if it's tuesday, we have breaking news. multiple senior administration officials tell nbc news the president in tends to stick with the august 31st withdrawal timeline in afghanistan. less than a week from today. troops furiously scramble to get american staff, family out before it is too late. another hurdle for the administration, major covid déàa vu. cases climbing, deaths more than a thousand per day. could fda full approval contain the fourth wave? tempers may be running hot in the democratic caucus, a spar with speaker pelosi over the timing of president biden's infrastructure agenda, and it

looks like besides the mess, something is about to happen. welcome to "mtp daily." i am chuck todd. what could be a pivotal day for u.s. withdrawal from afghanistan. we expect to hear from president biden this afternoon with an update on the situation. all of this comes as we confirm the president decided against extending the august 31st deadline, despite pleas from our allies and intel community and a lot of folks on the ground in the capitol as u.s. forces scramble to evacuate american staff and family and now we know that afghans, the taliban plan to stay in the way of afghans getting to the airport. more on this in a moment. the president met with the national security team and g7

leaders. he was supposed to deliver remarks on afghanistan at noon. taliban spokesman said the u.s. must complete evacuation by august 31st, a peek from today, period. signaling afghans will no longer be allowed to leave the country. evacuations through kabul are continuing, at a brisk pace, more than 21,000 people in the last 24 hours. defense officials remain focused on evacuating americans first and others by end of the month. >> there's been no change to the timeline of the mission which is to have this completed by end of the month. we continue to make progress every day in getting americans as well as siv applicants and vulnerable afghans out. we still believe certainly now that we have been able to increase capacity and flow, we

believe that we have the capability, ability to get that done by the end of the month. >> all of this comes as nbc news confirmed what was first reported by "the washington post," cia director bill burns held a secret meeting with the de facto leader of the taliban in addition to hearing from the president, the state department is briefing reporters, pentagon having another briefing as well. we have a lot of reporting to get to and some essentially some open holes to try to close. joining me, kelly o'donnell, richard engle, courtney kube. it seemed all of the momentum was moving in the direction of the president having basically a ton of support, whether it is our allies in europe, capitol hill folks, whether adam schiff getting a briefing, everybody on the same page, making it clear august 31st is an impossible deadline to meet. then we have the meeting with the taliban, clearly that didn't go well. now we have this reporting that he is going to stick with august

31st. basically the taliban has told us they're not giving us leeway after the 31st, we're just not prepared to say that? >> reporter: at this point, the latest information we have from a lot of conversations with administration officials and courtney will explain what she's learning from the pentagon is that the august 31st timeline remains in effect, with the president telling his military commanders he wants continued contingency planning in case there's a need that goes beyond that date. what would that involve? the mission to get americans and sivs, special immigrant visas is a commitment the president made. for example, if the taliban were not to cooperate any longer, that daily communication and coordination has been key so far and has contributed to the increase in evacuations we have seen. an official also said to me the possibility of a terror attack. if that were to happen,

something that has to be considered in this kind of landscape, that would effect the timeline. the reporting that we have is that the president is working with that august 31st timeline, the administration believes they can work toward that, have an expectation to do so, but wanted to give breathing room of additional contingency planning if there's a need. now, what is difficult to answer is that issue of at what point does the clock actually truly run out when you have to then not only getty evacuee ees but u.s. personnel there. this is a dynamic situation, one where there could be additional changes and from the white house point of view, you have different sort of audiences. you have allies you talked about the president worked with and met virtually be g7 leaders, they have strong concerns. you have voices from capitol hill. you've got the american veteran community and those concerned about welfare of american

citizens and afghan partners, what can be done and burden on service members and the pentagon. a lot of voices are contributing to this. at this point, the headline we have, as we expect to hear from the president, go forward with august 31st and have a backup plan. >> all right, kelly. let's go to courtney to see now that the deadline is still august 31st, we know we have allies that would like us there longer, they're trying to get their people out. if we're sticking to the deadline, do we surge more resources, code for possibly more troops to kabul to try to speed this process along or are we already at max capacity here? >> what is max capacity. five or six days ago, we were told 5,000 out a day, then 9,000, yesterday they got almost 13,000 out. i am not hearing any conversations about sending more

u.s. troops in. instead, the goal now is to continue to get as many people out as they have the past 48 hours or so, and that is as i said higher than what they told us was their max capacity. the u.s. military is sending just about every c-17 and 130 they have in fleets to this effort. they enlisted commercial airliners, they're doing everything they can. opened new locations, four in the united states now where they can send afghan potential siv candidates, afghan civilians, to wait while they are processed. at this point, i don't think it is capacity issue for the military. the hope is they can continue. there are things like the weather that can slow down operations at the airport. there's always a security concern. there's a very real isis threat going on at the airport, particularly outside the airport.

