captioning sponsored by newshour productions, ll >> woodruff: good evening, i'm judy woodruff. on the newshour tonight, the covid conflict-- amid a mounting death toll, a whistleblower lay s. missteps as the on re-opening schools and offers support to protests against lockdowns.en leadership in a crisis-- two former white house chiefs om staff oth parties offer lessons learned from their experiences during times of turmoil. plus, covid behind bthe pandemic exposes healthcare shortcomings of the prison system, now a breeding ground r contagion. all that and more ononight's pbs nehour. di

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of international peace and security. at carnegie.org. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions: and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for and by contributioyour pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> wdruff: the official, global death toll in the covid- 19 pandemic has rehed 300,000 tonight. that includes 85,000 in the united states. the new numbers were posted as a federal vacce expert laid blame at the white house door. white house correspondent yamiche alcindor begins, with this report.

>> the subcommittee on health will now come to order. >> reporter: today on capitol hill, a top scientist and whistleblower... >> ll, a top scientist andapitol whistle blower. >> some scientists raised early warning signals that were overlooked. pages of our pandemic playbo were ignored >> alcindor: dr. rick bright is a government expert on viruses who was working to combat covid- 19.ha he alleges tfederal officials withheld information re the early months of the coronavirus ou. >> we did not forewarn people, we did n not educate them on social distancing and wearing a mask as we should have in janud february. all of those forewarnings, ati of those edual opportunities for the american public could have an impact on further slowing this outbreake and saving mves. >> alcindor: bright says he raised concerns about an unproven coronavirus treatment, hydroxychloroquine, touted by president trump. he also claims, in retaliation, he was phed out of his job as

the director of the biomedical advanced research and development authority, or" barda." in april, bright filed a whistleblower complaint. it says his "efforts to prioritize science and safety over political expediency... rankled those in the administration who wished to continue to push this false narrative." st week, the federal office of special counsel determined bright's removal was retaliatory. it said he should be reinstated as barda's director during the investigation. but the bulk of bright's warnings today focused on what he frames, as the white house's sluggish response tohe pandemic. he described warnings from the c.e.o. of a major surgical mask >> i'll never forget the emails i received from mike bowen indicating that we are-- our mask supply, our n-95 mask supply was completely decimated. and he said that "we're in deep ( bleep )." the world is. a and we need . ldd i pushed that forward to the

highest levels i cn h.h.s. t no response. >> alcindor: committee democrats also accused the white house of puttinpolitics before science. >> dr. bright has filed one of the most spefic and troubling whistleblower complaints i've ever seen. he was the right person, with the right judgment at the right time he was not only ignored, he was fired for being right. we can't have a system where the government fires those who get it right and rewards those who get it completely wrong. >>lcindor: but republicans questioned whether bright himself acted properly. they challenged his motives for testifying.hi >>hearing is not about a whistleblower complaint. it's about undermining theon administrauring a national and global crisis. you chose not to elevateour concerns to the office of the inspector general but instead kept selective screenshots that didn't include full context.

>> alcindor: meanwhile at the white house, health ann services secretary alex azar echoed critiques of bright's record-- and defended president trump's. >> everything he's complaining about was achieved.dr bright was part of a team and was simply saying what erybody else at the whit house and at h.h.s. was saying. and on hydroxychloroquine, dr. bright literally signed the application for an f.d.a. authorization of it. >> alcindor: president trump dismissed bright as bitter. >>e looks like an angry disgruntled employee who frankly according to some people didt think heid a good job. >> alcindor: the back and forth over bright came amid the aongoing debate about whe how, to re-open the economy. new labor departnt figures showed almost three million more americans filed unemployment aims last week. that brings total claims since the pandemic began to more than pa million. the anxiety is pe across the country. today, protestmis in lansing, igan again demanded a re-

opening. neighboring wisconsin on wednesday, democratic governor tony evers' stay at home order extension was overruled by a conservative-mority supreme last night, bars quickly filled with patrons not wearing facial coverings against health official's guidance. one owner, chad arntsaid at his port washington bar, employees were desperate to return to work. >> after my employees haven't been paid in two months, i had to look out for them and their families and i had to look out for my business. >> alcindor: some cities in wisconsin, including milwaukee and madison, quickly imposed their own restrictions afterhe court ruling. >> president trump has encouraged an end to restrictions and today he traveled again, this time to allentown, pennsylvania. there, during a tiewfer a stribution center that makesec personal prve equipment, he ignored his own c.d.c. guidance and did not wear a protective mask. for the pbs newshour, i'm yache alcindor. >> woodruff: also today, the

centers fo prevention posted six pages of guidance for reopening schools, businesses, andther groups. the documents had initially been shelved by the white house. another 57 pages of more-extensive guidelines have yet to be released. tensions between hopes for a recovery and fears of new tbreaks made for another choppy day on wall street. but, in the end, the market made up some lost ground. the dow jones industrial average gained 377 points to close at 23,625. the nasdaq rose 80 points, and, the s&p 500 added 32 points. stepped aside as chair of the senate intelligence committee, over allegations of insider trading linked to the pandemic. the north carolina republican l soge amounts of stock just before the financial markets crashed in february. burr spoke briefly today, outside his senate office, after federal ents seized his phone on wednesday.

