for me that was never the case. it was about the challenge. it was about the hunt. that's all that mattered. >> that's all for this edition of "dateline." i'm natalie morales. thank you for watching. watching this sunday, why weren't we ready? >> this is going to get worse o before it gets better, for sure. >> the government's sobering te coronavirus projection.he hundreds of thousands of americans dead, under a best-case scenario. >> this will be probably the toughest week, between this week and next week. >> cases and deaths soaring fastest in the u.s., as guidelines are ignored. >> i can tell by the curve and as it is today that not every american is following it. >> should there be a national stay-at-home order? >> i don't understand why that's not happening. >> health care workers overwhelmed.y >> this is too much. i don't know how much longer i can do this. >> and states competing with each other for scarce equipment. >> it's like a madhouse out there.t >> it's like being on ebay with

50 other states bidding on a ventilator. >> my guests, surgeon general jerome adams, governors jay inslee and asa hutchinson, prime minister giuseppe conte, and michael lewis.co plus, what happens when covid-19 hits rural hospitals that lack doctors, beds, and ventilators?nd finally, scenes like this. the moments of love, selflessness and heroism keeping our spirits up in the face of a once in a century challenge. joining me for insight and analysis are nbc capitol hill correspondent kasie hunt, former republican governor of north carolina, pat mccrory, and helene cooper, pentagon correspondent for "the new york times." welcome to sunday and a special edition of "meet the press." >> announcer: from nbc news in washington, the longest running show in television history. this is a special edition of "meet the press" with chuck

todd. >> good sunday morning. the week began with two national reckonings on the coronavirus. the first is where we're headed. as of this morning, there are more than 300,000 confirmed cases in the united states and well over 8,000 deaths. the federal government is now acknowledging that in a best-case scenario, somewhere between 100,000 and 240,000 americans are likely to die from this virus.di one point of comparison, that's more americans than died fighting in korea and vietnam combined. as you can see, the united states, the soaring red line in this graphic here, trails the world in flattening the pandemic's curve. which brings us to the second reckoning, the government's performance.ofn sththnm like president trump insisting for weeks that the coronavirus was no worse than the flu, likei the lack of testing, the big one starting with the botched cdc test kits. like the government's inadequate stockpile of gowns, masks, and other protective equipment. like the mixed messages on face masks. the cdc recommending them, the president refusing to wear one,

like disbanding the national security council's pandemic team in 2018. there's so many, including one we're all responsible for, the o failure to follow safety guidelines. remember, the sobering death toll numbers hold only if everyone practices social distancing, and as we learned last week, that isn't happening everywhere. still, the bottom line is the government has been telling us it's been in control of the virus, when in fact it is the virus which has been in control of us. >> we are afraid for our patients. we are afraid for our families. we are afraid for our lives. >> in new york and around the country -- >> we are a small, rural hospital. we have no ventilators. >> medical providers, first

responders, and state officials are pleading with the federal government for more help. >> every state is saying the same thing. i need help. i need assistance. >> but this week, the trump administration repeatedly sent governors the message, don't look to us first. >> the notion of the federal stockpile was it's supposed to be our stockpile, not supposed to be state stockpiles they then use. >> by friday, the hhs website n describing the stockpile had been altered, saying it had enough supplies to respond to multiple crises simultaneously, to reading it really is to support short-term supplies as a buffer. >> i don't know if jared kushner knows this but it's called the united states of america. and the federal government which has a stockpile is supposed to be backstopping the states. >> nine governors are still e ferning to enact stay-at-homei orders and mr. trump is refusing to make them do so. >> i don't understand why we're not doing that. we really should be. >> the government's advice has changed over time. americans were told not to wear masks. now, the cdc is recommending they wear nonsurgical masks or face coverings in public. on friday, the president immediately made it clear he is not going to follow that guidance. >> you can do it, you don't havo

do it. i'm choosing not to do it. >> americans were told only older people or those with compromised imine systems were at risk. in fact, 21% of deaths and nearly half of patients admitted to the icu have been americans under 65, according to early cdc data. americans were told testing was widely available.r >> anybody that needs a test de gets a test.te they're there. >> even now, there have been just 1.6 million tests conducted nationwide. a fraction of what experts say is needed. in fact, for months, the president played down the virus. misrepresenting the facts. >> one person coming in from china. and we have it under control.in >> it looks like by april in theory when it gets a little warmer, it will miraculously go away.er >> this week, he reversed course on his rosy projections, acknowledging the u.s. death toll could be staggering, while attempting to claim --th >> 100,000 is, according to

