Takeout or delivery. Casinos, gyms, and movie theaters will be all closed for the foreseeable future. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo says the federal government should be in the lead, not the state. And as schools and businesses close their doors, the fed took an extraordinary step reducing its benchmark Interest Rate by a full percentage point to near zero. The fed also said it would buy at least 700 billion in treasury and mortgagebacked securities as part of an effort to boost the economy. But fears about the Economic Impact of the pandemic have led to yet another day of huge losses. We are now in the final hour of trading, as you can see right there, all three major indexes are still deep in the red, but not as deep as earlier in the day, when trading was halted for the third time in just seven days, the third time in seven days, unbelievable. The National Economic council director, larry kudlow, says the federal government will use every tool it can to reduce the economic damage. Watch this. The stock market is telling us, were going to be very challenged with the economy and i just want to take it a step at a time. I dont feel like making any forecasts, because frankly, we dont all understand the impact of all of these things or the virus itself. We will reach for every available way to mitigate and stem and undergird both the health side and the economic side. All right. Lets begin with the ongoing efforts to stop the virus from spreading. Nbcs tom winter is joining us now with the latest on what is happening right here in new york city. Yesterday, we saw this directive, bars, restaurants shutting down, as of tuesday. That timeline now moving up to monday evening, it seems. Tonight, why the adjustment there . Look, i think, first off, why is this happening in the first place . City officials looked at the amount of people that were at bars, restaurants, pubs, clubs on friday, particularly saturday night, and they were concerned to alarmed. Multiple city officials tell me people not staying home, people not trying to distance themselves. And of course, the more crowded a restaurant or a bar or a pub is, the closer you are to somebody else. The better chance you have of possibly being exposed to this virus. I think the city is just getting to the point now, in the whole tristate area, where they realize theyve got to stop. And theyve got to stop having people close together, and theyve got to stop this situation where this virus can easily transmit. So basically today, all the cities and states coordinating, because if you shut down in one place, this is a really tight, congested area. Its easy for someone to hop a train and get another city or take a subway and go to another part of another city and get access to a club or a bar. Just shut it all down. So lets bring up kind of the big question is what happens next here . You bring up trains. Hopping a train to go somewhere else. Is Public Transportation basically in the cards, a plan to shut down Public Transportation . Curfews, we know just across the river in new jersey, theres a curfew in place in hoboken. Is that something that new yorkers could expect here, too . What were looking at here today is a pause. Basically, new york city is looking and saying, okay, weve told everybody to work from home that can. Were shutting down restaurants, bars, and pubs. Were closing schools. When we look at that in its totali totality, are we at a point where we finally have some control and people are, in fact, distancing themselves from each other. And are, in fact, staying home and not being in these crowded places. And are we going to look at less crowds on those trains . So i think today is a key day for the city to look and take stock and say, okay, do we have the measures in place that we need . If not, do we need to take more drastic measures . I want to be clear, no one that were talking to in the Law Enforcement community and no one were talking to within the city says that there are those kind of restrictions, travel restrictions, what youre talking about, or citywide containment that that is not something that they plan to implement now. There are plans that they do have to be able to do those type of actions if they need to. In those discussions if they need to. Those discussions are going on. But right now, the idea of taking that plan and putting it into action is not something thats occurring. And i think thats important for people to know. I know youre going to bring it to us as you get it. Appreciate it, as always, my friend. So getting what we need when we need it. A major concern about the coronavirus pandemic is how its going to affect the nations medical system. The former head of the centers for medicare and Medicaid Services told msnbc earlier today that the u. S. Health care system is not ready for the onslaught of cases like we are seeing in italy and other countries. Please take a listen to this. There is no Health Care System in the country that is capable of handling what would be a tsunami of cases that weve seen in italy and other countries. Hospital systems, our medical system, our medical infrastructure is not prepared for this and to be fair, its saying, you dont build the church for easter sunday. So you should be expected to not be prepared for this. All right. So lets get into this. Are we actually prepared . And if in fact, were not, whats going to happen here . Joining us to take a closer look at this, dr. Kavita patel, a primary care physician and a nonresident fellow at the brookings institution. She helped draft the Affordable Care act, and sheryl peterson, Vice President of nursing practice for the American Nurses association. Dr. Patel, im going to start with you on this one. In his briefing this morning, new York Governor Andrew Cuomo was asked how many cases the state expected to see, and he made a pretty startling revelation. Take a listen to this. Google that question and you will get a range from 40 to 80 of the population. Merkle said, what, 70 . 60 . 60 of her population. 40 to 60 . So take 40 to 60 of 18 million, take a hospitalization rate of our sample of about 17 and then compare that to 50,000 hospital beds. So thats pretty incredible. That is 50,000 hospital beds doctor patel, in new york, according to a 2018 survey by the American Hospital association. There are just over 1 million hospital and intensive care beds in the United States, total. If we see a huge spike in this thing, what could we expect with regards to our infrastructure at hospitals . Well, i mean, it would collapse and combine that with president trumps kind of proclaimed on a call with governors today that, you know, well try to do our best, but basically, youre on your own, i think Governor Cuomo is right along with other governors to realize that this is really not an option. And these closures, while i think its such a jar to the american public, are the exact right thing to do. And keep the one good kind of Silver Lining is that youve got very Capable Health care workers we have doctors who are literally across the country interacting with each other to learn from italian doctors, south