>> this is a distraction to thed haork of the committee and the members and i think the security of the country is tooto importanave a distraction. >> woodruff: burr says his stoc transactions wsed solely on publicly available information. the senate voted today to re- instate survllance provisions of the law used in terrorism investigations. parts of the foreign intelligce surveillance act, o fisa, expired in march. the senate added new civil liberties protections and sent it back to the house for a final vote.us democrats are moving ahead with plans to vote tomorrow on a new pandemic relief bill. it totals $3 trillion, for aid to state and local governments and more payments to americans. but this time, republicans and democrats are divided, as senate majority leader mitch mcconnell and house speaker nalosi made clear today.t >>ill reads like the speaker of the house pasted

together random ideas from her most liberal members and slapped the word "coronavirus" on top of it.us an unserroduct from an unserious house majority that out of the crisis.ealing itself >> we're putting our offer on the table. we're open to negotiation, and so when people say "partisan", it's like, it wasn't partisan when they did it. did you y that? and so now we're saying here's our offer,et's see where you are. >> woodruff: the senate is not expected to consider the bill until after memorial day. t philippines, a powerful typhoon struck the eastern partc of tountry as the covid-19 heavy rain and winds near 100 miles an hour forced tens of thousands of people to evacuate.

crowded shelters, despite the lack of social distancing, in order to escape heavy rain and the swearing in orael's newr. the swearing-in of israel's new government was delayed today, over infighting for cabinet positions. instead, prime minister benjamin netanyahu and his former rival benny gantz announce ceremony will take place on sunday. they agreed to a power-sharing deal to avoid a fourth election in the last year and a half. and, back in this country, a federal appeals court revived a lawsuit charging that president trump is still profiting from his washington, d.c. hotel, whe in office. the district of columbia and the state of maryland have argued he is violating the constitution. the justice department and mr. trump's personal attorney said they will appeal to the u.s. still to come on the newshour: two former white house chiefs of staff offer lessons learned frol times of turmo colleges across the country grapple with how to continues clasring a pandemic. the coronavirus exposes the s

healthcarertcomings of the u.s. prison system. and much more. woodruff: governing in a crisis like the current pandemic can define a presidency. we were interested to ask whether story offers any guide to the present? >> the president of the united states. >> woodruff: on monday, surrounded by aides in mas, on monday, surrounded by aides in masks, and as the u.s. death toll from covid-19 passed 80,000, president donald trump eaclared victory in the battle to ramp up widestesting. >> in every generatirough every challenge and hardship and danger, america has risen to the task. we have met the moment and we have prevailed.

>> woodruff: for many that echoed another moment, in 2003, when president george w. bush spoke two months after launching the war in iraq. >> major combat operations have ended. t battle of iraq, the united states and our allies have prevailed. >> woodruff: that conflict woulo rage onearly nine more years, ultimately claiming morec than 4400 am lives, randreds of thousands more lives', and fail to produce the alleged weapons of mass struction. president sh faced major crises early in each of his terms: the attacks of september 11, 2001 came just eight months into his presidency and killed nearly 3,000 amerins. hurricane katrina hit new orleans in the summer of 200 1 killing over0 americans and

displacing hundreds of thousands more. and then, in 2008, tsing bubble burst. the fallout quickly became president barack obama's problem, as financial markets ieized up. major u.s. induslike automakers teetered on the brink of collapse, and millions of americans lost their job >> a failure to act will only deepen this crisis as well as the pain felt by millions of americans. >> woodruff: 2010's deepwater horizon oil spill in the gulf of mexico was the largest in history. >> the united states condemns in the strongest terms this outrageous and shocking attack. >> woodruff: two years later came the attacks on a u.s. consulate in benghazi, libya.

