hello. i'm chris jansing. we are waiting for president

trump and the daily briefing on the coronavirus to start at any moment now. meantime, the president has been digging in his skmeels his ongoing feud with governors around the country over testing and other help from the federal government. the bipartisan frustration on full display today as governors pushed back against trump repeatedly blaming them for any problems they have with equipment or testing. the president arguing that states have everything they need. >> that's just delusional to be making statements like that. we have been fighting every day for ppe. and we have got some supplies now coming in. we have been fighting for testing. it's not -- it is not a straightforward test. we don't even have enough swabs believe it or not. >> i talk to governors on both sides of the aisle nearly every single day. to try to push this off as the governors have plenty of testing and they should just get to work on testing and somehow we aren't doing our job is absolutely

false. >> i could double, maybe triple testing in ohio virtually overnight if the fda would prioritize companies that are putting a slightly different formula together for the extraction reagent kit. >> you can't process all of the tests if you can't take the sample and protect and it move forward through testing. so while our capabilities are there, these important supplies are not. >> as trump continues to push for reopening the country there is a new nbc news "wall street journal" poll showing nearly 60% of voters are more concerned that relaxing the stay at home restrictions will lead to more deaths than they are the restriction also hurt the economy. as far as his battles with the governors go, some have approval ratings of 80% individually while his is stuck at 46%. and more than half of those polled don't trust what he says about the coronavirus. while the latest numbers show that close to at least 40,000

americans have now died from covid-19, out of a total of more than 750,000 cases, there is some good news. sources telling nbc news that congressional democrats and the white house are close to an interim coronavirus relief bill, meaning more money for the small business paycheck protection program and small business loans as well as hospitals. let's bring in our panel as we wait for our president. robert costa, kimberly atkins, adrian he will rod, and dr. amish adalja. good to have all of you here. robert i want to start with the major reporting in your paper that the president is likely to be asked about today, that more than a dozen u.s. researchers, physicians, and public health experts were actually working full-time at the world health organization when the coronavirus emerged late last

year, and they were transmitting realtime information to the trump administration. does that undercut the president's charge that the w.h.o.'s failure to communicate the extent of the threat is directly laid at their doorstep? >> the "washington post," and its latest reporting, reveals that the w.h.o. story is far more complicated than the trump white house is laying out. they have called for an investigation to cut off funds for the world health organization. but it is not an isolated group "the post" story explains how the cdc, in many instances, including with the coronavirus, has worked with the w.h.o. to try to coordinate different aspects of the response. so when the president attacked the w.h.o., he's not looking at the full story behind the scenes. >> meantime, kim birl, we are looking at all of these poll numbers. and one of the people behind this new set of nbc polls looks at the president's unchanged approval numbers and says this.

in every crisis, we go through this coming together phase. and then we come to the recrime nation phase. and says there will be tough sledding ahead for the president. if we are not in the recrime nation phase yet, you wonder what that looks like, don't you? what is ahead for this president when you look at these poll numbers? >> i think that is something that is concerning a lot of republicans. i talked to one republican strategist who put it this way. if -- and the actual situation is more complex than this. but if it looks as this is a tension between protecting the economy and protecting human lives, if it appears that the president is on the side of the economy at a time when we are seeing these numbers of coronavirus deaths peak and we are getting to a point in our nation where just about everybody knows someone with the virus, knows someone hospitalized and maybe have had a loved one who has died from this disease, and you see the president trying to prioritize

the economy over that, that's a really devastating dichotomy. and that's one that they are looking to avoid heading into this election. they have to find a way to make the president presidential in protecting not only the money but human lives. and those poll numbers are bearing out that people are far more turned about the human toll this virus right now than what impact it is having immediately on the economy. >> in fact, adrian, 52% -- this is one of the numbers that stood out in the nbc poll simply don't believe what he says about the coronavirus. you are a communications speaker. wh -- communications expert. what does it mean when more than half of the people you are supposed to lead don't trust your word? >> if you were working on a campaign, if you were working in this case in the white house and you see the president's -- your boss's numbers, in terms of trust numbers, knowing that over half of the american electorate does not trust you, does not

think you are doing a good job and cannot be trusted to manage a crisis such as this pandemic, it is very, very difficult to recover from that. you know, you can recover from a low approval ratings. you can recover from, you know, you can gain some traction in the polls. but if people lose trust in you, it is very, very difficult to regain that trust. so i think trump's campaign, and his aides in the white house are looking at those numbers. you know, with a lot of dismay. chris, we are seeing this play out in suburbs, too. we are seeing that he is losing support in the philly suburbs, in the harris county suburbs. some of those swing states and some of the states that are on the horizon of being a swing state such as texas. not a good place for trump to be in. again, we are at the tip of the iceberg of this pandemic. this is going to consume and dominate his entire campaign. so to see his numbers slip like this on trust in particular, i think that's very damaging for