but as of now, they have been able to increase what they call the through put, number of people getting into the airport and out on flights. that's due in part to the taliban cooperating. the military has been cooperating and they're controlling crowds at the gates getting into the airport. as long as the taliban coordination and assistance helps or continues, then they should be able to work more towards this goal of getting as many americans and afghans out as possible. then there's the fact that there are upwards of 6,000 u.s. troops and embassy staff that need to leave before august 31st. that back times you away from that. that's three, maybe four days before that deadline that they have to move troops out. we're talking end of the week at this point they need to move some american troops out. >> all right. let me go to richard back in

kabul after being in doha. i want to ask you about conditions in doha in a minute after the alarming report on refugees living in doha, it isn't kabul at least. what are you seeing in kabul since you got back and is this trade off we made with the taliban, essentially providing safe passage for americans, have we traded away the possibility of getting afghans who helped us out by garnering support of the taliban to help get americans out? >> reporter: a lot of this depends on the will of the taliban, do you believe the taliban have changed. the taliban are now on their best behavior. they're saying they will support an inclusive society. police are back on the streets. they're leaving the old afghan flag in place. they have not going in and looted or ran sacked the u.s.

embassy. they're talking about building an inclusive society. they say they need the engineers, need the doctors, they're calling on afghans to stay. they say that the previous president who left, fled the country, that that caused panic and caused a rush on the airport and they're trying to stop that wound, that outward flow from this country. if you believe the taliban and the taliban are telling their people they have reassurances, they're saying we want the americans to leave but this does not mean others can't leave, that the commercial airport will one day open. they want the americans out and they're doing what they can to make sure the americans do leave, and that goes down to coordinating on a tactical level, operating security check points next to the americans. on a tactical standpoint, sticking to the august 31st deadline makes a lot of sense here in kabul because if you

lose the taliban's cooperation, the taliban could not necessarily although it is possible step up violence but more likely just unleash people toward the airport, stop cooperating completely, overwhelm the americans' process, have that process breakdown. but then if you step back and look at what is going on, this is the united states after 20 years. this war used to be called operation enduring freedom and it turns out not to be enduring and they're not leaving behind a society that's free, it is only free according to what the taliban says will be free, if the taliban promises they're free. you can look at it as tremendously humiliating, moment of humiliation, leaving, forced to leave on the taliban's clock and with the taliban's good graces. tactically it makes sense but i'm not sure how history, i think history will judge this as

a very dark period for the united states. >> richard, pragmatically, the u.s. has afghan allies that they want to get out. the taliban says no more afghans are leaving. how does right now before august 31st, can american soldiers figure out how to get american allies out or is that done? >> reporter: well, there's a little bit of confusion. today, the taliban gave a press conference and they said that people can't leave, the airport road is closed. then when it tranls latd to english, it said they're discouraging afghans from going to the airport. it is not clear they're shutting the tap entirely. they are still coordinating with americans, if there are specific names, they're willing to cooperate. they want this process to move ahead, they want to do whatever is possible to get this going. i believe kelly saying earlier,

if there is a terrorist attack, that could slow it down. the taliban don't want that, don't want some isis fanatic to set up a car bomb in the middle of this and slow it down days and days. there are taliban patrols all over the city. it is hard to go a block and not see a taliban patrol or check point. they have been friendly. when i went through them today, they saw me, i am clearly not a taliban member. they looked at me, waved us through. not an issue. they want this to go smoothly as possible because of their end game. they want to take this country for themselves and they're promising it will be free. lot of afghans have to take them at their word. when the door closes, they'll be dependent on going through the commercial airport. >> richard engle, kelly o'donnell, courtney kube getting us started. the president himself had a lot of meetings today, including

