Of medicaid and medicare services, as well as Robert Wilkey with the va. First a few basic facts and reports and then well hear from other members of the task force about ongoing efforts. At the present moment we have 43 domestic cases of the coronavirus. 48 cases of individuals who have returned to the United States. Of the domestic cases, 29 of the 43 are either in california or Washington State. And we have communities that are facing facing what the experts tell us could potenti potentially be a cluster in those communities. Sadly today there were four additional fatalities, raising the number that six americans have lost their life to the coronavirus. And on behalf of the president and all of the American People we extend our deepest condolences and sympathies to the families of those that were lost. Despite todays sad news, lets be clear. The risk to the American People of the coronavirus remains low, according to all of the experts that were working with across the government. This president has said were ready for anything. But this is an allhandsondeck effort. Todays activity really reflects the president s effort to bring the best minds of private industry together, the best leadership from around the country at every level. We had a good meeting this morning with governors from 50 states and three territories. I was able to convey to them the gratitude that the president and our entire administration feels. Particularly for governors that are dealing with the coronavirus in their states. Those that have taken repatriated personnel. I can say what i hear from the nations governors is that there has been a seamless relationship between all the agencies of the federal government and states thus far. And were encouraged to hear that. But i told them we are committed to a full partnership with state governments and to their Health Officials and to local Health Care Providers going forward. We also met today with some of the leaders of the Top Pharmaceutical Companies in the country. The president spoke to them not just about vaccines, which many of the companies are already beginning to work on. But just as importantly, the development of therapeutics. And it is remarkable to think that there may well be a vaccine going to Clinical Trials within the next six weeks. The nature of trials, as the experts have explained to us, is that the vaccine might not yet be available till late this year or early next. But the therapeutics, giving relief to people that contract the coronavirus could literally be available by this summer or early fall. The most encouraging news from the meeting was that our pharmaceutical companies, recognized as the greatest in the world, have formed a consortium to Work Together to share in the development of therapeutics and vaccines. A quick update. Yesterday we were fully implementing the new travel advisories for portions of italy and south korea. And the implementation of screening of personnel from across those countries who are trying to take a direct flight to the United States of america. I was pleased in the White House Task force meeting today to learn that within the next 12 hours there will be 100 screening, all direct flights at all airports across italy and across south korea. The president has directed us to bring the full resources of the federal government and to bring the very best minds in this country to bear on this effort. And finally today im a pleased to welcome to our White House Team a world renowned Global Health official and a physician. She will be my right arm through this effort as the president has tasked me to lead the white house response to the coronavirus. And im grateful that ambassador d Deborah Berks, also Deborah Berks will be on our team and even on her first day shes already been contributing significantly to our discussions. Dr. Berke serves as the u. S. Governments leader today for combatting hiv, a. I. D. S. Globally and has developed a reputation as that. Shes a scientist, physician, someone with three decades of Public Health, and has vast experience in interagency coordination. And dr. Berks and i have talked about the importance of bringing all these various entities together to bring about President Trumps vision for a whole of government response to the coronavirus. So with that, id like to recognize dr. Deborah berks for a few introductory and welcome remarks. And thank you for stepping up one more time to serve our country. Thank you, mr. Vice president. Its a pleasure to be here. I arrived from south africa last night. I had computer and phone in record time. It shows the level of efficiency and expertise to get moving quickly. Its clear the early work of the president both with travel restrictions and the ability to quarantine has bought us the time and space to have this task force be effective. I have never worked with such incredible scientists and thoughtful policy leaders and i got to spend the day with them. Im trying to get up to speed as fast as possible and i look forward to the days ahead working together to end this epidemic. Thank you. Secretary azar. You bet. Thank you, mr. Vice president. I just want to first start out by saying how delighted we are that ambassador berks is going to be leading coordinating these efforts across the government. Dr. Berks and i go way back. Dr. Berks and basically every leader at the department of health and Human Services go way back together. So we have established relationships maybe not too way back, right. We already have very established, productive working relationships that i think are going to keep the interax process working smoothly. As the Vice President said, dr. Berks has been asking the right questions and challenging us on all the right scientific and policy matters that we need to focus on. I just want to begin by recapping the Current Situation we face with covid19. As of this morning we have 43 confirmed or presumptive cases of the virus in the United States, excludeing our repatriated cases. 