>> narrator: america is reopening. >> protestover the death of george floyd while in police... >> narrator: people taking to the streets. >> ...the ongoing protests could cause apike in coronavi >> narrator: amid fears of av a second we- correspondent martin smith lookat how we got here. >> anybody that needs a test gets a test... s >> did y to him, "look, mr. president with all due respect, it's not true whatre yoaying"? >> yeah. i'm not going to comment on the conversations i've had with the president. >>arrator: the missteps an the denials... >> this is a new hoax... >> narrator: we have leaders throughout much of january bruary saying that this is a hoax. >> every lab is is fighting for it.every state >> narrator: now on frontline, "the virus".

>> thereill be thousds who will die needlessly, because of our lack of preparedness. >> frontline is made possible by contributions to your pbsn statom viewers like you. thank you. and by the corporation for public broadcasting. major support is provided by the john d. and cathine t. macarthur foundation, committed to building a more just, verdant and aceful world. more information at macfound.org. the ford foundation: working with visionaries on the frontlines of social change worldwide. at fordfoundation.org. additional support is provided by the abrams foundation, committed to excellence in journalism. the park foundation, dicated to heightening public awareness of critical issues. e john and helen glessne family trust. supporting trustworthy journalism that informs and inspires. and by the frontline journalism fund, with major support from jon and jo ann hagler. and additional support from

chris and lisa kaneb. (crowd cheering) (fireworks explong) >> martin smith: december 31. ("auld lang syne" playing) one million people crowded into new york's times square to celebrate what they hoped would be a bright new year. ("auld lang syne" continues) what no one knew at the timeig was that a hy infectious virudwas rapidly moving towar them. >> ♪ new york ♪ new york ("theme from 'new york, new york'" ends)

(crowd cheering) ♪ >> scientists say a new virus related to sars may be aksponsible for a mysterious pneumonia outbren china. >> smith: i had begun reporting on the coronavirus several months ago. >> the new coronavirus was found in 15 of 59 patients. ur>> smith: i had just retned from the middle east, where iwa covering events in iraq and out ofaution, i decided to quarantine in the catskillin new york city.rs north of i would do my reporting >> as it stands right now, the cdc believes that the risk to the american population is low. but we just don't know how contagious this virus is. >> smith: i want to understand where we were headed. were we prepared? were warnings beg heeded? (skype tone playing)

among my first calls was to dr. david ho... dr. ho. a renowned amerin medical researcher who i met years back when i was reporting on the e aidemic. you don't look too worse for wear. >> (chuckles): i'm just putting up a gd front here. (chuckles) >> smith: dr. ho had worked totem the spread of sars in 2003. now he was worried about the spread of covid-19. do you think people are grasping how, how serious this situation is? news. i think people hear the they watch t coverage. but it's hard to fully comprehe. certaiy, we did not realize that our government would be so ill-prared. we knew long agohat china was experiencing. i think it, the, there was a false assumption that that's somebody else's problem.pe it would not hto us. but that, that's the same kindud

of attthat people had about many other epidemics in the past we, we knew, if this thing blew up, it would just continue to spread. >> smith: wuhan, a major commercial hub in central china. the first case was identified here on november 17. iren blaring) no o knew what it was. but just a few weeks later, it was clear something was wrong. amy qin reported from china for the "new york times." >> in december, there were starting to be these patients that were trickling into these ishospitals in wuhan with pneumonia that doctors were really puzzled by. it was unclear how to trt them. they were giving them dicine and they weren't getting better, and they were stl running these very high temperatures. and the rumor was that this is a rus that people need to be aware of. >>

mith: throughout december, more and more people continued to come into wuhan hospitalswi high fevers and coughs. 34-year-old ophthaologist atsp wuhan central al, dr. li wenliang, logged on a group chat with some fellow medical school classmates. he was worried. have you seen the record of what was said, what he was saying? >> yes. t it really wasnt outrageous statement he made or anything, s juply said that, "i heard in our hospital there are cases of sars-like symptoms." >> smith: liu baifang schelld, and her husbrville, are longtime china experts. and that was enougto bring the authorities down ohim. >> yes. >> the public security bureau came and made him sign a confession, and made him agree

to, to be quiet. and that's a very threatening thing, because the public security bureau is no joke. it's a secret police force,d ople are fearful of it. >> in china, there's an entire system oonline surveilnce, in which they can monitor what's happening, and i think, in this case, they would've ble to use certain key words to track what people were saying. al and actu, local authorities, the police, have broad powers lto look into the personaf messagess citizens. >> smithlocal wuhan authorities issued a formal directive ordering other doctors not discuss the mysterious pneumonia. s (reporteaking chinese):

>> smi: despite the silencing of dissent, chinese scientists we working to map the genome of the virus. >> covid-19 was very quickly sequenced, and very quickly, people discerned that it was about 80% related to the sars coronavirus. but given the speed ofhe subsequent spread, it should have been apparent to all that there mustave beenra human-to-humanmission. >> smith: it surprises me to see that as of janry 12, the world health organization issued a statement saying"there is no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission." >> they rtainly said that, but, you know, they weren't on the ground. they were probably recounting what was reported back to th by the china cdc. >> smith: shouldn't they have known? >> well, they should have been asking tough questions. this was obviously an epidemic that was being spread by humans.

>> smith: but with lunar new year around the corner, no one wanted to spoil the festivities. >> (speaking chinese): (man speaking chinese): >> (speaking chinese): (people talking in background) >> chinese new year every year is a really festive time. this is the time when everyone gets together with their famili and in their neighborhoods, and in one neighborhood in wuhan, called baibuting, they had organized this large banquet, at which f 40,0ilies ended up attending. >> if you have a big t celebration, you don't w have bad news. and the same holds for the chinesnew year. if you bring up bad news during that time period, it is said that you'll be cursed with bad happenings for the rest oft.

