Taking to protect servicemembers and their families. Good morning to all of you and ood morning to the general and sergeant major. Our efforts on the navy side and we want to update you on the measures we are taking in the marine corps. Before i do thats correct let me give you our latest navy total of 133 positive covid19 in the United States navy. 104 active duty military, 23 civilians, 16 dependents and 19 contractors. I want to give a quick update on the teddy roosevelt. We found several more cases on board the ship. We are in the process now of testing 100 of the crew of that ship to ensure that we are able to contain whatever spread might have occurred there on the ship. But i want to emphasize that the ship is operationally capable and can do its mission sm the ship is pulling into guam and no one on the crew will be allowed to leave into guam and we are starting the process of testing 100 of the crew to ensure that we got that contained. The sailors who have been flown off the ship are currently doing fine. None of them have been required to be hospitalized because their symptoms are mild and aches and ains and sore throats and they are in quarantine now on gum. With respect to the marine corps, we have 44 positive test or covid19. 31 military, five gifflian, five dependents and three contractors and we are preventing the spread of the disease and contain any potential outbreaks and recover the force as quickly as possible. Oing across our naval force in partnership with the joint force. E provide quarantine support for american citizens returning from home from areas impacted by the virus. We provided commanders and to help families. The supplemental guidance will help commanders pay benefits to help minimize the risk to marines, respond to evolving situations and ensure the readiness of the force. This covers such as alternative places of duty, telework, leave and liberty and subsistence, housing separation, restriction of movement allowances. A general published a white letter to commanders describing our expectation of commanders and giving them the leeway to make decisions and preserve the force and give him some time to talk about that. To help with social distancing, the general has directed much of the headquarters and marine corps to remain at home. Our intent is to maximize virtual conferences, meetings, classes to alleviate large office crowding. We have scaled back or canceled several level exercises in 29 palms. We canceled schedule training to prevent the spread of the virus and remain transparent in remaining positive tests to the local communities. And i want to confirm marines stationed at the pentagon tested ositive on march 24. The marine is currently in isolation at his home and will undergo further assessment. The marine followed official guidance by isolating himself when his spouse began to show symptoms. He contacted the assigned medical facility and work space has been cleaned and investigation is currently under way to mitigate risk and preserve the health of our marines, civilians. He was last inside the pentagon on march 13. Two individuals were advised to selfisolate and both individuals area symptomatic. Naval recruiters will transition to prospecting via digital and telephone means only. Marine recruiters will not be meeting with applicants. Marine recruit depots are identify covid19 and recruits upon their arrival as prior to traveling to the depot in processing at the military processing stations. Those who present any symptoms, t this time, we know that at least two recruits have ceased positive for the virus at paris island but no instructors have tested positive. Recent test results two marines stationed at the paris island have tested positive. Those marines are in quarantined when they were notified. Both of those marines worked in office separate and apart from the training locations and we received word there are two confirmed cases of covid19 with recruits. Public graduation ceremonies have been closed to the public to minimize the spread of the virus to the force and their families. The depots have implemented Health Protection measures to include social distancing. We smect leaders to use judgment and implement health force Protection Measures to preserve the force and our mission. Our commanders are empowered to take necessary precautions because the virus is unique to every situation and every location. We will continue to assess and modify as needed future global force managements for deployment plans for the next 60 days. Today roughly 37,000 marines are Forward Deployed or forward station the. Those preparing for deployment continue to do so while taking measures. The marine corps and integrated naval force remains mission readiness. We stand ready to answer the nations call and preserve the force and our communities and our families. Thank you. We look forward to your questions. Start on the phone. Yes. Thank you. Can you hear me . We can hear you. Bob burns from ap. I have a question for the commandant and the secretary. General burger, the secretary just mentioned briefly the reductions and cancellations of various exercises and training. I wonder if you could give a broad assessment the degree to which training has been impaired here. Given all the restraints including the stop moving order from secretary esper today, is it 50 or more. Nd ask a question of the secretary, you mentioned the 103 active duty navy have tested positive. I dont know precisely the comparison of the other services. Seems to be higher than the other services and i wonder if there is an explanation the infection rate is higher in the navy. Let me answer that question and turn it over to the general. I think we are trending higher. I think some data out this morning showed we are probably a third of all the active duty people that have tested positive are within the navy and marine corps. I dont have a reason for hat. It would be speculation for me to try to give you a reason for why that has happened. I will say our forces are all over the world all the time. That may have something to