global pandemic. this hour we'll be digging into the past year and how we got here, tracing the pandemic has it unfolded from a misunderstood disease overseas to entirely altering the course of everyday life in america, with a special focus on those working the front lines under unimaginable circumstances. we'll also tell the true tale of how the failed leadership of the former president turned a crisis into a catastrophe and then into an american tragedy. as we enter year two of the covid-19 pandemic, our current commander in chief, president joe biden, is showing us what the art of the deal can really look like, brokering an agreement for merck to aid johnson & johnson in production of vaccine and by securing passage in the senate of his massive covid-19 relief package. yet finding our way out of the pandemic continues to be made more difficult by those among us who insist on not learning from history, who are once again prematurely stopping safely restrictions. all these states are ending

their mask mandates. all of them are led by republican governors. and this was the scene yesterday at idaho's state capitol. apparently a family burning masks in a barrel and standing around inhaling the fumes. joining me now in dallas, texas, morgan chesky. good morning, morgan. we have not seen any video of anybody burning masks in texas but you've been on the ground talking to texans about their view of the governor there removing the mask mandates. what are you learning? >> reporter: ali, i'm having trouble a little bit hearing here so bear with me. here in texas it's been an interesting past several days. since texas governor greg abbott made that announcement, we do know that a lot of people are saying it's been mixed messages. they have heard the governor say that the mask mandate is ending on wednesday, that businesses can open to 100% capacity but they're also hearing from mayors and local leaders that say, please, continue to mask up, continue to practice these covid

protocols that can keep everyone safe. we're here in dallas' deep ellum district, an incredibly popular area. we were out here talking to some of the business owners and people who come out here to just relax on a weekend. not a whole lot of masks but we did see people at least abiding by the rules when they saw that sign up on the outside of the door. when i spoke to business owners and said how are you going to figure out your own solution here, are you going to listen to governor greg abbott and open everything up to 100% or are you going to do a hybrid version of that, that was really kind of what we heard more than anything. i want you to hear what one business owner who owns a cider brewery had to say when asked about this big change happening on wednesday. >> definitely excited about the reopening. i'm a little concerned that people are going to treat it as a free-for-all and have masks around their chin like i do or no masks at all. i'm a little worried that people

might start walking into our business thinking that it's a mask-free zone so we put signage up that you saw. it says you still have to wear masks, still be safe. >> reporter: and that's really the sentiment we've heard from folks here in texas. now, down in austin, i spoke to one restaurant owner who is not opening his place of business at all. the reason being he's not going to do that until every single one of his employees can be vaccinated because he says it is simply too up safe an environment to put his staff in close proximity with customers who may now feel somewhat emboldened to go mask-free following the governor's recent order. >> morgan, thanks for your reporting. morgan chesky for us in dallas, texas. these past 12 months have taken a toll on all of us but the hardest hit may have been the many men and women working on the front lines in hospitals across the globe. they have seen it all. to that end i wanted to check in with a few of the country's bravest to see how they're

holding up a year later. six staff members held a conversation with me. they ranged from doctors and nurses to security and more. here's some of what we discussed. >> when i first heard about the coronavirus, i got anxiety, i started feeling nervous because i wasn't sure, and for the first week i actually did not sleep because my concern is how am i going to make sure our patients are safe and how do i make sure our employees are also safe. >> you handle environmental services here so you're at the full front end of this thing. you're the first people that had to make sure things were clean and stuff was in supply. >> yes, and it was very challenging. it was very challenging. i describe it as if you're in the ocean and you're swimming. the first wave hits you and then it's just wave after wave. it's hard for you to keep your head above water. >> actually in the first week, i was -- i was okay.

i think i thought that we would get through it. i didn't think it would be how it was and how it happened. one of my universities was one of the first first covid units in the hospital and we were the first to swab patients. eventually it trickled in that as rochelle said, it was like the ocean. it just kept coming, the waves just kept coming and the deaths just kept coming. there were times when you've seen in the news that there were nurses at the patients' deathbeds. i was one of them that were there holding their hands singing to them because their loved ones weren't there. it was terrifying but i also saw the best in humanity. >> when this all started out, it was a feeling of unreal. you think to yourself as a physician, you just get into this auto pilot mode where you just come into working thinking that maybe one week, two weeks, everything will disappear and everything will be fine.