>> smith: making matters worse, millions of people left wuhan in this period to visitt friends and family across the country and beyond. (speaking chinese): >> (speaking chinese): >> smith: it was not until january 20 that the chinese health ministry declareddy what was alrea obvious. the virus was spreading from human to human >> some ominous developments out of china. officis there have just confirmed the first human-to-human transmission of coronavirus. it's a huge story... >> the w.h.o. d not announce the prospect of human-to-human transmission almost two months after this thing began. and it was two weeks after taiwan had warned them that

there was human-to-human transmission. >> wuhan, china, ground zero for e outbreak, now under lockdown. >> smith: by january 23, han was placed on lockdown. >> all trains and planes out of that city halted just tonight. >> eerie for a cy 11 million people call home. >> smith: it w then that people around the world began to take notice. >> i perfectly remember the moment in which we start fearing e is issue, and it was when we have seen all thterpillar building a new hospital in just less than ten days. >> smith: dr. stefano fagiuoli heads the department of medicine at a hospital in bergamo, italy. >> it's in a place far away from us. so it was all tv show. but then, i remember i was having a meeti with some colleagues, and i said, "look, but if they are building a whole hospital, there must be something beyond our

perception." and i said, "i think we need toe repared." >> two new coronavirus cases have been confirmed here in singapore. >> (speaking italian): >> sth: in fact, by early february, cases began showing up in other countries, including the u.s. >> ...about the deadlyru coronaofficially hitting the u.s.... >> a ninth person has tested positive for coronav. >> this is now the third case in ontario, fourth case in canada... (voices overlapping) >> smith: meanwhile, dr. li wenliang, the wuhan doctor who had warned of the deadly virus at the end of december, had beed hospital little over a week after he was ordered to stayuiet. (device beeping) by late january, he was on a ntilator, struggling to breathe. by february 7, he was dead.is

eath was really a shock. and at that time, that was thelo st point in china's battle with the epidemic. ananhis death really put a h face on the cost of it. ew >> smith: when nof dr. li's death surfaced, chinese social media exploded in outrage. >> he, he told people truth at the end of december. g >> smith: the attention of dr. zhong nanshan, an 83-year-old highly respected pulmonologist, a top adviser to the government. >> and then he passed away.th >> she now dared to defy the party. people think he is, he is thee hero of cha. >> smiththat seemed odusual to me, to hear som that is an authority like that criticize the government. >> well, dr. zhong nanshan,

i mean, the reason why he has se muchbility with the public is because he's willing to push back against the government and iticize the government when it's necessary. i think he was speaking, jt saying what most people in china feel.>> his is chinese doctor. i suppose majority of chinese doctor actually like him. (blowing whistles) >> everyone would go out onto their balconies and turn the lights off and hold their cell ones up. (whistles blowing) it was really incredible to see.

>> smith: a month earlier, the trumps greeted the new year in florida. ♪ they hosted a big party at their mar-a-lago mansion. >> tonight, a new year, anan impeachment trial looming. >> family members, honored guests, and hundreds of mbers of president trump's private club. >> our country has never don better than it's doing rit now. we have the best unemployment numbers, we have the best employnt numbers. almost 160 million people are working. our country is really the talk. of the wor everybody's talking abouit. thank you very much. ("hailo the chief" playing) >> smith: but thateekend, the director of the centers for disease control, dr. robert redfield, received a pall from the american cdc office in cha. >> i was actually on a vacation

with my children, eir spouses, and my 11 grandchildren up in deep creek, maryland, and i did get notified from our cdc china office on new year's eve that there was a cluster of cases of a unspecified pneumonia in wuhan, china, that seemed to be link to a seafood market. >> smith: the call wasne of several that interrupted his vacation. >> and if you talk to my wife, she said i spent most of the time on the phone talking to... his chinesenanuaryle counterpart, dr. george gao. >> it got to the point that redfield's counterpart even breaks down crying during one of the conversations that he has with him. >> smith: michael shear is aco white housespondent for the "new york times." >> uh, which underscores for, for redfield the seriousness of what the chinese believe at thatoint that they're dealin with. the mory of those previous

viral infections-- sars and another one called mers-- they really ravaged that part of the world. so i think what you can, what you can probably draw from it ison, is a bit of the anet the partf the doctor sitting there in china, thinking to himself, "geez, what if this is asad as sars? what if it's worse?" >> smith: sheastands by his reporting, but redfield told me that gao was not very alarmed. >> he felt pretty confident that there was no evidence of humato-human transmission, d that really was the extent of it.th >> sso he wasn't very concerned. if there was no human-to-human transmissiononfirmed, then he wasn't very concerned at that point? >> back in janry third time frame-- third through sixth time frame-- um, there was not a sense of urgency from him. >> smith: but redfield wasnd concerned,alled his boss, alex azar, secretary of health

and human serves. he also notified the national security council at the whiteus the president had already begun receiving daily briefings from the u.s. intelligence community. asome contained warnings serious contagion with dire economic andocial consequences. >> they call it the pdb, the president's daily briefi. and the virus begins to pop up in those, just a sort of, hey, you know, this could be something, and we should keep an eye on it. >> smith: you say it's in his brief, we know that he doesn't always read his brief. >> right. >> smith: so what do we know about... when did the president know? >> that's a good question about whether or not he might havetu ly read it. he's never been clear any of the , times that he's been askd i think our reporting suggests that, um, as y say, it's, it's dst clear at all that he r the briefing. now says he was distracted. >> i mean, i got impeached. i think, you know, i certainly

devoted a little time to thinking about it, right? >> smith: and busy securing a big tre deal with china. >> a rare moment of collabation after more than two years of acrimonious talks. >> smi: during this period, azar was trying to alert the president, but couldn't get a meeting. instead, over two weeks passed before he got a call back from mar-a-lago on a saturday. and the president wanted to discuss something else >> the president was not reached january 18.y azar until and the president's first concern at that time was to talk about e-cigarettes. >> smi: ephen morrison is a health policy expert who has long ward that america was unprepared for a pandemic like this one. >> and secretary azar was having a hard time conveying the gravity of the situation to the president. >> smith: this is 18 days after the inese government has recognized that they are seeing deaths from this, and itakes 18 days for ar to get to the

president. >> correct. >> smith: was that the inesident's first true bri on this? >> as far as i know, it was the first serious high-levelon discus >> smith: but it is unclear how much azar pressed the president. he declined to be interviewed. according to michael shear, azar actually reassured the president that he didn't need to worry. >> what azar wanted to communicate to the president s, "we got this. we're not, we're not taking this lightly. cdc is on it, fda is on it. we're monitoring it closely." but also not, li, "we all have to panic and shut the country down." i mean, at this poins really, everybody is in the mode of, you know, this... "we gottkeep an eye on this." >> are there worries about a pandemic at this point? >> no, nott all. and we have it under control. it's, uh, gonna be just fine. >> smith: as late as january 26, dr. anthony fauci, the nation's top infectious disease official, downplayed the dangers.

