01/28/21 01/28/21 [captioning made possible by democracy now!] amy: from new york, this is democracy now! >> right now i want toevel with the public, we are fing two constraining factors. the first is getting enough supply quickly enough and the second is the ability to administer the vaccine quickly once they're produced and sent out to the sides. amy: another 4000 people die in the united states from covid-19

as the biden admintration says much more needs to be done to accelerate the vaccination rollout. while many in the u.s. will need to wait months for a vaccine, in the global south, it could still take years. >> rolling up vaccines while the least developed countries watch and wait. with every day that passes, the divide grows larger between the world's haves and have-nots. amy: we will look at the state of vaccination campaigns at home and abroad as new variants are spreading the virus at increasing rates. then to shocking news about the far-right group the proud boys. reuters obtained court documents showing the group's leader enrico tarrio is a long time

government informant. >> talked about him being an extensive cooperator. his lawyer calls him a prolific cooperator with law enforcement. we thought that was quite interesting. amy: all that and more, coming up. welcome to democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine report. i'm amy goodman. another 4000 people have died across the united states from covid-19 wednesday in what has been the deadliest month since the pandemic began. the biden administration projects as many as 90,000 more u.s. residents will die in the next month as the virus continues to spread out of control in communities in all 50 states. on wednesday, president biden's task force met publicly for the first time, remotely over zoom, and live-streamed from the white

house youtube channel. it had some problems. biden was notably absent, allowing scientists to lead th discussion. tamping at public expectations about rapid vaccinations for most u.s. residents. >> you're taking action to increase capacity, but even so, it wil be months before everyone whoants aaccine will be able to get one. amy: theace comes as new coronavirus variance are spreading across the globe with mutations that may make them more infectious and likely to evade existing covid-19 vaccines. after the headlines, we will go to houston, texas, to speak with dr. peter hotez. the department of homeland security is warning of a heightened threat posed by ideologically-motivated violent extremists angry over joe

biden's inauguration and "fueled by false narratives" -- a clear reference to former president trump's lies about a stolen election. the national terrorism advisory system bulletin came as federal prosecutors announced indictments against three members of the far-right paramilitary group oath keepers for conspiring to obstruct congress during the january 6 insurrection at the capitol. all three are u.s. military veterans. separately, federal agents have arrested robert lemke, a former air force captain from california who sent death threats to the families of democratic congressmember hakeem jeffries and journalist george stephanopoulos during the capitol riot. elsewhere in california, the fbi arrested 44-year-old ian rogers in napa county for allegedly plotting attacks on prominent democrats and twitter. an fbi affidavit says rogers had dozens of weapons, thousands of rounds of ammunition, and five

pipe bombs. meanwhile, washington, d.c.'s acting police chief told congress two police officers have died by suicide since the january 6 insurrection at the capitol. the second death of a d.c. metropolitan police officer had not previously been reported. a third officer, brian sicknick, died january 7 after he was attacked by the mob. this comes as reuters revealed wednesday that enrique tarrio, leader of the proud boys hate group which played a major role in the january 6 attack on the capitol, has a past as a prolific informant for federal and local law enforcement, repeatedly working undercover for investigators after he was arrested in 2012. later in the broadcast, we will speak with the reuters reporter who broke the story. president joe biden is set to issue a memorandum today reversing the so-called global gag rule federal ban on funding

, a for foreign nonprofits that provide reproductive counseling or referrals for abortions. biden's order also reverses a trump-era rule barring abortion referrals by health care providers in the federally funded title x family planning program. biden is also set to order the expansion of reproductive health care through the affordable care act and medicaid. the order also expands a special enrollment period for people to purchase health insurance from the federally run marketplace. senate democrats have reintroduced a bill to establish washington, d.c., as the 51st u.s. state. a matching bill was introduced by democratic congressmember eleanor holmes norton, who represents the district of columbia as a non-voting delegate. >> this is a bill that could easily pass and it would allow the president to send a message about democracy that cannot be sent in any other way, democracy