and at home, when a gunmanll ki 20 children and six adults at sandy hook elementary school. and in 2014, intense protests ergted over the police kill of michael brown in ferguson, missouri. joining us now are two key figures previo presidents have relied upon during times of national emergency.dr card served as chief of staff to president george w. bush and helped lead the administration's response after 9/11. he is now chair of the national endowment for democracy, a non- profitwarganization in ington. and former chicago mayor rahm emanuel served as presrsent obama's chief of staff, at the height of the great welcome to both of you. it's so good to see you. let me ask you, first, is there really any way to prepare for a crisis like this one, a? pandem rahm emanuel, i mean, you didn't face anything quite like this, did you? >> wll, not like this, but we faced multi-- the difference is

this is a singular crisis. a we fac crisis of a great recession, two of the longest wars in american history, and auto industry and a nufacturing base that wa going to collapse, and a financial sector that had totally contracted.so it was a f dominoes that were crises across the board, rather than one public health crisis instigating aneccausing anonomic cracks of unseen proportions, far greater, obviously, than what we faced on the eve of 2009. >> woodruff: well, you're right. it was a lot. and andrew card, you dealt with a lot-- >> i used to be 6'2" and 250 pounds. >> woodruff: go ahead, ady. >> every president has to deal with something that they didn't want to have toe dal with. george w. bush had a number of challenges. obviously, 9/11 was theiggest one, in addition to the great recession that started under his watch. but this is kind of a unique uchallenge for theted states,

but it isn't as if somebody didn't tell us that it couhald en. george w. bush gave a speech at the in additio united nations ir of 2005 where we called for t world to be prepared for a pandemic. i don't know when it's going to come, but it's going to come. and then he followed up wth a major speech inovember-- it was actually november 1, 2005, where he challenged america toad get to deal with a pandemic. and he said, "we don't have one going on now, but we have to be prepared for doing it." he called r congress appropriate $7.1 billion to get ready for a pandemic. heid, "you don't know when 's going to hit, but it's likely to hit." and that was aonderful road map to deal with the challenges we have today. >> woodruff: and given that,a rahm emnuel, what has this president done right, and what has he done wrong? well, look, i do think that the order they put out about at are the metrics for kind of starting to open up society and the economy were theght metrics. i i don't think what you would

do the day you put thpuem out, t out a tweet saying, "liberate, michigan, liberate minnesota and rginia," and undermine the very premises there. i think one of the things the presidngt should be doone is this should be a time where you actually aspire toward malice towards none, charity towards all, rather than the inverse, which is male towards all and charity toward none. i don't think he's brought the country united. i actually think one of the great silver linings here is the ited states has discovered how much we actually all have our sense of community and nhbor. and a lot of times we talk about our divisions. i actually would say thegh highhere is the unity and the president should aspire towards that. the second thing is rather than than not jviding, i think the biggest loss and the bigges probs rather than-- what every pandemic, what every crisis shoiz-- deal with it fast and furious. we have been slow and sloppy.

foaz first ane weeks were crucial nine weeks. rather than denying what was going to be a serus problem, rather than deferring, ignoring, even with intelligence and w public healtrnings, that nine weeks was a costly nine weeknd >> woodruff: what about these points, when it comes to building community, and frankly, when it cos to spedhis administration could have done a lot better? >> well, the president did a good job of calling us all to attention. we came to attention. i think it was a little bit tardy. and i don't fau the prsident, because i actually think he was on it pretty quickly by stoppi people from coming in from china. but i think the rest of thest admition maybe wasn't really sounding the alarm the way they should have, because it icwas easy to aate that this was likely to happen. and i know some believe that but i think too maninpeopl the white house maybe weren't heeding the call to action that was coming from c.d.c. and n.i.h. >> woodruff: in a situation like, that rahm, how much of it is the responsibility of the man at the top, the president, and

how much of it can be laid on the shoulders of the people who are work are forhem? >> i slightly disagree with andy. the intligence agencies and h.h.s. were giving the warning to the white house. there's a reason harry s. truman is famous for, "the bucstops herement. nobody at the third floor of health and human services can call tontther entire govern with a sense of urgency like the oval office. andy and i know, when you're the chief of staff, and you pick up the phone and say, "the president wts," people get focused and real serious. if people say the under secretarof health and human services wants, "let me put you on hold. i'll get back to you on itreal difrence. atuesday." and i'm sorry, the first eight weeks when the president said it will disappear-- i'm not trying to make a prlz point-- when it comes to pandemic or crisis, andy and i both know what you do in he first nineeks or the first eight weeks, or the first six weeks, crucial, and the slow and sloppy start is costly for lives and the ability of america to move forward fast.