not be worried or frightened by this. it's a very, very low risk tote the united sbecause we have ways of preparing, of screening of people coming in. but it's something that we, as public health officials, need to take very seriously. >> smith: a prominent biostatistician, nicholas jewell, had been tracking the virus for over a month.ti >> there was a remarkable lack of urgency in the western world. that this was actually almost shores, and that it was going to be potentially catastrophic unless we took major steps. mind that we lost the time that we had gained from the early warning coming out of china. >> smith: on january 29,ec white housomic adviser peter navarro sent the president a lengthy memo warninghere was a risk of massive loss of life. he urged flights from china to

be halted. the next day, secretary azar had a second call with the president. this time, he was more concerned. he warned the president that that thecoronavirus might become a serious pandemic. >> the vus has been spread rapidly over the last month. >> smith: the president responded by restricting some flights from china, but not all.ll and mins of people had already left wuhan, anyway. and many of those people weyi out to the rest of the world. >> yes, in fact, there are direct flights from wuhan to many cities in the u.s. throughout the monjanuary, until the lockdown. >> smith: so those are extremely important weeks. >> yes. >> smith: in fact, in the month before president trump's decision to restrict flights, an

the u.s. from chins,ople entered even afterwaf you were an american, you were exempted.s and fligom europe were not restricted for another six weeks. carriers were not ed.atic >> one of the things that they didn't know at the time was, even if even if a person isn't symptomatic, doesn't have a t fever, mayt person is still spreading the virus all over the place because they havn itthey're just not showing symptoms yet. >> smith: the virus could spread undetecte restricting flights proved to be a half measure. >> those of us who study viruses itknew that we're gonna ben waves here in the u.s. we had lost six weeks sitting onhe sideline watching chi struggle, and watching other countries struggle, thinking that if we shut our borders, uhi

we'll, we'll b. >> smith: jeremy konyndyk, ast specian global health issues, remembers meeting with some trump administration t officials arous time. in, um, february, you sat down th some administration officials, correct? >> so, it was an off-the-record dinner, so i can't say too much specifically about it, but it was very clear that most of the bandwidth that the administration was focused on-- forcing the, the travel e strictions on china, tracking people who had cckrom there, quarantining people-- that was the, the ball that they had their eye on at that time. >> smith: what's wrong with that? >> well, what... i was, i was quite gobsmacked by t at, because, to my mind, the biggest priorityat point was not preventing it from coming here, because it was inevitable that it would come here. you know, it's fine to try and keep it out, but you have to do so with the expectation that at best, you're buying time. >> smith: the problem was that

the administration was failing to understand the basic math behind a pandemic. >> if i tell you there's 30s case the united states, that's not going to scare you. that's not going to cause you to shut down your cities. if i tell you there're 60 cases in the united states, you stilla feel very comfe. 120, 240, and so on. you don't feel the power of ponential growth until it's ohsolutely stunning. so when you say,if there are 10,000 cases in e united states, then we ought to pay attention," the trouble is, in two or threeays now, it's 20,000. within another two or three days, it's 16 times. so it takes a long time to ramp up exponential growth, but once it gets your attentionit's stunning in its speed. >> smith: in new york city, an infectious disease specialist th new york-presbyterian hospital started to see cases

he suspected of being covid-19 by mid-february. he we started to hear that were a lot of viral illnesses that we were not able to identify. i started hearing conversations, suggestions from a lot of the community ctors in our area, that maybe we were seeing early spread here. >> sth: during this time, thees ent is saying everything's under control. people tt want to get a test, can get a teat this is going to disappear when the weher warms up. how did you take that in at the time? >> you kno it was tough, because, you know, asns clinicwhen you get the sense something is going on, you're waiting for the ality to conrm that. but most of the response was,"y know what? until we see a lge number cases, we don't want to overrespond. we don't want to be, you know, the boy who cried wolf." >> smith: inact, there were people who thought you were a little bit out there. they said, "what's wrong withif dr. n?"

>> well, that was, uh, that was actually when i reached out to ie of the, um, other infectious disease physiciathe area, and i said, "hey, we really should start communicating and preparing." um, and yeah, his response to one of my partners was, "what' wrong with dr. griffin?" "why, why is he, like, getting so worked upbout this? >> smith: dr. griffin was not alon many doctors and scientists were increasingly concerned that america was not prepared. among the rst countries outside china to face the coronavirus wasouth korea. their responses now a case study in how to hand an outbreak. back in 2015, the middle east respiratory syndrome, or mers,

had scared them. eispoke to south korea's f minister, kang kyung-wha. >> the lessons from the mers experience, uh, was, w instrumental. i think that failure had the seeds for the success this time. >> smith: officials called an emergency meeting. covid-19 in the wholecases of country, health care officials summoned 20 private companies on january 27 to a conference room inside seoul's central train station. l the train station in se is not just a train station. it's a multifunction complex. and so, if you want to bring in experts from all across the country and have a quick meeting, this would be the ideal place. >> smith: dr. hyuk-min yi was at the meeting and headed the

initiative. e. smith: the meeting, the meeting was tens >> yeah-- yeah, yeah. >> smith: it was tse because no one knew how v contagious theus was and how much time they had. >> smith: baseon their experience with mers, the number of infected people could be doubling every few days. a matter of weeks, sout korea could be looking at over

100,000 cases. moving fast, just days after the train station meeting, four companies had developed covidst just over a week later, one was approved for use. by february 7, 46 labs across the country began to test people. a process that oinarily could take aear had been completed in just over a week. there were only four cases when they had their meeting and, and call to action. >> that's right. and, you know, they recognized how dangerous this was, and even if all you have are four cases, that is a dangerous moment. >> mith: they tested around 10,000 people dail t y then swung into action very decisively, and set up this enormous testing regime along with very robust tools for monitoring cases and tracing

contacts and isolating and quarantining people based on that. they began acting before it seemed like they needed to do so. >> smith: former head of u.s.a.i.d. dr. rajivwas astounded by what south korea was able tdo. >> they have just deployed an army of community health personnel who are spraying purell on, on people going in and out of the subway, who are wiping down public spaand contact points, who are making drive-through testingai ble very broadly by doing swab collections and and mailing it in to a plic health laboratory construct, where, uh, and reference labsan that c validate the data quickly. >> smith: they thought everything was under control. >> south korea appears to be flattening the curve. >> south korea has done better thanost of the other countries around the world. >> smith: they had found only 30 cases. >> the lowest number of new cases... >> a leader in the global fight

against the new coronarus. >> something they're doing is working. >> smith: then, february 18, they identified a 61-year-old woman in daegu, south korea. at the time, they had discered no other cases in daegu, but when they traced her contacts, it led thehere. the shincheonji church, a christian sect that claims over 200,000 members who believe that their leader, this man,s the messiah. (audience cheering) officials knew they had a big problem. >> it became obvious that this was a cluster that was at risk, and then we decided to trace the group as a whole, and this is about,000, 10,000 people. >> smith: so, you tested 9,000 members of the chuh? >> not all of them, but we coacted them to the extent

that they were traceable, asked among them were much higher than any other gr >> smith: health officials found that thousands of church members were positive, and they were quarantined.ze ns would die. today, south korea, along with japan, taiwan and vietnam, has managed to control the spread the virus better than most countries. in seoul, a crowded city of ten million people, there have beenu justknown deaths. in the country of south korea, how many deaths, approximately? >> it would be 260... 264. >> smith: the number has now crept up taround 300.