in our own country, for our nations capital. amy: voting rights reporter ari berman noted on twitter -- "wyoming has 578,000 people, is 92% white, and has senators. two d.c. has 705,000 people, is 46% black, and has 0 senators." worldwide confirmed coronavirus cases have topped 100 million, and covid-19 deaths in the americas have passed 1 million people. mexico's wealthiest billionaire carlos slim, one of the world's richest people, has been hospitalized with covid-19. mexico's coronavirus death toll passed 150,000 this week. in colombia, president ivan duque led a funeral ceremony wednesday for colombian defense minister carlos holmes trujillo, who died of covid-19 at the age of 69. zimbwe's vernme held nerals wedsday for t

cabinet members who died of covid-19 -- the thirand fourth cabinet ficials toall to the viruduring the pandemic. in wuhan, china, a team of scientists with the world health organization has cleared quarantine and will begin its long-delayed investigation into the origins of the coronavirus pandemic. in new zealand, prime minister jacinda ardern has extended tough border controls through the end of 2021. new zealand has largely stamped out coronavirus, though it recently reported its first case of community spread in months. meanwhile, in lebanon, at least one person was killed as police fired live bullets at protesters who tried to storm a government building in the northern city of tripoli. protesters say a strict lockdown has exacerbated an economic crisis leading to widespread hunger. >> i am standing with the people here, the poor and hungry

people, people who can't find something to eat. >> if we what the tomatoes -- >> they closed everything because of coronavirus. >> this is how you ask people to stay at home? provide for those people you are asking to stay at home. amy: the biden administration has frozen u.s. arms sales to saudi arabia and is examining $23 billion in sales to the united arab emirates, including the sale of lockheed martin f-35 jets, which were approved by the trump administration as part of uae's normalization deal with israel last year. the biden administration has vowed to end u.s. support for the saudi-led war on yemen. minnesota congressmember ilhan omar tweeted -- "good. this is an important first step in ending our material support for war globally and the genocide in yemen in particular. i encourage the biden administration to continue down this path. next step, an end to all arms sales to countries that violate human rights."

human rights groups are demandg the immediate release of ashraf hamdi, an egyptian political cartoonist. hamdi was arrested at his home in giza sunday ortly afte he publied a videoarking the 10-year anversary ofhe revolution that ppled long-time dictator hosni mubarak. he faces charges of misusing soal media ses and sprding false ws. amnesty international reports egyptian officials are subjecting political prisoners to torture, cruel and inhumane detention, and are deliberately denying them healthcare to punish dissent resulting in deaths and permanent injury. poland has puts into effect its near-total ban on abortions. thousands poured onto the streets wednesday night to decry the move. >> i want us to have our basic rights, the rights to decide about our bodies, to decide what we want to do and if we want to bear children and in what

circumstances to have children. amy: the ban comes three months after poland's highest court declared almost all abortions to be unconstitutional, prompting the largest protests since the solidarity movement of the 1980's. meanwhile, honduras has imposed some of the most draconian anti-choice laws in latin america by voting to lock in the country's ban on abortions so future governments will not be able to legalize the procedure. abortions are banned under any circumstance in honduras and those who receive them can be put in jail. the recently passed legislation, which also bans same-sex marriage, comes less than a month after argentina legalized abortion. in newark, new jersey, city and state officials reached a settlement over the city's water crisis. newark residents were regularly exposed to illegally high levels of lead in newark's water supply, leading the natural resources defense council and the newark education workers caucus to sue in 2018 for violations of the federal safe drinking water act.

a warning to our viewers, the next story contains disturbing footage of police violence. florida officials say they will investigate after a video started circulating of a school resource officer body slamming a high school student into the concrete. the student appears to lose consciousness after she hits the pavement, but the officer still proceeds to handcuff her behind her back. the attack took place at liberty high school in kissimmee. newly resurfaced video shows far-right republican congressmember marjorie taylor greene confronting parkland mass shooting survivor david hogg on capitol hill as he lobbied lawmakers to enact gun controls. the video was filmed in march of 2019 before greene's election to congress last november. >> i am an american citizen. i am a gun owner. i carry a gun for protection for