modeling, a very low number. >> models show hundreds of thousands of people are going to die. you know what i want do? i want to come way under the models. the professionals did the models. i was never involved in a model. at least this kind of a model. >> joining me now is the u.s. surgeon general, vice admiral jerome adams. welcome to "meet the press." let me start with, you're the surgeon general. give us your recommendation on face masks. >> well, it's important for america to understand that originally the cdc, the world health organization, and my office all recommended against the public wearing face masks because the best available evidence at the time suggested they were not impactful in preventing you from catching a disease if you were the

individual wearer and you were healthy. we always recommended that if people had symptoms, that they wear a face mask to prevent spreading disease to other folks. here's what's changed. we now know that about 25% in some studies even more of covid-19 is transmitted when your asymptomatic or presymptomatic, so the cdc has recommended to people that you wear cloth coverings when you're out in public. here are the important points. number one, you need to make sure you're not substituting social distancing with face masks because the most important thing is still to stay away from people. make sure if you put on a face mask, you don't touch your face and you wash your hands before your utilize it, and number atreloublie the masks for the renc iin medical health care workers.g yond they need them.al i made a cloth face mask out ofo a t-shirt and rubber bands. anyone can do this. we all need to do our part to get through this.rt >> i'm curious, i know you made the warning, you're saying specifically, you don't want people to make a run on clinical or surgical masks. two questions i have on that front. number one, if you are caring for somebody in the vulnerable age group, should that person be

wearing a surgical mask? and second, if there were enough around the country, would that be the recommendation? and is it the only reason we're saying do homemade ones is we just don't have enough masks? >> well, the reason why we're saying make a homemade one is because that's effective in protecting you from me. remember, i'm wearing a mask to protect you, chuck, and you're wearing a mask to protect me. that's what you need. we want to make sure we're saving the medical masks for the health care workers and we still wouldn't recommend people wear an n-95 even if we had enough. when i'm in the hospital, i have to get specially tested to wear an n-95. they're uncomfortable. if you're taking care of a loved one, very important you wash your hands frequently, do

everything possible to prevent spreading disease to them, and i would encourage folks to consider wearing a cloth face covering when you're within six feet to them. >> the president made it pretty clear he's not going to wear one. would you recommend people wearing one at work? >> that, again, what you have to know, if you go to the cdc website, number one, this is voluntary. we're asking people to think about doing it to protect their neighbors and family. number two, it's not a substitute for social distancing. if you're at work and six feet away from someone, there's a minimal chance you're going to spread disease. if you're in a work environment where you're within six feet, dn you're close to someone, that'sb or socork re'sea something to consider, and that's what the cdc guidelines e say. they're based on the science. we always try to evolve our recommendations based on the best available science. >> admiral, i know you're hesitant to back-seat drive other officials and the calls they have to make, and i'm very aware of that, but i am curious. if you were advising the nine governors who have not issued stay-at-home orders, what would you advise them to do?

>> well, i would advise them to follow our 30 days to slow the spread guidelines. i ran a state department of health. i talked to many of these governors, and here's what i say to them. here's what i would say to them right now. the next week is going to be our pearl harbor moment.ee it's going to be our 9/11 moment. it's going to be the hardest moment for many americans in their entire lives, and we really need to understand that if we want to flatten that curve and get through to the other side, everyone needs to do their part. 90% of americans are doing their part, even in the states where they haven't had a shelter in place.ntin , ee but if you can't give us 30 wth days, governors, give us a week, give us what you can so we don't overwhelm our health care systems over this next week and let's reassess at that point.k we want everyone to understand you have to be rosy the riveter. you have to do your part. >> at a minimum, you wish every governor would issue at least one week? >> i wish every governor would encourage the people in their states to follow these guidelines for 30 days. that's what i want, but i want them to do what they can within their states. we know from a public health perspective, and i ran a public

