dedicated trade desk pros, and a passionate trader community sharing strategies right on the platform. because we take trading as seriously as you do. thinkorswim trading™ from td ameritrade. we have a big hour you will not want to miss. this is especially true if you are one of the millions of americans concerned about keeping our kids safe now that they are back in the classroom as covid cases are still surging. >> right now, our district, we don't have any mitigation efforts in place for covid, which is making a lot of teachers very nervous. >> i have an entire school of children who cannot be vaccinated yet. i have to do everything i can to keep them as safe as possible.

>> i have a sixth grader who's not vaccinated and i don't feel safe for her to have lunch together with hundreds potentially of other kids who are not vaccinated. >> i think we need to educate our students. i've taken the time to educate mine. >> all hour, we will be answering questions that you send in about how to keep our kids safe and who better to give us answers that we can trust than dr. anthony fauci. dr. fauci right now, just moments, he's going to answer those questions that have been submitted. you can still send in a question. it's talk at msnbc.com. meanwhile, we're keeping a very close eye on the potentially major meeting of the fda's outside advisers, the topic of this meeting, booster shots and whether we need them. let's get right to dr. fauci. chief medical adviser to president biden, also the director at the national institute of allergy and

infectious diseases. always a pleasure to have you, sir. let's start with this fda meeting happening right now. are you expecting pfizer booster shots to be approved? >> you know, i don't want to get ahead of the fda deliberations. the data i've seen i believe strongly suggests that would be the case, but the fda, with their advisory group, the verpac, will carefully look at every single piece of data and make that determination. so rather than get ahead of them, our position about at least planning for the e vennuation that we might have to give boosters, we have planned and are ready to go pending the decision that's made from a regulatory standpoint by the fda and their advisers. >> and to be clear, this would be a booster shot for everyone who's gotten the initial shot.

regardless of whether they're immunocompromised or age. >> no. we don't know that. we do know now that we already have approval to give the third shot from the mrna to individuals who are immune compromised, either transplant patients on suppressive therapy, cancer patients, patients with auto immune disease. we know that's good to go. that's happening. what's being discussed right now is the third shot for individuals. the age has not been determined and that's what they're actually discussing now. it could be a broad range. it could be anyone from 18 or 16 or 18 older. it could be elderly individuals. it could be people down to a certain age.

50, 40, 30. we don't know that know. that's what's being deliberated as you and i are speaking. >> let's turn to questions from viewers about children returning to the classroom. this is the first question from emily. do we know yet whether the vaccination is wearing off in school aged children? what about ages 12 to 18? in a month or two, many of these kids will be coming up on the six-month mark since they were vaccinated. how protected will they be at that point? when we will hear whether these kids should be vaccinated a third time or not? >> that's a very good question. right now, the data an waning of immunity in the children cohort, there is not enough data to make a determination. i would expegt that just like adults or just like older children or just like young adults, that you will ultimately see a waning of immunity to infection and mild to moderate disease.

that's the entire reason why the fda is meeting now. to make a definitive statement about the children from 12 to 15, i think is premature, but given what we know about what is happening in adults, at least to infection and mild to moderate disease, i believe ultimately that will happen. will it get to the point that would require a booster? we don't know that now, but we will certainly be following those cohorts to be able to determine if and when that should be done. >> next up, we have a question about preschoolers. joyce is asking, when talking about kids in school, all i hear is 5 and up. what about kids in day care and preschool? my grandchildren are one and a half and 3 and a half years old. the older one wears a mask, but the younger one is too young the wear one.

so what is the best way to approach this and keep them safe? >> let me give you the data about where we will be with vaccinations. you know, the children who are now from 11 down to 5, that they're being studied now for safety and for whether it induces an adequate immune response. and whether it's pfizer or moderna, pfizer's a bit ahead, of when they'll get that data, but likely by the mid to end of the fall, children in the age range of 11 to 5, there will be enough data for the fda to make a determination whether they should be vaccinated. things so far look good. i don't foresee any difficulty, but again, you've got to do the study. children younger than that are part of the clinical trial approach where we do what's called an age deescalation and giving them a booster at a lower