myself, and you are using or lobby and the money behind it and the kids try to take away my second amendment rights. amy: the video concludes with greene calling hogg a "coward." she wrote on facebook in 2018 that the marjory stoneman douglas high school massacre was a false flag operation. meaning it had been staged. david hogg responded on twitter -- "it's so frustrating that we have people like marjorie taylor greene in congress that would rather spread conspiracies about mass shootings than confront the reality people are dying every day from gun violence. i just want to do the work and help end gun violence," hogg wrote. marjorie taylor greene has been named to the house education and labor committee. in washington, d.c., immigrant activists and their allies staged an action in front of the washington monument wednesday, marking the 4th anniversary of trump's muslim travel ban. immigrant rights groups are calling for major reforms to modernize and humanize the

country's immigration system. they are also asking lawmakers to back washington congressmember pramila jayapal's roadmap to freedom resolution, which was introduced wednesday. this is congressmember jayapal. >> the roadmap to freedom invests in border policy that protects the rights of communities in the borderland, and not only do we want to stop building walls, but we need to in the mass militarization of the region while upholding the civil rights of those who cause it home. amy: in more immigration news, president biden is expected to sign an executive order as early as this week that would pave the way for tens of thousands more refugees to be admitted to the united states. and chicago city officials have granted landmark status to the south side home of emmett till and his mother. a local nonprofit hopes to turn the home into a museum. emmett till was lynched 66 years ago when the 14-year-old boy was on a trip to mississippi. it remains one of the most

horrific examples of racial terror in the jim crow south. chicago city councilmember and community organizer jeanette taylor said -- "a lot of times, history involving african americans gets forgotten about. we will repeat history if we don't remember it and have these hard conversations." and those are some of the headlines. this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine report. i am amy goodman joined remotely by my co-host nermeen shaikh. hi, nermeen. nermeen: welcome to all of our listeners and viewers from around the country and around the world. amy: another 4000 people died in the united states from covid-19 over the past day in what's been the deadliest month since the pandemic began. the biden administration projects as many 90,000 more people will die in the next four weeks as the virus spreads uncontrollably across the entire -- the united states. the total number of recorded

covid deaths in north and south america's just topped a million -- nearly halff the world's total. and that actual death poll is believed to be even higher. on wednesday, the biden white house vowed to take more steps to increase the rate of vaccinations after the trump administration left behind no national vaccination plan. biden's coronavirus adviser andy slavitt said it will take months before most people are vaccinated. >> we are taking action to increase supply and increase capacity, but even so, it will be months before everyone who wants a vaccine will be able to get one. amy: to help speed up the effort, the biden administration is devising ways to allow retired nurses and doctors to administer vaccines. earlier this week, biden announced plans to acquire another 200 million doses of covid-19 vaccines made by moderna and pfizer-biontech. the race to vaccinate the nation comes as more infectious and

possibly more deadly- variants of the virus are spreading across the globe, including variants originating in the united kingdom, brazil, and south africa. on wednesday, the biden administration admitted the united states is far behind many other countries in genetic sequencing to track the different variants. by one ranking, the u.s. is 43rd in the world. we now go to houston, texas, where we are joined by dr. peter hotez, co-director of the center for vaccine development at texas children's hospital and dean of the national school of tropical medicine at baylor college of medicine. dr. hotez is the author of the forthcoming "preventing the next pandemic." dr. hotez, thank you for joining us. if you can explain right now the new approach that the biden administration is taking? here in the united states, the wealthiest country in the world,

yet we have more than 1/5 of the world's deaths and more than 1/5 of the world's infections with less than 5% of the population. what is happening and why is the rollout so problematic? about half of 20 million to 40 million vaccines are not accounted for. >> we have had huge issues around covid-19 containment and control all through 2020, and there were two pieces to that. mostly coming out of the trump white house. there was this insistence, number one, on not having the federal government in the lead from having thindividual states take leadership with the federal government providing backup support for supply chain management and that sort of thing. the states never had epidemiological horsepower, did not have the modeling, did not

have the knowledge base to know how to control this virus so that was a failed strategy. then you had over the summer, late spring or early summer, this concerted disinformation campaign coming from the white house downplaying the severity of epidemic, masks being an important control tool, spectacular icing hydroxychloroquine -- which i don't impact, and all of us can buy led this deep acceleration that we saw in the summer in the southern states and midwest in the fall. then with the national vaccine program, there really wasn't much of a national vaccine program. there was operation warp speed which was a delopment program for new vaccines. but there were no real logistics for getting it out to individuals to be vaccinated. the logistics were about putting the boxes on the back of fedex and ups trucks and delivering them to the states without any national plan.