you know, you carry on with that. what you're trained to do, come in, help patients, you tell yourself you protect yourself, you do the right things, you're going to be safe. but at a time when you come in to get a sign out from your colleagues and you begin to see family and names on your list, you see a co-worker has been admitted to the icu, you see your attending physicians being intubated in the icu, then you sit back and you tell yourself, you know, you're just a human being. you begin to realize that you could be one of them. >> i was actually in the e.r., and one of our nursing administrators came downstairs and she said i need everyone inside the ambulance bay. and she just reminded everyone. she said this is what we do. this is what you went to school for. this is what we're going to do now. we're going to get back into these rooms and help as many people as we can. side. but at that moment i was like i'm all in.

i'm all in on whatever you want me to do. if it's in my capability, i'm going to be here to help any department. i went from assisting in the morgue to basically running the morgue with a bunch of my fellow officers. the things that you had to see down there are things that are sketched into your mind and into your hands forever. >> did you struggle with sort of mental health this last year? were there days when you found it to hard to cope? >> i found the energy within me to get up and come to work, because i know there was people depending on me and there was people in the hospital that was needing care. i just didn't give up, i had to keep on pushing no matter what because i was helping somebody in need of comfort and care. >> as a physician, you put your patients first. you looked at your colleagues. you know, we heard a lot of background talk like, well, this is what you all signed up for in

health care, right? this is not what we signed up for. we didn't sign up to die, you know. and when we saw people getting sick, and the virus is so evil because it's random. to lose somebody that their life's work is taking care of patients and healing them and to know that that's how they died. and you still had people that didn't believe it. it was unbelievable, to look outside and see the morgue trucks. this is not made up, it looked like a movie. >> in 2014, fresh out of med school, the ebola virus hit us back home in nigeria. it took me back in time. the fear that i had at the time, you know, i had that fear again. the only way that we helped ourselves as a residency, we came together as a group and supported each other. we talked about it, we identified people that needed to stay home, needed to take a break so we supported ourselves

and that was just a major way we coped. i don't know what i would have done without them. >> just thinking about them, it was just so, so hard because you do get used to that support every single day and you don't realize how much you need it until it's gone. and we're supposed to be so strong because we have to. i mean why would a patient want a nurse or a doctor or anyone here at the hospital who's crying in front of you all the time or who can't deal with what's going on? i'm still scared. i'm still traumatized from a year ago. >> if you can visualize this area and just being by yourself, just one guy, and there's no place for you to go because you're surrounded by body bags. not knowing, you know, where i'm going to store everyone. i actually had to meet a lot of family members. there's one family member that

literally she sticks out in my mind the most. i saw her four times in one week. she lost a grandfather, she lost a brother, she lost her husband, and i think a nephew, all within one week. and i went home that day and i said to my wife, i said have you ever heard a war cry? i said i heard it today. her voice is embedded in my mind. >> what did you learn about yourself in the last year? >> i've learned my strength, i've learned compassion, i've learned empathy, and just making sure that i am putting myself out there as a resource to the community. >> i'm also proud of myself because it made me realize that i'm a hard worker and i'm able to assist out where needed. and i'm resilient. i'm part of a resilient here at newark beth israel that come in each and every day to save lives. >> it taught me a lot about

medicine, a whole lot about medicine. it taught me resilience and now i say it every day, that i am so blessed just to be here and to have my family safe and my husband and two little boys safe. this is a time that i think we always should remember and remember how strong we all were. if we can get through this, there's nothing, nothing that we can't do as a community. nothing. >> thank you to those frontline workers and to frontline workers everywhere for a year of sacrifice and heroism. coming up next, we'll take you back to the very beginning of the pandemic and through every step and misstep along the way, one year later. back after the quick break.