korean doctors, china doctors, about how theyre able to stand up an entire intensive care unit, you know, over a weekend. And so there are very smart people thinking about it, but there is no question that we do not have an infrastructure to support the needs. And a lot of it comes down to often the leastexpensive supply, the masks, the cotton swabs, along with the mostexpensive supply, the people to actually do all of this. Sheryl, give me a sense of what you are hearing from the front lines. As we well know, any of us have been in a situation, having been in a hospital, we know the nurses are on the front lines of this thing. What have you been hearing from your fellow nurses with regard to their experiences so far in dealing with the spread of the coronavirus . Yeah, thank you. Nurses absolutely are on the front line, and they are delivering care on a daily basis. Theyre dealing with the daytoday crisis. Do we have a sufficient number of masks . Do we even have agreement between our federal agencies about what masks we need. How are we planning for the future . How are we going to sustain operations and its not adding more 12hour shifts for nurses, but how do we look and how are we going to sustain the entire Health Care Team . And we know there is good thinking going on, and that needs to be communicated regularly and completely to our nurses, so that they understand whats coming down the pike for them as they are delivering care. Are they not getting that type of communication at this point, sheryl, from your understanding . From our understanding, its still very spotty about what they know, about how the hospital is planning to move forward. I heard on social media from one of our members who was saying, they just keep adding 12hour shifts for us. Well, thats not going to be a sustainable practice. We really can and should do better. Dr. Patel, lets talk about the ventilators or the lack thereof. There was this fear that in the hospitals, theyre going to be so inundated and not enough ventilators in this country to take care of especially those immunocompromised and elderly patients. You have the president being reported to the New York Times today telling the state governors, you have to go after them and get them on your own. We will back you up, but go after them on your own, as well. Is this enough considering that ventilators with the coronavirus are basically what is saving peoples lives. Well, its certainly not enough today. We have about 110 to 120,000 icu beds across the country. But the real limit to that is actually nurses and doctors and assistants to staff those beds. So on any given day, we have about 60,000 kind of ventilatorsupported beds across the country. Now, we do not have enough ventilators for the kind of numbers Governor Cuomo was saying, but youve heard a lot of people, even on your show talk about flattening the curve. Thats why were closing things down if were having to talk about having enough ventilators for everyone with an infection, we are not going to have any sort of system to support that. We will, however, if we can do something in the next 14 days, staying in our homes, avoiding unnecessary social contact, we are absolutely going to be able to see this through. And i do believe it will be hard, but we will be able to work creatively to kind of to find the solutions. We do not want to do what italy is doing, where theyre having to make decisions, a or b, which patient is going to get the ventilator . We have to do everything now to prevent that step from happening. So sheryl, lets go there for a moment. Just so people can understand the scope of this thing and how important it is to abide by the rules that are being put in place, for this cordoning off and isolation that so many people are taking now, for these measures. What happens if we hit a point in which these hospitals are completely and totally overrun and inundated and they just dont have enough equipment to keep up with the number of immunocompromised and elderly patients that are coming to see them . Then were really at a point where there has to be some real decisions that are made. And those are decisions that should not be made by Front Line Health Care providers. Those are really decisions that must be made at a systems level. And that they should be based on transparency, ethics, equity, that it has to be proportional. There are real guidance out there through the National Institutes of medicine and other places where, in fact, weve thought about what do you need to do, when you have to alter the standard of care . And it really does have to reside at a systems level, where those decisions are being made. And quite frankly, where as kavita said, we are not there yet, however, what we really need to be doing is talking across systems within our communities, at our state and national level, so that we really know where are the resources that can and should be used and how are we making sure that those are being appropriately and fully utilized, so that were not legislate anything go to waste . And thats about communication. All right. Dr. Patel, sheryl peterson, as well. Thank you to you both. I want to go to some news now on the election front. Moments ago, Ohio Governor mike dewine announced that he is canceling inperson voting tomorrow because of the outbreak. Tweeting, quote, we cannot tell people to stay inside, but also tell them to go out and vote. Contests in three other states, arizona, florida, and illinois, as well are still on, but officials in those states are making changes because of this outbreak. Nbc news political reporter Vaughn Hillyard is joining us from phoenix, arizona, right now. Vaughn, good to talk to you. Talk us through, as we were seeing in ohio there, the impact of the coronavirus, a delay there. Talk us through what youre hearing from your sense with regards to how this outbreak is affecting the primary contest . Reporter exactly. And if we could, i want to emphasize that announcement from the governor of ohio, as simply a recommendation at this point. As it stands, there will be inperson voting in ohio tomorrow. I think that for voters in ohio, theyll learn much more over these coming hours. Here in arizona, there are four states that are going to be voting tomorrow in their primaries. Thats ohio, illinois, florida, and right here in arizona. To give you context, county officials here in Maricopa County, which makes up about 60 of voters in arizona, have been scrambling over the last four days. There were callins of poll workers. Poll workers often skew to much older generations that come here and actually work at the polls. They were calling in and canceling. You also had sanitation shortfall in which county officials said that they were not able to obtain enough Sanitation Equipment to take care of these polling locations. And on friday, the county officials here in Maricopa County announced that they were going to be shutting down one third of polling locations across the county. And they were opening up seven emergency voting locations, which is where we are right now. Theyve had more than 60 focus that have come in here, the day before