this is what the biden administration has inherited, and now it is a matter of trying to catch up as rapidly as possible and create a program for vaccinating the american people it is tough because we have a very depleted health system that is overly reliant on the pharmacy chains and hospital chains. it is not a hlth system as we would know it with a carefully orchestrated system of community clinics and that sort of thing. so we have a lot of work ahead of us. we are not doing well stop we have only vaccined about 5% of the american population. we need to get to about 75% before we can interrupt transmission and we have to do it soon with all the new variants coming in now there is a race against the new variants also we have to vaccinate around 3 million americans a day to get those 240 million people times two doses each over the next few months, and it does not look like we will get there, either. nermeen: dr. hotez, you have

written about this problem in a "washington post" article recently. what will happen if the scenario you're suggesting is essential, namely, 500 million -- half a billion vaccines -- in the next five months? if those are not given in the next five months, what do you see happening in the u.s., in particular, given the new variants that have surfaced? >> the bottom line is, deaths will increase. our cdc estimes the new u.k. variant could become a dominant variant in the u.s. as early as the spring. we also have the resilient variant -- as far as we know, we do not have the south african variant here. but we're not really looking, she pointed out, we rank near the bottom of doing genomic sequencing of virus.

there has been this disconnect between the science, our scientific horsepower and our public health response. hopefully, we can begin correcting that in the new administration. the numbers are chilling. we will get the 500,000 americans who lose their lives and get the 600,000. the reason i wrote the piece in "the washington post" was to kind of remind not only the biden administration, but the american people that we don't have to get there. we just need to do some levers in terms of pulling and pushing to get the vaccination out quicker. part of that relies on not being so reliant on the mnr i -- and mra. read on some of the other vaccines.

if we could do the same in the united states, j&j vaccine, -- we have a vaccine that is now been produced in india so they have the capacity of 1.2 billion doses. no one from the federal government has approached us about bringing that vaccine. i think there are many more things we can do to get the population vaccinated faster. it was a tough op-ed to write. the biden administration get that. they are science- and evidence-based. it is not really fun to say, yes, we have to do more, here's what iuggest. when it comes to setting lives, sometimes you have to do those things. nermeen: dr. hotez, in addition to the logistical problems you have outlined in administering the vaccines here in the u.s. and around the world, you have

written about the rise of strong anti-signs aggression in the u.s. if you could talk about that and the fact the world health organization has listed a vaccine hesitancy as one of the top 10 threats to global health and a recent kaiser foundation poll in december, that is, that found 25% of americans say they will probably or definitely not take the vaccine even once it becomes available to them? >> yeah, in fact, we also published a similar paper. i was part of it but it was led by a group of social scientists at texas a&m university in the school of public health. both the kaiser survey and our survey found the same thing, that there are two very different groups that are --

under the u.s. when it comes to covid-19 vaccines. one are what we call trump voters what the kaiser survey called republicans but the same idea of people from the political right, and then the african-american population. if you think about it, two disparate types of populations that are meeting around vaccine hesitancy. so try to understand that -- i think in terms of the political right, this is a movement we saw building up in 2015 around the time of the trump election that took off where i am in texas, the formation of organizations like texans for vaccine choice, oklahoma's for vaccine choice. this came out of a new health freedom, medical freedom ideology that government can't tell us what to do. starting in 2020, those same groups glommed on protests against masks and social distancing. this is when you have national anti-vaccine groups form and

this globalized western europe last year and they were protest leaned to qanon in the same kind of health freedom ideology in london and berlin and paris. this is not a full on globalized anti-signs movement. today we are releasing a paper that will come out in plus biology really looking at the historical threat of this anti-signs movement. it is a killer. now people are tying their political allegiance to not getting vaccinated, to not wearing masks, cannot social distancing. this was provided by the white house disinformation campaign last year. on top of that, of the russian government flooding or internet with what has been termed as weaponized health communication through their bots and trolls. so looking at what is a fringe

