with andrew brooks.ecular neuroscientists from rutgers university and helped develop a covid-19 saliva test. thank you for joining us. >> thanks for having me. >> okay, so i want to get to your test here in just a moment. but first, what is your reaction to these stay at home tests, because one of the big issues is there is currency in being immune. if you are someone who is presumed immune because you had it, you could possibly go to work. you could go out and do the things you need to do, whether it is for enjoyment or for your economic survival. >> yeah, no, it is a great point. and i think that at-home testing is going to have to take into consideration not just the actual tests, the safety, the stability of the sample and going to the lab that is going to run it but how do i identify and properly medically manage patients. so i think that a real viable opportunity here is going to see a lot of telehealth companies step up in this process. being able not just to make sure that the right person and yo

a scientist is with me now, professor andrew brooks from rutgers university in new jersey.ssor i can see you now, tell me about it, how does that work? >> so it's quite simple. instead of having a nasal oral different deal slob that is placed into the back of your throat, you simply have to spit into a tube, with some spin in a tube, you keep that tube, preservation agent observes the nucleic acid from the saliva allowing us to safely transfer it to the lab. doesn't require a health care professional to collect it, 6 inches away from a potentially infected person. also saves that personal protective equipment that we need to keep a patient to the hospital. >> bill: we cover a lot of ground on that, how many would you test, professor? >> so think about it this way, from a collection standpoint, the middlesex county as having drive through's, ten lanes that go through the motor vehicles. imagine if you had ten cars lined up, but you only had three people that could actually do that collection every 12 to 20 minutes. now you open up all those lanes ending have a single person

jillian: joining me as the chief operating officer of rutgers, doctor andrew brooks.nks for being here. this is such an important development. tell me how you got to this point. >> for a long time we have been using bomb materials for all kinds of research and critical diagnostics. when we realized the way in which tests are being conducted and sampled, putting healthcare workers at risk and the techniques that are used, we work hard to identify some alternatives and saliva was first on our list. jillian: listen to what the governor of new jersey said about this yesterday. >> we need reliable, safe access to testing for everyone and we need it everywhere particularly as we begin wargaming and thinking through the process of how to begin to responsibly reopen our state. >> everyone is trying to get plans for how to reopen and that is part of the process. if you look at healthcare workers affected by covid-19 this is 9282 cases, 27 deaths, how is this going to change what they are doing every day? >> it puts -- prevents healthcare workers from being unnecessarily expose

andrew brooks. dr. brooks, my understanding that you are going to be introducing a saliva-based test for covid-19 when and how successful do you believe it will be in determining whether the virus is present in the person who takes that test? >> yes we've already released the test. we got our eua approval last friday we've been running the test from the time we submitted our data packet for review to the fda we feel this is a big difference compared to swabs given that the collection is easier it does not put a health care professional at risk it saves ppe it can be done in a couple of minutes. the collection device is not uncliek the device you use for some of the direct to consumer -- we're collecting 2 mls of saliva versus the end of a q tip. the amount of material allows us to detect more virus more sensitively. >> when you speak to health professionals on the front lines, they'll tell you whether plenty of false negatives and false positives with the swab test do you feel your test is more accurate

joining me now is andrew brooks. chief operations officer and director of technology of rutgers cell and dna lab. andrew, thank you for joining us. let me be clear. when we are talking about testing, some testing is for whether you have coronavirus and some testing is for whether you had coronavirus and now have the antibodies. which one are you involved in? >> ours looks at if you have coronavirus. if you are infectious and you should be keeping your distance and quarantining because you can infect other people. >> you do have fda approval for the test? >> we have an emergency use authorization to use saliva as the starting material for the tests which facilitate enhanced collection by being able to collect more samples and more quickly and also have more robust testing. >> early to talk about mucous. we have mucous in our eyes and mouth and nose. i was curious why this goes up your nose as opposed to saliva. this is a concern that saliva doesn't hold enough of the virus as up in your nose. >> our data shows and what

rutgers professor andrew brooks was the chief operating officer of the rocker state lab that the developedthe technology said the statement can preserve personal protection equipment for karen scent of testing. we can significantly increase the number of people tested each and every day a as a self collection of saliva is more quick then swab collections. as many as 10,000 results can be processed in a day. starting tomorrow, for the first time, the general public can take test at a drive-through shiite in edison, new jersey, you must be a local resident and make an appointment. rocker said the white house task force has reached out to them to discuss expanding this type of test nationwide. coast-to-coast. dana. >> dana: that's a great development, david lee, thank you. oregon governor kate brown is unveiling a framework for reopening that states economy. it's all part of a team effort with two other west coast governors amid the coronavirus pandemic. they want to lift restrictions in their region and return to some semblance of normalcy. william la jeunesse is the narrow west coast newsro