and that has been very costly to the united states. and the president owns that. >> woodruff: what abo that, andrew card? >> the president does own that. and i understand that. but i also feel that maybe the other people at the white hous house-- i'm not talking aboute gencies. i know the intelligence community was sounding an alarm. but i think too many people maybe at the white house were not saying that this was a serious thing. peter navnarro, evidently,ew it. i'm not sure how often he was saying it inside the white house. >> woodruff: i just want to finally come back to both of you on this point rahm touched on earlier, and that is the role of nsthe president iniring the country, bringing the country together. when you think back to whether f.d.r. in world war ii o reagan after the "challenger" disaster, rahm emanuel, what criteria should we un judging a president in that regard at a moment like this? >> well, it's parent of the-- it's part of the presidential responsibility to give the singular office a voice to the

country. and i do think we're unitedand ady to move forward, and he could marshal that resources. the president spe for all of us-- president bush-- on the ashes of 9/11 at the world trade center when he said, "they will hear our voices." president clinton in oklahoma, when we saw the first domestic terrorism, at the ceremony he said, "we will be by your side as many tomorrows as it takpres" ident obama in south "amazing grace" he touched a chord of ourm huanity. and i think what's missing here, given the sense of unity thaal exists, that the president could actually take it to another level, and i think e reason governors are doing so well is because they see somebody that's trying bring us together and move forward. and,emember, president kennedy once said, "to govern it sto oose between bad and worse." and the president in this case, inew, is squandering a unique opportunity to bring the company together with a o

singularit both spirit and mission. and i think that's what, i think, is essential for the tesident. and ink he's actually falling short, which is why the public is judging him this way. >> woodruff: andrew card, finally what, about president trump on this question of inspiration? >> well, he has not been inspirational. does have a tendency to listen more to rosy than the reality that-- you know, america is strong. the people areea rting. governors and individuals are making a big difference to help, you knowcubring thirve down so that it doesn't overwhelm our healthcare system and pay attention to what the scientists artelling us to do, to self-distance and be very careful. but president bush was right when he most recently said, "a pandemic doesn't ow republican or a democrat. it's there fo."r everybo this is not a war against anyone. this is a battle against a disease tht is all-consuming, and we've got to be all in itto ther. so don't divide, bring together.

we with get through this, but we have to do it together. and i wish theresident, the current president, would offer that invitation more so tt we could all say, "this is our battle. we're all in i."t togeth >> woodruff: rahm emanuel, been theret the white house inve moments of crisis. we thank you both. >> thank you, judy. >> woodruff: colleges and universities across the country are wrestling with how and when fall.open for class in the many are planning to bringul students and f back to campus for classes. but not all schools believe itor wisetudents to return and some may include a mix of online learning. the california state university system, the largest four-year public university in the country, announced it plans topr offearily online, remote classes this fall, with few

exceptions. timothy white is the chancellor and he joinse now. talking with us. so, for your, what, almost 500,000 students and 50,000 faculty and stat , wha this fall going to look like for them? >> well, juy, nice to jon you. and, of course, the health and welleing of our studentand our faculty and staff, and also the communies where our 23 campuses are located across the state of california-- it'sst al00 miles from the northeastern-most campus in humboldt to san diego state in the south. interest for our students, towards their deghich isogress so vitally important for them individually, and for the state of california. but also doing it in the covid-19 era that will, sadly, persist over the next academic year.and so this is precisely te moment for students to lean inti

redication, and we want to create as many options for as many students as is humanly ssible. that's why we decided to, in the fall, to be prepared to be as 100% virtuals you can be. flower some courses you could never do, some of the laboratory courses or hands-on experiments engineering, architecture, agricuure, things of that nature. but we want to be prepared for that, the worst-case snawr quo, so that hopefully things will te in some parts of the state, and we can actually do a little bit more in person. >> woodruff: so there will be some exceptions, as you say for labs, and you mentioned architecture. i'm curious to know what percentage of your classes before now were being taught utline? >> we were ab0% of our courses online before. and when we pivoted two months ago in march to be online to finish out this academic tem here in the spring of 2020, we

converted 72,000 courses from in-person to online in the course of about a week and a ha. quite a monumental undertaking by our faculty and by our students andstaff. >> woodruff: that's what i meanted to ask you. hohow much of your faculty has d experience with this biscause it change. >> it is a change. and that's reason we're announcing now so our faculty over the summer moks can prepare-- they're brilliant when it cometo theirontent area, whether in biochemistry or physics or whatever the case may be-- but some have experience with technology, virtual technology, assisted learning, and oths have not. they've been more of a ulty member over the years. we're actually putting in a summer institute across the system where the fact cult come in-- virtually coome in-- fan intensive immersive experience to learn how to use all this amazing new technology that's developing on a daily basis to

create thasame vibrant, engaged learning experience independent fall in the virtual space, rather than in the physical space. >> woodruff: so with most people then being from home, is your tuition going to go down? are costs going to go dowth >> no cost of delivery through virtual technology actually increases with the purchasing of hardware,, softwa firmwear, the training of faculty. antuition, of corse, only pays a portion of what it costss to educate a student. the the other part comes fromat the of california. we're clear on keeping our tuition and mandatory feesbe constantause our costs to summit delivering the education through a virtual means re>>mai. oodruff: but how do you make the case to your students, though, that online education is every bits valuable as an in-person education? >> welw,l, you k that's the adaptation to the moment of tis