group has now blossomed in a terrible way to a full on anti-signs confederacy empire -- sites confederacy empire. we have to find ways to counteract that. amy: dr. hotez, i would ask about what is happening in texas. in dallas county, which has reversed a plan to prioritize vaccinating people in its hardest hit areas, largely communities of color, after state authorities threatened to cut their supply, saying it did not meet official distribution guidelines. your heart by governor abbott being involved with this. can you explain what has happened here? >> no, i can't. we know covid-19 is a health disparity and we have seen it hit especially hard among our hispanic populations. those other groups getting

really decimated because of the essential nature of their work. they are not working at home. they are at construction sites and family-owned businesses. i testified last year and call this historic decimation of the hispanic communities in texas. then you have this group on the far right which is protesting against masks in contact tracing and social distancing and now vaccines. this is a very lethal and toxic mix we have in texas, and that is why texas is a leader in the number of deaths. this is one of the reasons we are here. not only being a vaccine scientist, but trying to go up against these anti-vaccine, anti-science groups. i have a daughter with autism and wrote a book a few years ago

called "vaccines did not cause rachel's autism." that has put me front and center of having to confront and launch this counter affect to these groups. it is a scary place to be but necessary. this may be a new role that scientists in america have to have, which is to combat anti-science as part of their activities. amy: you're one of the officials at texas children's hospital. when we talk about these vaccines going into the arms of hundreds of millions of people, we're talking about over 16. the desperate plight to get kids back to school, the increase in suicide. what about tests on kids? are you involved? where are they happening? how do they happen? how do parents say come you can test my kid? >> i don't have too many details

about that. one of the things i have been pushing hard for, though, is the fact if we're going to reach 240 million americans to vaccinate, we're going to have to include adolescents and children in that mix. so accelerating vaccines for adolescents and kids also has to be a priority in those clinical trials. have not begun with the mrna vaccine and the i don't virus vaccines as well, that is something we're going to look at. one of the things we are pretty excited about without protein vaccine is it uses 35-year-old technology through microbial fermentation. that is what the hepatitis b vaccine is right now. that has been used to vaccinate kids for over 35 years. it is very safe, so vaccine technology. -- old-school vaccine

technology. nermeen: dr. hotez, just to go back to your earlier point, you've written a full book as you mentioned about your daughter's own experience with autism. if you could say what some of the misinformation is that is circulating about this vaccine, about these vaccines, the covid vaccine? you have written, for example, some of the concerns around the allergic reaction to the vaccines are not necessarily that different from allergic reactions. easy to other very common vaccines, including the flu vaccine. what do you think some of the misinformation is that is going around and how can it be counteracted? >> this is a huge problem because the anti-vaccine groups now, which historically have gone after the hbv vaccine and

other cancers come has that a lot of damage in terms of getting parents not to vaccinate their kids or adolescents, are now turning their attention to covid-19 vaccines and prevention measures. so there is quite a laundry list now i things they are alleging. play this game of whack-a-mole. you not going down, another pops up. the first was these high rates of allergic reactions that kill, is not true. the rate of anaphylaxis in the pfizer moderna vaccine has now been looked at around 3 million of 5 million, which is a little high than the anaphylaxis rate for the flu vaccine or hpv vaccine, which is one million to 2 million. it is very rare event. number two, they're saying vaccines were rushed. it popped up out of nowhere.

it is not true. this built on a decade or more of research and development. figuring out ways to deliver the slight proteins in a vaccine. this has been a program that has been up for more than a decade. after the first sars and mers series respiratory symptoms emerged. then it gets crazier from there. assertions that the mrna is creating what th term genetically modified humans. you've heard of genetically modified organisms, now they are calling the genetically modified humans. they have not learned much by way of haskell biology, not realizing a cell has both a nucleus and cytoplasm and the mrna only gets into the cytoplasm and gets made into protein. then it gets crazier from there.