inperson voting is supposed to begin, coming here and voting early. I want to let you hear from two individuals who have decided to take part, sarah and tom from scottsdale. Im coming to vote early to avoid the crowds and do some social distancing right now. Thats why youve come in on monday . Thats why we came in on monday today. March madness has a whole new meaning. Its people hoarding toilet paper and water and just going nuts in the grocery store. Louisiana and georgia officials have already pushed back their primaries, but as it stands here in arizona, voting is continuing on tomorrow. And that first woman you heard from, sarah boons, she said she works at one of the apple stores just kodown the road. Shes thankful that her employer was able to give her sick leave. She said, frankly, her mom did not join her to come vote today because of her moms concern. Shes over the age of 60, concerned about coming here to the polling location. And that is one of the issues that well be looking at here tomorrow, as this unfolds. As the questions over the extent to which folks here at these polling locations are able to sanitize. We should note, the polling workers here in Maricopa County, what they are doing, we watched them do this here, what theyre doing, folks are coming up to the touch screen and sanitizing the screen, then the folks vote, theyre sanitizing the screen again, then they give them Hand Sanitizer on their way out, and on the door handle, as each person comes and goes, their using clorox wipes to clean the door handle. The steps are in order, and the folks were talking to say they feel comfortable. But tomorrow, if there are lines, the question is, to what extent are folks able to be socially distant from one another and engage in this process. I want to be clear about this ohio thing. We are getting different reports from this. On twitter, from the Ohio Governor, he says, it is my recommendation that we postpone inperson voting until june 2nd. Thats what the Ohio Governor is putting out there, but in order to do this, there needs to be a court order in place. Whether or not that actually goes forward, really, is the question as of now. And of course, wherever we do get that answer, we are going to bring it to you. But vaughn, im expecting this type of thing, wondering if, especially as we are in this primary season, if you could just get to this quickly, if this is something we expect going forward. Reporter well, and again, county officials here in Maricopa County, theyve already shut down one third of polling locations. So our plan here is tomorrow morning to go to some of those polling locations where folks were expected to go, because the county has been sending Text Messages to voters. Voters told us that they received Text Messages from the county, informing them that their polling location is closed. But as youre well aware, not everybody has access to that sort of technology. And i think the question mark is, to what extent is there confusion . You know, county officials are trying. Nobody was expecting, with, you know, a little over 80 hours to be pulling off this sort of change here. And the last thing we should note is the Voting Centers here are, everybody is able to go now. Usually you have to go to your certain polling location. And one gentlemen said, he would have been able to go to that polling location and walked to it, but he came over this polling location knowing that everybody could now go there. Vaughn hillyard, my friend, stay safe. Thank you so much. So the coronavirus is disrupting the way of life for millions of americans, as you know. Yesterday, bill de blasio announced that the largest Public School system will close its doors until midapril. Take a listen. I know just how much our parents depend on our Public Schools. I know right now, there are so many parents who do not necessarily have any other place for their children. We are dealing with a challenge and a crisis that we have never seen in our lifetimes. And it has only just begun. So someone who knows this well, the effects of these school closures, the president of the American Federation of teachers, randi weingarten. And before you get started, i want to let everyone know that we are awaiting a press conference from the Coronavirus Task force. So if i interrupt you, i want to apologize now. But wow, School Cancellations across the nation one by one. Here we are today, new york city being the largest Public School system in the country closing its doors. Look, given what just happened with the cdc recommendations last night that they recommend that you should not have groups of more than 50 together. A class size is 30 to 35. If we are talking about social distancing in a real way, if we are talking about the fact that we dont have the tests, so we dont know the vector, so we dont know who has or who doesnt have the virus, then School Closing is inevitable. And the issue is, how do we plan to make sure we are helping those vulnerable kids who must be in school. How do we plan to make sure we have child care for the essential servants who are hospital workers and transit workers . How do we plan online . How do we plan for these tests . These are the plans that a lot of districts and a lot of states did all weekend long. 33 states have closed entirely, and all weekend, our members, leaders, and state governors and district superintendents have been planning this kind of online. So i applaud that finally mayor de blasio understood that inevitable is inevitable. This is unchartered water. I know that there was an announcement that you wanted to make, a recommendation that you feel like is necessary in this time. So, look, were trying to help not spread fear or panic. But School Closings are inevitable. And it is better to plan now, plan for online, plan for feeding kids, grab and goes, plans for how we do child care for essential workers. Maybe do like has been done in new mexico, where were doing this kind of feeding and other things on hospital premises, so that there can be child care there as well. We have to plan now instead of waiting for a positive and people being panicked about that. So youre saying if a School System is not closed at this point, start planning to close. They better plan for it now. From what i understand, the Coronavirus Task force is starting now and the president is speaking. So lets listen. Im glad to see that youre practicing social distancing. That looks very nice. Looks very good. I want to thank everybody for being here today. This morning i spoke with the leaders of the g7 nations and they really had a good meeting. I think it was a very, very productive meeting. I also spoke with our nations governors. And this afternoon, were announcing new guidelines for every american to follow over the next 15 days, as we combat the virus, each and every one of us has a Critical Role to play in stopping the spread and transmission of the virus. We did this today. This was done by a lot of very talented people. Some of whom are standing with me. And thats available. And dr. Berks will be speaking about that in just a few minutes. Its important for the young and Healthy