dose to determine is that lower dose safe and does it induce the kind of response that we expect would be protective. those data will be coming out a bit later than the data from the 11 to 5. hopefully not much later. maybe towards the beginning of this coming year. or toward it is end of this year. but the 11 to 5 would be in the mid to late fall. regarding what one does when you have children who are susceptible in the sense of being not protected by a vaccine, you do whatever you can to surround them with people who will be involved in taking care of them. those people need to be vaccinated and that's the reason why it's so important to get teachers, to get daycare people, who take care of daycare, and others, to have them vaccinated and in circumstances where a child is old enough to wear a

mask, certainly those around the children should be wearing masks. as well as other things like proper ventilation and cohorting and things like that. so the cdc has a guidelines and recommendations of how you can best keep the children safe in the various circumstances that you mentioned. >> our next viewer question is something a lot of parents are asking us. school lunch, dr. fauci. this is kelly. kelly say it is school my daughter attended does not practice social distancing. desks touch for snack and lunches. nor has the air filtration been boosted beyond upgrading. what else is i do to keep her safe, eating, in such an environment, dr. fauci? >> well, the school should be following the guidelines as best as they possibly can. again, of cohorting children, of trying as best as possible to keep them separated.

i know that's very difficult when you're dealing with young children. if they're old enough to wear a mask, they should be wearing a mask throughout the entire period of time except obviously when you're eating and outdoors, as much you can. i know some schools are allowing the kids to be able to eat on benches and workplaces outside. that isn't always feasible, but to the extent possible, we need to try as best as we can, but getting back to what i said a moment ago. you want to surround the children as best as you possibly can with those who are eligible to be vaccinated so that in the interaction with the children who can't be vaccinated, obviously, you've got to be as careful as you possibly can, but mask wearing and vaccination of those who are eligible to be vaccinated is the best way to try and keep them safe. >> the next viewer question is about masks, dr. fauci.

a viewer asks, for kids, do the same cloth masks that are often ill fitting and worn with lots of gaps on the side that we saw last year, the often too large blue doctors office masks, do they work as well against the delta variant as they seemed to against the previous variants of covid or is the delta variant so contagious that the kids in school should be wearing k95s? >> no, the -- well, that's a very good question because it gets asked all the time. there is not a recommendation that the children wear k95, kn95 masks. you want to mask to be as best fitting as it can. getting back to comparing delta to the alpha variant, getting back to however you slice it, the delta variant has always been more transmissible than the

previous variants. so what you'd like to do is to make sure you can get the children to get masks that are as best fitting as they can, but a requirement for a kn95 on the child isn't necessary and in fact, often that's much more uncomfortable than the masks you're showing on the screen right now, which actually might work against you if you have an uncomfortable mask that the children have trouble keeping on and keep messing with. so i think the masks you saw look like they would be adequate. >> our next viewer question is about testing in school. our viewer says our district has decided not the quarantine, but rather to test in place. the practice of a close contact going to school each day, but being tested in the morning daily in lieu of quarantining. this came from two high school piloting last year months and

months before the delta variant entered the united states. how safe is that in these times with delta, dr. fauci? >> again, i think what we have to do, craig, is make sure that everything you talk about with delta is always a bit more risky than it is with the others, but there haven't been head to head comparisons. so i really can't give you a scientifically based answer based on a head to head comparison. i can only tell you that you've always got to be more careful when you're dealing with transmissibility when you're dealing with delta because without a doubt, the one thing we do know is that delta is more transmissible. getting back to the original question you asked, that type of approach of daily testing has worked in other situations as opposed to when you get a child infected, you've got to quarantine everyone who's come into contact with them. so that pilot study you mentioned i believe is an

important study. >> i want to read you something that struck me from the interview in "the washington post" with former fda commissioner, scott gottlieb. gottlieb said, quote, much like we have tamiflu for influenza, we're going to have a drug like that from coronavirus. we're going to go from the pandemic to the endemic phase and delta may be the last major wave of this virus. what do you say to that, dr. fauci? are we going to soon be able to treat coronavirus ith the same kind of medicine we use to treat flu? >> well, i can address one of the statements made by dr. gottlieb, no doubt that we are in the process right now of not only testing drugs that are already showing some early indication of being effective. we have a number of treatments for covid-19, but what dr. gottlieb was talking about was

for example, a single or combination of direct antiviral drugs. we have a major program that we've initiated in both the development of and the discovery of drugs that can directly inhibit the virus. i would be rather certain that within a reasonable period of time, we will have drugs that will be able to treat the coronavirus, the sars cov-2. the reason that's important is that when people get severe disease, it usually is virus that goes from the upper airway, which is the point at which the virus enters the body, to other organs, particularly the lung. so when you look at serious disease, people who get hospitalized, people who require advanced treatments such as intubation and mechanical ventilation, that almost invariably relates to the virus