with the g7 allies. what he says in an hour or so will matter a lot. i want to bring in a democrat from pennsylvania, air force veteran, chrissy houlahan. she's also part of a briefing by administration this morning, two members of congress on the situation. congresswoman, thank you for joining me. let me just start if you don't mind playing role of reporter for us, what have you been told that you think the american public needs to know. >> so a lot, thank you first of all for having me, i want to thank the tens of thousands of americans that served in afghanistan and make sure they understand their service is not in vain, very much appreciated by the american people. in terms of the presentation that we were given today, i think you're reporters reflect what i would reflect back to you, this is a very dynamic, rapidly evolving situation,

trying to move tens of thousands out of afghanistan and build an infrastructure to do that rapidly. had only eight days to do that at this point in time, seven more days to go, includes folding up the tent, bringing people out. all the outside influences, various threats of one form or another are piling on, we have a situation it is a rapidly changing and dynamic, and hopeful to get out as many as possible. what i would emphasize, the tone and tenor of congress is we very much want the president to consider the august 31st deadline as not necessarily a deadline per se, but as you said, make sure that he has optionality, and recognize that the math doesn't add up getting the right number of people in that timeline. >> congresswoman, there's a risk reward with the decision to not abide by the deadline. clearly that was some

conversation we're having with the taliban. you know, how much do we put troops in harm's way, for how long, and to get how many people out, right? that is the calculation you have to make. where is your head on this? >> 100%, that's the calculation the commander in chief has to make. he has to balance safety and lives of people that are there bringing people out of afghanistan, our own people and those that helped us with safety of most people that would be left behind if we leave. and i think it is a grave responsibility that he has and i know that he is working with all his advisers, many of whom briefed us today trying to strike that delicate balance that we make sure to protect our soldiers who are on the ground as well as protecting people that helped us all along the way the last 20 years. i don't envy him that position but i would ask him to look at the numbers and math and think pretty hard about where we're heading in the next six or seven days. >> considering the numbers and

math, do you think we have enough soldiers on the ground to accomplish this or do you think we need to surge more troops? if you don't have cooperation of the taliban, we may have to surge in more troops, correct? >> in many ways, i agree with the panel you had on previously, there's only so much you can squeeze through the pipeline. the number of aircraft landing and leaving, number of people leaving at this point in time is pretty astounding, far beyond what we anticipated it would be, if we were able to sustain that over a course of the next week or so, we might be hitting the numbers we're interested in. the idea we can sustain it is hard to get your head around. would more troops necessarily help that? i am not certain that you can make that happen, make that part of the solution set. rather, you have a pipeline than a troops problem. >> is there one mistake in how this withdrawal was conducted or is it a series or do you come

down on the idea that the president has which is whenever we pulled up stakes, it would be chaotic. >> my responsibility as a member of congress and member of armed services, foreign affairs, my mission is oversight, to ask the right questions and make sure we get answers on behalf of the american people. this definitely does not look as though it was executed optimally. it looks as though lessons to be learned and need to be unpacking those, potentially parallel to us bringing people out. i think it is important there are lessons to learned from 20 years we have been there, lessons from the last two weeks, last two days, last two hours, and all of the questions can be answered while we maintain the mission of a safe and orderly evacuation out of afghanistan. >> what do you want to hear from the president today. sounds like you would like to hear him keep that resolve about getting every american out, regardless what the calendar says. >> absolutely.

i want to be sure i hear that about our american soldiers, i want to hear that about people that aided them, i want to be sure we talk about a lot of the population that we don't talk enough about, women leaders, activists that have been there, human rights leaders in that community over the last 20 years, people who defended us in the last 20 years, journalists. i want to be sure we leave no man behind and also leave no one behind that's been part of making sure we have been as successful as we have been in afghanistan in the past 20 years, and successful in bringing us all to safety as well. >> do you get the sense we have any leverage over the taliban now? if so, what is that leverage and is it usable? >> yes, we have real leverage. i think it is something like 75% of the afghan budget is actually money from outside, whether humanitarian efforts or not. that's a huge amount of money. it is estimated about $9 billion

of afghans, resources, money in treasury is now held outside of the country which is a significant, significant portion of that money, and much of it held by u.s. banks. so we hold in many ways the thing most important to a government which is resources, money. making sure they keep their citizenry safe and content. i think those are huge leverage points that we have and that we will use. >> is there a point we're going to have to recognize and deal with them the way we may deal with a country we don't like their leadership with but it is their leadership? >> that was part of the conversation today and has been part of the conversation of the past week is at what point do you need to make sure that you recognize no matter how much you don't respect a government, recognize a government, the point of recognition is when they follow the rules of civil governments and civil societies that are recognizable by the 140 or so countries that are out