him at this point. >> clearly, doctor, one of the problems for him is not only do many of the statements he make contradict what his experts are saying but they contradict what governors like in new york or new jersey are saying. for example, they are saying they cannot reopen their economies without wider testing. i don't know if you saw this estimate by researchers at harvard university. but it suggests that the u.s. as whole cannot safely reopen over the next month unless it conducts three times the number of coronavirus tests that it is currently administering. i mean, is that even possible? >> it is going to be very challenging. and this is something that's going to be different state by state and even con by county. there are some parts of the country right now that are probably okay when it comes to testing and reagents and hospital capacity. bull there are others like new york and new jersey who were the early hot spots that aren't. we are going to see sort of a patchwork of reopening until we get testing at the level it needs to be.

we need to be able to not worry about nasal swabs or reagents or any kind of shortages. we want to be able to test on clinical indications and not anything else. in many parts of the country that's sill not the case. >> robert you can really see and feel the frustration of the governors when they were talking about testing and some other things this morning on the morning shows. i mean, if the president is going to go after governors in general, he has a hill to climb. our poll today has governors approval rating in aggregate 3 points higher than trump's. it seems a risky business to say the least for the president, robert. >> in the governor dewine of ohio's comments earlier in your program he talked about his frustration with the food and drug administration. i sat down with dr. steven haughn in recent days, the commissioner of the fda to talk about how the fda has allowed some of these tests to be done

around the country and be used. but approval to say they have safe and efficacious hasn't been finalized for many of the tests. and it has left governors and business leaders in a different situation. because they know many tests are available n. terms of what is the right test, whether they can get to an antibody test, what reaches the threshold of comfort for people as they try to return to work -- all of those questions remain unanswered for many governors and business leaders. they are looking to the federal government, to the white house, specifically, to the fda for clarity as they encounter these challenges. >> so they are looking for charity, doctor, as the american people are looking for clarity. i mean when you listen for example, every day as i do to governor como's briefing, he said i know the question you want answers, when are we going back to normal, when are things going to open up again? then he will go back into testing into the science of it.

if there was one thing you wish you could get a clean clear answer on at this briefing doctor, what would it be? >> when will the testing be at the level that we have for other infectious diseases? when will doctors not have to worry about extraneous matters when they are trying to order a test? i think that's the key thing. because we want to be able to find these cases and isolate them. the only way we are going to be able to do that is to test. we want people and health care workers to be safe. for example, many hospitals may start testing patients before they go in for procedures to be sure they are not asymptomatically carrying the virus. to do that, we can't have constraints on tests. i am worried that some states are never going to get to that point without help. some states will get there. some states already are there. but it is not going to be the case in the hot spots that they are going to be there without federal help. >> that's part of the concern, right, whether these hot spots will emerge. so what can trump do, kimberly -- what he can do, i

guess, is he can sort of continue to ramp up the heat on governors. i mean there are places, stores in texas are going to be able to start selling merchandise with curbside service. some hospitals resuming non-essential surgeries. we have been seeing those pictures of lots of people on some beaches in florida returning, and to parks as well. but are you hearing anything in d.c., hearing anything in the white house, that there is nervousness that in this push to get things up and running again we are going to see these hot spots? we are going to see that places where we thought maybe we had already seen the apex, the curve was going down, that it is going to resurface? >> well, there is certainly that concern at the state and local levels from a lot of municipalities. and that the white house is not being responsive to that. look, i think the number one thing -- i think we are hearing this from this panel as well -- is the availablity of testing. nothing that the president wants to do in the plan that he laid

out in how to reopen the country in a step by step way can happen without the data that the testing can provide. and that is what local officials and governors have been saying from the start. they want to implement a program like that. but they can't do it without the data. and when it comes to not just obtaining the test but all of the materials. like we heard governors talking about, there is a supply chain issue. you have different governors negotiating with sometimes internationally trying to get these swabs, these reagents, these other parts, that it would be much easier for the federal government to set up a system for that. it seems that after the white house came under scrutiny and criticism early on for not implementing that sort of test asking promising that everyone would have a test and not delivering on it the president has chosen instead to pass it all off on the governors. the governors are saying they need assistance in that.

