almost committed the perfect murder. >> and who better to do that than a police officer? >> than a police officer. >> that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm natalie morales. thanks for watching. first up on msnbc, new shutdowns. some of the largest cities and states across the country taking historic action to combat the coronavirus. tens of millions told to go home and stay home. details on when and where. >> it may work and it may not work. i feel good about it. >> any hope? the search for a treatment separating fact from fiction, are any of the drugs being tried now going to help? >> downward special from wall

street to main street. businesses and commerce come to a screeching halt. details on the dramatic ripple effect and how long it will last. the conflicted images of states like california that are shut down while here in clear water, florida, spring break continues has finally hit a breaking point. still defiant, spring breakers hitting the beaches in the face of a worldwide pandemic. what this weekend is expected to bring, next. >> good morning, everybody. stranger all the way over there separated by the two boxes on this saturday, i'm kendis gibson. >> and i'm lindsay riser. corey is working from home today and we'll catch up with her a little later. this morning, there are 18,922 confirmed cases of coronavirus across all 50 states. the death toll climb to go 242. >> and at this hour, more states

are dramatically ramping up restrictions. overnight, illinois issuing a stay at home order. that impacts some 13 million people. as several other states are expected to do the same, president trump saying the federal government is providing help. >> we're providing historic support to small businesses and to the states. the states need support. normally, they would do this themselves, but because of the magnitude of it, the federal government has gotten very much involved in terms of getting the equipment they need. so we're helping them. it's a responsibility they have, but we are helping the states a lot. new york city mayor bill de blasio calling the city the new hety center of this crisis. the number of cases in the city topped 5,000 overnight. >> and the white house confirming last night a staffer who works in the vice president's office tested

positive for coronavirus. the white house saying neither president trump nor the vice president had close contact with that person. >> meantime, on capitol hill, high stakes negotiations as republicans and democratic senators raced to draft a $1 trillion rescue plan amid the outbreak. monica joins us with more. talks went through the night with top administration officials. are they any closer to a deal. >> that's right. they went late into the night here in washington, d.c. and, unfortunately, did not reach a deal, but they're hopeful that that will come later today. i can tell you the bipartisan groups had made significant progress on this, but they weren't, unfortunately, any closer to nailing down the specifics. and, of course, this is phase three of this deal and it's a $1 trillion stimulus package. and at issue, $500 billion for taxpayers, critical, that a lot of people are hoping and waiting on as this economic slowdown

continues. $50 billion for the airline industry, $300 billion for small business and then another $150 billion for other industries that have been impacted by this. so, of course, a giant price tag on this. but some of the sticking points have come down to things such as unemployment insurance. speaker nancy pelosi and treasury secretary steven mnuchin have been hashing out the specifics and we expect to hear more from them later on this morning on that. >> and, monica, the president yesterday announced new measures to combat the spread of the virus. what is that about? >> sure. earlier in the week, the president had signed this, but he hadn't actually invoked it. he said in a worst case scenario, he would be using it to direct companies to produce more of these critical personal protection equipment materials that we've been hearing about. we're talking about ventilators,

masks, gloves, all of these kinds of things we've been hearing about from health care workers. but take a listen to how he framed it. when he was asked about specifics, he couldn't provide any initially. let's take a listen to that. >> vent laters, masks, respirators. >> things that we need. including some of the very important emergency. i would say ventilators, probably more mask toes a large extent. we have millions of masks which are coming. and which will be distributed to the states. the states are having a hard time getting them, so we're using the act. the act is very good for things like this. >> so this is a case where the president is, in fact, now invoked this. and we heard as one example from him that general motors has committed to making some of these respirator products, they said, in order to help fight this pandemic. i'm sure it's something that the president and other members of the coronavirus task force when

they brief here at noon today will be pressed on. we hope to get more answers for you. >> google has a website and the website just finally came up online. we were with going to get the ships that have all those beds and those are still weeks away. we'll see what this brings about. monica, thank you. live in union square, good morning, nora. what does this order from andrew cuomo mean for new yorkers? >> here in union square, tents are going up for the saturday's farmer's market that is always happening and it's still happening here. the farmer's market sells produce and that is deemed an essential business along with pharmacies, health care, businesses and other grocery