by mid-january, the cdc was busy, developing it's ownes diagnostic >> good morning, everyone. >> smith: on january 28, secretary azar announced they were ready to go. >> this is really a hioric accomplishment. within oneeek, within onewe , the cdc had invented a rapid diagnostic test. within weeks... >> right out of the gate, i was feeling really good about the process. >> smith: scott becker is the c.e.o. of the asciation of publicealth labs. >> we were gonna be able to cover the country to a good extent for the surveillance and early detection that waseally >> smith: but that optimism evaporated by the end of t first week in february. >> it was sunday morning, february 8. i woke up a little bit i read my texts and my emails,

and i start seeing theseages. (email alerts ringing) "we'reaving a problem." "is anyone else seeing this?" i call that an "osm," it was my "oh, (eep)" moment. and i remember thinking, "oh, my god, wait till governors and others find out about th. we're all counting on getting testing up and running, and what a nightmare this is gonna be." (telephone ringing) so, it was pretty vastating to everyone-- the cdc staff to public health labs to epidemiologists, the publicni health com. you know, we were left without the biggest tool in our toolbox. >> government officials discovered contamination in a cdc lab in atlanta... >> smith: by then, a diagnostic test developed by s germentists was available from the w.h.o.ff

but u.s.ials would insist it was better to find an american solution. >> any of these groups can submit their testing kits through our regulary ocesses, but without that and to accept tests that have noting >> good answer, that's a good answer. >> smith: is that excusable, that they failed to have a test ready to go?ha >>s inexcusable, in my book. i mean, how can you distribute something that is so critical to monitor the epidemic, and then have it be faulty? we cannot distribute drugs like that. we cannot distribute other fda-approved tests in that fashion. so that's certainly inexcusable, and it, it set us backfor a good month, i would say. >> smith: is it unusual to he a glitch in the initial tests? >> i have not seen another mistake like this at cdc. the tests have rolled out very effectively, uh, without a glitch in the past.

>> smith: tom frieden was head of the cdc during the obama administration.is here any bigger misstep or stumble here than the failure to test? >> i think, when we look back at what went right and what went wrong, we're going to focus onry febr what should have gotten done in february that didn't happe >> so my first question to you is, uh, does the cdc's tt for coronavirus work? >> yeah, uh, the problem was , when the test was sent to the states, one of the components had a contaminant in it. >> smith: i asked dr. redfield why south korea succwhere the u.s. failed. >> koreaad already developed private-public partnerships through the mers thing, and really had invested enormously appropriately, and that's what our nation had not done over the last 30 years. so, you won't get an argument from me that the public health workforce has been reall

underinvested in for decades. >> the cdc now says it's now going to send improved tests to the labs facing problems. >> smith: weeks were lost ile the cdc remanufactured the tests. if the failure at the cdc andak the outbin china and south korea did not instill more urgency, the februaroutbreak in iran should have. this is qom, a place of pilgrimage for shiite muslims a frll over the world, including china. it was here that the world's next major outbreak of the virus erupte from the beginning, iran's leaders, like america's, played down the dangers. a mixture of religion and national pride hadelayed iran's response. iran would soon be reporting the

world's highest mortality rate. >> we never thought iran would be one of the first ies hit, uh, by the pandemic. but for whatever reason, because of our contacts s,or because of other rease were one of the first countries hit. >>mith: i was able to reac iran's foreign minister, javad zarif, in tehran. it was 6:00 in the morning my time.why do you think you were h ha? what, what are the theories now? >> well, nobody knows.me , uh, it was at a time when, uh, more than anything, the popution was unprepared. >>mith: in fact, it was natural that iran would be hit with a virus from china. it is not only that chinese pilgrims come here. iran faces tough u.s. economic sanctions, and as a result, china has become iran's lifeline to the outside world. >> (laughing)

(cameras clicking) >> smith: kami alaei is an iranian health care expert living in exile in the u.s. >> smith: the flights were on iran largest carrier, mahan air. but zarif told me that iraned cancts flights from china at the same time as america did. k >> i te were one of the first, uh, to limit flights and to seen passengers. >> smith: the americans cut flights to, from china at the end of january. >> my information is that our

decision was made basically in the same time zone as the others. >> smith: yet one analysis of flight records showsmahan air flew over 55 round-trip flights to and from china between february 5 and february 23. theylew on to iraq, syria, turkey, lebanon, and other countries. all the while, iran's supreme lead, ayatollah khamenei, would continue to downplay the virus. at one point, he said it was possibly a biological attack. >> (speaking farsi): : >> smi you agree with the supreme leader that the coronavirus was perhaps a nibiological attack by thed >> well, there are a lot of

speculations on all sides about this, i said it's t unreasonable to believe that. (siren waili) (people talking in background) >> smith: talk of a biological d attack was atraction. (machinery beeping) tehran's hospitals were overwhelmed. on social media, people were seen collapsing in the streets. >> (man speaking farsi): >> (speaking farsi) >> smith: the vernment also delayed the closing of parliament. at least 23 senior government figures caught the coronavirus. senior officials died.ozen

iraj harirchi, the deputy healtr miniappeared at this press conferen conference clearly ill, whilede ing he had the coronavirus. >> he said, "no, this is just,co you knowon cold. it's not a serious thing." >> smith: the next day, hodver, he tested positive was hospitalized. many of iran's faithful continued to deny the seriousness of the situation. >> (eaking farsi): >> smith: it wasn't until march 16 that the government closed m's shrines.