health department, whether it's smoking or opioids, there are all sorts of different rules and different regulations in states. just last week, governor cuomo actually said it would be declaring war on the states to issue a federal quarantine. governors are rightly protective of their ability to determine what's best for their citizens. we want them to have the science to make the best recommendations.e >> i want to put up a quote froi amy actin, the director of publ. she said this on march 13th. and admiral, it's been haunting me ever since. this is what she said, on the 41 end of a pandemic, you look a little bit like an alarmist, like a chicken little. and on the back end of the pandemic, you didn't do enough. are those words that we should all be living by? which is you may be hesitant right now if you're a leader about debating health versus thu economy. hindsight, you're going to wish you had done more? >> 20 years in public health, and i know director actin, those

words couldn't be truer. we're always telling people we would rather prevent disease than treat disease. i tell people we aren't going to treat or supply our way out of this problem. there is no magic bullet or magic cure. it's public health and prevention. everyone coming together, practicing good hygiene, staying at home, doing the things we have always told people to do to prevent the spread of infectious disease. >> when are we going to have a website that was advertised where we can get a test, where t we can find out about antibodies. it seems clear we're never really opening the economy fully until we're able to gps this virus. where are we? >> 1.7 million tests. that's about 1 in 200 americans. that's where south korea was with their initial testing surge. we're seeing testing ramp up, and we know it's never enough tests fast enough, but i feel confident that within the next two to four weeks, we're going to be where we want to be to be

able to do adequate surveillance and understand where the disease is, where it's high and low, and where -- and to have appropriate health recommendations. what does reopening look like? we want to make sure we're l seeing cases go down for a goode one to two weeks in places. we want to make sure we have testing, but we want to make sure we have good public health infrastructure so when we identify a positive test, people can then follow up, isolate, follow up on their case contacts, and make sure a single case doesn't turn into ten, 100, 1,000 cases. >> do you think by the end of april, we'll be in a testing situation where we're actually doing surveillance rather than just trying to play catch-up? >> we are doing surveillance in many places. montana, for instance, actually has a higher testing rate than the average for the rest of the country. so we're doing surveillance in many places. i we're going to get the antibody ce testing which will give us more information and i talked to the admiral, the head of the testing task force, and he says he feels

within a month, we'll have antibody testing more widely available. again, 100,000 tests being done per day, 50,000 abbott tests coming online. testing is becoming more and more available, but it still doesn't replace the fact we want everybody to act as if they have covid-19 right now and protect your neighbor, protect your loved ones. >> very quickly, admiral, the president mused about a one-day reprieve for easter sunday.vibo i understand it from a, you know, hopeful scenario. would that be a public health mistake? >> the president is always hopeful. he's aspirational, and we're trying to give people the science. the science says right now, this palm sunday, and i'm a catholic, i would be getting ready for church right now, we need you to stay home. this is a hard week, it's going to test our resolve. the hardest week of our lives, but i'm confident based on the numbers in washington and california and italy and spain,

we can get through this. we will get through this. i know the american people will do the right thing and stay at home. >> surgeon general jerome adams, thanks very much. stay healthy.ow wngam stay clean, and i hope people do watch your video on how to make a mask. thanks for coming on. >> watch it. and stay home. if you go out, use one of these. thank you, chuck. >> all right. thank you, sir. >> joining me now are two governors who have taken different steps in the face of the coronavirus pandemic. it's governor jay inslee of washington state, the first state to be hit hard, and asa hutchinson, one of the few governors who has not issued a stay-at-home order. governor hutchinson, i want to start with you. you heard the surgeon general there. he's pleading, give him a week. he would prefer for all 30 days of this months. your response to the surgeon general? >> great comments by the surgeon general. in arkansas, we're doing everything that the surgeon general has outlined plus more.