having gone to disseminate and go to the lung. when we get and if i say when, because it's not just going to be if, it's going to be when, when we get drugs that will be able to block that, you're going to see a lot more people not advance from the early stage to the advanced stage of disease. so in that part of it, i agree with what he said. >> before i let you go, really quickly, how would you characterize where we are right now in this fight against the pandemic? are you more optimistic than you were last time we chatted about a month ago? >> well, you know, it depends what you mean, craig. we have within our capability to be optimistic. if we can get the now 70 plus million people who are eligible to be vaccinated and are not yet vaccinated, if we can get the overwhelming majority of those people vaccinated, particularly

as we're entering into the fall season when we'll have people more indoors, we can either do more poorly or much, much better. that's going to really be dependent on getting people vaccinated. so we have the capability, we have the resources, we have the vaccines. we just need to get these people vaccinated. >> dr. anthony fauci, thanks as always for your time, sir. try and enjoy your weekend if you can. thank you for your service as well, dr. fauci. >> thank you for having me. pleasure to be with you. >> a lot to digest there from dr. fauci. much more to talk about this hour. a team of doctors here to answer more of your questions. also ahead, i'll talk to the president of spelman college about how covid is shaping the school year there. first up, this is avela bower from minnesota in her pink princess dress, singing and

dancing. a rare condition has now left her paralyzed and her mom and doctor say she got it after testing positive for covid. her mom is now pushing other people to get vaccinated and thinking of life before all this happened. >> she was athletic, super funny. very, you know, she loved people. she always was you know, helping a classmate if they felt left out or anything. she's just a great kid. great kd lift and push and push! there... it's up there. hey joshie... wrinkles send the wrong message. help prevent them with downy wrinkleguard. feel the difference with downy. age is just a number. and mine's unlisted. try boost® high protein with 20 grams of protein for muscle health. versus 16 grams in ensure high protein. boost® high protein also has key nutrients for immune support. boost® high protein.

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we're back with more looking at the challenges of keeping children safe in the classroom. this morning, one mother in minnesota is hoping her daughter's fight will inspire more people to get vaccinated and wear masks as kids are back in the classroom. the 8-year-old, who was diagnosed with a very rare condition, an inflammation of the brain and spinal cord that damages nerve cells. the condition has left the little girl paralyzed and her mother says she developed it after she tested positive for covid-19. telling nbc, quote, if getting the shot and wearing a mask is one step closer to preventing this from happening to another child, that is what i want to stress. nbc news social news gathering reporter jean reported on the

story, joins me now. first, can you tell us how avella's holding up and what the path forward looks like? >> she's been in the hospital since march 6th, so it's been over seven months now. she's completely paralyzed, can't walk or talk and needs to be fed through a tube. she's had an even more rare subset where the damage is so severe that she may not recover. in the beginning, her brain was so damaged that she couldn't see, but her doctors now believe she has retained some sort of vision. that's been a little development in the right direction. it's just such a big change for her family because before this, she was a very active and energetic kid. she was teaching her friends how to play chess. she was really known to help kids come out of their shell, so it's been a big lifestyle change. >> you also talked to her

pediatrician and here's part of what he told you about her condition. >> we certainly know that for any of these causes, preventing the virus prevents the adem. so certainly the accepts we can take to protect our children is one step towards eliminating these complications that aren't on people's radar. >> did he have any other advice for parents who might be anxious after hearing about this? >> when i spoke to dr. pitt, he mainly stressed that adults, now more so than ever, need to step up and take preventive measures to protect children. last year, it was the kids who sacrificed for their grandparents and older people. they were home schooled. didn't see their friends. they did this to protect the more vulnerable people so now it's a reverse situation. we're seeing covid have terrible

side effects on children so now is the time more so than ever with adults to step up and do what they can to protect children. >> thank you. thank you for your reporting here. i want to turn now to our two experts to answer some more viewer submitted questions. i'm joined by dr. blackstock, founder and ceo of advancing health equity. also an msnbc contributor. and dr. heeda. professor of medicine at rutgers medical school. before we get to viewer questions, i want to ask you about what we heard there. for worried parents who are watching this or listening, help us understand just how rare this is. >> being hit by lightning, but really probably even rarer than that.