covid era. we have to find a way to make sure that our students-- and i'll tell you, it will be different in the fall, but it elect very, very good. and not only the cufay teaching but also very robust virtual academic support and student support. so in the rtual space, it will be as robust as we humanly can. we will have on campus lents, for example, capstone for but instead of having 20ing. students in a lab there, will be something like five students in and they'll be physically distanced and in betwee on use the instrumentitation, there will be cleaning of the instrumentitation, and people will have on pesonal protective gear. so we believe very strongly it's time for r udents-- new ones and continuing-- to lean in and to get thalt al-important degree because that can never be taken away from them. and at any given moment in time,

if you have aleol draerk your unemployment rate is about half what the rest of the popundtion is, a income is did billion 1 million over your lifetime. it's not a time to stop even though there are someie inconves. it's a way to adapt and cope and >> woodruff: you'id that you are open, though, tocl reinstatinses if you get different news. what experts are you listening to for that ki of information? >> we're using scient, followinhe data. we're using intnational epidemiologists, and also local epidemiologists here in the state of california. we have infectious disea practitioners that are advising us. and, of course, our regional and local public health officials as well as state public health officials. and so since the health d well-being is at the top of the list, it's going to be that advice, thaat forecasting tt guides us through this. and, quite frankl o it's one the main reasons we have decided to do what we're doing. >> woodruff: chancellor timothy white, capitol hill

state university system, thank you very much. >> thank you, judy, e-bye c >> woodrufid-19 is sweeping through the country' jails and prisons. they have proven to be a breeding ground for contagion, with tight quarters that don't allow room for social distancing, shortages of cleaning supplies and lack of protective gear like masks. some prison systems and jails have been leasing inmates early to free up space-- idbut people we spoke to i say it is too little, too late. criminal justice reform with this special series, "searching for justice," on our website, in a moment, william brangham will talk with the former medical director of new york's prisons, but first, yamiche alcindor brings us some voices from prisoners and their families.

>> alcindor: there have been dozens cases of covid-ide the district of columbia jail. >> he tells me that people catch it like it's water. >> alcindor: the situation became so dire that, in april, a emergency overhaule jail's health measures. cykeithia staley's partner, william cox, is being held in the d.c. jail on a weapons possessi charge. >> people have corona. instead of them sending people home or sending them to a doctor, all they doing ise quarantine peo the cell for a long period of time. and that's not safe because the cells are dirty. people have died from it on the same unit, same floors that he's on.ik he feelsit's easy for him to get it. a indor: right now, more than two million americans are coronavirus outbreak deepens. many prison systems have ended in-person visits for loved ones. inmates say there's little they can do to avoid catching the virus. brian asey is serving a life

sentence for kidnapping and rape son.an quentin state p he now directs a media outlet >> it's not really built for six feet distance, because it's too packed. when they leus out to eat dinner, we still have to standin in ato get our food, there's no way we can keep the six feet.sy if you havtoms or anything, it's like they punish you because they put you in the hole to quarantine you away from everybody. so if a person is sick, they're gonna try and get away from them because nobody wants to go in the hole.ap if somethingns, there's nothing ey can do because it's too crowded in here. a syem sayey areaking use of vacant space to keep inmates six feet apart. >> you may start the call now. >> alcindor: onenmate, who preferred not to use his full name, described the conditions inside the missouri prison where he's serving time for murder >> we have masks, they just gave us something they call a mask.

the staff are not required to a wear masthis time. we keep trying to reason with them.th we neestaff to wear it, because they're the only ones who can bring it in here. we don't get cleaning chemicals for our cells. if you can afford ajax, the only thing you can clean your cell with is ajax. my main concern is the ventilation system, because they don't ve no air blowing out. if i cough in my cell, and if there's germs in it, it can go to the next cell or whatever, we're all hooked up together. it.one person gets it we all got >> alcindor: cammie maturin runs a nonprofit that works winh rcerated people in louisiana including her fiancee, sirvoris sutton, who is serving a life sentence for second-degree murder. >> he has been there for, this is his 29th year. i believe that he had called the coronavirus back in march because he had all the symptoms, he had the sinus, the cough, the congestion, he had fever, he had

couldn't smell, couldn't >> alcindor: she worries prisons authorities are resigned to covid deaths. >> when you hear that they've accepted 2500 bo bags and you get a will and testament from your loved one, that ithat you.'s knocks the wind out because i did receive a will via email, so did a couple of other people. >> alcindor: meanwhile, inmates and their family members can dot littleait, and hope the virus doesn't find them behind bars. for the pbs newshour, i'mor yamiche alci >> brangham: to help us better understand how and why this virus is hitting prisons so hard in particular, i'm joined by dr. homer venters. he is the former chief medical jail system and auf "lifeity and death in rikers island" dr. venters, thank you very much for being here. we heard a lot of concerns in