People to understand that while they may experience milder symptoms, they can easily spread this virus and they will spread it, indeed, putting countless others in harms way. We especially worry about our senior citizens. The White House Task force meets every day and continually updates guidelines based on the fastevolving situation that this has become, all over the world. Its all over the world. Its incredible, whats happened in such a short period of time. On the guidelines of the task force, the new modeling conducted by dr. Berks and our consultation with governors, weve made the decision to further toughen the guidelines and blunt the infection now. We would much rather be ahead of the curve behind it and thats what we are. Therefore, my administration is recommending that all americans, including the young and healthy, work to engage in schooling from home when possible, avoid gathering in groups of more than ten people, avoid discretionary travel, and avoid eating and drinking at bars, restaurants, and public food courts. If everyone makes this change or these critical changes and sacrifices now, we will rally together as one nation and we will defeat the virus and were going to have a big celebration all together. With several weeks of focused actions, we can turn the corner and turn it quickly. A lot of progress has been made. Im also pleased to report today that a vaccine candidate has begun the phase i clinical trial. This is one of the fastest Vaccine Development launches in history, not even close. Were also racing to develop antiviral therapies and other treatments and weve had some promising results, early results, but promising, to reduce the severity and the duration of the symptoms and i have to say that our government is prepared to do whatever it takes. Whatever it takes, were doing. Were doing it in every way. And with that, i would like to just introduce dr. Berks, whos going to discuss some of the things that we strongly recommend. Thank you. Thank you, mr. President. I think you know, over the last months, weve taken very bold action to stop the virus from coming to our shores. And because of that, we gained time to really get together and understand the progress across the globe of what has worked and what hasnt worked. We now need to appeal to every single american, so that they can have their role in stopping the spread of this virus. Weve talked about things before, about washing your hands, but we really want to focus on, if you are sick, no matter who you are, please stay home. If someone in your household is diagnosed with this virus, the entire household should quarantine in the house to prevent spread of the virus to others. The reason were taking these strong and bold steps is because we know there is virus spread before you develop symptoms, and then we know that theres a large group. We dont know the precise percent yet, that is actually asymptomatic or has such mild cases that they continue to spread the virus. If your children are sick, please keep them home. Now to our older population or those with preexisting medical conditions, everyone in the household needs to focus on protecting them. Everyone in the household. I want to speak particularly to our largest generation now, our millennials. I have the mom of two wonderful millennial young women who are bright and hard working and i will tell you what i told to them. They are the core group that will stop this virus. They are the group that communicates successfully, independent of picking up a phone. They intuitively know how to contact each others without being in large social gatherings. Were asking all of them to hold their gatherings to under ten people. Not just in bars and restaurants, but in homes. We really want people to be separated at this time. To be able to address this virus comprehensively, that we cannot see, for which we dont have a vaccine or a therapeutic, the only thing we have right now is the amazing ingenuity and compassion of the american people. Were appealing to all americans to take these steps, to protect each other and to ensure that the virus doesnt spread. These guidelines are very specific, theyre very detailed, they will only work if every american takes this together to heart and responds as one nation, and one people to stop the spread of this virus. Thank you. Thank you very much, dr. Birx. So just to connect to what i mentioned to you in previous discussions in this room, and dr. Birx said it very well, in order to be able to curtail this epidemic, we have a twopillar approach, chone of which i belie has been very effective in stopping the substantial seeding, and namely the travel restrictions weve discussed many times in this room. The other equally, if not more important, is when you have infection in your own country, which we do and you know i can read the numbers, but theyre really what weve seen yesterday, incremental increases, both globally and in the United States, with the curve doing that. So therefore, the kinds of things that we do are containment and mitigation. This, what were mentioning now, the guidelines, when you look at them carefully, i believe, if the people in the United States take them seriously, because they were based on some rather serious consideration back and forth, some may look at them and say, theyre going to be really inconvenient for people. Some will look and say, well, maybe weve gone a little bit too far. They were wellthoughtout. And the thing that i want to reemphasize, and ill say it over and over again, when youre dealing with an emerging Infectious Diseases outbreak, you are always behind where you think you are, if you think that today reflects where you really are. Thats not word speak. It means, if you think youre here, youre really here, because youre only getting the results. Therefore, it will always seem that the best way to address it would to be doing something that looks like it might be an overreaction. It isnt an overreaction. Its a reaction that we feel is commensurate, which is actually going on in reality. So take a look at the guidelines, read them carefully, and we hope that the people of the United States will take them very seriously, because they will fail if people dont adhere to them. We have to have, as a whole country, cooperating and collaborate to make sure these get done. Thank you. Okay, go ahead. Mr. President . Mr. President , a lot of people are concerned about how long all of this might last. Do you have any kind of estimate that if americans really were to band together and do what the white house was suggesting, how quickly we could turn this corner . Thats my favorite question. How many times, anthony, i think i ask him that question every day. And i speak to deborah, i speak to a lot of them, i get the opinion. So it seems to me that if we do a really good job, well not only hold the death down to a level that is much lower than the other way, had we not done a good job, but people are talking about july, august, Something Like that. So it could be right in that period of time, where it i say wash it washes through. Other people dont like that term. But where it washes