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this thursday will mark one year of living in the covid-19 pandemic. the first known cases of covid-19 in the united states were confirmed on january 21st,

2020, although scientists now believe the disease was most likely silently spreading state side weeks earlier. there was just one confirmed death from covid-19 in the united states through february. right now more than 526,000 americans have died from covid-19. more than 29 million have been diagnosed. we now live in a world which few people, if anyone, could have imagined exactly one year ago today. good morning, it's saturday, march 7th. there are now 335 confirmed cases across 28 states. 17 people have now died from the virus. at the time, numbers were low and there was a lot of confusion and questions about the seriousness of the situation and what exactly covid-19 was. but days later on march 11th, several major turning points, including two moments which changed public perception. tom hanks and his wife, rita

wilson, announcing on social media their diagnoses, and the nba suspending its season indefinitely. and one moment which changed the course of human history. >> breaking news tonight. the coronavirus outbreak declared a global pandemic. >> covid-19 can be categorized as a pandemic. >> it became clear that america had been caught off guard and extremely unprepared. >> in the past two weeks, i've probably seen as much death as i've seen in the past three years. it's bad. it's really sad. i feel like everybody that we intubate is terminal. it almost feels futile. >> 79% of nurses say they are once again being encouraged or required to reuse their ppe. >> now gowns are in short supply and the wipes that we use to clean medical equipment. >> dr. anthony fauci calling covid-19 out of control, predicting the possibility of 100,000 cases a day. >> i'm very concerned because it could get very bad.

>> it was around this time evidence was beginning to mount that covid-19 spreads via air borne transmission and not just direct exposure to an infected person. in mid-july the world health organization officially announced that covid-19 can be airborne and linger in the air in crowded indoor spaces. several months later the cdc revealed that people who test positive for covid-19 are 2.4 times more likely to have dined out and 4 times more likely to have been at a bar or cafe. dr. fauci's 100,000 new cases a day prediction came true, but it ultimately proved to be a major underestimation of the eventually peak of over 300,000 new cases a day. that monumental january surge had a direct correlation to thanksgiving, the holidays, and new year's celebrations. and it wasn't the first time america had experienced post-holiday surges.

>> there's growing concern tonight that relaxing restrictions is causing major increases in covid-19 cases. >> many health experts think the surge to the crowds on memorial day. >> i think memorial day was a big factor. i think people have let their guard down. >> things are so bad that even trump politicized cdc is urging americans not to travel during the thanksgiving holiday. in el paso, texas, things are so hellish that the county has multiple job openings for morgue workers. there are more than 200 bodies at the morgue being stored in nine temporary morgue trailers. the situation has also been hellish economically for tens of millions of americans, and has had a catastrophic effect on american small business and households. >> an astronomical 6.6 million new americans filed for unemployment claims last week. the highest number of first-time claims reported during the entire 2008 financial crisis was 650,000, one-tenth the number.

>> he lost his job at the restaurant. >> he said the food they're picking up here is for their christmas meal. >> the food banks distribution has increased by 145% since the pandemic hit. >> families that never thought they'd be waiting for food donations two days before christmas. >> it definitely was a shock. >> in addition to the continued pain and suffering the covid-19 pandemic has brought, there was another constant right from the beginning. lies and stupidity from the former president. >> when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away. i hope that's true. it's going to disappear one day, it's like a miracle, it will disappear. it will go away, just stayectomy. it will go away hopefully at the end of the month and if not hopefully soon after that. it's going to go, it's going to leave, it's going to be gone. this is going to go away without a vaccine. i always say even without it, it goes away. >> considering the president's lackadaisical approach to the serious pandemic, it didn't come as a complete surprise when

americans woke up one saturday morning to this breaking news. >> roughly 210,000 americans are dead from covid-19. 7.4 million have been diagnosed with the disease and that now includes president donald trump and first lady melania trump. >> i'm going to walter reed hospital. i think i'm doing very well, but we're going to make sure that things work out. >> things did work out for the former president, thanks to several experimental treatments, including a monoclonal antibody cocktail and the powerful and serious steroid dexamethasone. a month and a half later amidst the start of what would become that record-setting surge across the country, glimmers of good news. >> moderna announcing today its vaccine is nearly 95% effective. >> pfizer now says its vaccine is 95% effective. >> this is live now at the pfizer plant in portage, michigan. the first fda authorized covid-19 vaccine is right now being loaded up. the first truck is leaving as we