that taped piece by yamiche inalcindor about conditionide the prison. we heard there are a lot of outbreaks in there. thisviay seem very s to you, but can you just tell us a little bit more abjat why ils and prisons are such great vehicles for spregdz the virus? >> cthtainly. ank you for having me, and cusing on this imortant topic. jails and prisons and ice detention cters, they're really created, physically, in a manner that promoatsz the spread of communicable disease, and covid-19 we know is very easily spread fm one person to another. and so the close contact that people are in when they're detained, when they're in housing areas, other parts of these facilities, really promotes the spread betweenboth the people who are detained and staff. but two other very important asects are that th way they're run, these facilities, the way there's a high toerance for squalor, for fillingfith where e antithetical of whu seerol is

inside these places with trash and garbage and lack of attention to keeping the places clean. the operational sandards in these places really promote the spread of this disease. anc finally, beause we've kept all of our evidence-based h structures and organizations outside of these walls for .c.,des, places like the c.d statements of health, c.m.s., and the joint commission, things that help us have evidence-based practices in the community, those groups are generally awol when it comes to health practices and transparency be wnd bars. and find that implementing evidence-based practices in an emergency like this is ver hard when we haven't tried to do that before the emergency started. >> knowing who is sick and who is not inside thie prson walls is, obviously, enormously important. that comes back to testing. what can you tell us about the landscape of testing? is it being don is it being done enough in jails and prisons around the country?

>> no, it is certainly not being done enough. scores of peoporting theyll have are short of breath, or even people who have objective fever that are not being tested so there is not enough testing. bueyour point is a rally critical one which is these places already have broken systems fopeople whore sick to access any kind of health service, something that's called "sick call" in most of these down on a piece of paper-- "my stmed hurts,my head hurt" many places i investigates those complaints of medical problems go unanswered. that's the baseline. and you put in covid-19 where all of a sudden scores of people in these places have new healt problems. and therare broken systems at play. certainly the lack of testing, thourt, is an imt part of this. because when you see, for instance, cases among staff going up, up up, up, up, but you see no testing or no positive cases among detained

people, you have to wonder what's going on. it's probably not that nobody who is detned actually has the virus. >> we have certainly seen certain jails and prison facilities releasing prisoners to tryo free up more space space. we saw donald trump's former caem manager, paul manafort, released because he'an older person. how important is releasing prisoners to free up space? >> it'bs used in many areas but not enough. allows us to get some of the most vulnerable people ou of the setting, people at high risk of dying if they contract cocrd-19. it's atical tool, as you mentioned, because it helps us manage the outbreak inside for everybody who is there. we can oread peopt, keep people in appropriate housing areas and a safer distance from .each oth but it's also a critical tool because it helps us pre

local hospital systems from being overwhelmed. when the virus runs like wildfire through these facilities, just in thce of a day or two, it can overwhelm a pical hosl, and particularly for rural counties, where we have fewer and fewer hospitals because of hospital closures, but we have lots and lots of county jails, state and federal prisons, and i detention centers. when this virus tkes hold in crowded facilities it can completely overwhelm the sole one or two nties in wanterving space of a day or two. thank you very much for your time. >> thank you so much. >> woodruff: once again, the was in the million week. jobs te official unemployment rate is likely to spi20% by june, if that is not already the case unofficially.

and federal reserve chair jay powell warns we could be facing a prolonged recession that could damage growth for years to come. everyone wants to re-start the economy. the question is how. paul solman gets the views of a nobel-prize-winning economist as part of our series, "making sense." >> right now, this week, there is a choice about getting some more activity going versus um protecting lives. >> reporter: paul romer, who won a nobel prize in 2018 for his work on technology and economic growth. these days he's focused on how to avoid an economic depression. >> really, the only way to get back to a healthy economy is to stop the death and make people feel safe. >> reporter: and ending the lockdowns n't do that, he says. >> we're going to have a kind of a seesaw pattern, i think, of trying to open up, realize that we haven't done anyto protect againsthe spread of the virus and then pulling back. and what we're going to just

have tdo is find a sustainable way to contain this virus. be reporter: that way, he' arguing, is mass testing-- everyone in the u.s., every two weeks. >> if you don't know who's infectious, the onlyay to lock down and isolate the people who are infectious is lock down everybody. i think if we just test everybody and isolate the people who are fectious, we can easily suppress it and we can do it without, you know, causing a depression. >> reporter: but how can we do that, given the well-known shortages of test supplies-- personal protective equipment, laboratory capacity? says romer: how can we not? >> each additional test frees up about eight or nine people who can go back work. what's the value of the work the eight or nine people cano. man! the test is really cheap compared to what tdo people can and for people who say, well, we can't get a lot of them right now. i'm okay with that. right now and start to get some