through. So is this the new normal until the height of the summer . Well see what happens. But they think august, could be july, could be longer than that. But ive asked that question many, many times. Yes . That being said, mr. President , americans today and looking forward are living with so much anxiety and so much fear facing uncertainty right now. Im curious, how are you talking to your own family about this . How are you talking to your youngest son . Do you everyoniz emphasize withe of anxiety . People are very scared . I think they are very scared. I think they see were doing a very professional job. Weve been working with the governors and frankly the mayors local government at every level. We have fema totally involved. Fema has been, you know, usually, we see fema for the hurricanes and the tornadoes and now we have fema involved in this. Theyve been doing a fantastic job locally, working with people that they know, because they work, like, as an example in california, in the state of washington. They work with them a lot on other things and theyre very familiar. So theyre working on it. What you can do and all you can do is professional, totally competent. We have the best people in the world. We have really the greatest experts in the world. And some day soon, hopefully, it will end, and well be back to where it was. But this came up it came up so suddenly. Look, we were surprised, we were all surprised. We heard about it. We heard about reports from china that something was happening and all of a sudden, we did make a good decision. We closed our borders to china very quickly, very rapidly. That was a otherwise, we would be in a very as tony has said numerous times, we would be in a bad position, much worse than we would be right now. If you look at whats happening in other countries, italy is having a very bad time. Your family ive spoken with my son, he said, how bad is this . Its bad. Its bad. But were going to be hopefully a best case, not a worst case. And thats what were working for. Hopefully you can clear up some confusion on two key fronts. One is about your own test. The other is about containment efforts. Is the administration considering more aggressive containment options . Like a quarantine, a National Curfew well, we have that very much. We have that very much. And we are weve been pretty aggressive. We were early with europe, but we were very, very early with china and other places and fortunately, we were. And as far as containment here, we are were coming out with strong suggestions. And you know, its becoming a little bit automatic. You look at people, theyre not doing certain things. For instance, theyre obviously not i wouldnt say the Restaurant Business is booming and bars and grils and all people are selfcontaining for to a large extent. We look forward to the day where we can get back to normal. But are you considering instituting a nationwide lockdown or a nationwide quarantine . The nsc knocked that down, but there are still some questions about how at this point, not nationwide, but there are some you know, some places in our nation that are not very affected at all. But we may look at certain areas, certain hot spots, as they call them. Well be looking at that. But at this moment, no, were not. The second question is, you said you had your coronavirus test friday night. The white House Doctors office put out a statement around midnight friday saying that no test was indicated. So when exactly was your test administered . I had my test, it was late friday night, and the reason i did it is because i had no symptoms whatsoever, so the doctor said, you have no symptoms, so we dont see any reason, but when i did the press conference on friday, everybody was going crazy, did you do the test, did you do the contest . So very late on friday night, i did the test. And he may have put out, or the doctor may have put out something, i dont know what time the letter went out, but the results came back, i believe the following day, and we tested negative. So the question is, how could the white House Doctors office saying that a test wasnt indicated, implying that you hadnt had one, when in fact you had. Well, i told them, i went totally by what they said, the doctors, more than one. They said, you dont have any of the symptoms, they checked what youre supposed to check, and that i didnt have symptoms. But i did a test late on friday night and it came back, probably 24 hours later or something. They sent it to the labs, came back later. Mr. President , you had a teleconference with the nations governors today. And in that teleconference, you told them if they need things like respirators or masks to try to get it on their own. What did you mean by that they can get them faster by getting them on their own. In other words, go through a supply chain that they may have. Because the governors, during normal times, the governors buy a lot of things, not necessarily through the federal government. If theyre able to get ventilators, respirators, if theyre able to get certain things without having to go through the longer process of federal government, we have stockpiles now where were ordering tremendous numbers of ventilators, respirators, masks, and theyre ordered. And theyre coming. And we have kind of at this point, i think, mike, we have a lot. But if we can get them directly, its always going to be faster if they can get them directly, if they need them. And ive given them authorization to order directly. Mr. President , one of the big weaknesses in our Health Care System is Surge Capacity for medical facilities and i wanted to ask what precautions, what plan is being done to get china was able to build hospitals in a matter of days. Are you prepared to use the corps of engineers or fema to Start BuildingSurge Capacity that we may need in a couple of weeks. Well, first of all, we hope we dont get there, thats what were doing and why were taking a very strict look at this. But were also looking at areas and not only looking, were expanding certain areas. Were taking over buildings that arent used. Were doing a lot in that regard. We hope we dont have to get there. But we are doing a lot in that regard. Mr. President , can you clarify something. These guidelines say stay home if youre sick. Yesterday, the Vice President said, no one should worry about losing a paycheck if they stay home when theyre sick, but the house bill exempts companies of 500 employees or more from paid sick leave requirement, and thats 54 of the american workplace. Why is it a good idea to only require Small Businesses to provide well, were looking at that and we may be expanding that. We are looking at that. We want fairness, we want it for everybody. Were looking at that through the senate. Because as you know, the senate is now digesting that bill. So we may very well be adding something. Good question. Two questions for you, mr. President. One going off of what he was asking. How many ventilators and how many icu beds do we have right now and will it be enough . I can get back to you with that number. Weve ordered a lot. We have quite a few, but it may not be enough, and if its