speak. the fda granted emergency authorization to the moderna vaccine. the fda granted emergency use authorization to johnson & johnson's covid-19 vaccine. the first covid-19 vaccine trial conducted in humans for moderna's vaccine actually began last march and the results were quickly promising. >> jennifer, a 44-year-old mother of two from seattle, was the first person to get it. >> it's a bright light for everybody in this country and across the world that we're seeing success here. >> the country continues to see success with more and more americans now getting their vaccines. but even with an end in sight, as we enter year two of the covid-19 pandemic, we are far from anything that resembles what normal used to be. >> things are not going to substantially change until we reach herd immunity, so that's about 70% of the population being vaccinated. >> as we approach the one-year mark of the pandemic, we want to honor the bravery of those on

the front lines who put themselves at immense risk to save the lives of others. i'm joined by my friend dr. stanford, founder of the black doctors covid-19 consortium. she has vaccinated people the last 26 days. she has been our companion throughout this whole thing in understanding the vaccine, understanding the virus itself and understanding the inherentin equities in the way testing was conducted and the way the vaccines are being released. you moved from testing and in fact i got my first covid test by you in philadelphia into vaccination. and one of the things we're seeing is that philadelphia, where you understood there was a shortage of access for health care for black people, it's 42% black but 21.5% of the vaccines in philadelphia have gone to black residents. so black residents are getting about half the vaccine that in theory they're eligible for. you are working hard to fix this

inquity but across the country this is not fixed. >> that's absolutely right. thanks for having me on, ali. we put our foot down, quite honestly, because we have worked so hard over the past year to try to level a playing field when all you had was a covid test and contract tracing. they were essentially nonexistent in black and brown communities, so we brought them there. then with the vaccine, we did so much with education and dealing with the hesitancy and so forth, and then we were able to bring the vaccines and then we had folks that were not reflective of these underserved populations coming in. and so we started to oversample from zip codes where the vaccination rates were low, the positivity rates were high, and we have a lot of unpleasant people on twitter because of that. but you know what, we set out to serve the underserved, to level

the playing field, and that's what we are going to continue to do. >> and i was going to say, while there are lots of reasons to underline the inefficiencies and the inequity in the system, you have had a lot to celebrate in the last year. you went out there and other people like you said i see the problem, i hear the problem, i will fix the problem. >> absolutely. and this is not a one-woman show. there are hundreds of folks that have been by my side from the very beginning. and honestly, the residents of philadelphia who really came out and supported us every day, that we earned the trust. when we came back with vaccinations, it wasn't the first time they had seen us because every single week we were in those communities, we were at those churches. and i should mention when we are trying to vaccinate the communities where the disease is most pervasive, that is a public

health measure that helps everyone. >> yeah. >> if you come from a community where the positivity rates are lower and then go back after you've been vaccinated, that doesn't help us get to herd immunity faster. it doesn't help us decrease the spread when the spread is most pervasive in these underserved communities. >> i just saw a pew poll this morning that indicates when you and i started talking, acceptance rates amongst black americans was in the 40s. it was similar amongst hispanic communities. everything, every group has increased. according to this pew poll there's been a significant increase in acceptance rates or a decrease in hesitancy amongst black americans. >> absolutely. and i believe that that is from modeling by example, quite honestly. we received our first vaccines december 16th and our second in january. and i believe because we had earned trust, people could look at us and say, wow, if they're

going to do it, then maybe we should do it. you know, people listen to voices in the community that were telling them that it was safe, that this was not like the atrocities of the past, that 40,000 people had already taken it in phase three trials before you, so you were not being a guinea pig. that people who are nonblack and nonbrown were paying very high prices in coming to your neighborhood to take it, so it wasn't the same. i think people started to look and use their own common sense as opposed to some of the absent leadership that we had throughout this year to make very sound and wise decisions. >> dr. ala stanford, history will smile on you and the black doctors covid-19 consortium. thanks for everything you have done, not just for the community but modeling for the country what success looks like. our good friend, dr. ala stanford. remember, if you are eligible, please plan your vaccine.