however, we don't know which children are susceptible to these kinds of side effects from a viral infection. that's the scary thing. you don't know whether you're child will come down with multisystem inflammatory disease or something like the enreceive. we don't know which child can go that way. >> i want to turn to viewer questions. the first one here, i think this is on a lot of parents minds as they send their children to the classroom every day. dr. blackstock, what is the risked to masked elementary students in a classroom if one student has covid and refuses to wear a mask. what's the risk if that child wears a mask? >> right. such a great question. many parents have this concern. we've had some studies, especially some great studies out of north carolina that have shown that universal masking in schools keeps students safe.

now, if one student does not have a mask on and the rest of the kids have masks on, that substantially reduces their risks of being infected. what we've seen is a lot of unnecessary quarantining since schools have reopened and this is a great opportunity to use a rapid testing test to say where if a student is exposed to someone who has been infected, if they test negative, they can stay in class because that means they're not infected or infectious. so again, if your child is masked, but exposed, that substantially reduces the risk and making sure those masks are well fitted. >> this next question comes to us from amy in bethesda, maryland. she writes i have an 8-year-old with an underlying condition. is it safe for him to go to school in person if the school is taking all precautions or with this delta strain, should he do virtual?

dr. lahita, what do you recommend? >> well, the recommend the child stay home if their immune o deficient, on chemotherapy. if the child has any deficiency, i would do virtual learning. i don't want to take chances with children who have immune deficits. >> next viewer question from kathy. she writes i'm having a baby in october. congratulations, kathy. i also have a 7-year-old daughter at home in virtual school. in january, when i go back to work, is it risky to send my 7-year-old to go face-to-face and my baby to daycare in florida? dr. blackstock? >> right, there are multiple factors that would influence a parent's decision to send a child back. i would make sure i understand what's going on in terms of community transmission levels, but more importantly,

understanding and asking questions about what is happening within schools. what type of mitigation strategies are they using. do they have a universal mask mandate for schools and day cares? what is their testing policy? physical distancing? what is the status of ventilation and filtration in the schools and i would also ask about the percentage of their teachers and staff that are vaccinated as well. so all of those factors would absolutely influence whether it would be safe to send your children to day care or school. >> dr. blackstock, dr. lahita, stand by. we're going to answer some more questions. we're going to take a quick break. not just elementary and high schools trying to figure out how to keep kids safe, colleges are putting new rules in place everywhere from lecture halls to stadiums to dorm rooms. the president of spelman college is here to talk about their strategy. first up, your questions are pouring in about students safety as this school year ramps up.

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this morning, we're still keeping an eye on the fda advisory meeting. they're looking to decide whether or not to approve pfizer's booster shot. we've gotten a ton of questions from viewers about these potential third doses. our two experts still here to

answer some of these questions. our first viewer comes is from larry in new york city. larry's asking what is the downside to offering boosters to all even if it's not totally proven that it may be absolutely necessary? dr. blackstock, is there a downside? >> some of the safety data that has been observed so far on people receiving a third dose shows most of the adverse effects are similar to the effects after the first or second dose. injection site pain. headaches. some fatigue. typically those symptoms, but i think it's very important that we wait for the fda to make their decision because they are doing a very thorough combing through of the data, of the literature, to make sure that a third dose will be safe for everybody. >> our next viewer question is from mike. this one's on the pfizer booster

shot. mike's asking is there going to be a difference between the formulation of the original pfizer vaccine and the booster so that the booster will help with the changes in the virus and other variants coming besides the delta variant? dr. lahita? >> no, not really. right now, because the booster's coming so quickly, the messenger rna, and the covering, that's not going to change. not right now. there's no need for that. remember, most people are very, very highly protected with just the two shots. so the third shot is really going to boost is immune system so that you're about 98% protects against all of the variants. >> this question on booster shots comes to us from maryland, dr. blackstock. i'm fully vaccinated with the moderna vaccine. can i take the pfizer booster?