for example, i applaud the recommendations on masks. yesterday, we issued guidelines that if you go out, social distance, first of all, but lais bring a mask with you in case you get in environments where you cannot have that six-feet spread. in arkansas, we have a targeted approach that is very strict. we have closed bars, restaurants, schools, some of our park lodges. we're emphasizing the social distancing. and we will do more as we need to. but let me give you an example of why the masks are so important, and by the way, we have had success in arkansas comparable to other states. in fact, beating and slowing the spread more thane some states that have actually had a stay-at-home order. but you have a stay-at-home order, tomorrow, 600,000 arkansans will still go to work. it's more important the message, do your social distancing. don't gather in groups of more

than ten people, and bring a mask with you. i'm going to follow that instruction. if i can't social distance, i want to have a mask on. we just had last night a breakout in one of our federal prisons here in arkansas that have ten inmates that tested positive and four guards. that's a federal facility. but stay-at-home doesn't help there. you have to have masks. our state prison is producing masks we can utilize in our state prison environment. those are some of the things we're doing. we'll do more as we need to, listening to our public health officials. >> all right. governor inslee, all week long, dr. birx has basically used washington and california as examples of trying to show the country, look, this can work. this social distancing can work. it's hard, but look at what's happened in washington and california. i know you said you're not out of the woods, but do you believs edubhave started to flatten thin gtonyi curve?ngwo >> yes, the evidence that dr. birx has pointed to repeatedly does demonstrate we have had some success flattening the curve. that has taken place because we acted relatively early.

we had a staged way of moving in forward. we're one of the most aggressive stay-at-home, stay healthy initiatives in the united states. and i think this has a reason to believe it's been demonstrably successful. and i'm glad we got on it relatively early while the president was saying that this was not a problem and that it was a hoax.no we were acting to save the lives of our citizens in a number of states, including california and washington state. it's pleasing to know that if leu act aggressively, and if yoa realize that even though you're looking okay today, it can bite you big time tomorrow, i think that's one of the wisdoms, i think it would be good to have a national stay-at-home order, and the reason is that even if washington gets on top of this fully, if another state doesn't, it can come back and come across our borders two months from now. this is important to have a national success. but i want to reiterate, we're a long ways away from being out of the woods.

we have not got down to anywhere close to where we need to be to declare victory of this an horrendous virus. >> what does -- governor inslee, i want to start with you on this first. have you started the conversation about what metrics you'll be looking for to start lifting some of these stay-in-place orders? >> yes. but those are just only to begin to think about this because we have been so intent on making sure this is a successful stay-at-home order.to a and so far, it has been. we have had huge compliance in our state. washingtonians are responding to the call, and we're really happy about that. but yes, we are looking at the metrics. fortunately, we're very fortunate here in washington, we have the university of washington labs, some of the best in the world. they give us the metrics we need. we watch these like daily or hourly, and we'll look at them on a mix.d there isn't one number. there are many numbers we'll look at to see when we can come out of this. i extended it a month just two r days ago to may 4th.ll so we're in a very vigorous, one

of the strongest, probably the , strongest in the nation, to mayr 4th at the moment. we have more work to do. >> governor hutchinson, there was the ceo of the university of arkansas for medical sciences, the medical center there, said the state lost an order of 500 ventilators. essentially got outbid by another state. should you be in that situation? should you be forced to be bidding against -- is this something the federal government needs to step in and handle? >> well, it's difficult. and we have had circumstances, we're trying to collect our ppe, our protective masks, and we have been outbid by another state after we had the order confirmed. so yes, that has been challenging for us. but we recognize that the federal government has said we're your backstop. h you have to get out there and compete, and it literally is a global jungle that we're competing in now.

>> you think that's the way it should be? you think that's the way it should be? look, i know idealogically and philosophically, where a lot of people believe in federalism, but in a moment like this, should this be the case, states competing? >> no, there needs to be -- i would like to see a better way,t but that's the reality in which we are. we put $75 million to do our procurement, and we'll work through this. the federal government has made it clear they are the backstop. and if we need more ventilatorst right now, they're going to be going to the hot spots, new york and california. but i have been assured when we get to the point, if we need ventilators in arkansas, they're going to be there. we're not waiting on that.il we're going out in the we marketplace, trying to buy ventilators, whether it should or shouldn't, that's where we are right now. let me come back, if i can, though, and i want to compliment governor inslee. we're watching his success, some of the things he's done there. but i would point out that even in a stay-at-home order that is one of the most stringent in washington state, you can still