use this qr code. put your phone up to it on the screen if you'd like or go to planyourvaccine.com. it will take you to nbc's interactive personalized state-by-state guide which has everything you need to help figure out when and where to receive your vaccine. you can sign up for customizable alerts to let you know when you're eligible to receive the shot in your state. the administration has said that by the end of may there will be enough vaccine for everybody in america, so make sure you get in he way, with respect to coronavirus has been achieved. the $1.9 trillion stimulus bill has passed the senate. americans will soon get the relief they have been waiting for. it's not a permanent fix. joining me next is andy slavik. we're going to talk about how the biden strategy changes moving forward. the thing about freedom is... freedom has no limits. there's no such thing as too many adventures...

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joe biden's $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief bill passed the senate yesterday with all republican senators voting no on the bill that was designed to help struggling american families. biden announced the $1,400 stimulus checks will be distributed this month. the bill also includes $350 billion in aid to state and local governments and an extension of federal unemployment benefits. the democratic-led house will vote on the amendment package on tuesday, days before the march 14th deadline when federal enhanced unemployment payments stop. while this legislation is a major achievement for the biden administration, it exposed resistance from a handful of democrats, like joe manchin of west virginia. as politico described it, quote, manchin paralyzed the entire senate for ten hours and threatened to side with republicans to cut weeks off of unemployment benefits.

which would be unfortunate for americans because as my next guest wrote back in july before joining the biden administration, he wrote we can virtually eliminate the virus any time we decide to. we are four to six weeks from being able to do what countries around the world have done. the economy would take a several-week hit. we would need extended unemployment insurance. joining me now is senior advisor on covid response for the biden administration and former administrator of the centers for medicare and medicaid services, andy slavik. good morning, andy, good to see you. >> good morning. thanks for having me on. >> now that you've got more tools in your toolbox, you've got the covid relief bill that will pass the house in a couple of days, which means relief can start getting out to americans quickly. we've got extended unemployment. we now have the johnson & johnson vaccine. your white house has made an arrangement where merck will help j&j manufacture this vaccine. and frankly, i think the numbers yesterday were remarkable in terms of the number of people vaccinated, partially because of this j&j vaccine, which can get

out quickly without the need for deep refrigeration and in one dose. now that you have everything you've got, what does the projection look like from you? >> well, ali, i think we're seeing now the country coming together. we're seeing the congress taking up very important legislation to support americans, businesses, individuals, vaccinations to get through. we've seen businesses come together and do incredibly unusual things, heeding the president's call to work together as merck and johnson & johnson did. and then we're seeing just plain old execution. so we are working very, very hard to accelerate the number of vaccinations. as you said yesterday, we had 2.9 million vaccinations. we are now averaging about 2.1 million per day on a seven-day average. we have stood up 18 different mass vaccination centers across the country. thousands of people are volunteering to vaccinate people. the stories we're hearing about

people being vaccinated are incredible and incredibly moving. i watched your segment about the last year and it's hard not to get emotional thinking about all we've been through. >> i've got emotional every time i've seen this. let's talk about 2.1 million on a seven-day basis, 2.9 million yesterday. at this rate if you extrapolate, you're going to get to the 100 million dose target in 50 days. the target was 100 million in 100 days. now, the white house has since said that there will be enough vaccines for all americans by the end of may. can you give me clarity on that. is that all americans or all americans who want one? and does that mean everybody will be able to get that vaccine by the end of may or does it just mean we will have adequate supply? >> well, what it means is that we'll have enough vaccines i think we said for 300 million americans. there's 250 million adults in the country right now. right now, as we know, most teenagers are not eligible. younger kids are not eligible. so it's more than enough for every adult. i think