there, recognizing governments at this time, something like 107 countries in our briefing were behind the idea of making sure we are thoughtful if we recognize, whatever government evolves from the chaos in afghanistan. that's a lot of the world stage thinking about the issue of how we recognize and who we recognize and when do we recognize that government. >> chrissy houlahan. air force veteran, will be involved in the action. thanks for sharing your perspective and what you learned. >> you're welcome. thank you. up next, what the afghanistan fallout means for the country's standing abroad. senator ben carden joins as the president prepares to address the crisis. and new nbc poll numbers on the january 6th insurrection, amid ongoing effort by trump and

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welcome back. as we mentioned, president biden is set to speak on the evacuation effort later this afternoon. all this after an emergency meeting with g7 allies that expected him to delay the deadline for u.s. withdrawal as thousands of people flood the kabul airport, the crisis raises difficult questions for the administration about its standing on the world stage and obligation to our allies. joining me now with a bit of that perspective from a capitol hill point of view is senator ben carden, member of the senate foreign relations committee, ranking member, chaired it, the way most are, they go back and forth. senator, good to see you. i want to start with the decision apparently by the president to sting with the august 31st deadline.

i have to tell you, not the greatest look. we have director of the cia meeting, hesitate to call it secret meeting when you find out about it within 24 hours, meeting with the taliban. we have our allies asking us to extend it to the 31st. you have been briefed on the hill with intel folks hinting the 31st isn't enough time, now the taliban says no and president biden has to say no. is that a mistake? >> chuck, good to be with you. i think president biden's number one priority is to get as many people out of afghanistan as possible, starting first with u.s. citizens, secondly with those directly helping our mission. and third, those that are extremely vulnerable under a taliban government, that's important to the mission but not directly. i think the way that he is proceeding now, we're seeing the numbers at a high level, haven't hit these numbers yet, beyond the capacity we thought we could get out.

his strategy is to maximize the number of people he can get out of afghanistan. i am certain he has contingency plans but he does not want to announce that, it could effect the ability of getting the numbers out that we're getting out today. but we need to stick with our mission to make sure all those that fall in this category have an opportunity to leave afghanistan safely. that may require us to stay longer, and i think the president recognizes that and we have contingency plans if needed. >> basically you're saying for now, it is in our interest to give the taliban perceived leverage over us until the 31st, see if they live up to their word? >> we know the taliban, you cannot trust what they say. we have serious challenges moving forward with an afghan government controlled by the taliban. we know that those challenges will exist. our immediate interest is to get

meme out of afghanistan and that means yes, we are trying to have communications with the taliban, trying to get their cooperation in letting people reach the airport, trying to avoid a military confrontation at this point. we're going to analyze how this was handled through oversight in our committees. there's been a lot of mistakes made in the last 20 years and we need to understand those mistakes moving forward. but right now, let's stay focused on the mission getting people out of afghanistan quickly and safely as possible. if that means trying to get cooperation of the taliban doing it, that's what we're doing. >> i want to read from the communique from the g7 leaders, joint statement. it seems to echo where we have no choice in how we deal with the taliban. our immediate priority is to ensure the safe evacuation of our citizens and those afghans who have partnered with us and assisted us through the years. as we do this, we will judge the

afghan parties by their actions, not words. legitimacy of a future government depends on the approach it now takes to uphold commitments to ensure a stable afghanistan. i guess the question is this, senator. is there a point if the rest of the world is going to recognize the taliban, we kind of have no choice but to do so as well? >> i expect the united states will play a leadership role among our allies in the way we move forward with the taliban government. they have to respect international norms for us to give them the type of recognition and credibility. that's not right now one we think is going to happen, so we're not prepared to say we're going to recognize the taliban government and we believe our allies will follow our leadership and join us in those decision making. >> do you think it was appropriate to send the head of

the cia to basically negotiate with the de facto leader of the taliban? >> i think the results were that we got more people out safely quicker, so yes, i think it was the right strategy. i don't think it gave the taliban government legitimacy. it was strictly an issue to try to handle transition of people getting out of afghanistan. and the proof is in what is happening now, we're seeing that we are getting more access, more people are able to get out of afghanistan. we're not finished in the mission of getting people out of afghanistan, so the jury is still out. >> our primary leverage over them is financial. what that also means, there could be carrots and sticks, if they do certain things, we release money to them. how comfortable will you be with a policy that might open up the financial spigot to a taliban led government? >> as i said first, i want to hold my views until we get