people back to work. >> reporter: economics ista fundamy about costs versus benefits, so all this testing is added to the economy when the ni people that you were talking about go back to work. test down to $10, unit ofof a testing per day will cost us about 3600 per year. if that frees up nine people then that means a median income of say $50,000. ni times 50,000 would be $450,000 dollars. it's like a hundred fold increase on your on your investment. there aren't very many investments where you get a hundred x return, pretty much guaranteed. >> reporter: the latest relief bill did include $25 billi for testing. so is $25 billn enough? >> no. we need to commit about a hundred llion a year to expenditures on testing. that's enough to get us 23

million tests per day, or test everybody every 14 days in the united states. the 25 billion is enough to get going, it'll give us some, some demonstration projects. i think we should be testing and reopen, you know, for tv, major league baseball, i think we should be testing everybody in nursinhomes, i think we should be testing frequently everybody who's a health care provider. t >> reporter: y hths? >> no, no no. bygones are bygones. i think it's a horrible mistakeo orry about, you know, who do we blame, who are we going to punish. ha to be thinking about, oh, would have, coulve, should have. >> reporter: romer does, however, fault the food and drug >> the f.d.a. applion was 28 pages long. >> reporter: miles o'brien's recent frontline documentary described the challenges facedit by a univeof washington researcher in the early days of the pandemic, when he raced to get a new test approved. >>ne of the things is they needed a document fed ex-ed across the country bore they

could lo at the document. >> you couldn't electronically transmit it? >> i could electronically transmit it, but they couldn't i look at it untwas fed ex- ed. >> the f.d.a. told me it did review grenger's alication but it was incomplete. they also said they were lancing the need for tes with concerns about accuracy. >> i understand why they have to be very careful. but they're making people who are innovating, finding better ways to do the tests, jump through these extraordinary hoops. and it's takinmonths to just get simple things done. >> reporter: case in point, says romer: the siva test approved last week. >> you just spitn a tube, much better than those, those swabs, but it took almost a month for the f.d.a. to say, okay, well, somebody can spit in the tube without being physically presenn ront of a health care professional who watches them akile they do it. and i mean if it a month to make a decision like that, we're never going to get to the faster, cheaper, better tests that we need. >> reporter: what about people

stwho've gotten the blood that shows thathey have antibodies so they must have had the virus? are they then okay? is that a testpehat will allow le to just go back into the world? >> reporter: so you can't restart an economy with just the five percent who've got antibodies. you've got to let the virus run through the community and get ti 60, 70% with antibodies. but it's a horrific path to get there, because a million people are gointo die along the way. and it'll take a year for that kind of process to work through ole economy. >> reporter: what's your biggest >> the biggest risace islly? that the economic turmoil is going to lead to political we can rebuild. we can recover income. but if we damageur institutions of rule of law, democracy, basic freedoms, that can take a lot longer to rebuild. >> reporter: are we moving towards the kind of investment you think we have to make? >> i am actually very confident

that it's going to happenth because are no good alternatives. we're losing 500 billion a month. it's eventually going to dawn on people that we can't afford to keep doing that. and compared to that, 100 billion a year is really pretty cheap. >> reporter: in fact, romer is sure enough that testing will soon be everywhere, he offered to put his money where his heart is: $500 of it.>> 'm so confident that testing will be the way out of thisis crhat i'll bet you that in six months we'll be doing 20 million tests a day in the united states. >> reporter: so i'm bettingth against you no we're not going to h 20 mis,ion a day, ten six months. and i pay your charity if you win and you pay my charity. >> that's a deal. >> reporter: i'll take that bet. okay. have me back and we'll see how it goes. >> reporter: for the pbs newshour, the uler-skeptical olman, now with some skin in the game.

>> woodruff: that brings us to ask us, where we take questions on the pandemic to experts to help make sense of these tough times. we get your questions from our website, twitter, instagram and facebook. for the record, facebook is a funder of the newshour. juna nawaz has more. >> nawaz: thanks, and thanks to all of you for sending us your questions. now, parents and grandparents are dealing with even more responsibilities these days, taking on new roles as teachers and counselors. in addition to caregivers, a lot parenting in the pandemic tout answer them, we're joined by dr. sarah vinson, a child and adolescent psychiatrist. shts also the former presid of the georgia council on child and adolescent psychiatry, and she joins us now from atlanta. newshour. welcome to the thanks for being here.