may. we are now getting from factory into arms very, very quickly. three days after johnson & johnson was authorized, it was in people's arms. so we are getting more efficient. we are executing. and so my estimation is that we will be over the course of this spring, we are trying to make sure that everybody can get a vaccine into their arms that wants one and have conversations with people who may be on the fence and say i think very much like dr. stanford does in philadelphia, who's a total gem, making sure that people can have people to talk to and get their questions answered because we think these vaccines are absolutely incredible and peep will take them if they hear about them. >> andy, i was heartened to see this new pew poll that shows greater acceptance rates amongst people of all races. in fact a significant jump from african-americans from the

mid-40% to 60% of who have gotten the vaccine or will take the vaccine. you told npr july 27th, and i think what you said may still hold. the fundamental issue at play isn't simply a slow turn-around for virus test results, you blamed a widespread erosion of fundamental trust at all levels of society. we've seen this play out in many different things, but we really saw it play out in 2020 in part because people don't trust their government sometimes and in part because the last administration made it very easy to be untrustworthy about this. are you able to repair this fast enough to get more people to take this vaccine so that we get to herd immunity or are you not worried that we'll get there? >> well, look, i think the fundamental trust in government and in each other has to be restored. we learned a lot about each other and ourselves over the last year for better and for worse. and it's time we tend to those issues. so you talk about our vaccine rollout. what we've been trying to do,

can't always do it but try tol underpromise and overachieve so the country can see we can be trusted. at the president's direction we're trying to give very straight answers. we talk about the fact we have a shortage. we don't sugar coat things. when the news is good we a it's good and when it's challenging, we say it's challenging. i think what people are seeing is as more americans take the vaccine, they are seeing the incredible outcomes. the fact that there are hardly any even temporary side effects and that people are -- that they're highly effective. we've seen the deaths in nursing homes drop like a stone. as people see that, i think they do get off the fence. you can't blame some people for saying i want to get some questions answered. >> i have heard from more people that received the j&j in a week than people who had any vaccine in the last couple of months.

some people are bad mouthing this vaccine. boy, it gets in -- it's being distributed fast, it's getting into your arm. once you've done it, you're over, you've got the vaccine. are you a little worried about the fact that some people are like, yeah, i don't want this j&j vaccine. >> i'm not. look, i think it's a reasonable conversation. it's a reasonable set of questions. i think we have to take the approach that everybody's concern is valid and should be addressed with straightforward answers and suspects. dr. fauci and many others have done a lot of work on this and they basically said all three of these vaccines do the most important thing, they prevent you from dying and prevent you from being hospitalized. 28 days after taking any of these vaccines, there are no deaths and no hospitalizations. with j&j, that includes being tested in south africa where the p-1 variant, the one that evades some of the vaccines are the case. there's a few more people that may get a runny nose. we understand that. i don't think that's what we're

worried about. i think we're worried about saving people's lives. >> andy, good to see you as always, thank you. andy slavitt, good to talk to you as always, my friend. health inequality in the united states has been unmasked by this pandemic. it's always existed, it's just that more people are starting to notice it. the racial disparities are hard to ignore when black and hispanic americans are dying at a rate much faster than the general population, and now they are lagging in the race to get a vaccine. it onlkes a second for an everyday item to become dangerous. tide pods child-guard pack helps keep your laundry pacs in a safe place and your child safer. to close, twist until it clicks. tide pods child-guard packaging.

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if you watch this show, you know that we beat this drum a lot but it's an important drum to beat. people of color have borne the worst of the covid pandemic, this we know. according to states that keep track of vaccination data by race, so far black people have been vaccinated at about half the rate of white people. hispanic people, the disparity is even greater. now, many are quick to blame these numbers on vaccine hesitancy on the part of some minority groups, and some people of color are in fact skeptical of the vaccine with good reason. many have made that point on this very show. but polling shows a major shift in people of all races who are interested in vaccination. according to a recent pew poll that i mentioned a few times this morning, 61% of black americans say they plan to or have already received a vaccine