big components saying we are implanting microchips into people. it has me and tony fauci he and bill gates in some area 51 labs sticking microchips into the vaccines and 5g links. you can imagine, saying the vaccines contain aborted fetuses or aborted fetus material. all of that needs to be diffused. part of the problem is in the united states, we have never really mounted a big counter to the disiormation campaign for anti-vaxxers. we have never taken a seous effort to dismantle the empire. i think that is something we're going to have to look at if we are going to be successful at this. nermeen: dr. hotez, your forthcoming book is titled "preventing the next pandemic: vaccine diplomacy in a time of

anti-science." sling what you mean by vaccine diplomacy. in the facts were just talking about of anti-science. where does this originate? you've said these anti-vaxxers are opportunists, but what do they stand to gain from opposing the vaccines that might in fact save them? >> the book looks at a lot of 21st century forces bringing back disease. started writing about a year before covid 19. it looks at things like war and political collapse, depleting health systems, climate change, urbanization. one of the subthemes is all of these things are not ordinarily areas that biomedical scientists get training in and we have a call to broaden our training for scientists. in terms of the anti-science

movement, i think it amplified in texas in 2015. one of the ways it got so strong was the link to political funding and the creation of political action committees. so part of the motivations the anti-science groups tied their start of far right ruling of the republican party -- right wing in the republican party. it is not the only thing going on. there is also a link between of your expensive health and wellness industry that is promoting fake nutritional supplements, even fake autism cures. so that is another thread. you also had the fake books. if you go to amazon.com, as everyone has done, you will get a scroll down menu to the left that includes health, fitness, and diet. you click on that and get a second menu that has vaccinations. all fake co-conspiracy books.

amazon is probably one of the single largestromoter of anti-science and anti-vaccine disinformation. a lot of this is monetizing the antiscience, monetizing the internet. that is a big driver as well. we don't really have our arms around the whole moneyrail by any mea, and i think that would also be a very productive avenue for some investigative journalist. amy: dr. peter hotez, co-director of the center for vaccine development at texas children's hospital and dean of the national school of tropical medicine at baylor college of medicine. author of the forthcoming book "preventing the next pandemic: vaccine diplomacy in a time of anti-science compass speaking to us from houston, texas. when we come back, no matter how difficult it is to get vaccines in the united states, compare it to scores of poor countries

around the world. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now! i'm amy goodman. south african president cyril ramaphosa is urging wealthy countries to stop hoarding surplus doses of covid-19 vaccines. he made the comments in an address to leaders at the world economic forum. >> the rich countries of the world went out and acquired large doses of vaccine from developers and manufacturers of these vaccines. some countries have even gone beyond and acquired up to four times what the population needs. and that was aimed at hoarding these vaccines and now this is being done to the exclusion of countries, of other countries in the world that most need this. we are all not safe if some countries are vaccinating their

people and other countries are not vaccinating. we all must act together in combating coronavirus because it affects all of us equally. amy: south african president cyril ramaphosa's comments come as the death toll from covid tops 42,000 in south africa, the -- about half of the continent. to talk more vaccine equity, we are joined by dr. mohga kamal yanni. she is a policy advisor to the people's vaccine alliance and to unaids, the joint u.n. program on hiv and aids. she has worked for decades on access to medicines and healthcare in developing countries. she was previously a senior health and hiv policy adviser at oxfam, the global anti-poverty organization. speaking to us from oxford in great britain. thank you so much for joining us again. you just listen to dr. hotez, the problems the u.s. is having in disturbing the vaccine.

you listen with an ear of whatever problems we are having in the u.s., if only. the idea of the 46 countries that are vaccinating their population, only one is a low income country. what can be done about this? >> the thing is, what people forget is the problem we are havi or one of the big problemss the supply. there isn't enough doses availableow or tomorrow or next weefor everybody. even if you want to vaccinate everybody in the.s., as your plan is, biden's plan, the same as the u.k., where are you going to get the doses there is a supply issue. the e.u. is havina fight -- content on what ey will be able tsupply for the time being. why? because there isn't enough doses.