j thank you for having me. >> nawaz: so letp right into the questions now. our very first one comes from anne stringer.gr she's dmother from may's landing, new jersey. she reacd out to on facebook. and this is ann's question. she says, "i feel anxious and closed off wh my adult girls back home. also, my son is overwhelmed with s three kids. any tips for our multi- generational family?" dr. vinson, what advice can you give? >> and so the advice that you have is going to be simir to the advice giving everyone right now is to focus on the things that you have control over and that you can change. so we can't change the fact that peoplere sort of cooped up, that your family have a lot of extra responsibilities right now. but we can still be intentional about making connections with people and talking and interacting in whatever ways we most sense for us. and so there may be things that you want to do to help like

frantically, doing face based on the facts, not just looking for ways to be active and involving your grandchildren's lives. another time with them positive way. >> nawaz: those are all great tips. good luck to ann out there. let's go to our next question now comes from julie gerien. she's in napa, california. she also reaed out on facebook and julie sent us this video. >> some parents are beginning to let their kids socialize. how can i keep my kids safe and still let them connect with friends in person? m making sure that my kids wash their hands and i'm monitoring their proximity to others. but other parents may not be. >> nawaz: dr. vincent, how do you do that?ou how doeep your own kids safe and can you to let them safely socialize with other kids? >> so like anything else, when it comes to parenting, there's sort of a risk benefit analysis that you do right and your child is learning to drive. you're afraid of letting it do that. but, you kno it's sort of part of what they need to do in order to progress. and so now we're ipost-covid world or covid world whe part of parenting is thinking about these things. and so this way we're going to have your kids go over for a

party at someone's house. may ask questions about, are the parents going to be ther what's the level of supervision? those sorts of things. we get more information so that you can make a decision as a parent about this is safe enough for me to feel comfortable with them going. so under these conditions, i think it's completely fine for me to ask questions about whether their friend has been sheltering in place. what precautions they have taken that people are going to be wearing masks when they're getting together. and those are all pieces ofin rmation you have a right to know. and using that information and then make a decision about whether it makes sense to move what with that in pers not.a or ini do think that that is to be really helpful for children from a rural health standpointe tole to talk and interact with their friends. and so there are ways that wehi can makesafer if everybody's wearing masks, if we're asking those questions and those sorts of things, the risk benefit analysis of parenting, we all know so well. question now.'s get to another

this is from l.h. philip. she works in education in arkansas. she submitted this question to us on facebook. she writes, "wwere thrust into is situation with little preparation. what will we do with stunts who are poorly prepared?" when schools reopen, dr. vinson, it's such a good question. what can you say to h. that? >> and what i say to l.h. is this transition backs going to be a challenge for teachers, for administrators, for parents, and especially for the children. and i do think there are ways that we' going to see preexisting gaps in education that get bigger as a result of people being home for so long. and so the next question iwe well, what do? and i think that there is time now for us to have conversations with school districts, with administrators, with state decision makers around the kinds of supports th we need to adequately support needs both from an academic standpoint and an emotional standpoint when they go back to school to give them a better chance at this being a successful transition. >> nawaz: so important to point

ort the problems existed b will still be there post pandemic. ouofinal question now comes us from holly joseph. she's in the bay area in california. she reached out to us on twitter and holly sent us this video. >> how do we keep kids engaged and distance learning versus just completing their assigned tasks? >> nawaz: dr. vincent holly is in my husband paul and head's. what how do we do this? this is so difficult for smany parents home schooliht now. >> yeah, and, you know, teaching nts are being asked to do something that is a skilled profession. and so my advice is look for ways that it alies. that makes sense for you and it makes sense for the child and that you can demstrate sort of in the home setting. so it could be something like playing monopoly you gather if you're talking about money and making change. so looking for things that use those principles at school, but in a practical way where youe able to engage with them. but looking for n ys that you corporate that into

activities that you do. >> nawaz: good luck to all the parents out there. dr. sarah vinson, thank you so much for being with us and taking these questions today. >> thank you. >> nawaz: and thanks to all of you for your questions, you can send us more anyti hours, twitter, facebook and instagram accounts or on our web site, that's pbs.org/newshour. >> woodruff: online,e have more tips for parents on talking to children about the virus and their feelings. that's on our website,ho pbs.org/ne. and that'she newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. join us online and again here tomorrow evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you,e stay fe, and see you soon. >> major funding for the pbs

newshour has been provided by: >> the ford foundation. working with visionaries on the frontlines of social change worldwide. >> and by the alfred p. sloan foundation. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and friends of the newshour. rp this program was made possible by the ation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you.

captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

. hello, everyone. welcome to "anpour & co." here's what's coming up. brazil records its highest daily death toll yet as the president bolsonaro continues to address the threat. we get the story from theealth minister he fired. then as the sessionooms large for the united states and many economies, c a more equal society emerge? the economistn o her way. >> desperate types cause for desperate measures. that's where we are now. >> mark cuban talks about getting the nba bac c onourse and small business book its feet.