hours. i always know and i keep testing. so i'll test every day for five days after an exposure. i consider that an exposure. i tested this morning because i knew i was going to see you in person, unmasked. i think that's just what we need do do. if you have vulnerable people in your household, whether it is children or elderly, you have to continually assess your risk. >> brennan: thank you for the guidance on that. and, as you said, i'm

aware of it because of my kids. we're now at close to a million deaths. infection rates are going up, hospitalizations are going up, i think it was 18% on the week. do you think we're done with the massive waves of infection? >> doctor: i like to look at the whole spectrum of the last two years. and so if you look at what we've been through, we went through a mini alpha variant surge in the same locations last year at this time. then we went into that lull of may, where everybody thought it was over. and middle of june, and then we had the predictable surge across the south. what you need to be looking at is global data. i follow south africa very closely. they're good about testing. theory about sequencing and find their variants. they're on an up slope again. each of these surges are about four to six months apart. that tells me that natural immunity wanes enough in

the general population after four to six months, that a significant surge is going to occur again. this is what we have to be prepared for again in this country. we should be preparing right now for a potential surge in the summer across the southern united states because we saw it in 2020 and we saw it in 2021. >> brennan: wow, that is not general consensus right now. that's a warning. you think that's what is coming for the south. is it this new variant? >> doctor: each of the surges have been a slightly different variant because, yes, our immune system wanes. who is carrying the virus? we are, vaccinated individuals as well as unvaccinated individuals. and we have to make it very clear to the american people that your protection against infection wanes. so if you're going to go see your grandmother or someone that has metastatic breast cancer, or someone under treatment for ho hodgkins disease or a

family member with down syndrome, you need to test before you go. if you assess your risk, like we did last night, and make sure you're negative. >> brennan: so what you're seeing in south africa you do think is a lead indicator of what may be coming here? >> doctor: correct. what has happened each time is we've had a summer surge across the south and a winter surge that starts in our northern plains and moves down, accelerated by thanksgiving and the holidays, christmas, kwanzaa and hanukkah. and that is predictable. so now we have to figure out-- we have tools, better tools that we had a year ago. so we have the tools now to enable every american to not only survive, but thrive. but that means every american has to have access to these tools. and in our rural and red counties that people keep talking about, they have lack of adequate health care.

lack of primary physicians. lack of individuals to counsel them about vaccines. i went to elka, nevada, and they are three hours from a hospital that could take care of covid. so we have to be attentive to all americans, no matter where they live. >> brennan: you, in your book, talk about some of these institutional issues. you're talking about at the state level, but also at the c.d.c. and health and human services as well. in your book, you sea there is no plan "b" then, and still to this day, there is no plan "b." there is no early warning system in this country. why hasn't this administration been able to fix this? because you're not the only person that has said this. >> doctor: i'm thrilled to over the past few months people are given more attention to this. that's why i wrote the book, i felt there were issues on the ground that resulted in americans not surviving. every american needs to be

able to click on a test site to show them what is happening in their community with test positivity -- >> brennan: sorry, continue your thoughts. the hospitalizations -- the c.d.c. says to focus on that -- >> doctor: well, if you wait until hospitalizations, there is so much community spread that you cannot prevent it from getting into nursing homes. because we interact with each other. people think because they're boosted or vaccinated, they cannot be infected. and they are carrying that virus into hospital rooms, into nursing homes, and to dining room tables where their vulnerable family members sit. not every vulnerable family member has an affective immune response to the vaccine or the booster. so we need to know if they're protected or not. we have to be able to ut to utilize those antibodies. if your grandmother has no

antibodies, don't think their immune system is going to protect them. they're going to need something else. we have dupo and tools that we can use. >> brennan: doctor, thank you for your insights. we have to leave it there. and we'll be back.

>> brennan: next sunday, we'll be talking with former attorney general eric holder. thank you for f for "face the nation" i'm margaret brennan. captioning sponsored by cbs captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

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