why are therenough doses? because we are keepi the production tied to one company. only astrazeneca can produce this vaccine, only pfizer can produce the bionth, and only madrona can -- modea for the h. we are in a pandemic and we need to vaccinate a big populatn if you want to be safe. what is the solution? to share technology most of the whset up a mechanism whereby you can share it. the companies can share the technology with the mechanism called covid technology access. [indiscernible] from the company to the potential users also whether they are in india or indonesia

or jordan south africa or italy or spain or any other countr y,apacity totally unused. why? because we still want to keep or leaders went toeep the monopoly on supply and on price at the hands of the pharmaceutical companies. this is crazy in a pandemic. it is spent in normal time. in a pandemic, it is just crazy. nermeen: dr. yanni, as you said, there is a shortage for these reasons of vaccine of the vaccines that are available as of earlier this mont, a small group of rich countries comprising just 16% the world's population, had already bought up 60% of the world supply. now it is clear at this poin that most low and even middle income countries will not get

access this yearnd possibly next year to either the pfizer or moderna vaccine -- although, some may get the astrazeneca vaccine. a number of countries now have been making bilateral deals with china, which has two vaccines that have been approved at least in china, as well as with russia for their sputnik v vaccine. what do we know about the effectiveness of these vaccines and the likelihood that they will help, the production and dissemination in poorer countries will help arre the pandemic? >> well, the countries realize ey cannot wait. they're going to the big companies, they get the reply of "sorry, all the productiois booked."

they got that answer from a number of companies. so they had to go to the chinese and the russians. now, that chinese companies, the two mentioned and there are others in the pipele, but the two you mentioned are using old technology. they have the great potential being easy to me or easr to make and they can produce -- so they have that potential. e problem is,e don't have the data on the efficacy and the safe of these vaccines. in brazil, the clinical trial said it is %. we do not know the details so it is difficult to really judge. it is difficult to jge the

efficacy and the safety and the quality of the vaccine. however, the goodews, both vaccines have submitted data to the w to look at e efficacy and quality and hopefully the who can get this information, can get all of the information they need and therefo can tel us if e vaccin are good. if they say these vaccines are od, then that is really good news for developing countries. they would not have to wait for pfizer omoderna. the russian vaccine -- i think the who is still waiting for data on the russian vaccine, to explore it, tonvestigate it. but i think -- well, they are still waiting for the data so we don't reallynow what will happen. but again,here isapacity in

the world. we go rounand round trying to find solution when t solution in our face. the countriedon't nt to loo at it. if you have technology, she the technology so shiner -- so china can share. 30 years experiencin manufacturing vaccines for its people. indians ar also -- vexing on top of the astrazeneca. aly has capacity. when everybody that has capacity can produce a vaccine, can you imagine how many millions of doses we will have for developing countries and even for rich countries? amy: thank you for being with us. we hope to have you back soon. this is a continuing issue in this crisis of the globe. dr. mohga kamal yanni is a

policy advisor to the people's vaccine alliance and to unaids, the joint u.n. program on hiv and aids. has worked for decades on access to medicines and healthcare in developing countries. when we come back, who is enrique tarrio? the leader of the proud boys, a prific government informant. stay with us. ♪♪ [music break]

amy: this is democracy now!, democracynow.org, the quarantine report. i'm amy goodman with nermeen shaikh. weend today show this stunning story about the proud boys, the violent supporting far-right he group that took part in the capitol insurrection three weeks ago. reuters revealed wednesday the group's leader, enrique tarrio, as a pass as a prolific and former for federal and local law enforcement repeatedly working undercover for investigators. reuters cites the transcript of a 2014 court hearing prosecutor argued for reduced sentence for them in a case by telling the judge, "i have never had a client as prolific in terms of cooperating in any respect."

the news comes just over three weeks after tarrio was arrested prior to the insurrection of returning -- burning a black lives matter banner at eight historically black church in washington, d.c., during a december protest. tarrio also faced weapons charges because he had illegal high-capacity magazines and ammunition on him at the time of his arrest. for more, we're joined by aram roston, investigative journalist with reuters. his exclusive is headlined "proud boys leader was 'prolific' informer for law enforcement." talk about the significance of what you found, exactly he is, and interesting that he was arrested right before the insurrection so he could not take part in it. tell us the story from the beginning. >> enrique tarrio is the leader

of the proud boys. he is very high profile now. we have all seen him in videos leading the proud boys in portland or washington, d.c., in prior rallies, they call them. [indiscernible] hearing here for a 2012 case, criminal case, in miami. that hearing as you mentioned was an effort to reduce his sentence by telling a federal judge about the extent of his cooperation. the federal prosecutor, an fbi agent, and his own defense lawyer listed numerous cases in which enrique tarrio had cooperated with local authorities and investigations, including undercover, multiple undercover investigations. at the federal level, said he helped prosecute 13 people in