stores. some of them have adjusted areas, but basically 100% stop on nonessential businesses is an uptick in the severity. this is putting a halt on anything that can put anybody at risk here in new york city. basically, they're keeping mass transit open to get nurses, doctors, essential personnel to their work, but the governor advised nobody else should be using mass transit at this time. there's over 40 deaths here in new york city and more than 5,600 positive cases. so you played the sound earlier of mayor bill de blasio being the center of the epidemic here in new york. he's saying these numbers equal about a third of the total cases in the united states. so new york is really a hot spot right now and the government officials are trying to take as many precautions as possible. just across the river, though, lindsay, new jersey governor says he's going to tighten up the screws on social distancing

rules and the connecticut governor has taken similar steps, as well. >> it will be interesting to see what kind of precautions everybody is taking at that farmer's market today. and also deemed essential, reportedly, liquor stores in new york. thank you. nbc's garrett hague in the meantime is live for us in chicago. garrett, how are people there react to go this new statewide stay at home order that came in overnight. >> well, kendis, this will be the final step in what's been a slow walk towards chicago and the illinois/chicagoland area shutting down as restrictions have tightened and tightened and tightened. today, that order to stay at home goes into effect at 5:00 this evening. we expect to see a continuation of what we've seen over the last couple of days. people going out to shop, to buy their essentials. that will still be allowed after this order goes into place. but as rumors have spread, people have been going out and trying to take care of as many

errands as they can as early as they can. here are some of the shoppers that we spoke to yesterday. take a listen. >> i think i have everything at home, you know, we'll still be able to go out 1k3g9 food and stuff. so should be all set there. and i think we're ready for it just as the announcements and updates. >> i'm not going to lie. it's something happy. i know i should be eating healthy, but i'm, like, sad so, you know, brownies make me happy. >> i think we all get that. listen, the mayor and the governor, other public officials have been telling people there's no need to panic, no need to horde, no need to overstock. the grocery stores, the pharmacies, all essential services will be continuing at this time. they're hoping to tamp down on the panic and try to keep as many people off the streets. temperatures in chicago are not expected to break freezing until about 3:00 this afternoon. it will hopefully help keep

people off the streets today, but the bad news continues for this area. united, the air carrier based here in chicago announced overnight they're cutting their international flights by 95%. the city getting ready for spring, but prepare to go hunker down like it's winter. guys. >> united joining many of the other big carriers, including delta which has cut its flights by 75%. garrett headache, thank you. and janice mackey frayer is live in beijing. janice, you've had some of your own quarantine misadventures that you've been updating your twitter followers on. coronavirus seems to be slowing down in china. does it seem like things are going back to normal over there? >> for a third straight day, wuha wuhan has recorded a day with no new locally transmitted cases. that is a big deal when you put it in the context of the some 81,000 cases across china and 3200 deaths.

most of them, of course, being in wuhan and surrounding hubei province. so some businesses there are now being allowed to open. the city has been in lockdown since the 23rd of january so it's been pretty much two full months now. some families are now able to venture out with a special pass, they can do some shopping, but they only get two hours to do so. but this is being seen as a step out of the very dark days of the pandemic here. in the rest of china, the concern still remains imported cases. these are cases that are now coming from other parts of the world with people who are returning to china from italy, from the uk, from the u.s., people like me who are coming back into the country are now being required to quarantine for 14 days. i am in isolation.

the rules, since i came back, have since changed and now anybody coming back into the country has to be quarantined in isolation at a so-called government facility which is basically a series of hotels around the city. the main concern here, of course, is that they're trying to get the economy back on track. this is the world's second largest economy. it's the heartland for so many supply chains. so they are trying to ease the economy back on track, but they don't want to trigger a second wave of infections. >> lindsay. >> janice, i wanted to ask you quickly, you know, china has been expelling some journalists in the country. what are you saying to people who are questioning the information and the numbers we're getting from china? there has been some questioning of the information all along. we know that in addition to countries waging a war on this pandemic, there are also information wars, a media war between the u.s. and china, and