and that is where the standoff is. >> adrian, the president obviously does have his corps of supporters and people he has been back. hundreds of people turning out for example, to protest in austin texas, where the organizer was the info wars owner, conspiracy theorist alex jones. looking you have been in politics a long time, political communications a long time. bending the truth to fit your own narrative is nothing new. disinformation is nothing new. but now we are at a point, when we have a battle between truth and disinformation, that can potentially have life or death consequences, right? >> yeah. i mean, that's the concern that we are dealing with, chris, is that we have got -- you know, the virus does not know if you are a democrat or a republican. the virus does not care. the virus does not discriminate based on political affiliation. and what you are seeing now is this diss information war play

out. you are seeing as you mentioned info wars, another particular network that plays to trump's base. right-wing writers that are perpetuating this and trying to mobilize trump's base to basically say, everything is extreme as the coronavirus being a hoax to let us go back to work, give us our freedom back, we want out of our homes, we want to go back to work. let us out of this prison essentially. but that's not -- i mean, that's so irresponsible for the president to perpetuate. and it is obviously not the case. i mean what you are seeing play out here is donald trump is playing into a base strategy. he knows he has lost traction with independents. we saw some polls show a 20-point loss from the support of independents over the last three weeks largely based on the way he handled this pandemic combined with the fact that he simply doesn't have the numbers there to get elected without --

with only his base. which means he's got to run a base strategy and then he is also trying to suppress the vote. it is disturbing to see this because we are not talking about losing votes here, we are talking about losing lives. >> well, let's see. the president is coming out very shortly, we believe. he was scheduled at 15 minutes to the hour. the vice president is expected to be with him as well. we have seen his growing frustration and pushback over the last week or so as he has been the target of criticism. we will keep our panel. we will take a quick break and be back right after this. you are watching msnbc. hing abog multiple clouds for your business. when you've got public clouds, and private clouds, and hybrid clouds- things can get a bit cloudy for you. but now, there's the dell technologies cloud, powered by vmware. a single hub for a consistent operating experience across all your clouds.

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it's called unprepared. and it is a new ad from joe biden, going after president trump for his handling of the coronavirus crisis. trump never got a cdc team on the ground if china. and the travel ban he brags about? trump let in 40,000 travelers from china into america after he signed it. not exactly airtight. look around. 22 million americans are out of work. and we have more officially reported cases and deaths than any other country. donald trump left this country unprepared and unprotected. >> so that's among the first set of digital ads in battleground states for biden and the campaign's first major investment in targeted ads. joining me now, beth fouhy, of

nbc news, and adrian he will rod is back, former senior adviser to health care's presidential campaign. great to see you. beth, tell us more about the ad and theed bien campaign strategy here. >> well, we remember of course from the hillary clinton campaign versus president trump in 2016 chris that what president trump likes to do is tyke what is a per seesked weakness of his own and project it back onto his opponent. you remember the i'm not the puppet back and forth he launched at hillary clinton in the case of russia. in this, we learned that president trump is going to make china an issue against joe biden. the super pac that biden's campaign launched is powerful and includes obviously tons of footage that have come just in the last month and a half or so showing president trump complimenting president xi in china, complimenting his

response to the coronavirus, saying nice things generally speaking about how the chinese government was handleding the crisis. now he has a super pac on the other side supporting president trump going after joe biden saying he has been too soft on china. it is the strategy trying to press what is clearly going to be a liability for president trump in this case, that the lack of reaction, and lack of attention to coronavirus when it was clearly sweeping through china and instead trying to say that joe biden has a problem with china. joe biden of course does have relationships from his many years in the senate and as vice president with the chinese government. there is certainly some evidence that we can say that he has been supportive of firming up that relationship with china. but it is really hard for me to see how the trump campaign thinks that joe biden is going to be vulnerable on this issue in the same level of magnitude that president trump is. >> one of the things i think they look at, adrian, is that biden has this deficit of

attention. we are waiting for the briefing. the president gets an hour or two hours or sometimes more every day. axios put together an article how trump drives news cycles. seven times more interactions on facebook and twitter in the last month. twitter, facebook, instagram followings dwarf trumps -- trump dwarves his. and he was mentioned three times as much on cable news. how does he fight that? joe biden is being smart right now. on one hand he is not currently in an elected office. he doesn't have current control over what is happening besides coming out several times a week in interviews and trying to have some sort of influence in terms of how he would handle it if he were in office. i think owe vrtly trying to insert himself right now is not productive. and we are seeing trumps numbers tank. again, he's holding steady with his base, chris, the poll you

mentioned earlier today, the nbc "wall street journal" poll indicates that. but he is losing ground among the independent and swing voters he has to win in order to get reelected as president of the united states. joe biden in the meantime gets to come out, you know, do selected interviews, have a controlled message, demonstrate leadership, talk about how he would do things differently than the president. also remind people of course that he helped manage the h1n1 pandemic and the ebola virus outbreak when he was vice president. so he's able to remind folks of that but also not trying to overly insert himself. governor cuomo has done an outstanding of being the opposite voice of trump, if you will. and he is in leadership. he is in elected office. vice president biden is not. he is letting cuomo take the mantle there, he is sitting back. he is raising money. he is gathering his campaign getting organized for the final