(crowd shouting, clamoring) >> (speaki farsi): (men shouting) >> it took some time for us to close the shrines. we have a very trational society, with people who still doot agree with us. en>> smith: by then, gover officials had began enforcing social distancing and stay-at- o hoers. but it was too lat today, irahas reported over 180,000 cases and 9,000 deaths. ♪ (horn honks) (people talking in background) >> smith: coronavirus should have been no surprise. the world has seen an increasing number of viral outbreaks in

recent years. >> ...official tells us that there may ready be hundreds more fatalities than have been reported. >> smith: in 2014, the ddly ebola epidemic was a big wake-up call. >> this is an epidemic of dysfunctional health systems. >> smith: jeremyonyndyk led the u.s. government's effort to fight it. >> it was a monumental effort to bring that outbreak underl. cont i think all of us who were involved in that effort lookedt backat and said, "wow, a truly airborne or droplet-style respiratory pandemic is going to be so much worse and so much more difficult." and so there was a real urgency in the final yrs of the obama administration to begin laying more groundwork for that kind of a scenario. >> smith: to addss potential threats like this, the obama white house ornized a pandemic response team inside the national security council, the nsc.t >> we havein place an infrastructure so that if and when a new strain of flu like

the spanish flu crops up, five years from now or a decade from 01w, we've made the vestment. >> smith: but in after trump tapped john bolton to head the nsc, the pandemirespse team was reorganized. its members were reassigned. its leader, admiral timothy ziemer, left. bolton has maintained that he was simply streamlining bloated c operations, and that it did not hurt america's pandemic response. but last year, stephen morrison headed a bipartisan effort to address america's pandemicon re capacity. his report, released in november 2019, recommended the pandemic response team be moved back to the white house. >> we live in an era in which we're seeing increasing rapidity and increasing velocity and increasi impacts of these new

pathogens coming at us. this is the condition of our microbial universe today. >> a sars-like virus has now spread into japan. >> more than 10,000 people died from h1n1. the idea that you would disband your capacity willfully at the white house, aware ofhe developments of the last twos, decahich were convincingly that we needed to be prepared, and far better prepared, on a consistent and sustand coherent basis. >> smith: what's then explanatat would be ven? >> well, i can't speak for john bolton. i presume that they wanted toib see that respoity moved over, out of t white house, toar the secretof hhs and to those who worked underneath him. >> smith: so what's wrong with that decision to move this capacity over to the hhs? >> the mistake there is to assume that the secretary of hhs is able to see the full picture

and be able to command the different elements of our government to respond in a coordinated and coherent and integrated way. um, that can only happen, uh, through an empowered entity at the white house. so, by definition, we set ourselves up for a slow and sluggish response.a ow, sluggish, and halting response. ♪ >> smith: e virus was about to slam into europe. >> (chanting, singing) >> smith: on february 19, a championship soccer match was t to kick off in italy's largesstadium... (crowd singing, cheering)

>> (yelling) >> smith: the atalanta team from bergamo, in mbar, won the game. a >>lanta had made it four-nil. (crowd cheering) mithafterwards, bergam became the epicenter of italy's outbreak. (crowd cheering, clamoring) >> smith: dr. stefano fagiuoli bergamo remembers. >> i had ten colleagues from our hospital which went to see all got infected.they >> smith: oh, my god. when i spoke to dr. fagiuoli, he was quarantined at home after catching the virus himself. >> it's interesting that the two main outbreak in spain are close to madrid and valencia, which was the other, the opponent team. slow to react.ina and iran, was dr. rco vergano is an anesthesiologist in turin. >> we, we we conducting

really, the usual, a normal life, a social life inhe last week of february. and it is really difficult to implement the social distancingw measurn you don't have your hospitals already overwhelmed by patients.ai (siren wng) >> smith: but they were losing valuable time. flights were cut from china,t, s in the u.s., italy hesitated to do more.s the job ft up to town mayors. >> (speaking italian): >> (speaking italian): >> (speaking italian): social media.e viral on people, i think, uh, realized quite soon that, uh, this was a way to protect them and protect others. (man speaking italian):

>> probably this happened maybe a couple of weeks later than, uh, than was necessa. because what, what we know is that if you implement some real stringent social distancing measures at the beginning of the surge, and since this is an exponential surge, just maybe 24 or 48 hours earlier is enougto avoid more than 30 or 40% of the numbeof infected people three weeks later. (piano playing) >> smith: the closing of flights from china had done little to stem the spread. in january, the government ofal ity was celebrating a new initiative to crease chinese tourism. two chinese tourists from wuhan arrived in milan on january 23.y ested positive a week

later. the virus was already here. >> italy's surge in cases now mas the biggest coronaviru outbreak outside of asia. >> with the death toll leaping by more than 50% in one day...>t country in europe, with more than 7,300 reported infections. >> smith: was there a moment in time when this really seized your attention? >> in, in my case, personally, it was that skype call from the task force in lombardia. from this friend of mine. he told me, "i have seen scenes in hospitals that i will neverfo et in my whole life."he he describedospitals with, uh, people in hallways and pele dying outside of hospitals, because even therug were not enoh ambulances, outside of the hospitals.ueue

>> smith: hospitals in italy'srw north were olmed. there were notnough beds, let alone ventilators. >> in, in a condition with a severe shortage of resources, and maybe you have ten people in need of a ventilator, and, and only one or two ventilators available. >> smith: and they need to be used by younger people that have a gater chance of survival, right? >> yeah. >> smith: the government did noorder a nationwideockdown until march 9. eo ple talking in background) >> smith: to date, over 34,000 italians have died of covid-19. seeing what was happening around the world, top american public health officials were increasingly convinced that halting flights from china was

>> ihink most health officials agree that at best, it delays, d as the secretary says, kind of pauses things. other officials pltoand two confront the president on february 26. >> a broad pandemic throughout the world, travel restrictions are not gonna help. you can't just travel-restrictne ever >> the public health officials, redfield, anthony fauci at the n.i., stephen hahn at fda, they had all decided that was gonna be the day they were gonna tell the president, "hey, look, we need to, we need to be more aggressive he." re theyh: but be could do that, dr. nancy messonnier, a top cdc official, oke out publicly. >> tonight, the cdc is calling e coronavirus a "tremendous health threat." >> we are working to readyr blic health workforce to respond to local cases, and the the possility this outbreak could become a pandemic. >> smith: it was a dire warning. >> the virus has killed more than 2,2 people and infected infected nearly 77,000 worldwide.

>> smith: the president was on his way to india. >> thank y, mr. president. >> smith: the, he was reassuring. >> you may ask about the, uh, coronavirus, wch is, uh, ver well under control in our country. we, uh, have very few peopleth wit. s >>th: but as he prepared to return home, msonnier spoke to reporters again. ultimately, we expect we will see community spread in this country. it's not so much a question of if this will happen anymore, but rather more question of exactly when this will happenho anmany people in this country will have severe illness.ea >> federalh officials sa today that coronavirus wil certainly begin spreading... q >> it is notstion of "if," but "when." >> as nancy messonnier is giving this briefing to reporters, the president is jusgetting on air force one in india to fly home. so, as he's flying home, the stock market crashes a thousand points.

