Thats right. So the question this morning is, what does this all mean for you . Obviously, these numbers are going to give people some pause in terms of choosing perhaps this vaccine. Dr. Fauci says vaccines, though, still, whatever you can get, the best way to keep this virus from evolving further. Officials in South Carolina also have just confirmed the nations first cases of the south africa variant. The new model shows the pandemic could claim nearly 654,000 lives by may 1st. Lets begin with the j j breaking news. Our senior medical correspondent Elizabeth Cohen is with us. Can you explain what that means for everyone watching . The bottom line is, if the Johnson Johnson vaccine gets authorization from the fda and you are looking for a vaccine, and youve looked for moderna and pfizer, which are better, theres no question, but you cant find them because theres not enough of them but you can get Johnson Johnson, experts are telling me, get it. Do not hesitate to get it. It is still a good vaccine. It still gives protection. Its just not quite as good as pfizer and moderna. But it is still good. Remember, there are plenty of vaccines out there that have the level that Johnson Johnson is giving for other things. The flu shot, for example, sometimes only 50 effective. And Johnson Johnson is way better than that. So lets take a look at what Johnson Johnson found. When they were looking at the ability of Johnson Johnsons vaccine to prevent moderate to severe cases, they found it was 66 effective. Modernas was about 95 effective in that realm. Now when you look at what matters even more which is preventing severe cases, keeping people out of the hospital, keeping people alive, Johnson Johnson was 85 effective. Six months ago if we thought wed have a vaccine that was 85 effective, wed all be jumping up and down in joy. Moderna and pfizer are 100 effective, or nearly 100 effective in preventing severe disease. Johnson johnsons vaccine is quite good, if you can get it. Once its approved, if its approved, you should for sure get it. You can always get moderna and pfizer later. Theres nothing that precludes you from doing that. One expert said thats what i would do. If i could get j j now, id get it and then get moderna and pfizer later when i was able to get it. Poppy, jim . Elizabeth cohen, thanks for breaking down the data here. Joining us now to speak about this more is the Infectious Disease expert, Michael Osterholm director of research and policy at the university of minnesota. Always good to have you on. Good to be with you. Help us break through this data for folks listening here who are constantly bombarded with information and this good in the good news character. Theres another option coming out from Johnson Johnson with the advantages of being one shot versus two. Do you agree with the guidance that, listen, if this is the one that comes available to you first, take that one. Take what you can get, even though its slightly lower efficacy than moderna and pfizer. Well, first of all, let me just say that if i were in the General Public right now, my first reaction would be, i want the one that protects me the most. We havent really done a god job, i think, of explaining to the public that the immune response that occurs with the vaccine sometimes takes months to mature. And what all of these studies you are hearing about are really what happened in the two months after the last dose was administered. And for example in the Johnson Johnson study, which hasnt really been discussed, this protection got better the farther you got out from the vaccination. And that actually if we had followed this several more months, it might have been an equal, if not superior vaccine to what were seeing with moderna and pfizer. So weve got to do a better job of helping the public understand these are really in my mind, three almost equivalent vaccines. The advantage here is the Johnson Johnson vaccine is much more stable. We can keep it in our refrigerators longer. We dont have to worry about the extreme temperature issues. And for many clinics out there, this is going to be the ideal vaccine to have. One dose. Stable vaccine. Use it. That is so helpful dr. Osterholm. A key difference is that j j is a little bit more like a flu vaccine because it is made from a weakened virus, right . Its not the mrna or the rna. Should that matter to people . Right. Its not actually like the glu vaccine but what it is, its another vaccine where it uses another virus piece. Basically what we call an adno virus to help cause the antigen or material we were trying to vaccinate you against, how it enters into the body and how it then presents itself to the immune system. So it is a tried and true method and again, it has been well researched for many, many years. So from that standpoint, we think this is a very positive development. Okay. Now i dont want to get ahead of ourselves because right now were still struggling to get a first vaccine option into the arms of americans. But if it gets to the point where all of us, and it will get to that point, where its widely available, any of these vaccines is widely available, do you agree with the guidance that, lets say you get j j vaccine first. That does not preclude you at a later date from getting the pfizer or Moderna Vaccine to add to your immunity . Does that make sense for folks as they think about this longer term . Let me just say right now were on a vaccine journey. Were going to be learning a lot about these vaccines over the course of the next three to six months. And what i mean