stretch, which will hit this summer. and again, i think if he was trying to get out there every single day and insert himself into this mess it would do more damage. he's doing exactly what i would be doing if i was advising his campaign right now. >> adrian he will rod, beth fouhy, great to have both of you. thank you so much. we have seen the blue door open. a few people have come in. it look like the briefing is going to get under way in a short period of time. let's send it to wash. andrea mitchell is standing by. hello andrea. >> as president trump is preparing the come in today with vice president pence who yesterday was traveling to colorado for the air force abd me commencement, the controversy over testing is heating u. we saw on all the sunday talk shows governors saying, including republican governors larry hogan, the republican governor of maryland, the head of the governor's association nationally saying we don't have enough testing. we don't have enough components for the testing that governors on their own cannot do this

without a federal program and of course the vice president saying to chuck todd on meet the press that there is sufficient testing for the governors for all the states to get the first phase of reopening going. monica, i may have to interrupt you if the president walks into the room. but as you know this is heating up as there is a potential agreement, a tentative agreement on most of the components on this new, $470 billion by my count according to nbc's reporting which includes another $310 billion for the paycheck protection program as well as some money for hospitals, but not the money for food stamps, not the money for states that the democrats have been trying to get as well. >> exactly, andrea. this briefing is now an hour and a half nearly delayed. that may be part of the reason as the final details continue to be hashed out and it seems they are getting closer and closer to

a deal. but a lot of questions for the president to answer not just on that, on the subject of testing, as you raised. we say there in the room the fda commissioner, the cms administrator. it is possible they will be taking a lot more questions on testing as they have received a lot of bipartisan criticism today and specifically questions of why isn't the fda helping with matters of reagents for example, for these testing kits? it is not just a matter of the actual tests. it is a question of swabs as you heard there from republican governor dewine of ohio. it is a question of why isn't there more on the reagent front that can be done by the federal government. but the president has been insistent today that it is not his responsibility, that he really wants the stakes the take charge on this issue. so you can expect a lot of questions on that. and then absolutely questions on new reporting from the "washington post" about the world health organization and some cdc/u.s. officials who were detailed and embedded into that late last year and who were

conveying really time information on the coronavirus pandemic to officials here at the white house. it is unclear exactly how high up that went. and hhs tonight is calling some of that reporting misleading. but certainly questions raised because the president has been quick to blame china and he wants to make sure that that is something that stays a the forefront of all of these briefings. and now here's the president. >> here comes the president. we are continuing to negotiate with the democrats to get our great workers and small businesses all over the country taken care of. i think we are getting close to a deal. it could happen. it could happen. a lot of good work has been going on. we could have an answer tomorrow. we are going to see what -- what exactly does take place. we are also looking at helping our hospitals and our rural hospitals who have been hurt very badly. the rural hospitals for a long time have not been treated properly. we are looking to help them, and

beyond. so we are looking at hospitals also as part of the package. we will see how that all comes out. but a lot of good things are happening. some very good negotiations. i just got off the phone with the secretary of the treasury. and we have some very good negotiations going on right now. and i think you are going to have a nice answer tomorrow. but we will see. america continues to make steady progress in our war against the virus. as of today, we have tested 4.18 million americans. that's a record anywhere in the world. the united states has now conducted more total tests than all of the following nations combined -- france, the united kingdom, south korea, japan, singapore, india, austria -- australia, sweden and canada. and our testing is expanding very rapidly, by millions and millions of people. so we've -- we've done more

testing than all of these countries combined. france, united kingdom, japan, singapore, australia, sweden and canada. that's something, right? we are doing a great job. we're -- we are -- this team is an incredible team. and that includes army corps of engineers, our military people, our admirals, our generals. got one of our great admirals here. he has done an incredible job. you haven't slept too much in the last two months either. look at him. somebody said the me, president, you look tired. i said i should be tired. we should all be tired. but we have to win, right? >> yes, sir. >> tomorrow the vice president will lead a call with our nation's governors from fema headquarters, mike? >> yes, sir. >> to review what more they can do and do together to develop locally tailored testing strategies working very hard

with governors now on testing. we want to help them out. before the call we will send them a full list of all of the large laboratory machines in the states -- they have a lot of machinery in the states. some they are aware of, they are there, really high quality machines and the potential capacity of their machines if they are fully utilized. a couple of them didn't know they could be utilized in a different manner. they were only up to 10% and they could go up to 90% more. many governors are relying on their state laboratories rather than the full capacity available to them. for example, quest and lab corps, the commercial laboratories, mastive laboratories that can handle a lot more than they're being sent. a few days ago it was at 30%. they are only at 30% capacity now. i don't know, probably the same. but they have a lot of capacity. in addition, academic laboratories, big research labs.