17 are travel related in one way or another. 26 are believed to be persontoperson spread. Because of the president s strong leadership and all of the hard work that our Public Health professionals have done at the local, state, federal level, the immediate risk to any individual american has been and does continue to be low. But the risk for people with possible exposure to identified cases can be high. What every one of our experts and leaders have been saying for more than a month now remains true. The degree of risk has the potential to change quickly. Especially if we see sustained spread of the disease around the world, which could qualify this disease as a pandemic. As dr. Fouche said this morning well see more cases of Community Spread in the United States. As we emphasized for some time now, we all need to prepare for the potential need, prepare for the worst, hope for the best. In some places we will have to use the range of our mitigation efforts. In fact, we already are working closely with Santa Clara County and the state of washington, particularly king county, to assist them in thinking through some of the best practices from our pandemic action plan as well as learnings from singapore and hong kong around the most Effective Community mitigation efforts such as temporary School Closures or other responses such as having school, but perhaps not having assemblies in school. Thats why the president has taken an unprecedented whole of government approach to protecting the American People. Including the steps in the last few days to radically expand and improve the testing that we have and to improve access tos arepy raters needed by health care workers. The cdc and i spoke with almost every governor we have this morning and we greatly appreciate their close cooperation with us. I also wanted to now introduce an individual who i asked the Vice President to have join this task force because the centers for medicare and Medicaid Services play such a vital role. 1. 3 trilli 1. 3 trillion of spending here in the United States, providing health care to 60 million american seniors. As weve seen this disease can have a disproportional impact on the elderly and ill. So they have an important regard with regard to funding of care, but also a vital role that you may not know of in regulating longterm care facilities, such as Nursing Homes and other Health Care Facilities. An important regulatory function. So im delighted that administrator verma is joining the task force now. Thank you. So for the Trump Administration and cms patients come first and the health and safety and welfare of americas patients and provider workforce is our highest priority. Let me start with what cms is. As the secretary said we are the nations largest insurer covering 130 million americans between medicare, medicaid and the individual insurance market. Some of these are our nations most vulnerable populations, elderly and poor. Critically we have a responsibility for pretty much every Health Care Institution in america. This includes facilities such as hospitals, critical access hospitals, home health agencies, Nursing Homes, Surgery Centers and the list goes on. That gives us a Critical Role in addressing the coronavirus. We are responsible for enforcing the quality guide lines based in part on information from Partner Agencies like the cdc. So let me stress that cms has longstanding Infectious Disease policies already in place that weve used effectively for other outbreaks such as influenza. So they have these procedures in place and should be prepared for what they may see. Well continue to proactively update our regulations. Well be working with cdc. Right now, like i said, those are already in place and its our job to make sure that Health Care Facilities are effectively implementing those guidelines. And we will work with the cdc to determine whether we need to update or change those. Also we are looking at what we cover and clarifying the types of products and services that our programs will be able to pay for in terms of medicaid and medicare. With that ill turn it over. Very good. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for stepping up. I want to recognize a couple other members of our team. Tony fouche, National Intuit institute of health. Thank you. I want to make three points to underscore what the Vice President and secretary azar said we had an extraordinary meeting with the ceos and a variety of individuals in the pharmaceutical and bio tech business. Several were in the room where people were collaborating with and their enthusiasm about getting involved in helping us along with the development of products and the availability of products be they vaccines or therapeutics. It was very gratifying. Second im very pleased that the president and Vice President will be visiting the nih tomorrow. Well have the opportunity to show them firsthand, in real time, the kinds of things were doing. Finally one comment about ambassador dr. Berks. A couple people up here said i go back a long time with dr. Berks. Nobody goes back as far as i go with dr. Berks. She was actually a fellow in my program as a trainee. We knew she was a star then. And now what has happened over the years, shes been a super star. Together we saw the first patients with hiv in the early 80s. We were involved in a vaccine trial, the First Successful trial with hiv. I had the privilege and honor, among others to put together the pep program for president bush, and she was the ambassador in charge. So i cant tell you how excited i am to finally once again get back in being partner with debbie berks. Thank you, doctor. Finally, dr. Bob redfield cdc. Bob . Thank you, mr. Vice president. What i would like to do is just recognize that cdc continues to work and provide support to really the backbone of our Public Health system in this nation, which is the state, local, tribal and Territory Health departments. These teams continue to work to identify