there is the sense that the last shots vnts yet behave not yet b. >> thank you. joining us now is sadah omuer, director of the institute for global health. welcome to you. thank you for being here. what is your sense right now of how the coronavirus response is going? are the steps that are being taken at least locally here by the administration enough to kind of flatten the curve that we've been talking about for some time? >> things like social distancing should help, but there are other components that need to be added right away, ideally, things like quick testing and not just testing, but isolation of contacts, contact tracing and

figuring out which of these contacts are positive and then recommending isolation right away. >> we've seen governors in three states tell people stay home, only leave for absolute emergencies. if you're not an essential worker. now, do you think extreme measures like that are essential and should more states follow suit? >> unfortunately, more states will have to follow suit. because we are an interconnected country. viruses go from state to state. unfortunately, states are looking at the prospect of restrictions on movement and so-called social distancing. hopefully, you know, the hope was that people would comply with these voluntary orders. hopefully compliance will

increase. but states might find it necessary to have shelter in place kind of orders going forward. >> well, does that also mean you have to stay inside? yesterday i went for a walk. it was a beautiful 75-degree day in new york and there were a ton of people out. there's no way everybody was three feet apart. >> technically speaking, if you're going outside and you're maintain ago distance, that should be okay. but the problem happens when everyone tries to go outside at the same time. so, you know, we will have to have a balance of responsibly exercising these kinds of opportunities of going outside. so if that doesn't happen, then, unfortunately, a few states will have to -- are likely to escalate to a situation where they ask people to stay at home unless they have specific functions to perform outside the home. >> a lot of people have been paying attention as they've been watching. if we can pop up that graphic and you'll see the number of cases here in america.

and, obviously, it seems as if we are -- we are on that trend that is similar to italy if we can take the shot, you'll see what i'm talking about where we have some 14,000 cases. but i look at that and i also think that's because we're getting a lot more tests. i think the important number right there are the number of deaths. what is more important for us to pay attention to right now? >> so this is just a sentinel event kind of a situation. so events that tell us a little bit more about what is going on underlying these numbers, but are not the complete picture. so yes, debts and reportdeaths reported cases are important, but we should interpret them with caution. because we don't know the denominator.should interpret th caution. because we don't know the denominator. even if we look at deaths, not just the number of deaths, but based on the availability of tests, the kind of people we are

testing, we're not testing contacts that aggressively, we're not texting people in the community, we are testing people who present with reasonably severe symptoms, etcetera, and even that is patchy. so we're just looking at parts of this puzzle, not necessarily the complete puzzle, not necessarily the complete picture. >> and with this sort of lockdown do you think say through memorial day, july, beyond? >> it's too early to say. and that's why it's all the more important that these lockdowns respect people's liberties in the sense that those who cannot go outside and earn a living are -- you know, have a stimulus payment that congress is discussing, that we respect genuine need for people to go out. if they need to be restrictions on the movement of everyone else, so on and so forth.

so this is not a thing that will go away in a week or so. we'll have to deal with it for a little while. the period of, you know, how long that period is going the be, that depends on what happens in the next few days to a week that tells us about the trajectory of this outbreak and then you can have reliable models to say how long, you know, this kind of stuff would be necessary. >> all right. appreciate your time. it was interesting kind of seeing that shot, as well, of times square. completely dead at this hour. look at it right there. crossroads of the world. it's crossroads for one person right now. delays in testing making it hard to know exactly how many people have coronavirus. why some countries were so ahead of the curve and how the u.s. is rushing to get tests out quicker. plus, the new questions about four u.s. senators and why they sold stocks right before

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we're back now with a live look. that is downtown chicago. it is 5:22 in the morning. so it's fairley quiet. have no doubt this is what it will look like throughout the day as that city and the rest of the state is on lockdown. increased testing for coronavirus in the u.s. shows higher number of confirmed cases with new york showing a sharp rise. as of last night, more than 8,000 cases statewide. almost 5700 of those in new york city and a total of 43 deaths. >> more states put residents under orders to stay at home. one says the shortage of test kids makes it difficult to gauge how many people are really sick. >> this is not a partisan issue. the federal government was not prepared the way they should