i don't want to take any chances with moderna getting on board. i was vaccinated early and am over 65. what do we know about this? >> i would advise maryland to wait for the moderna data. that is what the fda is waiting for currently. they have what looks like enough data for pfizer to make a recommendation, but for moderna, they don't have such because they received ua approval much later than pfizer. so i would caution maryland about going out and getting a pfizer vaccine and waiting for the moderna day to return. >> dr. lahita, this viewer question is one we've gotten quite a few times recently. about the covid vaccine and flu shot. margaret is asking can covid booster shots or initial vaccinations be given concurrently with flu shots? >> what's the recommendation? >> get one or the other and wait

two to three shots. both of the shots have adverse reaction for some like headache, fever, muscle aches. i'm advising her patients to get the flu shot right away, when it comes out, then wait two to three weeks to get the booster shot if the booster shot is available and recommended by the fda. >> our next viewer question is another one we've been getting a lot. this is deb. do we have any updates on a johnson & johnson booster? dr. blackstock, we've heard a lot about the boosters for the mrna vaccines, but what about the jnj shot? 18 million americans got that one. >> i know. this is always the million dollar question and it's because the jnj vaccine rolls out later that we don't have enough data yet and because other countries also don't have as much data on johnson & johnson vaccine. i will say that again, fda is

aware of that and they are collecting data on johnson & johnson to determine whether or not a second shot will be indicated and you know, there are hospitals, there are places, ucsf is actually giving out a second dose after johnson & johnson, but i would wait until fda has had a chance to review specifically johnson & johnson data before you go out and get a second shot. >> doctor, we're getting our money's worth out of you. don't go far. you're going to answer more of our questions in just a few minutes. up next though, covid and college campuses. when you think of campus in the fall, you might think football, homecoming. but hvus are scaling back and canceling some of those festivities. the president of spelman college is standing by. we're talk about how they're adapting to each new twist and turn from this virus. us

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right now, college students and alumna are looking forward to homecoming, but rising covid cases are forcing some schools to rethink in-person celebrations and that's historically true at historically black colleges and universities. the number of schools including spelman, morehouse, hampton, are scaling down and in some cases, canceling in-person celebrations all together. i'm joined by the president of spelman college in atlanta. it's an honor to have you. dr. campbell, so let's talk about the school year, but homecoming. spelman and morehouse usually plan those together. the events bring in a lot of fund raising dollars. you've decided to celebrate virtually for the second year in a row. what led you to that decision

and what kind of reaction have you gotten to it? >> thanks, craig. homecoming not only brings in a lot of fund raising dollars, it brings in literally thousands of people to our campuses. and we looked at the rates of infection in georgia. we looked at the rates of hospitalization and the rising number of deaths in atlanta, in fulton county in particular where spelman and morehouse are located and we made the decision that it is in best interest in the health and safety of our students, faculty, staff, and visitors, for us to pivot from an in-person to a virtual homecoming experience this year. >> you didn't want to host a superspreader event. >> we certainly did not. and we decided that was in the best interest of our communities. >> and right now as i understand

it, you're requiring all faculty, staff, and students to be fully vaccinated. how is that going so far? >> this is going exceptionally well. as you know in the atlanta university center consortium, we have four colleges. spelman and morehouse, clark atlanta university and morehouse school of medicine an i am very pleased to say that on the spelman college campus, 94% of our students are fully vaccinated. those who are not have an exemption. a medical or religious exemption. and over 90% of our faculty and staff are also vaccinated. again, those who are not have a medical or religious exemption. this is true pretty much throughout the atlanta university center. these numbers are similar throughout all of the campuses. so we feel confident that we have taken the steps to

mitigate, not eliminate, but certainly to mitigate the risk. so we have vaccination. we require masks. indoors and outdoors. we require social distancing and now, we require testing, not only for unvaccinated students, but for vaccinated students and faculty and staff on a weekly basis. so we feel that we have done pretty much everything that we can do to keep that risk low. >> it does not sound as if there's been a great deal of vaccine hesitancy there at spelman. any idea how many cases you have had on campus so far this school year? >> we do. we know, we keep track every day, every week. we keep track of the positivity rates and i am very pleased to say that at this point, they're under 1% for our students and

faculty and staff. >> sounds like it's working. dr. campbell. president of spelman college. thanks again for your time. >> thank you. good to be here. >> the latest curveball for school districts this year. getting enough bus drivers to even get kids to school. we're going to look at how massachusetts is getting pretty creative to deal with the shortage and how other districts are coping. we'll do that, next. ther distris are coping we'll do that, next. th the worl. that's the nature of being the economy. observing investors choose assets to balance risk and reward. with one element securing portfolios, time after time. gold. agile and liquid. a proven protector. an ever-evolving enabler of bold decisions. an asset more relevant than ever before. gold. your strategic advantage.