there is tremendous capacity out there. and some of then want the fast -- you know, the instant abbott machine which just came about due to the research during this little short period of time. and it is very quick, but these labs can do them very quickly also. and they are massive. they can handle much more -- much more than the machine, the small machine, can handle. we continue to procure millions of swabs, test collectors. i have something here. just happen to have a swab. looks innocent. not very complicated. anybody like to see what it looks like? should i open it? >> yes, please. >> open it up? i will. i will. this is what it's about. right? is it -- does it reminds you of something? reminds you of this, right? one is a swab. one is a q-tip.

it is actually different. it is very sophisticated, actually. but it is a little bit like -- so this is the swab. and we have ordered a lot of them. they have a lot of them. some of them -- some of the states, they were shipped to states and the states don't know where they are. and -- but that's it. why don't we give this to karen. perhaps she will take an extra test. right? but this is a big deal. and we are working on it. and we are working with the companies. a and i think in the end we are going to have a tremendous -- a tremendous success. nobody is close to us. no country is close to us. in fact, and i appreciate it very much, the "wall street journal" wrote a fantastic piece. a highly respected gentleman, christopher demuth.

this piece was in the "wall street journal" weekend edition. trump rewrites the book on emergencies. that's what's happened, too. and we -- just read one paragraph. he has given pride of place to federalism and private enterprise laweding the patriotism and proficiency of our fantastic governors and mayors. meaning i do call them fantastic when it is appropriate. and our incredible business leaders and genius companies. i guess i have probably used those terms, too, when they are doing a good job. when they are not doing a good job i don't use those terms. toic doctors and nurses and order lease and tremendous truckers. they have all done good jobs, by shouting out many of them by name and documenting their deeds on a fully daily basis, he has vivified the american way in action. once it was refluktantly aroused. it was hard to get it aroused. and it is hard to get it

aroused. but we got it aroused. when asked why he has not issued orders for nationwide home and business lockdowns he has emphasized that the intensity of the epidemic varies widely and is best met by calibrated state and local government. and added importantly that such steps would conflict with the constitution. but very importantly, he's just a very respected gentleman. to see this was a very nice feeling. not for me necessarily, but for all the people that have worked with us. i mean, they have -- they have worked so hard. and we have developed tests that are so fantastic. we've -- we've come up with things that nobody had ever heard of. and we did it during, during this pandemic. we did it under pressure. it is called reaction under pressure. it is pretty amazing what our people have done. that includes all of our military people, and our cdc.

i -- just about everybody you can imagine, including tony and deborah. and they have worked long hours, as nobody is getting a lot of sleep. we are close to finalizing -- i want to thank the writer, christopher, of this article. that's a great article. that was frankly, the least of it, what i read. it was a great article. we appreciate it. we are close to finalizing a second partnership through which a u.s. manufacturer would convert its existing plant to produce over 10 million additional swabs per month. and we should be ready to announce this in a very short period of time. we also are going to be using, and we are preparing to use the defense production act to increase swab production in one u.s. facility by over 20 million additional swabs per month. we've had a little difficulty with one, so we are going to call in, as we have in the past, as you know, we are calling in the defense production act.

and we will be getting swabs very easily. swabs are easy. ventilators are hard. ventilators are a big deal. and we are now the king of ventilators. we have so many ventilators. you know, i said nobody that need adveed ed advened ventila turned down. amazing. we are working with the team at oak ridge national laboratory to use injection molding capacity to produce over 10 million collection tubes per week. tremendous numbers. in the meantime the supply chain and the logistics task force continues to surge testing and needed supplies all throughout america. mike's team and the task force, they just met. they have been meeting virtually every day. and it is a great team, right? it is a great team. they have been doing a great job, mike. you have been doing a great job.