people out of afghanistan. but i must tell you this, knowing their past record, it will be very difficult for us to have any type of normal relationship with the taliban government in afghanistan. they're going to have to show us that they respect the rights of their citizens, particularly women and girls, and we're going to be watching that very, very closely. i am not overly optimistic you're going to see a warm relationship between the taliban government and the united states and our allies, but we will reach as much accommodations based on actions of the afghan government. >> among the various how did all this happen approach to the chaotic withdrawal, we're getting reports out of doha that afghan refugees are basically in conditions of squaller, and there's finger pointing, saying the state department didn't prepare the pentagon for what was needed and all of this.

i have to tell you, when you see all of this haphazard planning when it came to withdrawal, we didn't decide to withdraw at the last second, we have been preparing for this a year and a half. how did things like this end up so poorly? >> great question and one i'm sure we're going to be asking in the united states congress as part of the oversight function. as i said earlier, there's been mistakes made over the 20 years in afghanistan. i think starting with the bush administration in being distracted and not finishing the job in afghanistan by sending our troops into iraq. i think mistakes were made by president trump when he had that secret meeting with the taliban and announced withdrawal by may of last year. i think the dye was cast for this type of circumstance, but it doesn't relieve president biden for having a place to deal with every contingency, and looks like that was not the

case. yes, we are concerned, why are we in this situation, why did we have to act in such a panicked way. why didn't we anticipate more this could have happened and had contingency plans in place, including other countries where we could evacuate afghans during the process. >> senator ben cardin, one time head of senate foreign relations committee. appreciate you sharing your global perspective. thank you, sir. >> thank you. up next, we have some new nbc poll numbers on the public's shifting views on what happened that day on january 6th as the house select committee seeks records of hundreds of officials, including lawmakers. f officials, including lawmakers o. ♪ ♪ you already pay for car insurance,

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terrorism. 52-47. look at the change since january. there you go. that's what's happened on the right. the chairman of the house select committee on the attack, benny thompson, told reporters his panel intends to get phone, text, social media communication from several hundred individuals, including members of congress and does not rule out trying to get associates of mr. trump or his family. realize the ecosystems and what's happened on the right, in particular vaccine hesitation and now in this. meanwhile, new historic developments in new york as a democrat kathy hochul takes over

as the first woman to do so in the state. her full swearing in took place earlier this morning. she was officially sworn in midnight at the state capitol building. she joins the ranks of 44 other female governors in united states history. not new york history, united states history. 19 states have never had a female hold that title. hochul succeeds andrew cuomo, following sexual harassment allegations and impeachment inquiry after holding office more than a decade. she's scheduled to give her first virtual address to new yorkers later this afternoon. all right. we learned that president biden is scheduled to give his remarks in afghanistan at the top of the hour. we'll take you lif to the white house as soon as that begins. don't go anywhere. that's scheduled minutes after the fda briefing since they granted full approval of the vaccine, supposed to start at the 45 minute mark.

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welcome back. the covid task force briefing is expected to begin. we'll bring it to you when it starts. firgs time since the full endorsement from the fda. democrats say they'll be able to proceed on a budget resolution. but things now are a bit fluid. there was haggling between the moderates and democratic leadership, the house will move forward today on the budget resolution but commit to holding vote on the infrastructure package by late september. sahil kapur is on capitol hill. i guess i have to ask this big picture. so the moderates threatening the reconciliation package here, what have they gotten, a

guaranteed date on the infrastructure package, so basically if the reconciliation package is still hung up, say by september 30th, the bipartisan deal gets a vote no matter what? is that where we're headed? >> reporter: that's essentially it, chuck. speaker pelosi and house democratic leaders offered in the new house rule is a date certain, pretty much ironclad guarantee that the house will vote by september 27th at the latest to vote on the senate passed infrastructure bill, regardless what happens with reconciliation. the speaker is reluctant to do this because she wants both bills to pass in tandem. there are no guarantees votes will be there on september 27th for the infrastructure bill, if the reconciliation bill is not done then. this puts pressure on house democratic caucus to get their act together on a multi trillion package. yes, to your question, looks like moderates have got especially that significant concession that house democratic