go buy your marijuana. that's why it's important that we add to that social distancing and the masks that we're advocating if you can't social distance. and that's why every state, whether we're procuring or whether we are determining what's best in our state to reduce the spread, we have to be able to have some flexibility making those decisions. and that's what we're seeing. we're learning from each other. >> well, very quickly, governor hutchinson, i want to give governor inslee a chance to respond. but governor hutchinson, anthony fauci has begged basically for a national stay-at-home order. does his -- does his basically begging for this at all have an impact on you to change your mind about this? >> he's just looking at the nation as a whole and as a surgeon general said, this weekl is critical.t cid and we are doing everything that their guidelines say. they mentioned the masks. we're leaning forward even more in that regard. and so we're all pulling

together on this. but whenever you look at our state, i think dr. fauci would be very pleased with the fact that we're beating some of our other states in reducing the spread and the commitment that we have to working every day to accomplish that. e >> all right, and governor inslee, very quickly, is the relationship with the federal government getting better week by week? >> well, look, we had good et communications with the vice oo president, with the cdc.h those have been good. but this is ludicrous that we do not have a national effort in this. to say we're a backup. the surgeon general alluded to pearl harbor. could you imagine if franklin delano roosevelt said i'll be right behind you, connecticut. good luck building those paddle ships? we need manufacturing in the united states, as we started on december 8th, 1941. we need to nationally mobilize using the defense production aci so we can get these companies

instead of making cup holders, start making visors. start making test kits. we don't have enough test kits by far in my state or anywhere in the united states. so we governors, republicans and democrats, have been urging the president to do what he should, which is if he wants to be a war-time president, be a war-time president. show some leadership. mobilize industrial base in the united states. that what we need. >> governor jay inslee, democrat from washington state. governor asa hutchinson, republican from arkansas, thank you both for coming on, sharing your views. this is going to be a long fight here. good luck to both of you on the front lines there. >> when we come back, italy was the first european country hit hard by the coronavirus. i'm going to talk to italy's prime minister about what the united states can expect to see in the coming weeks. od b as we go to break, all morning we're going to try to show you uplifting scenes, beginning with firefighters cheering workers at new york presbyterian hospital.nn

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into your voice remote to bring the theater to you. welcome back. vice president mike pence said it last week, we have become the next italy. on march 4th, italy closed its schools and universities. on march 8th, most of northern italy was placed on lockdown, and one day later, the lockdown was extended to the entire country, something we have not done yet here. did it work? since its number of new cases peaked on march 21st, italy has seen an unsteady but a decline nonetheless of new cases. so what can we in the united states learn from italy's experience? joining me now is italy's prime minister, giuseppe conte. mr. prime minister, welcome to "meet the press." let me simply start by asking how you and your citizens and your own loved ones are handling all this? this has been a very trying time. i know you just lost a bodyguard

to this deadly virus. >> unfortunately, unfortunately, it was terrible news. but let me say one thing first. we are suffering very much. more than 15,000 italian lives lost to their dear loved ones, to our society, to our nation. it's a pain, and in these difficult times i can only say america, president trump wants more proven to be italy's loyal friends. i want to thank president trump who made us feel his support and presence. and i'm grateful to american people for this. about what is known today, i can say first of all, since the very beginning of the pandemic, italy has put public health first, and for this reason, we have adopted very strict measures that you mentioned. and adjusted them to the evolution of the infection. second, the political choices must be based on scientific

evidence. third, it is crucial to implement decisions with full transparency. our liberal democracy are built on the contact we have with our own people, and we owe to them, through transparency in the same way we provide them with safety and security. this is the italian model. >> do you believe given what we have seen, and it looks like you have flattened your curve, do you believe that you have flattened the curve because of these tough measures you have taken? or do your scientific experts believe the virus just might be running its course? >> in this moment, i cannot say when the lockdown will stop because we are following the suggestions of our scientists in the scientific community. but you have to consider that

italy has been the first country in europe that, of course, faced this pandemic. our response has not been perfect maybe, but we have acted the best of our knowledge. today, i see that our model is implemented and its validity as we're acknowledged by the w.h.o., and the results so far indicate that we are on the right path. therefore, the most important message to give to our citizens is stay home as much as possible. do not go out. and if you must leave your home, for example, to go to work or to bye food, always respect fellow people. we're asking our people a great

sacrifice. i'm aware of it, but it's the only way to defeat the pandemic together. the more we respect, the sooner we will get out. >> it sounds like there was a story in "the new york times" today that if with testing that you're hoping in your country that in order to reopen parts of the economy and reopening parts of the country, that you might be able to have, okay, if you have the antibody to the virus, you can work. and if you don't, you have to stay home. do you think that is in italy's future? >> we will work for that, but in this moment, we are all in the same battle.