many governors are doing this incredible work and they are working with us very closely on testing and working in their states. again, it should be a local thing because it is point -- it is all of these points within a state. but we are helping them a lot. and we want to help them a lot. we are going to help them more than a lot, actually, when you think about it, with what we have done. think of it. we have done more than all of those countries combined. we are encouraging them to share their successful strategies with other governors. some of the governors are doing a better job than others. the robust capacity that we have brought on line will empower governors to deploy sophisticated strategies so they can safely reopen their states. some people believe in testing very strongly. and other people believe it in less strongly, but, still, it is a very good thing to have, i think we can say that. some people believe it in like they can't exist without testing. and other people don't believe in it nearly as much. they can see how they are doing,

and they feel how they are doing. and they have been pretty vocal about that. i think you know pretty much who i am talking about. but i believe if they want it, we should give it to them and get it for them and work with them. you must remember that the governors wanted to have total control over the opening of their states. but now they want to have us, the federal government, do the testing. again, testing is local. you can't have it both ways. testing is a local thing. and it is very important. it is great. but it is a local thing. and we are going to get -- we are going to get it done to a level in a very short period of time because all of these -- all of the swabs are coming in. all of the necessary materials. a lot of them, as i said are already there but a lot of people don't know that yet. but we will be doing testing at a level. already we are doing testing at a level nobody has ever done

before. but we will be doing testing at a level that the biggest tester in the world will be very happy very soon. it is. it is very much like ventilators. you don't haerp the word mentioned. and that's much tougher. much tougher, when you have to build these machines. we have built thousands of machines. we'll more than help the governors. and we will make sure that everything goes well just like it did with ventilators, frankly like it did with face masks on a much easier subject, face masks. again, everything is easier than a ventilator. ventilators are tough. i spoke yesterday with the president of mexico and of various other countries. we are going to be helping with haven't will iters. we have tremendous numbers of ventilators. governor cuomo is going to be sending up to massachusetts some of the excess vent will iters that we were able to get. that's great. i think that's a great thing. the number of new hospital

admissions is also significantly down. when you look at these numbers, it is a good thing to see. other than the fact that we also know how people have been ravaged by this curse, by this horrible scourge, plague, call it -- it's got many different names in many of the hot spots including a 50% decline over a nine day period in new york city a. fantastic decline, a beautiful thing to see after going through the opposite. we continue to see improvement with declining trajectory of cases in seattle, detroit, new orleans, indianapolis, and houston metro areas. more evidence that our aggressive strategy is working. and i thank the american people for their selfless doe investigation. the american people have done a hell of a job. we are saving downless lives. again i will say it.

i always wanted to say can you leave it open? nobody ever heard of anything like this. not since 1917, 100 years ago, has anything like this happen. and in those days they had no real communication, they couldn't say go inside. people just died, almost 100 million people. it is reported. it is tough. so the american people, what they have done is -- incredible. they have learned a lot. you know? and you see people picketing a little bit, they want to get out and the get on with their lives. that's good. but they have learned a lot. they have learned a lot about distancing. even now, until this thing totally goes away. they have learned about the washing their hands and all of the different things that we have been talking about ad nauseam for so long. and they get it. they get it. in some places the governors are ready to go. in other places they can't go yet. and they won't go. they have to have it safe. i want it to be safe, too. it has to be safe. again, i have to say this, i

can't emphasize it strongly enough. i am probably going to show you charts of some of the countries that are really having trouble. and one in particular is having a massive problem where they said let's go, we are just going to keep going. the lines that we are famous for now, somer flat, and some are up. this is like a rocket ship, this country is -- and they didn't -- they decided let's go and let's wing it. you know, they thought it was okay. but it's -- it's a problem. it's a big problem. there is one in particular that everybody thinks did it but the people are staying in. okay? the head of a country doesn't have to say stay in. these people are smart people. they know what's going on. they see what's going on they don't have to say -- they can say they are not doing that, but the people are staying inside. there are not a lot of people outside sitting at saf as

despite what the mode of a country is. but if you look at europe, most countries have done this. a couple tried not to. italy tried not to. spain tried not to, they went that way. france tried not to. nobody wants to do this. it is a brutal step. we are going to close down your country. who ever heard of a thing like this? but we would have had millions of people die if we didn't do this. millions of people. and i believe that, mike. i think in looking at things that we have been looking at over the last couple of days, i think -- and really, over the last couple of weeks, from the time we did it, shortly thereafter, i said we made the right decision in closing down. made the right decision on borders. banning people coming in from china, banning ultimately coming in from europe. but we would have had millions of deaths instead of it looks like we will be at about a 60,000 mark, which is 40,000 less than the lowest number

thought of. so this isn't a case where people say we would have had that number. it is similar to a flu. it is not similar to a flu at all. if we hadn't done anything. a flu is 35. it goes from 27, 35, 40, 50 sometimes. it is over a long period of time. much different. it is even a much different death, to be honest, a much different death. this is violent. cms is finalizing new guidelines for doctors and patients the resume elective surgeries. that's a big thing. a lot of hospitals were closed. they couldn't do any elective surgeries. they will be able to start doing that. procedures and medical care that needs to be done in person as long as the rate of infections remains low in a community, we want patients to be able to go to their doctors, get clinically tested, and have work done, surgeries, receive treatment for