dose. 70% of hispanics are in the same boat. 91% of asian americans. the problem is less hesitancy than it is access, because our health care system is embedded with systemic racism. people of color who generally have worse health outcomes and have less access to care also by definition have less access both to testing and to the vaccine. because of the nation's vaccination campaign, many health experts expect a return to normal later this year, possibly sooner, but does normal mean continuing to live in a world that leaves certain people behind? dr. jones is a friend of the show and she joins me now. she's a family physician, an 'em deemologist and former president of the american health association. dr. jones, thank you for being with me. like the matter of unemployment insurance, like the matter of food insecurity, the matter of the lack of access or the lack of good access to health care amongst black americans was a problem that people like you

pointed out at the beginning of this administration, the beginning of this pandemic. it remains a problem today. so we not only have to solve the immediate problem of vaccinating black people and people of color at a rate that is the same as the general population, but we have to solve the underlying problem that black people have access to care and testing because there will be another pandemic. even without the pandemic we will still face health inequality. are we doing enough to solve for that? >> no, we are not. ali, thank you for having me back. what we are doing is ignoring the systemic racism that is underlying the differences and access to health care, the differences in access to excellent educational opportunities, the difference in access to jobs and quality housing and clean environments. we are ignoring the impacts of systemic racism. in fact racism is a huge problem, but i think racism denial is a huger problem. it's a black hole.

it's got lots of mass, but it's sucking things into it. and the same way that covid denial by former president trump has led to the disastrous situation that we find ourselves in one year later, racism denial is enabling people to not name a problem and, therefore, to ignore it and to individualize the problem, to blame vaccine hesitancy as opposed to lack of access. what we need to do is, yes, we need to -- i'll just say this, increased supply is not necessarily going to increase access, so we need to be deliberate and intentional in all of our efforts. we also need to bring vaccine plus. when we go into communities of color with vaccine, we need to also go in with jobs and education and quality housing and green space and

environmental cleanup and everything, or else we will see the pattern yet again. >> dr. stanford was telling me that while there is some hesitancy that she faces amongst black americans in philadelphia, her bigger problem is still just getting more vaccine. i'll get every last vial of vaccine that you give me into the arms of black people. we can deal with hesitancy a little bit later. right now we're still not getting enough vaccine just for the people we can vaccinate. >> that's right. and i just want to say on the vaccine distribution, we are so delighted that we now have three vaccines in this country where all of them prevent severe cases and death. but i also want to warn us that as we rapidly distribute all of our vaccines, there should be no community that just as one option. that what we need to do, because lack of options is what put people of color more at the front line in terms of exposure

to the vaccine. lack of options is constraining us in all ways, and so i would say we need to have at least two vaccines in every community. this is just a little bit of a warning as we roll out all of the differentvaccines. i also want to say -- may i just say one more thing, ali. >> of course. >> inaction in the face of need is a hallmark of structural racism. and when we continue to see disproportionate impact of covid-19 or disproportionate infant mortality or disproportionate anything and we do not act, we are participating in structural racism. there was recently -- the journal of the american medical association recently had a podcast which was characterized as structural racism for skeptics in which the host said

maybe we shouldn't say the word "racism." what is this structural racism thing. this racism denial is a huge problem in addressing racism. we need to name racism. we need to say that racism exists, that racism is a system, that racism saps the strength of the whole society and that we can act and we must act to dismantle racism. we can't just say, oh, that's a thing. i don't have time for that right now. now. them with our viewers. dr. jones is an epidemiologist and the former president of the american public health association. always grateful for your time. earlier you heard my discussion with a group of frontline workers from a new jersey hospital.fr i asked them what they were looking forward to once this nate -- nightmare is over. they all had one thing in common. they all had one thing in common

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before my conversation with the workers at newark medical center ended i asked them what they were looking forward to as life slowly moves to a new normal. nick said he would like to finally get married. bessey wants to visit with new family members she hasn't met yet. this doctor is looking forward to his son to eat lunch with his friends at his new school's cafeteria. and another wants to hug his mom. they were a panel of six representing hundreds of thousands across the country who for a year have put their lives on hold and risked them to keep us safe. we are deeply grateful to you heroes. thank you for watching this special edition of velshi one year later. after this break we have another hour of show. tammy baldwin and hue demings

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