by that is, for example, weve already seen that the variants in south africa can surely have a big impact on how well these vaccines work. Were going to also have more information eventually on whats happening in brazil with that particular variant. And so i think right now, suffice it to say, get your first doses. Well have to keep sorting this out. Not sorting out to look at safety. Not sorting it to look at whether you should get it or not. Get it. But were going to be constantly reevaluating it. Whats the best way to protect the most people over time . And that may be that you will be getting a booster dose on a routine basis with one or more vaccines. So i know its confusing right now, but i think, get your first dose now. Protect as many people as possible. For sure. Probably the most Important Message anyone is going to hear today on this is that. You said definitively the worst is still ahead of us in this. Can you put that into context with this j j news we just got today . Well, one of the challenges we have right now is time. You know, people are talking about running a race with these Variant Viruss to get people vaccinated. If thats the case, weve already lost. Theres no race. If you look at what we can deliver in the United States with vaccine, literally in the first 65 days after the inauguration, not 100 days, and make that the 100 million dose goal, if you look at that, thats only about 12 of our population will be vaccinated. And protected. And so from this perspective, if the variants take off, as i believe this one from the uk is going to do in the next 3 to 4 to 5 weeks, by the time we get into february and march well still only have 12 of the u. S. Population vaccinated, and we can see case numbers far exceeding anything weve had to date. This really, i think, is the darkest hours of this pandemic. We have to acknowledge that. Thats what we need to start getting ready for. When we go from 150,000 cases a day, far beyond 300,000 cases a day, far beyond 120,000 hospitalizations a day. Far beyond 4,000 deaths a day. And i think thats all likely to happen in the next upcoming months. Just such a shame all the lost time in getting a handle on this. Final question, if i can, dr. Ashish jha who youre familiar with had an interesting thread on twitter talking about variants here. And making the point that variants tend to show up in countries that have not gotten this under control. That have let the virus do its work and mutate to a point where they could become more transmissible and possibly, we dont know yet, more deadly. I wonder, do we have a handle on whats happening in the u. S. . We dont do a great job of tracking the Genetic Signatures of these variants. Are we get anything better at seeing if were developing our own more transmissible variants . Yeah, well, in fact, wherever this virus is is reproducing, which right now is worldwide, youll see variants develop. And weve had a number of variants. Variants are not uncommon. What were most concerned about are the variants that cause more frequent disease transmission, more severe disease or evade our immune response from vaccine or infection. Here in the United States, we do not have a good understanding of whats happening with the variant movement. We were right now 42nd in the world by countries in terms of Doing Sequencing of this virus. I know this is a high, high priority for the new administration to basically upour game substantially. We need that data very, very badly. And so right now, we dont have a good handle on whats happening in our country. It is such a hill to climb to get everyone vaccinated, distribute it and sequence the way we should be. Dr. Osterholm, were grateful for you this morning. Thank you. So much lost time. Still to come fractures inside the gop have many republicans asking, is it still the party of trump . Is that a good idea . Plus, the capitol riot suspect, insurrection, really, who sat at speaker pelosis desk, has been denied bail. More on new Security Efforts around the capitol. Later this hour, we speak with four young women all members of a club no one wants to join. Each of their husbands only in their th30s or 40s have died fr coronavirus. For weeks after he passed, i would wake up suddenly in the middle of the night, and i would reach for my Phone Thinking i missed the call. I missed a call from the hospital. And then you realize, no, you know, he already passed. You have to like tell yourself the story again. Their strength is remarkable as they raise their Young Children without fathers anymore. Youll hear their stories ahead. This morning, a growing battle for the direction and soul of a fractured Republican Party. Former President Trump out of office, but clearly not out of power. At least when it comes to his own party. He and his allies are now targeting the ten House Republicans who voted for his second impeachment, including ramping up attacks on the number three ranked republican in the house. That is congresswoman liz cheney. Republicans, though, are staying mostly silent despite pressure by democrats to rebuke the qanon supporter and peddler of just the most ridiculous Conspiracy Theories you could imagine, congresswoman, shes a sitting congresswoman, Marjorie Taylor greene. Greene under fire for stunning often abhorrent comments calling the parkland shooting a false flag operation. Shes also talked about a giant laser from space that caused the fires on the west coast. Were not making this up. Cnns Lauren Fox Is On capitol hill for more on this. And i wonder, we talk about Kevin