coronavirusa conditions and resume preventive care. we will be allowing that to happen very soon. we have no capacity in the hospitals with what happened with the plague. we had no capacity to do it. if your doctor believes you need a treatment in person, you can get a treatment now. you can and should get a treatment now. we are asking that health care facilities have plans in place to keep patients safe during their visit. some places like new york, new jersey, where they really got hit hard, it is going to be a little bit tougher. they have done a great job, but they really were a center. i mean, they were a center. i was watching that. it was incredible. but now they are -- they are leveling off, and i think they will be coming down very soon. administrator verma will be telling you more about it. mike is going to say a few words. sima will then speak, tell you more about that. my administration continues to

execute our massive military operations to supply our hospitals with equipment they need and beds, if necessary. but it looks like we are totally covered on beds. we have plenty of beds. it is highly unlikely. that would be bad news if we needed more beds. but it looks like it is going just the opposite direction. i want to thank governor cuomo, the relationship there, for this whole thing. we are building hospitals. it was very good. we built a little bit more than we needed. that's good, as opposed to building a little bit less. that's not good. but he's worked very well with us. the governor of louisiana has been great on the bed -- on the whole situation with the beds. frankly, the governor of michigan was very good with us on -- on beds. you know, it is a complex subject. you need buildings, or you have to do tents, or you have to do a lot of different things, a lot of different ways. but the army corps of engineers

was fantastic. they were fantastic. florida, likewise. governor de santis. and i could name probably six other locations. i tell you, one -- california was fantastic. he was really good. he was really good. and i appreciate the fact that he -- he said what he wanted to say and he wasn't letting the press force him into saying something he didn't want to say. i appreciate it very much, the governor of california. he really -- he worked very hard. we worked together. he worked very hard. the federal government is currently procuring more than 100,000 ventilators threw new production or purchases with thousands already delivered. we delivered thousands of brand-new ventilators all throughout the country. new york would be i guess the biggest user. and they are now taking some of their excess ventilators, which

is great, and they are sending them up to massachusetts. i think 400. and that's a great thing. our total supply of ventilators continues to exceed by a lot total expected demand. governor cuomo said today that no one who need advent lator was denied a ventilator. that's a beautiful statement, and i appreciate it. all governors are in that same position. we do have a clip that i thought would be appropriate to put up today. it will take two minutes. and i think you will find it interesting. but we appreciate it. and let's see if we can do that. you will turn out the lights and we will see if we can do that. thank you. >> what the federal government did working with the states as i just said was phenomenal -- we bent the curve. we flattened. >> he is a good-looking guy.

>> government facilitates people's actions. we had to double the hospital capacity in new york state. that's what all the experts said. the president brought in the th corps of engineers, they built 2,500 beds at javits. it was a phenomenal accomplishment. close to 1,000 people have gone through javits. luckily we didn't need the 2,500 beds, but all the projections said we did need it. and more, by the way. so these were just extraordinary efforts and acts of mobilization. and the federal government stepped up and was a great partner, and i'm the first one to say it. we needed help, and they were there. state and local governments were fantastic. the hospital was fantastic. new york was fantastic. and that is an undeniable fact. just look at what they said was

going to happen. cdc, coronavirus task force, cornell, mackenzie, all of them. they had a lineup here and the actual line is down here. what do you owe the variance to? heroic efforts on behalf of people as facilitated by government, federal and state. >> they had something else. are they finished with that? they left out the good part. great job, fellas. >> what was the good part? >> they did a better job on ventilators. no, andrew had something nice to say. we won't go through that. but he really -- it was really a good statement. do you want to put the rest of it up or do you not have it? i just think it's so good because it's bipartisan. you know, this is not about

democrats, republicans. this is about a thing that hit our country the likes of which has never happened to us before. wars, civil war, sure, but first world war, the second world war, they're not fought in this country. this is being fought in this country. it's being fought in 184 countries all over the world. it's terrible. but i want to thank andrew, governor cuomo for the statement. if you go a little bit further, it was even far beyond even that, so it was good. do you remember? huh? >> i have to work on getting the first part. >> whatever. he said some really good things. and it makes people feel good. actually, "wall street journal," christopher was saying, i want to make people feel good, too. when they're doing a good job, i

want to make people feel good. the admiral has worked so hard. mike has worked so hard. it was on this morning. it's a little longer clip than that. but you'll see it was really a very nice thing that he said. and people appreciate that because they've done a great job. the federal government has done a great job with all of it. the swabs are easy. they're coming by tens of millions. you'll have so many swabs you won't know what to do with them. that's easy. so they'll all, they'll all be there. a lot of them are there already. they're learning about their testing capacity they didn't know about that we have in the various labs, including academic, you have to remember. you have a lot of these big colleges that have labs that are totally ready to help. but i want to thank the dynamic