we are fighting the same powerful and invisible enemy. the virus will spread again and our efforts to sacrifice would be in vain. for this reason, it's crucial the cooperation of our democracy and it's strategic international cooperation, and it's a strategic also that conflicts around the world should stop. italy strongly supports the appeal for a global cease-fire. it's time for all the parties in conflict to stop fighting each other and unite against an enemy which won't make a difference and we have killed them all. >> mr. prime minister, i know these next couple sundays in particular are going to be really difficult to think of these empty churches on palm sunday and on easter, it's going to be difficult. my condolences, again, to you, and stay the fight. keep going. and keep flattening that curve. thanks for coming on. >> thank you very much. if i can say, i'm really proud to serve my amazing country. thank you very much. >> thank you, mr. prime minister. when we come back, why

wasn't the government ready for this pandemic? the panel is next. >> and as we go to break, the reunion between my nbc news correspondent colleague janis mackey frayer and her 6-year-old son in china after being separated for seven weeks. e1

welcome back. the panelfá is joining us from welcome back. the panel is joining us from

their remote locations. we are practicing our social distancing. capitol hill hill correspondent kasie hunt, the former republican governor of north carolina, pat mccrory, and helene cooper, correspondent for "the new york times." i think we can best sum up the argument or debate this morning in particularly, who's in charge, and kasie hunt, i want to play the president on the cdc mask guidelines because in many ways the mixed messages he sent here sort of sums up the back and forth between the feds and the state. take a listen. >> the cdc is advising the use of nonmedical cloth face covering as an additional voluntary public health measure. so it's voluntary. you don't have to do it. i don't think i'm going to be doing it. i think wearing a face mask as i greet presidents, prime ministers, dictators, kings, queens, i don't know. somehow, i don't see it for myself. >> it's worth noting, by the way, the italian prime minister, before he started the interview, before he sat down, he actually was wearing a mask. all of his aides were wearing masks. we thought that was interesting there. kasie hunt, this seems to be

this push and pull here. the governors want the feds to take more control. and the president definitely doesn't want to do that. >> and even asa hutchinson in your conversation there, he's resisted that state-wide stay-at-home order, as you pointed out, but he also said in that interview, he was going to be wearing a mask and modeling the guidelines, the surgeon general just a minute earlier putting a face mask on, on camera. clearly, our public health officials believe that this is a message that they want to send to people in the strongest possible terms. and this is, of course, an evolution. we were initially all told this wasn't necessary unless you were sick, but at this point, what the president is saying, chuck, we're seeing in any polling that's being done, we're seeing it in how people are responding. more people are listening to what this president has to say than have at all yet in his presidency because we are all tuned in trying to figure out

how to make our way through this together. and so if he wants americans to wear masks, he needs to say that very directly, and we all know, especially those of us who are trying to raise children, you have to model the behavior yourself to convince others to follow. >> that's for sure. pat mccrory, as a former governor, as a former mayor, i know you're sympathetic to somebody above your pay grade trying to tell you how to run your state or run your city. i get that. but when is the point as a governor that you actually want the feds in charge? >> well, one thing i have been in the fog of war during hurricanes and tornadoes and winter storms where you're making life and death decisions while balancing the economy and also balancing the turf between not just the federal government and state government but if i think you examine every state, there's turf among the county health directors and the

governor. and as you get closer to the people and the elected officials are closer to the people, there can be varying opinions. in the fog of war, you have mixed data. you have mixed communication. and you have evolving opinions based upon that new data. that's contactually what's happening. the one thing i don't like that's happening is the blame game. you know, the washington governor mentioned pearl harbor. i think after pearl harbor occurred, the worst thing a governor could do is blame franklin roosevelt for pearl harbor. what you need to do is go, what do we need to do now? and be specific. and we all live in our lanes of responsibility, and some of those lanes overlap, and there are gray areas. this is not unusual in a fog of war. >> i'm just curious, though, governor, i want to follow up. i'm obsessed, i put that quote up for the surgeon general, the public health official from ohio, amy acton. are you surprised more politicians aren't erring on the side of caution. it seems if you're wrong about this, boy, is that a bad way to be wrong. if you're wrong and you have been overly alarmist, well, nobody extra has died. if you're wrong and you have underplayed, boy, you have a lot to answer for. >> i had a theme during our