>> wall street continues to sell on those coronavir fears, the dow falling close to 900 points today... >> tv is broadcasting notop about how this is gonna change the way americans live, and ofur , the president hadn't so, by the time aie onethis. lands, wednesday morning on the 26th, he's fuming. he's angry. the big economic success that he's constantly touting is under assault, from his viewpoint. he picksp the phone and lls a azar, yells r, says, "you're scaring people to death here.ng what's gn?" but the, but the big consequencof, of that is that the briefing that the public health officials had intended tp do for tthat evening after he had returned, that briefing never happens. >> smith: angry with his public alth advisers, trump refusedwi to mee them. talk of more aggressive measures, such as stay-at-home ders and strict social distancing, was put off.

messonnier's warnings were heresy. >> they then, the next day, dedicated an entire presidential press conference to walking back the, the warning and thet assessment te had given. >> thank you very much, everybody. >> and with the benefit of a month's hindsight, she was 100% right. she accurately aicipated what was about to happen. she tried to warn the country of that and, uh, the white house tried to furiously walk it back. >> mr. president, the cdc said yesterday that they believe it's inevitable that the virus will spread in the united states, and 's not a questn of "if" but "when." do you agree with that assessment? >> well, i don't think it's inevitable. it probably will, it possiblyld will, it ce at a very small level or it could be at a, at a larger level. whateverappens, we're totally prepar. we have the best people in the world. >> as someone who served in government, i can tell you, that kind of behavior sends a very, very clear signal to government permissible to say.is and is not >> smith: it's interesting that it's very much like whatpp ed in china in late

december and early january. >> the parallels areery, are very striking. i think it's immensely irresponsible of people in this administration to be blaming china for that kind of behavior, even as they have enga it themselves. >> smith: dr. nancy messonnier would be sidelined. alex azar was removed as head of the task force. he was replaced by vice president pence. >> mike is gonna be in charge, and mike will report back to me, but he's got a certain talent for this, and, uh, i'm gonna ask mikeence to say a few words, please, thank you-- mike? >> smith: what talent vice prident pence was bringing was not clear. >> thank you, mr. president. >> smith: when he was govern of indiana, he had slashed the state's public health budget. as a staunch evangelal christian, he had questioned scientific advice. t >> so you doel like you're being replaced? >> not in the least, i'm, i... >> he's not. >> when the, when this was

mentioned to me, i sais delighted that i get to have the vice president helping in this way-- delighted, absolely. >> smith: the ily press briefings became a platform for the president's positive ssaging. >> you are hearing the line thathe risk for americans is low, which comes from everybody's mouth, from the president on down. >> how should americans prepare for this virus? irould they go on with t daily lives, change their routine? what should, what should they do? well, i hope they don't change their routine, but maybe, anthony, i'll let you, uh, i'll let you answer that, or bob? if you want to answer... >> sure, mr. president. thank you. i think it's really important that, as i said, the risk at this time is low. the american public needs to gow h their normal lives. >> smith: you said, february 29, "the risk at this time is low. the american public needs to go on with their normal lives." >> it was true at that time, martin. i think the risk was low. >>mith: but by this time, china had had an outbreak.

iran was in the midst of a major outbreak, as was italy. anyou're saying, "at this time, the risk is low." >> yeah, well, the risk was low to the general american public at the time. >> smith: but the fact is that we had stumbled in februartote adequately, to test enough people to know wre things were going. how can you say that when we had such inadequate testing? >> well, the purpose, i'm sure, of your documentary is to help identify lessons and correct them so we don't repeat this. many of us are in the arena, where, as teddy roosevelt would sa we're marred and bloody. uh, we're trying to dare greatly.be hopefully, a, we'll know the triumph of high achievementk and, yw, at worst, we'll fail by daring greatly. (crowd cheering) >> smith: throughout february, the president had continued toho his rallies. >> hello, phoenix.

hello, las vegas. great to be with you where else would you like to be bua trump rally, right? (crowd cheering) la >> smith: hed others for exaggerating the threat. >> now the democrats are politicizing the coronavirus. you know that, rht? coronavirus. they're politicizing it. and this is their new hoax. >> smith: the present would not call for social distancing for another two ana half weeks. >> we have leaders throught much of januarand february saying that this is a hoax. >> 35,000 people on average die did anyone know th flu. 35,000. and so far, we have lost nobody to coronavirus in the united states. >> it's a complete denial of science, and leading to all sorts of decisions that are harmful to our country, to our planet.

>> smith: you're quoting the president. he made these comments. is it your view that he kn better than that, or was he simply misinformed? >> i cannot psychoanalyze the president, but we know that he, he has a tendency to, to believe he's the best at inerything. and he probay he's better than the scientists. in hysteria mode, fake news, is and their camera just went off. (crowd jeering) the camera. >> i think if he were practicing medicine, he would be negligent, and he would be prosecuted. >> the president's behavior, the presidens resort to repeated falsehoods, is a function of the way he is approaching this crisis. he's approaching this crisis about how it affects his own political survivability and re-electability. >> uh, this is a list of, uh,

the different countries.ed untates is rated number one, most prepar.e >> i would equ to something like seeing a hurricane offshore that has just taken out a couple of caribbean islands and is strengthening to category as it heads for florida, and not bothering to tell peopleo get off the beach and board their windows. and ly starting to do that when you see the storm surge coming ashore, by which point, c it's, rse, far too late. be smith: the first covid-19 death t recognized in america was on february 29, near seattle. it was followed by a cluster ofases in a nursing home. new york city.mb would land on from t suburb of new rochelle, 20 miles north of the city, an estate lawyecommuted daily by train in to his office in

midtown manhattan. ♪ in late february, he started feeling sick. on february 27, he checked himself into a new york presbyterian hospital in bronxville, new york. lawrence garbuz tested positive on march 2. >> the man in his 50s in westchester, but works in manhattan. >> new york city health department says he is in severe condition. now, the entire family in quarantine. >> smith: r dr. griffin,wh had been seeing patients with covid-like symptoms since mid-february, the garbuz case confird what he had suspected all along. >> this gentleman had not, travel he had obviously acquired it in the new york area. >> smith: dr. griffin had been pressing for more testing for weeks. >> mm-hmm. >> smith: but because of a lack of testing capacity, he says the cdc told him he could only test garbuz's immediate contacts. >> bye.