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so many of the challenges that parents and children are dealing with to stay safe in school, from figuring out the right thing to do with masks and testing and keeping kids distanced, but what about school in the first place? a lot of schools are struggling to get enough bus drivers to take kids to school because of the pandemic, but in massachusetts they seem to have found a creative solution, training national guard members to take over driving duties. nbc's ron allen is in redding, massachusetts, where guard members have been training all week. ron, first of all, why is this a problem for so many districts

and what are you seeing there in massachusetts? >> reporter: well, it's a labor problem like so many other industries, retail, restaurants and others are having to find people to work through the pandemic and it's also a covid problem and there are bus drivers who tend to be elderly and retirees who retired who found better paying jobs who don't want to deal with masking mandates and vaccine mandates and some who don't want to be around young children who can't be vaccinated. so it's a complex problem. here in massachusetts there are some 200 national guard soldiers who are driving school busses around the state to get kids back to school. a number of towns asking for help, we understand, is growing and there are other cities and towns across the country that are looking at that. we talked to the superintendent of the chelsea city school system. here's what she had to say about why she thinks this is a good idea and why she asked the governor to send guard troops to

her town. >> we worked so hard in chels toe bring our students back. we have covid mitigation strategies and we're still wearing our masks inside and we're making sure we're cleaning and we have social distancing as much as we can at lunch, and we need to get our kids to school on time and that hasn't been happening for everybody. >> a lot of parents have been saying they're just having all kinds of hassles. school busses aren't showing up and school busses are doing longer routes so it's taking kids an hour to get to school when it took 15 minutes and busses are crowded because they're putting more kids on a single scombus when this is going to end is unclear. one thing that's happened is the extended unemployment benefits program ended about a week or so ago and some school bus operators think that's going to help with recruitment because people were relying on those benefits and they were doing the low-paying, part-time erratic hours jobs. so perhaps that will help, but we'll see.

there are so many variables to covid in the classroom and how it will all play out and this is yet another of them. craig? >> thank goodness for the national guard, though, there in massachusetts. ron allen, ron, thank you, my friend, have a good weekend. >> i want to bring back our two experts and dr. robert lahida to answer viewer-submitted questions. this was a few moments ago. just got this one in. this is katie asking what is the current data in science and science-based recommendation on plexiglas desk dividers for little kids? dr. blackstock, what do we know about that? >> great. the plexiglas we see in schools and restaurants is very performative. we know coronavirus is airborne and those plexiglas dividers don't help much and what's more important is insulation and filtration in the classroom. opening windows, opening doors

and getting hepa filters in there, that is much more important than these plexiglas dividers. >> this next question just came in to us from talisa, i apologize if i'm mispronouncing my name. my granddaughters caught covid from going to school. this week is their second week of being sick. they still have symptom, but my son thinks that they are able to come back to school and come over to my school because it's been two weeks since they were diagnosed. are they still contagious? is it too soon for them to go back to school or be at my house? dr. may edda? >> yes. until the symptoms go away, and they don't have fever oraches i would keep them quarantined and i would keep them out of school and especially unvaccinated relatives. as long as they are symptomatic you don't want them to go anywhere near people who are

either vaccinated or unvaccinated because they can still be shedding the virus. >> the next viewer question comes to us from rebecca in houston, texas. my son's in high school, he got his first vaccine 32 days ago without knowing that he'd already contracted covid three days prior. he has recovered from covid, but now he is past due for a second vaccine. does his first vaccine still count? should he get the second vaccine now or wait a few weeks. dr. blackstock, what do you recommend for a backup? >> that's an interesting case, and i would recommend he get the second dose now. the three and four-week interval. those were intervals because there were urgency to the trials, but we actually see when you increase the distance between doses and the separation between doses it's more effective so i would go ahead

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this is "andrea mitchell reports." we are monitoring the weekly covid briefing as they are set on receive conflicting advice from an outside panel about whether a third shot is needed for the population. president biden has set this coming mndz to start administering those doses more broadly, but two fda veteran vaccine experts quit and the debate over boosters erupted. in a rare disagreement, government and private scientists disagreeing over the risks and benefits of a third dose of pfizer or moderna for adults under 65 years of age who are not immunocompromised. we are also following the breaking news on capitol hill. fencing is up around both the capitol itself and now the supreme court one block away. while thousands of police officers have been mobilized ahead of tomorrow's pro-trump rally supporting the january 6th rioters. the national guard is also on standby, but we start with the covid response. joining me now is gabe gutire