not enough, we will have it by the time we need it. Hopefully we wont need them. And youll give us the exact number . Because so far, they have not given us a number. Well give you a number. If its important, well give you a number. Yesterday, you said this is under tremendous control. Do you want to revisit this statement if we are going to be experiencing this until july or august, five more months when im talking about control, i mean, we are doing a very good job within the confines of what were dealing with. Were doing a very good job. Theres been a tremendous amount of the way theyre working together, theyre working hand in hand. I think theyre doing really a great job. And from that standpoint, thats what i was referring to. But its not youre not saying its under control, right . Im not referring to it the coronavirus. Yeah, thats not under control for any place in the world. Yesterday, you said it was. No, i didnt, i was talking about what were doing is under control. Im not talking about the virus. The stock market took another hit today. Is the u. S. Economy heading into a recession . Well, it may be. Were not thinking in terms of recession, were thinking in terms of the virus. Once we stop i think theres a tremendous pentup demand, both in terms of the stock market and in terms of the economy. And once this goes away, once it goes through and were done with it, i think youre going to see a tremendous, a tremendous surge zp are you looking at any Domestic Travel restrictions . I know thats been on the table before, but is that firming up at all . Were not really. We hope we dont have to do that. But its certainly something we talk about every day. We havent made that decision. Mr. President , can i ask you, doctors and nurses in this country are telling us, across the board, that theyre terrified of this virus, of the fact that they might get it or take it home to their families. What can you say to assure Health Care Providers in this family that the federal government is doing something today to make sure that they get personal protective equipment to protect themselves and their families . I think the federal government is doing everything that we can possibly do. We made some very good early decisions by keeping people out, by keeping countries out, certain countries, where the infection was very immense. I notice a lot of people are talking about south korea, because theyve done a good job on one side, but on the other side, tremendous problems at the beginning. They had tremendous problems and great numbers of death. I think that weve done a fantastic job from just about every standpoint, with that being said, you look no matter where you look, this is something. Its an invisible enemy. But we are speaking all the time, not only with the people, but also the professional people, the nurses, the doctors. They have been doing a fantastic job. We are also working very much on getting them the kind of equipment that they need. And for the most part, they either have it or they will be getting it. But, remember this. We want the governors, we want the mayors, we want them locally from a local standpoint, because it can go quicker, we want them to work. We had a great talk with the governors today. I think it was a really great talk. Theres a tremendous coordination, theres a tremendous spirit that we have together with the governors. And thats pretty much, for the most part, bipartisan. Yeah . Mr. President , you told john that you think that this could wash through, as you said, july, august. You just told steve when he asked you about the possibility of recession, you said, it may be. Im curious, if there is a recession, when do you think that might hit . Well, i dont number one, determine recession. I just say this. We have an invisible enemy. We have a problem that a month ago nobody ever thought about. Nobody in the ive read about it. Ive read about many years ago, 1917, 1918, ive seen all of the different problems, similar to this that weve had. This is a bad one. This is a very bad one. This is bad in the sense that its so contagious. Its just so contagious, sort of recordsetting type contagion and the good part is, the young people are they do very well and Healthy People do very well. Very, very bad for older people, especially older people with problems. My focus is really on getting rid of this problem, this virus problem. Once we do that, Everything Else is going to fall into place. Yes, please. Mr. President a lot of rumors last night, a lot of rumors last night that you were going to put in a National Curfew or some kind of yeah, ive been watching. Right, exactly, me too. Your people have been saying this is a foreign disinformation campaign. Is that whats going on . Are people messing with us on the internet . Well, i dont know. That, i cant tell you if they are or not. I think a lot of media has actually been very fair. I think people are pulling together on this. I think it could be that you have some foreign groups that are playing games. But it doesnt matter. We havent really determined to do that at all. And hopefully we wont have to. Thats a very big step. Its a step we can take, but we have not decided to do it. Mr. President , two things, one on airlines and one on jeff bezos, can you talk a little bit specifically about what you would like to do to help the airlines, first of all. And second of all, we heard that jeff bezos has been in contact with the white house daily. Can you say what hes been asking for or proposing to you . Ive heard thats true, i dont know that for a fact, but i know that some of my people have, as i understand it, have been dealing with them or with him. And thats nice. Weve had tremendous support from a lot of people that can help. And i believe he was one of them. As far as the airlines are concerned, the airlines, were going to back the airlines 100 . Its not their fault. Its nobodys fault, unless you go to the original source. But its nobodys fault. And were going to be in a position to help the airlines very much. Weve told the airlines were going to help them. Were going to be helping and backstopping the airlines. Well be helping them very much. Its very important. What about the stock market, sir . 