so, our impression at this point, in the end of february, unginning of march, is that we already had commy transmission of covid-19 in the new york area. but you're only letting us test people that have had contact with this man. we don't think he got it in new rochelle. weuspect he got it commuti to and from the city. we would like to start testinges all people with respiratory symptoms that we don't have a diagnosis for. >> smith: what's their response? >> we still have our rigid iteria. um, unless someone is really severely ill, they need to have a direct contact or a travel history. >> smith: and what's your response to them? >> our resnse is we think this gentleman got it in the community. we think there's community spread, and we would l do broader testing. >> smith: but you're not allowed to. >> we're not allowed to. ♪ >> smith: jessica caro is a nurse who works at a new york

presbyteri clinic. >> we first heard the news of the wyer from new rochle getting sick, and that scared me, because i live, like, maybe a ten-minute drive away from there. >> smith: her 16-year- daughter jiaa was the first one in her family to get sick. >> she was complaining to me at she had a fever. and, you know, nurse mom was just, like, throwing her some motr and saying, you know, "you'll be fine. you'll be fine." and i finally got a thermometer on her. i almost dropped it 'cause it was 105. not 100.5, it was 105. >> smith: wanting to get her daughter tested, jessica called new york's covid hotline. >> thank you for calling the new york state covid-1hotline. >> smith: eventually, she got a live person on the line, but it didn't help. >> this man was like, "hasour daughter traveled to china?" i'm like, "no."he's le, "well, d contact with somebody that's sitive?" i'm like, "well, we don't know." and the last question was, "is she short of breath?"ke and i'm ell, not currently, but she's very sick." bd the man tells me, "well, if she's not short ath, she

doesn't qualify. i rember hanging up the phon and just, like, i could feel the heat coming off of me, just how angry i was. : there was a shortage of tests across america. dr. subutler-wu runs a clinical microbiology lab in los angeles. >> testing was very restricted. you have to get approval from your local public health authority in order to be able to do that testing. and they then have to coordinate with the cdc tapproval to do the testing. so it was a very arduouspr ess. >> smith: because of shortages, the cdc limit who qualified for a test. >> at one point, the testing was limited to people coming in from mainland china. but viruses don't respect borders. they don't respect anything like that, and so i think we wereeh always wayd because of that.

in january, february, that ier really started to feel like even if the public health labs were able to offer this testing,'s ust not sufficient. we're not gonna be able to respond to something of this magnitude. (birds chiing) >> smith: i've talked to a number of doctors, and they say, "loo if i couldn't tell them that my patient had been to china, they couldn't get a test." >> yeah, that's a decision that's made individually by each health department, how theyo wanted that. i will say that early on, injans that were recognized in the united states were largely linked to wuhan, china, and so those were the case criteria as is new epidemic happened. smith: by early march, the cdc allowed for more people to get tests. but shortages persisted, thougho

nocelebrities. >> reports that kevin durant has been tested positive for the coronavirus. >> on social media, criticism for celebrities who'een tested, like celine dion, heidi klum, and reportedly kris nner. >> whatever it may be, i'm gonna quarantine myself. >> how are non-symptomatic professional athletes getting tests while others are waitingin ine? >> smith: we see stars being able to be tested, whereeoe without means or without celebrity status are unable to get tested. u >> yeaortunately, a lot of issues with regard to inequity in our society have really come out. but i think that people gea little bit intolerant when it's actually affecting the health om their loved es, their children when they realize that, you know, you're concerned about your mother. she can't get tested, but a vipt can get . and i think that during a pandemic, there's something quite wrong with-with that

occurring. t>> our response is amonghe very wor in the world. certainly among all the major countries. >> smith: by the end of theek first n march, there were 337 cases of covid-19 in the u.s., and 17 deaths. bucases were doubling every several days, and only around 4,000 people had been tested. when the president visited the cdc on march 6, he flatly denier was a shortage. >> anybody right now andbo yesterday... a that needs a test gets a test. they're there; they have the tests, and the tests are beautiful. >> smith: you know, march 6 is ete date that you won't fo where the president came to the cdc. n,'s wearing the hat, "make america great agand he t.ates that everyone who wants a test can get a t did he believe that do you think? >> again, don't-- i'm not gonna comment on what i think the president believed or didn't believe. >> smithdid you talk to him?

did you say to him, "look mr. president, with all due respect, it's not true what you're saying"? >> yeah, i'm not gonna comment on the conversations i've had with the president.s >> if therdoctor that wants to test, if there's somebody coming off a ship, they're all set, they have... i remember watching that and thinking i'dike the ability to test patients in my hospital on a much larger scale than what and i know i can't to that either. sot the time, it didn't reflect the reality of what i was experiencing as the clinical laboratory director in a hospital. not at all. perfect.he tests are all li the letter was perfect, the transcription was perfect. >> it was a made-for-tv event, um, and it was sound bites. but the reality of the situation was quite different, and i think most americans knew that at the time. >> smith: the president had to have known. >> i would expect that he did. >> smith: but evenad there been enough tests, the u.s. was facing shortage of nasal

swabs, masks and other equipment needed to carry out the tests. and the president aced responsibility on state and their own suppliesto acquire >> respirators, ventilators, all of the equipment, try getting it yourselves. we will be backing you, but try >> when he says things like the governors in the states should be trying look after their own needs and get these things themselves, what that s is there is no single picture of what the country nds. >> smith: you're on your own, boys and girls. >> you'ron your own, but we're alsooing to be buying up all the supplies that we told you you need. every state is basically goingdd on ebay and g against all the othe and against the lideral government to try and get the basic su that they need. >> smith: by march 11, there were 1,300 cases in the u.s., and 36 deaths. it was then that presidenttr p decided to expand his travel ban to european counies. >> my fellow americans, to keep

new cases from entering ourwe shoresill be suspending all travel from europe to the united states for the next 30 days. >> smith: the next day, dr. fauci testified before congress and admied they were sti failing to test adequately. >> the system is not really geared to what we need right that is a failing.asking for. >> a failing? yes. >> yeah, it is a failing. let's adt it. >> he was spot on, and i'm glad he said it. somebody had to say it. >> the way people in other countries are doing it, we're not set up forhat. >> i concur with dr. fauci. we've completely failed. this is a, this is a massive failure. at the end of the day, the whole way that health care is set up in this countrye failure, too, right? th every lab is fighting for itself, every state is fighting for itself, every city is fighti for itself. i mean, that's not what you need in something like this.