have been and now we are all producing numbers. we're over 500 cases. what does that mean? it means what we've been able to test, that's what we've found. however, we don't have enough tests. it's hard to extrapolate how many people are carrying covid-19. >> joining us now, matt kuso. he joins us from brussels. europe remains the epicenter of the outbreak. the headline on his latest article, can't get tested? maybe you're in the wrong country. why is america behind other countries when it comes to testing? >> that's a great question and it's a question we sut out to answer. for the record, i'm here in brussels and it's a very similar policy here. unless you're really sick here, you're not going to be tested. and that is pretty much the policy in many, many states and

a lot of countries in western europe. a lot has been made about this idea of a shortage in tests. that's true now, but what we found was the starting gun for developing these tests occurred in early january with the release of the genetic code of the virus. and within days, the scientists had come up with test protocols and within two weeks, you could get tested in australia and very quickly, they were churning out test kits in korea, in singapore. what you saw, you saw laboratories there and governments there coalescing around the area that we're going to need to stock up, mass produce these tests. south korea has tested hundreds of thousands of people. you're seeing an aggressive campaign in australia to say we're going to test because we're containing this disease.

so it was really about organization and preparation early on. >> some of these countries have a better medical system than we have. i've been supposed to the south korean system over the years. i know it very much very well. you wrote when aggressive testing might have allowed officials to stay ahead of the disease passed more than a month ago. so do you get a sense that this delay in testing will lead to higher numbers of deaths back here in the u.s.? >> well, there's a lot of factors, right? outbreaks don't go linear based simply on testing. obviously, we're going to see some effect here in western europe and in the united states to the aggressive measures, the lockdowns and such. but what we saw was that countries that used testing early to say we want to really be sure to identify everybody who is positive and identify all

of their contacts and use testing to test asymptomatic people, to then put them in isolation, those people were able to bend the curve, those people were able to stay ahead of the disease. australia is still basically in phase one of this. they're still in containment. the disease is not running wild there. singapore, which is obviously very close to china and has a significant chinese population, they announced right out of the gate, we are going to test and be super aggressive and this is going to be bad. when we talk to lab scientists around the world, they say look, a lot of times we take our cue from political leaders. it was clear here that we were going to test so we remember going to be aggressive with our test production. the united states decided to run with the cdc and that decision may have been fine, but the cdc test was flawed so the united

states was set back by weeks. so there's decisions, blunders, there is luck. it's not so simple just to say testing alone would have fixed this. >> you also write the virus quickly outpaced the president's early predictions. here is a look at some of those. >> we're finding very little problem, very little problem. you treat this like the flu. it's going to disappear. one day it's like a miracle, it will disappear. >> the democrats are politicizing the coronavirus. this is their new hoax. >> anybody that needs a test gets a test. they're there. they have the tests. the tests are all perfect like the letter was perfect. the transcription was perfect. it will go away. just stay calm. >> did politics affect the u.s. response? >> look, i don't know if politics, party politics, democrat/republican politics

affected the response. but politics in the sense of governance and government decisions and government messaging certainly did. we saw it in the united kingdom. we saw it in france. these are countries that had weeks to prepare after the chinese outbreak and the messaging from some of the political leaders was like, it seems like a pretty small problem. as the president said, this will probably go away. it's just a couple of cases. it's largely a chinese thing. and what you saw in countries that happe that were aggressive, they said this is going to be a problem. we are going to see a spike of people. and a lot of these countries were basing that on their experience with sars, with h1n1 and so what you started to see was really kicking an entire institution, an entire infrastructure into high gear early on. now, who knows what happens. this is a pandemic.

countries that have been successful early on could become overwhelmed, but right now the countries that were prepared that had a consistent political message and a scientific community ramped up early, those countries faired better and were able to test better. >> and they were able to flatten that curve, that so-called curve as they talked about. is there a relationship in the meantime between testing and containment? >> well, certainly there's a relationship between testing and containment early. and so that is why what you see with the w.h.o. is saying is test, test, test. we can't fight a fire if we don't know where the fire is. but testing once you have a widespread outbreak becomes a different game. when you're first starting out, you want to test everybody and all of their contacts and lock everybody down and stop things from spreading. that is containment. once the disease has spread

really fast, oftentimes you're going to be fighting a -- it's like a three alarm fire. it becomes much more difficult to test every single person. and so that is why you've seen governments in the united states, here in belgium, in france, basically say if you're sick, just stay home and don't call for an ambulance unless you really need it. don't go to the hospital. you risk infecting others if you're sick. and just sweat it out. frankly with no treatment for the disease, kevin where things are right now, a lot of doctors say that is the best advice. but that means a time of people who have the disease are not going to be tested, at least not for the foreseeable future. >> thank you. $1 trillion could be on the table to help the u.s. economy from the coronavirus crisis. who will benefit from the bailout and who may not, next. s, but maybe not for people with rheumatoid arthritis.