25 billion for the Passenger Carriers and 4 billion for cargo . Were going to be looking at it very strongly. We have to back the airlines. Its not their fault. In fact, they were having a record season, everybody was. They were having record seasons and then this came out and came out from nowhere. Not theyre fault, but well be backing the airlines. Stocks continue to fall today. The best thing can i do for the stock market is we have to get through this crisis. Thats the best thing we can do. Thats what i think about. Once this virus is gone, i think youre going to have a stock market like nobodys ever seen befor before. Thank you, mr. President. Will you be voting mr. President. Hell be back in a second. I think the question that i think maybe john asked about, until july, the guidelines are a 15day trial guideline, to be reconsidering. It isnt that these guidelines are now going to be in effect until july. What the president was saying is that the trajectory of the outbreak may go until then. Make sure we dont think that these are solid in stone until july. Yeah. That would be the outside number. Yeah. Mr. President , youve been criticized please, go ahead. Mr. Go ahead. To follow up, Senate Republicans, do you want Senate Republicans to change the package that passed the house last week i think they may make it even better. Theyre working together very well with the house. Theyre working very much in unison, like the question before. Theyre working to only enhance it make it better. And make it fair for everybody. And thats what were looking to do. So we may go back back and forth with the house a little bit, but both will be in a very positive fashion. Please . Mr. President , these new guidelines say avoid social gatherings and groups of more than ten people, but the cdcs recommendations yesterday were for people to avoid gatherings of more than 50 people. Whats evolve ed in you and you teams thinking in the past 24 hours. And also, what exactly do you need to see in a stimulus bill. Well, let me just have the professionals answer that. Would you like to do that . Great. Thank you and thank you for that question. So we have been working on models day and night around the globe to really predict, because some countries in our very early stage, like the United States, weve been working with groups in the united kingdom. We have new information coming out from a model, and what had the biggest impact in the model is social distancing, small groups, not going no public in large groups. The most important thing was if one person in the household became infected, the whole household selfquarantine for 14 days. Because that stops 100 of the transmission outside of the household. And as we talked about, early on, its silent. We had another silent epidemic, hiv. And i just want to recognize the hiv epidemic was solved by the community. The hiv advocates and activists who stood up when no one was listening and got everyones attention. Were asking that same sense of community to come together and stand up against this virus and if everybody in america does what we ask for over the next 15 days, we will see a dramatic difference, and we wont have to worry about the ventilators, and we wont have to worry about the icu beds, because we wont have our elderly and our people at the greatest risks having to be hospitalize hospitalized. Thank you, mr. President. Very productive call today, with governors. We talked about the new rollout of testing that weve described yesterday and drivethrough and communitybased testing and i know how grateful the president is for the efforts that governors are making and now, with the admiral and with the United StatesPublic Health service, as well as fema, weve made great progress today in coordinating those efforts. But the other issue that was raised with the president today was personal protective equipment. And the reason i mentioned testing is because one of the recommendations that we have for states is that these remote testing sites make a priority of two groups. One would be people over the age of 65 that have symptoms. We dont want them to go to hospitals or emergency rooms. We want them to go to a remote site in a parking lot or at a isolated community location. But the other category is our Health Care Workers. We want to make sure that our Health Care Workers have the opportunity to be tested and using that new high throughput tests that the president arranged with our major commercial labs, well be able to do that much more expeditiously. So were putting a great deal on our Health Care Workers that are dealing with people with the coronavirus and others concerned that might have been exposed. The other piece is were grateful that the legislation passed by the house of representatives includes Liability Protection for n95 masks produced by Companies Like 3m in minnesota, by honeywell, literally tens of millions of masks are produced every year for industrial purposes, for construction. But the Health Experts say they can be used just as readily to protect Health Care Workers from respiratory ailments. 3m and other companies were not able to sell those to hospitals, but the president negotiated with the democratic leadership in the house and senate. Weve added a provision to the bill that will literally from one company alone add another 30 Million Masks per month back to the marketplace. Were strengthening the supply chain and Health Care Workers around america can be absolutely certain that the president and our entire team are going to continue to put the health of America First and put first our Health Care Workers across this country that are meeting the needs of the people of our country. Mr. Vice president , how many test kits have been sent out and how many people can actually be tested . I think i think the admiral can answer that. And you might want to talk about the roving also. So thank you very much for that. As we talked about yesterday, were really entering a new phase of testing. At first we were at the initial phase where the cdcdeveloped test was only available in Public Health laboratories and the cdc. Works very well for a few thousand tests per day after it gets running. Were now moving into a phase that the big commercial laboratories with High Throughput Screening have availability. So as we talked about last week, because of the historic efforts of the fda, a roche test and as the president predicted, a thermo fissure test were produced last week. 1. 9 million of those tests will be sequentially into the ecosystem this week. From the information we have right now, 1 million tests are available. With all the reagents, primarily at quest, Lab Corporation as ane of others. It doesnt matter if theyre in your neighborhood. Every day when people get tests, a little white box goes out in front, it gets shipped by an incredible Distribution System and the test result is electronically reported so these are available to people nationwide. We expect more and more than 1 million coming on board this week as the reagents come up and people with the Testing Capacity validate that in their own hospitals and other places. And in the future we expect at least 2 million next week and 5 million the week thereafter. There are also a whole growth of whats called laboratorydetermined testing or laboratoryderived testing where individual laboratories, because of the regulatory deregulation can develop their own tests and start using them. So if youre a Certified Lab with complexity, you can do that. So the point is testing is entering what we normally do where big labs receive these through normal channels, so that part of it is really under way. Do you know how Many Americans have actually been tested . Do you have a number . There is a number. I dont have that number because ive been working on setting up this Distribution System. So this is where we are. The state and Public Health laboratories and the cdc are published every day on the cdc website. The cdc gets feeds from lab corps and quest and they get that on a daily basis. What is not being received