crisis and hurricanes was be overprepared and hopefully be underwhelmed. and that i think should be the goal of every leader. there is this tremendous balance that we all have, and one thing about even the stay-at-home policy, i could say it almost discriminates against the blue-collar worker who is watching us do our job from long distance. the blue-collar worker can't stay at home to keep the manufacturing lines open of textile and rubber and cloth that we need in our hospitals right now, the delivery trucks, the grocery stores, the blue-collar worker is going, wait a minute, i don't get to stay at home. >> helene cooper, there's been a lot of chatter about the president ought to appoint, you know, ought to deputize, maybe it's a member of the joint chiefs, a general of maybe, you know, somebody of the status of a jim mattis, somebody like that, to basically become the

procurement czar here. >> there has been a lot of that. as you know, at the pentagon, the reason people are saying to do this, to appoint a general, is the pentagon, they specialize in planning. that's what they do all the time, and in a war-time situation. it's just been so fascinating, though, chuck, seeing the an go this and just how much we have appeared to lag by a good ten days to two weeks this virus with everything that we're doing. the fact that you have the administration, the white house, finally coming on and saying we should be wearing face masks is something that many, many health officials say should have happened a month ago, and the fact you still don't have the president onboard with that, i think, is hugely significant. i'm not sure which kings and queens he thinks are coming to the white house that he needs to be worried about greeting with a face mask on, but the very idea that president trump is talking about appearance, that it won't look good for him to be seen wearing a face mask at a time when you have thousands upon thousands of americans dying and

so the numbers are looking like they're about to go shockingly higher says a lot about leadership in a time of crisis. >> very quickly, kasie hunt, i noticed we have 6.6 unemployment claims this week, and it seems like that number made nancy pelosi and mitch mcconnell say, oh, we should agree on the next round of spending. this is coming soon, isn't it? >> nancy pelosi earlier this week, chuck, was ready to start talking about infrastructure projects, jobs bills, essentially, the next phase of this. it only took 24 to 36 hours for her to suddenly turn around and say, you know what, actually, we're still in the emergency relief phase of this. and i think you are going to see congress try to act as quickly as possible in that vein. >> yeah, and it almost will be like a refill the coffers of what was promised with the first round, which we're still trying to get out, the small business loans, unemployment. all week long, you'll see a lot of technical problems on that front. i hope folks are patient on there.

>> i have to leave it there. thank you guys for our shortened panel. >> coming up, author michael lewis on finding creative ways to fight the pandemic. >> first, the scene at jefferson hospital in philadelphia where health care workers had a message for all of us and they tried to do it with a smile. stick around. d a message for all of usxd and the tried to do it with a smile. stick around.

welcome back. data download time. so far, coronavirus hot spots have primarily been urban areas like new york city, where there's always an icu bed shortage. but access to those beds is likely to get even more limited as the pandemic spreads inland to more rural areas with older populations. let's take new york city as our base line. it's home to numerous top-rated hospitals, but there are still over 1,000 60-plus-year-old people for every one icu bed. the rest of the country would seem to be doing somewhat better with one icu bed for over 900 people. good news perhaps, but that's where the good news ends. check this out. only 47% of all u.s. counties have any icu beds at all. and only 29% of u.s. counties have ten or more. there are 536 counties in the united states where 30% of the population in those counties is over the age of 60, and of

those, only 23% have any icu beds at all. you see where this is going. in counties we call aging farmlands, the most remote counties in the country, the numbers are even more dire. there are 161 of those remote counties. in all 161 counties, there are only six icu beds total. up until now, we don't know how covid-19 spreads in very rural environments where vast spaces make social distancing easier or a way of life in some cases, but evens as most eyes have been on new york city, the virus has been spreading outside of the metro area. two weeks ago, there were fewer than 800 counties with one case. this week, there were 2300 counties with at least one case. when we come back, are there ways to fight the coronavirus that we're not yet thinking of? author michael lewis joins us next.