federal cases. we thought the significance was because, of scum his current organization, the proud boys, is very closely linked to the investigation going on now by the fbi into what happened at capitol hill on january 6. amy: enrique tarrio told reuters "i don't know any of this, i don't recall any of this," but after your story broke, he wrote on telegram -- on "the article sensationalize is the fact in this case there was some heavy cooperating. he also wrote --

can you talk about the history of the proud was this violent, white supremacist no chauvinist murderous group, kyl law-enforcement and open, california, for example, officer underwood? >> well, i'm not sure if the product was were involved and in that case or not. amy: boogaloo bois. that's right. >> which are a sort of different movement. at said, the proud boys have been involved in many violent clashes, obviously in the january 6 case. they were founded really in 2016 as this sort of opposition to the so-called political correctness in this idea it would give men who were silenced a voice, these sorts of things

most of they often call themselves a drinking club and they will say the jerking clu is a patriotism problem -- drinking club with a patriotism problem. u've seen enrique tarrio photographed wit numerous political heavyweights. he took over in 2018 -- when i say took over, he was elected as their chairman. he is the most vocal person affiliated with them, the most recognizable person with them. you mentioned his response here. it is clearly at odds -- we are relying on a transcript of what actually happened in court. assistant u.s. attorney,'s own lawyer, and fbi agent go through these issues of corporation with the government, which include, as we said, his own lawyer

described this undercover operation where he reportedly was trying -- the lawyer says, at his own risk, to pay people to bring in sort of imaginary -- agreed to bring in people to do something illegal. he was doing this undercover. so we thought this was significant because of the way the fbi is looking at the agency come at the proud boys now. you mentioned his criminal case. he was arrested in january 4,2021 just days before january 6, when everyone knew something was going to happen. people thought it was going to be a large rally, the public was told. he was arrested and later the fbi said his arrest was sort of an effort to preempt anything that might have happened. we don't know exactly what they

mean. that is what they said. he was arrested on misdemeanor charge of burning this black lives matter banner. he admitted that on social media . he said he knew he was going to be arrested in d.c., yet he did have on hi aording to e charngocumts, these hi-capacitmagazine -- which arspecificallynd welknown to be legal inashingto d.c. theyere maganes, rif magasith prd boys ingnia on tm. nermee the dartment of homela secity s been warning a heightened thre of domesc extrist vience fr people gry at dald ump'electionefeat and inired byhe stormg of the u.s. capol. whatole do y think t proud ys plad in that d e larger teat of ite

premacistiolee in the u.? at wilhappen tthis gro nounder thbiden adminiration? it really rd t see wha willappen wi tm. early,here's lots of group t there. iean, nowe haveece so familiar with the three percenters, boogaloo bois, oath keepers, and of course the proud boys. what role they played in this? i don't know. it is clear from some of the arrests edge took place over the capitol hill riot that resulted in five deaths, it is clear -- at least five proud boys members were known proud boys members were arrested. they wembroiled, clearly part of the investigation. amy: do you have any information that enrique tarrio is an

informant today? >> we do not have that information. informant is a term of art. he was helping police in many ways but for the fbi, as specific sort of uses of that term for specific relationship they have with informers. it is unclear -- he was clearly doing many things, as we said. he was providing information. back then, he was providing information. he was going undercover for local lice departments. after that, we don't know what happened. we did say in the story he told us he had told police departments of upcoming rallies to be helpful. we discussed that a little bit in the story where he said he had discussed certain things

with law enforcement. amy: aram roston, thank you for being with us investigative , journalist with reuters. we will link to your piece "proud boys leader was 'prolific' informer for law enforcement." tonight tomorrow we look at the new film "my name is polly murray." [captioning made possible by

thank you for joining us. ♪ thank you for joining us. from our studio in tokyo, this is nhk "newsline." the latest gdp data for the u.s. show the country's economy shrank last year by 3.5%. that's the largest contraction since 1946 when the nation was just emerging from world war ii. the u.s. commerce department released preliminary data on thursday.