leaders will promise a vote by the end of next month. >> i was going to say, that seems to be a significant moment and could mean you get two different signing ceremonies, which politically the biden white house may prefer, even if passage they believe is easier doing it in tandem, no? >> reporter: moderates absolutely want two signing ceremonies, they want to go back to swing districts and say they worked across the aisle to do something major for roads, bridges, and public transit, spend about a trillion of infrastructure. that's a significant achievement. progressives what they care about, their bottom line is that the reconciliation bill passes, don't care when and how, they want these to pass in tandem, it is a game of leverage between progressives and moderates. progressives are concerned if the infrastructure bill is passed and sent to president biden's desk that moderates will

either make demands to shrink or kill the package, that they won't get the major expansion they want. >> this feels like a classic case where nobody is looking at the forest through the trees. everybody has their own separate political needs here. hard to see the down side to two bites of the apple rather than one. two signing ceremonies is obviously better than one. >> reporter: and the forest from the trees, two wings need each other to get it done. this is the linchpin of president biden's agenda, the signature achievement if they can get it done of the democratic trifecta. it is popular. they want to go home and campaign on it in the 2022 election, not much else is moving with the filibuster that appears to be going nowhere. they have to get this done if they want to go home and campaign on it and if they don't, they can't go to voters

empty handed. how are they going to say please, elect us, keep us in power if they don't have a significant accomplishment to run on. this is the beginning of what will be a long and treacherous journey to right that multi trillion reconciliation bill. haven't even gotten to the substance of that. that's another whole kettle of fish. appears they have votes to get it off the ground now. >> despite how many times we say it is 3.5 trillion, there are a lot of democrats haven't signed off on that, we haven't even agreed on the eventual number. that bill has a longer path than we sometimes may think. sahil kapur on capitol hill for us, thank you. as i previewed, white house covid task force briefing is under way. an important one. >> we won't let up. we're now in a pandemic of the unvaccinated. and the way to end the pandemic is more vaccinations. more vaccinations.

that's exactly what we're getting done. nationwide, we have gotten 6 million shots in arms in the last seven days. that's the highest seven day total in over a month and a half. and at the end of last week, for three straight days, we got more than 1 million shots in arms each day. that's the first time that happened since june. importantly, we dramatically increased the number of people getting first shots each day. back in mid july, we were averaging 260,000 first shots in arms per day. today we are getting a more than 70% increase. we're seeing the greatest increases in states that had been lagging on vaccinations, alabama, arkansas, louisiana, mississippi, more people got

shots in the past month than prior two months combined. this is critical progress in the face of the delta variant, more and more americans are stepping up each day to get vaccinated. we are working to encourage more vaccination. including through vaccination requirements. over the past several weeks, we adopted vaccination requirements for federal workers, the armed forces, and health care personnel at both the department of veteran's affairs and department of health and human services. just last week, the president announced nursing homes serving residents covered by medicare and medicaid will be required to have vaccinated staff. yesterday after a thorough, independent and rigorous scientific review process the

fda gave full and final approval to the pfizer vaccine reaffirming its findings that the vaccine is safe and effective. dr. murthy will discuss this is a keel milestone to get more shots in dr. murthy will discuss this is a key milestone that will help get more shots in arms. we know there are americans who have been waiting for the fda process to be completed before getting the shot. for those americans, the wait is over. now is the time to join the more than 200 million americans who have already rolled up their sleeve and gotten vaccinated. it's free, it's easy and it's never been more important to protect yourself, your loved ones and your community. it's not just individuals. institutions must step up too, and many are. in just the past 24 hours cvs,

chevron, texas instruments and a health system that's one of the largest in louisiana, all of them have stepped up to cover their workers. new jersey and new york city have stepped up to cover teachers and school staff. the university of minnesota and state university of new york have stepped up to cover students. we expect more and more to follow. if you're a business, a nonprofit, a state and local leader who's been waiting for full approval before you put vaccination requirements in place, now is the time. you have the power to protect your communities and help end the pandemic through vaccination requirements. our wartime response will continue to deploy every tool at

our disposal to get more people vaccinated. just today hhs announced it's changing its reimbursement policies so pharmacies and other vaccination providers have additional support and incentive to administer vaccines in smaller long-term care settings. this will help ensure long-term care have greater access to vaccines. at the same time we drive more progress on vaccinations, our covid-19 surge response teams continue to work with states to respond to delta outbreaks. we are working with 17 states and have deployed over 700 federal personnel, served hundreds of ventilators, ambulances and other critical assets to support hospital systems and established dozens of free testing sites. since july 1st, we've shipped