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we are back with our breaking news coverage of the dangerous pandemic. states across the country are ramping up restrictions as the number of coronavirus cases climbs in the u.s. overnight, illinois fwming the latest to order people to stay home. >> on capitol hill, senators are working through weekend hashing out the third bipartisan coronavirus aid package. this one will include relief checks for taxpayers. our reporters on the hill say senators were negotiating late into the event. a vote is expected sometime early next week. and the u.s.-mexico border will be closed for travelers and similar restrictions go into effect tonight for canada, as well. >> and later this morning, the senate will discuss a trillion

dollar bill to save the u.s. economy. some top senate democrats and republicans were unable to reach an agreement on that bill last night. >> a first draft includes $50 billion in loans and loan guarantees for airlines and 150 other businesses. it includes $300 billion for small businesses. alexis, does this draft go far enough to help businesses and industries that will be the hardest hit? >> good morning and thanks for having me. i think the short answer is no, it does not. when you look at them talking about bailing out big industries like the airlines, the cruise industries, absolutely. but let's not forget that smault business is the lifeblood of this u.s. economy. we have about 32 million small businesses in this country. they employ 47% of the private

workforce. and a lot of them don't have the cash reserves that a starbucks would have. more than half of small businesses polled said they would not be able to last three months. so these businesses need a lifeline. they are basically on borrowed time. they have employees that they need to worry about. oftentimes it's just the owner themselves and they need some survival tips. they need a way to survive. >> i've seen some reporting on the average small business with enough cash on hand to last 27 days without any new income coming in. that is really striking right now. the "new york times" editorial board in the meantime is writing that it believes $300 billion. right now allocated to small businesses is just simply not enough. the government should give unlimited amounts of money to help them afloat. you agree with that, obviously?

>> i think these are extraordinary times and they call for extraordinary measures. i spoke to the person who is the head of the devastation unit within the small business administration yesterday. and these are the people who handle things like weather related events, hurricanes and how they affect small businesses. they're still going through claims that businesses put in back in 2017. and i asked them how are you going to get this money to people right away? they said they've started accepting applications for about $2 million in loans. they're going to go through the $2 million in loans in a matter of minutes with this crisis. so the sba said while they are taking applications now, these are loans, they're not grants. that's a big difference here. and i also asked whether or not these loans would be zero interest and, sadly, they're not. they were telling mess these loans would be low interest payments of $3.7%. when you've got entire cities and most of the country in

lockdown, nobody going out and spending, $3.7% interest on a small business loan could make the difference between a company surviving and not. and the airlines are being given the $50 billion they asked for, but new data from j.d. power shows u.s. car sales from monday to wednesday this week were down 33%. so what needs to be in a final bill that will help other industries? >> you've got the auto industry now locked down, all three major automakers saying that their north american factories will be closed at least three march 30th. and now we have the government saying, if we bail out some of these industries, we needs to have a stake in them. this is reminiscent of the 2008 auto bailout. in the end, actually, the united states was able to make good on

the investment they made in gm. some on capitol hill don't believe that is the way to go, that the u.s. should be taking an equity state in these companies, but it is something that is on the table. >>. >> oil companies, as well. the energy producers are suffering. the price of oil was down about $20 a barrel, suffering its biggest decline in three decades. when oil suffers, it's a domino effect throughout the economy. usually we say oh, great, oil is lower. but a time of these companies won't be able to survive without low oil prices. a lot of them pay dividends. and some of the smaller industry producers will not be able to pay off their loans and simply