right now, and ambassador birx is fixing is these homegrown tests in highly complex labs dont necessarily get reported in the system. However, as we move forward, particularly in the commercial phase we are right now, we expect about 80 to 85 of the tests to flow right into the cdc. Thats not good enough for ambassador birx, she wants 100 and well work on that. So i think just to put it a different way, a lot of a lot of testing has been going on. I dont believe anybody has been able to do what were doing and what we will be doing. And let me just say that we talked about the drivethrough testing yesterday. I want it to be clear to everybody, this is just another tool for states and local Public Health systems and Health Care Systems to use. Its not replacing testing that goes on at a Doctors Office or in a hospital. Or if you go to your doctor and get tested in that office. This is just another tool were helping the states to have. Again, as we talked about, this is modeled on the femabased points of Distribution System optimized for testing. We expect this week, we now have gear, people being shimmed right now today that well be in over 12 states with multiple sites, many states having multiple sites to start augmenting the local capacity and really providing the state and local people what they need as another way for people to get tested. So this has never been done before. Thats never been done and certainly not on a level like that. And i will say that i think i can speak for the professionals that if you dont have the symptoms, if your doctor doesnt think you need it, dont get the test. Dont get the test. Not everybody should run out and get the test. But were able to handle tremendous numbers of people. Mr. President , earlier today Governor Cuomo of new york said that he believes that Hospital Capacity soon will be overwhelmed and implored you to call on the army corps of engineers to build temporary facilities to house patients. Is that something were looking into it. Weve heard it from two places. There are two places of that specifically, new york being one, and we are looking into it very strongly. Yeah. Sir, how have you changed your old behavior to take account of this virus . Are you washing your hands more . Ive always washed my hands a lot. I wash my hands a lot, probably if anything more. Certainly not less. What was it like taking the test . Not not something i want to do every day, i can tell you that. Its a little bit of a its a little bit of good doctors in the white house, but its a test. Its a test. Its a medical test. Nothing pleasant about it. You said in a tweet that Governor Cuomo should be doing more. I think he can do more. What specifically should he be doing . I think he can do more. Its an area of the country thats very hot right now. I think new rochelle, a place i knew very well, i grew up right near new rochelle, its a very i think its an area that has to be tamped down even more because its a hotbed, theres no question about it. But were getting along very well. Weve had a very in fact i noticed he made some statements just now that the relationship with the federal government has been good. The federal government has done everything they have wanted us to do. But we can i think its very important that all of the governors get along very well with us and that we get along with the governors. I think thats happening. Mr. President , the defense secretary and assistant defense secretary that decided to separate and be in a wububble t protect the chain of command, is that something you and the Vice President have been doing . I will say this. Were very careful. Were very careful with being together. Even the people behind me have been very strongly tested. Ive been very strongly tested. We have to be very careful. But everybody should be. Vigilant. We have to be vigilant. Mr. President , two simple questions please. Two simple questions for you, mr. President. I dont know if this is a question for you or dr. Birx. But dr. Birx said it is the millenials that are going to lead us through this and now is the time to look out for the older people in our home. Older might be a state of mind, not necessarily an age, so for those millenials of us who have parents who are in their 50s, 60s, 70s, what is older . What should we tell them at this point . Well, if i was dr. Fauci, i would tell you theres a physiologic age and a numerical age. So older people with preexisting conditions. What do we mean by that . Significant heart disease, significant kidney disease, significant lung disease, any immunosuppression, any recent treatment for cancer, any of those pieces and any household. Now, why do i think the millenials are the key . Because theyre the ones that are out and about. And theyre the most likely to be in social gatherings. Theyre the most likely to be the least symptomatic. I think weve always heard about the greatest generation. Were protecting the greatest generation right now and the children of the greatest generation. And i think the millenials can help us tremendously by having plus they need to communicate with each other. Public Health People like myself dont always come out with compelling and exciting messages that a 25 to 35yearold may find interesting and something they will take to heart. But millenials can speak to one another about how important it is in this moment to protect all of the people. Now, you could be 40 and have a significant medical condition and be at substantial risk. You could be 30 and having come through hodgkins disease or nonhodgkins lymphoma and be at significant risk. So there are risk groups in every age group. But theres more millenials now than any other cohort, and they can help us at this moment. Mr. President , thank you very much. You already talked. Mr. President , the other day you said you were not responsible for the testing shortfall. Very simple question, does the buck stop with you . And on a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate your response to this crisis . Id rate it a 10. I think weve done a great job. It started with the fact that we kept a very highly infected country, despite all of the even the professionals saying, no, its too early to do that, we were very, very early with respect to china. We would have a whole different situation in this country if we didnt do that. I would rate it very, very i would rate ourselves and the professionals, i think the professionals have done a fantastic job. As far as the testing, you heard the admiral. I think the testing that weve done, we really took over an obsolete system or put it maybe in a different way a system that wasnt meant to do anything like this, we took it over and were doing something thats never been done in this country. I think that we are doing very well. We took the system, we worked with the system we had and we broke down the system purposely, we broke it down in order to do what were doing now. And within a short period of time and even now were testing tremendous numbers of people and ultimately youre saying it will be, what, it will be up to how many people will we be able to test . We certainly expect with th