over a half million life saving therapeutics to treat covid-19 patien patients. they are preventing hospitalizations and saving lives. we continue to accelerate the use of these treatments. in just the first two weeks of august we shipped more than ten times the amount of treatments we shipped to states in the entire month of june. we are acting aggressively to stay ahead of the virus and are planning for booster shots starting the week of september 20th pending fda approval. we expect the rule will be simple. get your booster shot 8 months after your second shot. we're working with states, pharmacies and others to get the job done at the local level. we convened two important meetings, one with governors and their teams and one with

pharmacy ceos to discuss their operational planning so they're ready to hit the ground running. we will mobilize an unprecedented level of federal support we've provided states, pharmacies and other partners since the president took office and help in any way that we can to get booster shots in arms. i'll end with this. the president's whole of government effort continues full speed ahead across all fronts to defeat this virus. as we have said from the start, we need everyone, governors, leaders of educational and health care institutions, employers, small and large businesses and all americans to do their part to defeat this virus. let me turn it over to dr. walensky. >> good afternoon. last friday cdc reported 157,000 new cases of covid-19.

our seven-day average is about 137,000 cases per day. this represents an increase of nearly 12% from the prior seven-day average. the seven-day average of hospital admissions is about 11,000 per day, similar to the previous seven-day period. seven-day averages of daily deaths have increased to 739 per day, an increase of 23% from the previous seven-day period. as cases, hospitalizations and deaths continue to rise, i want to reemphasize the serious risk of covid, especially to the unvaccinated and the importance of vaccines to prevent severe illness and save lives. this slide shows data on hospitalizations among vaccinated and unvaccinated. this is a nationally representative sample of hospitals that covers approximately 10% of the u.s.

population. based on these data, from january through july, covid-19 associated hospitalization rates were 17 times higher in unvaccinated, shown by the blue line, compared to vaccinated adults, shown by the green line. these data have been submitted to a server and anticipate they will be posted online in the next few days. additionally, we published a report of data from los angeles county between may and july which found that people who were unvaccinated were five times more likely to be infected and about 29 times more likely to be hospitalized with covid compared with people who are vaccinated. these data remind us if you are not yet vaccinated, you are among those highest at risk. the delta variant is highly

transmissible, represents over 98% of covid cases here in the united states and is driving up infections, hospitalizations and deaths across the country. please do not underestimate the risk of serious consequences of this virus. vaccines are the best tool we have to take charge of this pandemic. we continue to see more and more data on the safety and effectiveness of the vaccines authorized in the united states and now we have full fda approval for one vaccine, and extraordinary safety data for the others. if you are unvaccinated and ready to revisit your decision to get vaccinated or still have questions, talk to your physician or a trusted source to get the information you need to get vaccinated. thank you. i'll turn over to dr. fauci. >> i'd like to spend the next couple of minutes in addressing a much underutilized intervention for covid-19. that is the use of monoclonal

antibodies for the treatment and prevention of infections and covid-19 disease. next slide. for those not totally familiar with this monoclonal antibody is an antibody produced by a single clone of b cells or a cell line and consists of identical antibody molecules that can actually be produced in the invitro situation in unlimited quantities. if you look at the blown up spike protein, the red molecule on the right upper panel, when you talk about polyclonal antibodies, the concentration and the affinity of those

antibodies can be markedly improved if you get a single cloned antibody, hence the word monoclonal. that's against the very specific part of the spiked protein that can have a major effect in prevention and treatment. we have three anti-sars monoclonal antibody products that currently have emergency use authorization from the fda for adults and children 12 years of age and older who weigh at least 88 pounds. there are three of them. there's the regeneron product referred to as regen cove. each of these products targeted the spike protein of

sars-covi-2. so you can do an indication for these antibodies that are twofold. in this regard clinical trials have demonstrated that early treatment with monoclonal antibodies can reduce the risk of covid-19 hospitalization or death by 70 to 85%. it is important to emphasize that this must be done early in infections and not wait, of course, until a person is sick enough to be hospitalized. that's when you get the best effect. we want people out there including physicians as well as potential patients to realize the advantage of this very effective way of treating early