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some big news from the music world overnight. and many people mourning the loss of kenny rogers. hi family announcing the singer dieing overnight of natural causes. he was 81 years old. famous, of course, for many, many hits. of course, "the gambler" and "lady." in a career that spanned some six decades. kenny rogers dead this morning. four u.s. senators are facing appreciate over the timing on of their stock sales amid the coronavirus. republican north carolina senator richard burr now reporting himself to the ethics committee after it was revealed that he sold around $1.7 million worth of stock as he was receiving daily briefing intelligence on the coronavirus. he released a statement saying

he relied solely on public news reports to guide my decision. meanwhile, georgia republican senator kelly leffler is defending herself after the daily beast reported she dumped millions of stock. she said she had no knowledge of the sale. and the new york times reports dianne feinstein and her husband sold between $ 1.5 million and $6 million in stock. the transactions were made by hurry spouse and she has no involvement in any of his his decisions. and the "new york times" reports republican neared from oklahoma, james innhoff sold $400,000 in stock at the end of january. he told reporters he did not direct the sale of any of those stock. senators have a lot of money invested in stocks. wow. well, joining us right now live on skype is virginia representative don buyer who is

a democratic member of the ways and means committee. congressman, since all of these sales took place, the stock market has dropped 30%. what is your reaction to all of this? >> it's very concerning. i think we're going to have to sort it out because the cases are different. if it was made by a third party, that's one thing. i'm really concerned in the richard burr case where apparently he did direct the sales of those stocks and he's in the most unique position because he's the senate chairman of the intelligence committee. so he was right there understanding exactly what was going to happen. >> and congressman, you have been self-quarantining for more than a week after you learned that a friend you interacted with tested positive for coronavirus. are you feeling any symptoms? >> no, not at all, although, you know, i think we've done a,000 emails and phone calls all day long. one of the things i'm seeing again and again, though, is

virginia where i live is a couple of days behind california which is a couple of days behind seattle. the earlier we act, the more we can get people to stay home and self-quarantine, the less likely it's going to be. i saw the motion that the car sales were down 38%. i'd rather have them down 90% for two weeks and get over this than have them down 38% for the next year. so we really want to -- part of my staying home was to try to model the right behavior for everyone that might be watching. and speaking of the right behavior, we've learned this week that two of your fellow congress members have tested positive for the coronavirus, representative ballard from the miami area and ben mcadams. how has this news reverb rated on the hill and does it hit home once you learned these folks were positive? >> it very much did. one of the big things that we work with right now is the notion of remote voting.

there's been a lot of resistance to it because we've never done it in the 240 years of congress. on the other hand, it seems like 50 members or congress are over 65. a lot of our most important leaders on both sides are over 80. what does that mean when you try to get them to fly back from california, alaska, texas. you don't want them getting sick because they are the most vulnerable. they are leading an effort to figure out how to de vogt remotely. i have no worry about us working are he moatly. people are staying up late all night. lots of emails and texts. but the vote will be critical too. >> congressman, quickly, can you tell us what small businesses in your district are telling you about this crisis? >> they are panicked. especially the restaurants. virtually anybody that is dealing with the public. i talked to people that have laid off not just 100 but 500,

700 employees. . >> wow. . >> one of the most important things we're trying to do with this next package is how do we preserve the small businesses. yes, there is provisions in there for paying people sick play, extended unemployment benefits. businesses have to close and many of them won't be coming back. one of the most important provisions i have seen so far is the plan that would literally allow small businesses to borrow 80% of operating expenses, zero interest phroepbs guaranteed by the federal government, as long as they kept everybody on the payroll. we will be pushing for something like that. >> so many retail small businesses already been hurt going into this year. so this will no doubt be absolutely devastating. congressman don beyer, thank you very much. shutting down beaches and keeping people out of the bars. the safety measures coming to spring break towns to keep everyone safe as health leaders

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here's what's trending on coronavirus this morning. even through the scare, spreading cheer is as easy as turning on the lights. homeowners have hung christmas decor like a house in wisconsin we'll try to show you. that wasn't the right video. and the hallmark channel is airing countdown to christmas movie marathon all weekend long. while much of the country is at a stand still, d.c.'s cherry blossoms have sprung. they reached peak bloom early because of the warm weather. they are offering a live stream. >> look how close those people are and how many people are out there. i don't mean to be debbie downer. it is great that the cherry blossoms are out. practice a little social distancing while you're out there. . >> good advice to end on.

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♪ first up here on msnbc, lockdown. 75 million