ventilator reserve because what they've done is incredible. it's capital d.v.r., by the way, innovative public/private partnership. we're gaining access up to additional ventilators in hospitals that can be redeployed quickly to areas with the greatest need when they're not in use. and we right now have almost 10,000 in our reserve. we've been able to giveaway thousands like we helped andrew or we helped phil in new jersey, doing a great job. andrew will tell you that, too. they have a very good relationship working together and working with us. but we have -- now we're back up to almost 10,000. and this is after giving away tens of thousands of ventilators. and we're going to fill up the reserves the states. we're going to work with them so in case this happens again -- but we're also going to help other countries.

i was telling you the president of mexico, we're going to be sending a pretty large quantity be to mexico. they very much need them, and to other countries that need them. we've had about six calls of other countries. they need them. it's hard to get done. our companies stepped up and they did an incredible job. some of them were automobile companies and they take an assembly line and they say, guess what, we're making ventilators now for a while. but because of the historic steps that we've taken, i remain confident that every american who needs any of this equipment, any of the things we're talking about, has it now or will shortly after it. through the project air bridge, we've completed 64 flights carrying over 64 million pieces of personal protective equipment such as gloves, gowns and other medical gear, with 50 more flights scheduled in the very near future. the team doing that is an incredible team of military

people and young geniuses. some are older geniuses, but mostly younger geniuses, i think i can say. some are people that made vast amounts of money in silicon valley, you know. these are very smart people. the job they've done is incredible. i said, where do you come from? i sold my company, sir. how much did you get? i think he said $700 million. i said, that's good. you want to work for the government? no, i want to help our country, sir. and it's tremendous brain power. it's a beautiful thing to see. young incredible people that love this country and they work with the military. you would say they're pretty smart, right? >> yes, sir. >> they're in the upper scales of i.q. >> yes, sir. >> they were the upper. they were the top scale, i'll tell you and they're great people. but fema is working to commit another $384 million to produce another 64 million gowns for health care. these are the highest quality

where they're very safe. when you put them on, they're safe. very important, the quality. the gown is very important. people in different places, different countries, they're wearing gowns with cuts in them. these are very safe. i want to thank america's textile manufacturers for their partnership in this remarkable undertaking. two u.s. companies, hanes and standard textile are contracted to produce 5 million gowns by the end of the month. that's really moving. that's really moving. two great companies. you know the companies. another great american company, honeywell, recently began manufacturing n95 masks in rhode island where they converted a factory in less than five weeks instead of the nine months it was normally expected to take. so they've already done it and they did it so rapidly. five weeks instead of nine months. it's amazing, the spirit of this country. it's really about the spirit of the country.

we said do it, do it fast. but they did it -- and this was a major conversion, too. this was a different world. honeywell is hiring more than 1,000 american workers to produce 20 million masks a month. 20 million masks a month. thanks to the defense production act we'll be receiving another 40 million masks over the next few weeks. i also want to thank 3m because they stepped up. we had a dispute at the beginning, but that got worked out quickly. they've been doing a great job, 3m, they really have been. i want to thank their great c.e.o. we had a little skirmish, but it worked out well. and they're doing a lot of work right now on masks and other things. this production is in addition to the 55 million n95 masks my administration has already distributed. plus we ordered and it's coming in soon, 500 million masks. you would think, what are you going to do with them? they get used rapidly.

in addition to that, as you know, we sterilize masks now. great company in ohio recommended by the governor of ohio strongly, and it's doing very well. and they're sterilizing the masks. a lot of masks can be sterilized up to 20 times. that's like buying 20 masks. i always wondered why aren't they sterilizing these masks. some of them are sophisticated masks. some of them you captain because of the material, others you can. we have two companies that do this. one company i know very well in ohio, and they're doing a great job. so they're sterilizing masks up to 20 times you can sterilize a certain type of mask. to these numbers in perspective, to put them in per speculative, they use an estimated 25 million masks in a typical year. in a typical year, 25 million. that means we secured four times

n95 masks than we would during a typical year. over a matter of a couple of weeks, we had more masks than we would do in a year. think of that, over a couple of weeks. moreover, we're bringing supply chains back home and we've learned a lot about supply chains. we've learned are that it's nice to make things in the u.s. i said that a long time. one of the reasons i ran for office, we started making things everywhere but here. if one thing comes out of this, more than anything else, it's that we should make product in the united states. and these supply chains, they sound wonderful. but if one country has a problem, the whole chain is ruined. i've been saying did for a long time. i ran partially on that. i ran partially on that. i ran strongly against china, and then we made a great trade deal where they