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welcome back. michael lewis has spent his career chronicling people who find creative ways to identify and solve problems. in his latest book, "the fifth risk," he essentially describes what happens when in his view, the trump administration dumbed down government too much to function properly. so is the trump administration prepared to take all of this on during this current crisis? michael lewis joins me now, social distancing from berkeley, california. welcome to "meet the press." long time, first time, as far as i'm concerned.

good to have you on. >> good to see you, chuck. >> let me just start with the premise of your book, which you were looking at the transition. and i say -- i want to connect some dots here. i'm going to put up a screen grab of all of the people who have been in charge of the department of homeland security in the trump administration. five different people. two have been senate-confirmed. three actings including the situation here. it feels as if, i know dhs wasn't a part of your book, but that amount -- is that the definition of the fifth risk here, sometimes, personnel? >> you know, the book, the starting point for the book is you really have to think about the federal government as this -- as a manager of portfolio of risks, right? and many are catastrophic and you don't know what you're going to have to deal with t but there are people in there who are dealing with it. and what caught my eye and the reason i wrote the book is we had this process to hand over the government. and it was actually by law the obama administration was required to spend a great deal of time preparing to hand the government over to whoever succeeded it. and obama took it really

seriously because bush had handed the government over so well to him, he thought. and trump, on his side, had built this enterprise of 500 people he'll roll into the department of homeland security, the department of agriculture, wherever, and he fired them the day after the election. so the transition never happened. that's the beginning of this whole story. the beginning of our response to the pandemic. the knowledge of how you dealt with, i don't know, say, an ebola outbreak was never really transferred to the trump administration. and i think that if you're going to -- when people look back and tell the story of this crisis, they'll start there. >> there's no doubt they will. look, i want to pivot a little bit. you just did a podcast and you noted we're going to learn a lot about our society during this pandemic that is probably going to surface problems we didn't know we needed to solve. what are a few that you're seeing now that you think we need to be keeping an eye on? >> are you talking about like

risks we should be terrified of? you know -- >> yes. >> well, look. this in some ways was not -- the fifth risk in my mind was the risk that you weren't really -- that you weren't really -- you didn't have top of mind. and i came to the idea because i walked into the department of energy and got the briefing from the chief risk officer that the trump administration had not bothered to get. i asked, like, what are the top five things you're worried about just in the department of energy. he said, look, there are a lot of really smart people dealing

with things like, one, preventing a nuclear weapon from going off when it shouldn't go off. two, preventing the electric grid from going down or coming under attack. three, north korea getting a weapon they actually deliver to the west coast. it was like one thing after another. and there were steps being taken to prevent these bad things from happening. now, the question is, across an administration that's being run by a person who is largely indifferent to it, to what extent is this portfolio of risks more likely to happen? and the thing that worried me and the thing that got me interested in writing the book in the first place, was like if something actually happens, i don't know what it is, what's going to happen, but when it happens, they're not going to be prepared to deal with it.

now we know what happened. so we're now in the land of second best solutions because we had someone who neglected the instrument, the tool for dealing with the crisis. >> look, we're going to end up having -- something will change in our society based on this. one of the things i have wondered about is we're learning who's essential. we're finding out the truck driver is a lot more essential than some of us, the person who stocks the shelves, a lot more essential. do you see a reckoning on the economic front that rights those wrongs in time? >> you know, the first thing that might come out of this is an appreciation of the federal government, of what it does. its basic job is to keep us safe. if we don't pay attention to how it's run, we will find ourselves in this situation all over again. so i think that's the big thing. i think that's the big thing that comes out. >> all right. michael lewis, i have to leave it there. also wish i had more time with you and i'll find a way to get more time with you down the road. thank you, and thank you to all of you who have been watching today. please continue to practice that social distancing. doing everything you can to keep your family and neighbors safe. the sooner we do it, the sooner we'll get through this. we'll be back next week because if it's sunday, it's "meet the press."

good morning. it's monday, april 6th. everybody, good to see you this morning. we are beginning with those ominous warnings from the nation's top health officials who say we are now entering some of the darkest days of this nation's history. the coordinator of the white house coronavirus task force predicts death around the new york, detroit and louisiana hot spots will all peak at the same time this week. now, while the u.s. surgeon general is comparing this moment to the worst attacks this country has ever seen, watch this. >> the next week is going to be our pearl harbor moment. it's going to be our 9/11