>> is it possible that your impulse to put a positive spin on things, may be ving americans a false sense of hope? >> no. i don't think so. >> misrepresenting preparedness right now? >> i don't think so. i , i don't think so. i think that, uhink it's got... >> the not-yet approved drugs. >> sh a lovely question. >> what do you say to americans who are scared, though, i guess? nearly 200 dea 14,000 who are sick, millions, as you witnessed, who are scared right now? what do you say to americansho are watching you right now who are scared? >> i-i say that you're a terrible reporter. that's what i say. go ahead. i think it's a very nasty question, and i think it's a very bad signal you're puttingt the american people. the american people are looking for answers, and they' looking for hope, and you're doing sensationalism... >> smith: by the end of march, there were more than 5,500 deaths. ♪ jessica caro, the clinic nurse, was never able to get her daughter jianna tested.

fortunately, jianna recovered. but two weeks later, jessica's aunt amelia spiked a high fever and cough. >> i get a phone call from my mom that my aunt is ill. and that's when i started to get really scad, because you kept hearing the hospitals filling this is, this not good." >> smith: amelia was hospitalized, but in the mean time, jessica got another call. it was her mother. >> sheaid, "i have to tell ayou something, that i ha fever." and i said, "no, mami, please, and she goes, "yeaave a fever, and i started coughing and i'm scared." >> smith: jessica's mother was hospitalized on april 7. the next day, just down theho ital hallway, her sister amelia, jessica's aunt, died. by now, there were over

18,000 deaths from >> the one time that i spoke to her on the phone, she was very out of breath.rd ever was labored, um, and t we, at that point, were just conversing t. but then, i-i had text at some point in the evening, and she hadn't answered me back. and i, like, now started getting worried and next thing you know, i get a text from her. it was, like, garbled gibberish, and then iwas, "call me, call me now." and, um, the doctor was there and e door is telling me, um, you know, "unfortunately, at this point, we need tote intu >> okay, thank you. i appreciate it. thank you so much. >> smith: since visting was prohibited, jessica couldot only reach herr through facetime. >> hi, mami. hi, mama, do you hear me? in my heart, i know she was able to heame, but it was hard to see her like that.

i even promised her that when she t better, i'd take her to her favorite place, which was the casino. and, um, not being able to, um, be there and hold her hand andr let ar my voice has just been the worst of all of this. ma, i love you. i loveou so much. you're so strong and you'rew fighting i ku are.o i need yout better mami, okay? >> smith: after 16 days on ventilator, jessica's mother anne martinez, passed away. it happened on april 23. it w her 80th birtay. ♪ by then, or 50,000 americans had died. ewaround 15,000 of them in yorktate. the bodies were stored in refrigerated trucks

next to the hospits. when we interviewed dr. ho on march 31, he described neyork this way. >> new york is the new wuhan right now. there is tremendous carnage seea in all the hos in this area. theye scared. they're overwhelmed. it's like being hit by a tsunami of-of patients. and they're not well-equippedht to fhis. >> smith: who do you blame for this? >> i blame the governm i, honestly, i blame the government for, um, not alerting us sooner that this was gonna be an issue, not, um, consolidating a nationwide stockpile and not putting people in charge of, uh, giving it too eds it in an orderly fashion. just being a citizen, not even being a health care professional and watching the news, i can see how just incompetent everything

is. >> smith: jessica caro's mother andunt immigrated here from the dominican republic. black and latino communities grossly, disproportionately killed by this virus. >> smith: cleavon gilman is an emergency room doctor at new york-presbyterian. >> that's just due to that a large majority of us live in housing projects as uh, a lot of us are also essential workers, um, mta, officers, grocery clerks, um, and that's just taking a toll on ouwhole community. across the city, the virus has been twice as deadly for blacks and latinos as whites, and poverty is also a dangerous. risk fac >> i think this crisis has unmasked a tremendous vulnerability in america, where

40, 50, american households barely get by day-to-day, have lost faith in the american dream for their children, that their kids can do better than they can, and-d now our society will have to grapple with and deal with the reality that we can't just hide and pretend that that's not the case anymore. ♪ >> smith: today, theotal number of americans who have died is more than 115,000. a columbia university study has calculated that had a ay-at- home order been imposed at the end of february, it would have prevented 83% of all u.s. deaths. it's remarkable to me that in the vietnam war, i think 55,000 american soldiers died, ande wew saying we might see four times that many people die. >> yep.

it's-it's astounding. you know, 9/11, we lost 3,000 people, and in response to that, the country built an infrastructure for protecting against terrorist attacks that costs an average of $150 to $250 billion a year. we need to take this threat as seriously as we take the threat of terrorism. um, it has the potential to kill at least as many, not considerably more, americans, and i hope, coming out of this,r whene do eventually come out of this, we'll finally take seriously the importance of s healurity and public health investments. (sirens wailing)mi >>: finally, there was in new york, scores ofe workers. ohealth care workers died the virus. ♪ ie new yorkers to show their support. every day, thousands went to the streets and their windows to say thank you.

(cheering, applause) (air horn blowing) (cheering, applause coinue) all the while, the number of bodies overwhelmed the city. trucks made their daily runs to a potter's field where the poorest among us are laid to rest. worldwide, the virus has killed more than 430,000 people. in the u.s., a nationwe lockdown has led to the steepest drop in employment since the great depression.

now countries around the world are beginning to reo health care officials warn of a second wave. >> go to pbs.org/frontline for more of our covege of the pandemic. >> (chanting) i can't breathe! >> and listen to our podcast "race, police, and the pandemice wi historianni cobb. >> from our educational system, our healthcare system, like all these things that ultimately culminate in the explosions that we've seen in the past week. >> connect with frontline on facebook and twitter, and watch anytime on the pbs video app or pbs.org/frontline. >> wall street loves a success story. and, john kapoor had great story to sell. >> his mantra was, by any means necessary, get the job done.

>> the only way that i knew how to do it to get that guarantee, is to bribe doctors. >> this is a very dangerous product. if it was misused, it could actually kill people >> low doses aren't at much money higher dose, more money. >> so when i saw them, i felt hope. >> narrator: the story of the iraq war told by the civilians who lived it. >> then there was a chaos.t >> major combaoperations in iraq have ended.on >> misccomplished. yeah? seriously? >> narrator: the memories and experiences fr those who survived. >> it's very dangerous to forget. because memory all is what's left for us. >> frontline is made possible bu contons to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. and by the corporation forin public broadca major support is provided by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation, committed and peaceful world just, verdant

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♪ -today, i'm going toe talking about something really important. i am transgender. ♪ -i realize that this is really who i am, and now, we are like a family. ♪ ♪ -tonight is the premiere for my film, "black dog," and i am so excited. everyone i know is here. -oh! look who it is! -whoo! -whoo! [ cheers and applause ] -when i was little, i really wanted to be involved with the film industry, but every time i thought of a director, i thought of peter jackson, and i though "oh, my god.