Mccarthy saying hes going to have a conversation with Taylor Greene now, sort of reminds me of the way i might talk to a 9yearold if they spoke back to me. Is there any real effort within the party to do something about her, or is she going to just go on and theyre going to hope we forget about it . Were not seeing a big effort in the Republican Party at this moment. Obviously, there are some democratic efforts to both remove her from congress or try to kick her off of her committees. Now ultimately, a decision to kick her off the committees she serves on would be a decision for kev in mccarthy, the House Minority leader. In the past hes taken those kinds of actions against former congressman steve king. He kicked him off his committees and eventually king could not win his reelection. So that can have a massive impact on a members ability to fundraise, a members ability to win votes back home in their own district. So thats certainly an option if republicans wanted to take it. But the Republican Party is doing a lot of soul searching. They are trying to figure out where to go in a posttrump era. You saw sKevin Mccarthy down in florida taking that photo with the president , a sign hes not ready to move on as he eyes 2022 and trying to take back the house of representatives. We also saw this playing out in wyoming yesterday. Matt gates a conservative member of the Freedom Caucus who was literally campaigning against liz cheney, a member of his own leadership. Heres what he said in wyoming. We are in a battle for the soul of the Republican Party, and i intend to win it. You can help me you can help me break a corrupt system. You can send a representative who actually represents you, and you can send liz cheney home. Back home to washington, d. C. And we should note theres just such a juxtaposition in what youre seeing out of House Republicans right now. Especially Kevin Mccarthy, their leader, n what youre seeing from Mitch Mcconnell who has not spoken to the former president since december. A clear tdivide here in the pary and house and some in Senate Republican leadership. Something to keep an eye on as they continue battling this out for not just days and weeks but potentially months and years. Do republicans have the votes to remove cheney at this point from the Leadership Position or is that still an open question . I still have sources telling me this is a very steep climb to remove her from her Leadership Position. That doesnt mean theyll not talk about it next week when they have a Conference Meeting to discuss this potentially and other issues, but i definitely think its still a very steep climb. And its a big question mark. And i think a large part of it will depend on where Kevin Mccarthy lands. Hes clearly stood by her side through this process. If he gets pressure from the right to move beyond her, i think that could have an influence on where the party goes. Well see. Mccarthy has moved before on this. Sometimes within the same day. Lauren fox, thanks very much. Joining me to discuss is olivia troy, former Homeland Security counterterrorism and task force adviser to mike pence and elizabeth newman, former assistant secretary of counterterrorism. They are both part of a group of republicans and Trump Administration alums forming the republican Accountability Project which plans to support lawmakers who voted to impeach trump and to go after republicans who continue to support the former president. Thanks for joining us. Good to have you on. Thanks for having us. So the republican Accountability Project, its main goals to try to protect republicans who you say had the backbone to vote to impeach the president , give them resources, et cetera, but also hold republicans accountable who have bought into the big lie about stolen election, et cetera. If i can begin with you, elizabeth, given how much of the base is still loyal to trump. You dont have a 10 problem here within the party. You have like an 80 problem, right . Do you believe you realistically have the resources and the backing to win this . To win this battle . Well, i have two answers to that. One, i dont know that 80 of the Republican Party are diehard trump supporters. I think the number is much, much less. Theres a difference twbetween holding your nose and voting for someone and voting for policy. After january 6th, seeing where the rhetoric has led to realizing that character really does matter, i think theres a softening happening right now. And i think some of these leaders in congress are misreading cues. They are probably having a little bit of abused Spouse Syndrome where theyre scared of his shadow. This is their opportunity to separate and redefine the party away from trump and aside from all of that, you know, the reason we did this project, it wasnt because were trying to save the party. Its because what they have done and in participating in President Trumps lies, it led to violence, and they need to be held accountable and Tell The Truth that the election was not stolen and apologize to their constituents if they want to have a political future. Olivia troye, what republican lawmakers have said to me in private, though, its only a handful willing to say it in public is, yeah, all this is damaging. Yeah, the man the old man is crazy, but if i say that in public, ill never be elected again. So i get that you always have overreach, right . Parties always overestimate to some degree their mandate here. But how do you fight that dynamic, right . Because the ten who voted to impeach him, seven already are going to be primaried