new cases, isolate and Contact Trace these together to Work Together to try to limit the transmission of the coronavirus. And working with our Public Health partners we continue to be able to identify new Community Cases as the secretary said we always anticipated. And use our Public Health assets to aggressively, again, confirm those cases, isolate, do Contact Tracing to use our Public Health tools to limit the spread of this virus. I want to echo what was said by the Vice President and the secretary that despite seeing these new Community Cases, that shows you we have a Public HealthCommunity Across this country in action, the risk to the American People is low. I also want to add my looking forward, i know my entire agency is looking forward to the president and the Vice President and the secretarys visit to come to atlanta on friday and get to meet a lot of the wonderful people that form the backbone of this great agency. Thank you. Thank you, bob. Well take a few questions. Steve holand, reuters. How quickly do you expect the virus to spread throughout the United States . Let me refer that to the experts. Go ahead, bob. Are there any details about the cluster in Washington State that show us anything . I think the important thing, as the secretary said, from the beginning we anticipated to see Community Cases pop up. And now we have a number of new Community Cases, which the Health Departments are aggressively evaluating to see if they can understand the linkage, who are the contacts, how is this virus spreading. I think the American Public should rest assured we have one of the finest Public Health programs in the world when you look at the state and local territories. So were going to continue to see the cases as a consequence of them doing their job. Were going to use the Public Health strategies that we can to limit that transmission. We should focus on that. Were working hard to contain the Community Outbreaks but as the secretary said were blending that with strategic mitigation strategies. Just to underscore something i said the other day. There are two aspects of this, cases coming in and controlling the spread thats already in here. There are two things going on. The kind of restrictions of travel to areas where there are hot spots in the rest of the world. Just like the original inhi b s inhibition of travel here with china i think is going to mitigate against the question of the wider spread and the Contact Tracing thats very aggressively going on. You can never predict 100 of anything. But i think whats going on right now with the cdc and particularly the state and local Health Authorities i think is going to really get us through this. Steve, its something i learned along the way is that when we have cases that emerge, state and local Health Officials are in the lead but cdc is on the ground immediately helping to identify how that how that might have originated with that individual, find any other people they might have been cases. D the president originallys took unprecedented action to do all that we couldnt prevent coronavirus from coming into the country, now we are focused on mitigation of the spread as well as treatment of it. Kristen fischer the . She walked out. Let me go with haley jackson. Two questions for you, President Trump hinted today that there will be new travel restrictions on top of what we already have seen. With italy south korea and around. Can you elaborate around on what countries . Germany has seen some Community Spread will they be on the table . The president is very clear, we are going to follow the facts and listen to the experts every step of the way. The action the president authorized this weekend, raising the travel advisory, the American People should know that we are saying they should not travel to certain section of italy or south korea. Those advisories may expand but we will allow the caseload in those countries to define that. In addition to that to establish the screening protocol which will be in full force in the next 12 hours, in both countries, we will ensure that anyone traveling on a direct flight to the u. S. Receives multiple screenings at all airports in italy and south korea. To your point, the nature of the eu is one that does not require a passport to move around. Our task force spoke today to about new cases. There were some in several european countries. We are following that closely. Again we will listen to the experts, we will watch the cases and i know the president will make the decision in regards to both travel advisories and restrictions on those facts. Then you are pandemic, do the experts behind you consider this as a pandemic in all only designation . I would just refer to the experts, our view is it would be the World Health Organization to define. Our task force is in talks with them today. The and let me let the secretary address that. This isnt so much about semantics, our briefing today in more than 60 countries at this point, we are going to continue to focus on ensuring all we can to prevent people coming into the country with the disease, mitigating the bread once we identifys cases and to provide treatment. I spoke with doctor and doctor mike ryan the Incident Manager for w. H. O. We wanted to get a sense of their thinking and how theyre accessing the pandemic status. I will let them speak for themselves but at the moment while were seeing Community Spreading in, most pulse regions in the world, there are many definition its people use around the word pandemic. One issue is the sheer magnitude and we have had very large number of cases that are spreading in china. The absolute came out of cases what reflecting communities spreading are not comparable to any other pandemics that have been declared for before. Even the h1n1 where you have billions of individuals infected, thats what they are thinking about this. We are going to keep working with them. We dont have it a view if they should designated a pandemic or not. I just want to