and i reached out this morning and left a message for professor andrew brooks, who is part of that team. we are working intensely with her and with middlesex county to rule out this new testing system, and we will closely monitor how everything goes. nationally, and you have heard this before but it bears repeating, resources and ppe have been limiting factors to the testing regime, and we know what we need, and we will advance every opportunity to increase mass testing. it is incredibly gratifying, a source of great pride for all of us to see new jersey's own flagship university stepping up testing gap.the i am proud of the work at rutgers and look forward to moving forward with them. i know judy and her team joins me in that. as i said yesterday, we are not alone in our desire to have more sites and more tests. we have wanted that from moment one. every state in the nation is facing the same issue we are. thewe also have conducted most tests of any american state him and the only states which have conducted more tests are states whose population are significantly larger, new york, cal

. >> sandra: this is andrew brooks, the chief operating officer at the lab at rutgers that came up with this game changing test. he said saliva testing will help with the global shortage of swabs for sampling and increased testing of patients. it will not require health care professionals, as you mentioned, to be put at risk. saliva testing will also be important for people who are in quarantine because they don't know how long it will be until they are no longer infectious. that's important and leads into my next question, dr. debbie. what are we learning now because there seems to be mixed messages on this, about whether or not we can get the virus again. if someone had to tested positive for it, symptoms are no symptoms, can they get it again? >> there's a lot of unknown here. these reports are coming from the world health organization but sometimes people test positive for the coronavirus, then they test negative and then they test positive again. so the worst-case scenario is someone is getting reinfected with the virus or it's getting reactivated but i personally think there could

brooke baldwin. thank you so much for being with me. we'll get to governor andrew cuo cuomo's comments in a moment. let me begin with the life and death crisis facing this country. how much can we go backward when it comes to infections and deaths. that answer according to new modelling reopening too early will bring deadly outcomes. deaths from the coronavirus will keep on rising. the cdc says all depend on how much contact reduction americans practice. as more than a dozen states like georgia, florida and texas begin to open businesses, one model cited by the white house raised injections. the model new fears as many as 74,000 people will die. moments ago florida governor defended his response to coronavirus. he's in washington meeting with president trump. >> the most sirconian orders in some states and compares to florida. gough from d.c., maryland and new jersey and new york and connecticut and massachusetts and michigan and illinois. you name it. florida have dos done. everyone in the media said that florida is going to be like new york and other city. that's not happening. we understood the

brooke baldwin. thank you so much for being with me. we'll get to governor andrew cuo cuomo's comments in a moment. let me begin with the life and death crisis facing this country. how much can we go backward when it comes to infections and deaths. that answer according to new modelling reopening too early will bring deadly outcomes. deaths from the coronavirus will

andrew cuomo is shutting down the subway over night. let's start there with shimon prokupe prokupe prokupecz, why now? >> reporter: that's a very good question brooke. why now? because this has been going on for several weeks, several weeks into this pandemic. the governor is saying starting on may 6th, between the hour of 1:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m., they'll be closing the subways. the largest subway system in the country, unprecedented metrovov the governor here, he's going to do that so they can do the subways and clean all different statio stations. one of the things we have been reporting on is a homeless problem within the subway. the subway system have been over run by homeless and a lot of unsan ti unsanitary conditions and transit workers complaining of dealing with unsanitary conditions so they're trying to find a way to deal with this. why is it being done now? this is a way to get the homeless off the subway so the governor is saying they're going to close the subways between 1:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m. starting on may 6th. one of the reasons they have been keeping the subway system open was for the front line workers, nurses and doctors and gr

brooke baldwin announced friday she has tested positive for covid-19. cnn host chris cuomo also tested positive earlier in the week. he is the brother of the new york governor andrew cuomo. malaysian economist and journalist martin khor has died at the age of 68 after a battle with cancer. he served until 2018 as the executive director of the south center an intergovernmental , organizationon of develoloping countries and was eveviously head of the third world network. khor advocated foror collective solidarity among nations in the global south to fight against ecological damage wrought by the world's wealthiest nations. this is martin khor speaking to democracy now! in 202012 at the u.n. climate change summit in doha. >> the catastrophe of climate change is a already. we''re not waiting for the next century of our children. we are the children we're talking about are suffering from climate change. unfortunately, what we're seeing in doha are not reflecting the urgency that is required by what is happening out in the world. amy: that was martin khor, who passed away last week after a battle with cancer. to see our other interviews with martin khor, go to democracy