know how they are thinking about it. That is reflective of their current thinking. I asked them if they could put out some points about how they are assessing it. The ban with abc . Go ahead. Screening passengers from italy and korea, what exactly would that screening look like . Is that temperatures . Is that every single passenger . Who will be conducting it . Will it expand into other countries how many tests will be contacted . Last year you said there were 3600 what is the update on that . Our state department is and our Inter Agency Group has worked out that arrangement with italy and south korea. South korea is three hours ago fully implemented it got the screening on all direct flights all airports. As i mentioned within the next 12 hours or so italy will have implemented the same thing. For it will be multiple temperature checks in the airports for people before they are boarding. We are working very closely to assist them and implementing that. Let me speak about, let the doctor hung speak to about the status of tests. One thing i heard from governors was the issue of test kits and the availability of those. I want to commend the doctor and the fta for some very swift work making it available for more tests to be taken which include multiple tests and authorizing local testing, which will make it more possible as our experts told us to identify additional cases. As we find more cases, it will mean our Health Officials are doing their job in a large part. And the availability of those tests will be contributed to that. As you heard from the secretary and the Vice President we had the cab pasty to allow state health laps to perform tests. On saturday we issued a new policy to give some regulatory flow disability of these test. So Academic Centers, private companies can develop these tests, tell us theyve had valuable date those tests and begin to use them. They alert us of that and then later on we can look at the validation data. They are adding the responsibility to show the validation of those test. The new policies from multiple companies an Academic Centers we expect to have a substantial amount of tests throughout this month. The estimates we are getting from industry right now is close to 1 million test will be able to be rough performed. When were talking about risk you guys are saying with so few tests being done and the incubation rate being two weeks how could be accurately say that the risk is lower at this point. We havent put out 1 million test yet. If you talk about the entire country the whole 360 million people, the risk is low. The point you are making is since we havent yet done the testing into the community, how do we know the risk is low. I imagine it still will be low regardless of that. What happens in realtime things can change but right now today monday if you look at the country as a whole the risk is low. People are worried about spring break and whether they should cancel their travel what is the expert for spring break travel. Do you yourself bring feel comfortable bringing your grandchildren and their partners on a trip . I can say theres been no recommendations for any limitations of travel in the United States. Let me let the experts speak to recommendations with regard to travel. That i travel across this country all the time my kids love all the country. This is the time to use common sense its a good time to washer hands. This time a year thats always a good decision. As we said the risk remains low. And while weve had a tragic loss but, the reality is as i said 29 of the 43 domestic cases are in california, and in Washington States and are centered and very specific centers that we are working to identify the source on. We but i dont, i think people should just continue to use common sense this time of year. With regard to International Travel a lot you talk to the expert. I just want to echo with the Vice President said we want people to go and live their normal lives. The secretary is right even before the coronavirus if youd asked cdc what you should do about preparedness we would give that every individual should think ahead whether its a hurricane, and those recommendations havent changed. I want people to reflect that. Im going to, there are no travel restrictions in the United States. The cdc and the state department have worked hard to recognize those areas where there are Significant Community transmission. We give you advice that you recommend to not travel there. China is that. South korea is a level three. Italy, japan, iran there are level three travel advisories for those countries. Reconsider those travel. United states there are no travel restrictions. The risk to the American Public is low. We will increase substantially surveillance, so if you wonder what we do for a flu, with doctor hassan and the fda getting more tests done. Those Surveillance Systems will be activated in the near future. We will have eyes on significant new evidence of community pockets around our nation. With regard to International Travel will continue to monitor the cases we will follow the facts and the experts and the science. And determine whether additional travel advisories or restrictions are warranted. That being said we are going to slip out, we will be back here, if i may, we will be back here every day. Get used to seeing us we will bring in the experts and give you the best and most high quality realtime information from the best people in the world. Thank you all for being here. We speak federal Health Officials testify regarding Coronavirus Response efforts. Watch live tuesday at 10 am eastern on cspan. Three online at cspan. Org. Or listen live on the free cspan radio app. As the coronavirus story continues to unfold, you can access all of our recent coverage on the cspan home page. It includes hearings briefings, washington journal segments and it is regularly updated to include the latest events just go to cspan. Org and click the coronavirus link at the top of the page