do with it and we have big fleet consen station such as san diego and norfolk where we have a lot of people together. We havent done the forensics where these individual sailors contacted the disease and until we do that, it would be irresponsible for me to say why this is happening. As far as training, i dont know if 50 , i dont know the exact percentage. I would say though as the secretary mentioned, unique part of the navy and Marine Corps Team this is your force and readiness that has to be ready to respond to a problem in the world and never given advance otice. So we have to be ready all the time. The commanders, the guidance to them is pretty clear, we have to respond when we are given the direction to do so you have to do the training. They they have changed their training where there are not large bodies in a close confined space. They have spread it out and curtailed some training that was nice to do, good to do but not necessary for their essential task. They have tailored but you expect your marine corps and navy when they are called to do o. About the basic training graduations, when i graduated, it was important for my parents because i accomplished something finally in my life. What are you doing to allow parents are you videotaping so they can watch it at home . I know correct. Everything is being teleadvised live and recorded. I understand how important those events are for families and recruits and new marines ready to educate. It is a unique time. Ts not going to be the same sitting at a graduation. There is a digital record that will transition with the new marine and will have the capacity to have that. Are you there . Thanks for doing this. The navy in particular have taken aggressive measures from gathering in groups and grooming standards. Is the marine corps moving out on those policies and if not, why not . I want to address each one individually. Where they make sense, yes. Things like grooming standards, barber shops in one area may be open and in another base they may be closed. We trust the leaders to make those calls and given them the latitude to waive requirements when its not practical. The flu like other pandemics is different from area to area and region to region. We have not said all grooming standards are relaxed for a given period of time. All commanders have latitude to make adjustments based on what is available at your location. I dont know if that is exactly what youre asking. It does. And what about fitness tests. Promotion board is pretty fascinating. This is an area week and a half, looking at creative ways of how you would run a Promotion Board. In other words of everybody being in one room staring at a computer screen, they are now looking either we might have to delay it or is it possible to spread across two or three rooms electronically with video teleconferencing activity and have the Promotion Board run on time. But you would be spread across multiple rooms. It is driving us to be creative and im sure the other services are doing the same. In some cases we will delay hings. Like always, Young Leaders are coming up with Creative Ideas how to accomplish it but in a different way. I was wondering how boot camps have changed. What a changes have you made with the personal grooming. Whats going on there . Everyone is getting their eads shaved. You probably got the same, i imagine. But there will come a time where it comes worse and worse that bashers wont come to. Do marines cut marines hair . And the commanders at both of our recruit depots have talked heir bay through it. As the secretary mentioned, those who are going through the military Processing Center and on to paris island or san diego, they are being isolated for a period of time to observe them before training starts where normally they would have that period after boot camp. We just moved that to the front. Now when you get to paris island or san diego, you are in a period of isolation. But during training, if you heard major adjustments . Thats a great question. There are challenges. Its kind of a new opportunity. Social distancing is one of the largest hurdles right now in the environment because it is closed. However in our dining facilities, recruits are spread out more than they would be. Ygiene is a priority and inherently no matter what you bring people from across america in a close. Heightened sense of hygiene. Imagine those things right now making minor adjustments to the training schedule. As a followup, has any of he marine corps cases been aboard ship . None that i know of. There might be, but none that m aware of. The Navy Personnel on the ships, how did you get to test the entire ship and where are he tests going to be processed . On the carriers, largedeck ship, we have the capability to test them in a lab on the hip. They can process through certain number a day and so we are ooking at ways now to not only maximize that capacity on the ship to test but send some of those swab tests out to the d. O. D. Labs for testing. Sean, are you there . Thank you for doing this. Address this idea there is a general sense that the marine corps is not being a responsible stakeholder. Pictures are showing largescale mass formation, rifle ranges and exercises still kicking off. And barber shops on marine bases are have stayathome rders. Why not stay in a couple of months or use virtual trainers for academic classes. Pictures look different to youf they look unique its probably because its true. He marine corps is unique. We are mandated to be the nations most ready force and thats what you would expect us to be. The exercise you referred to at 29 palms, im not sure where you are getting your information will not go in april. Im not sure where you are pulling your information from but it may be dated a day or two. The training we have to do, recruit training or officer candidate training, some of that is absolutely necessary and everything from where they live to martial arts training, some of that is up close and personal. But we are very confident that both the leadership that supervises that training and medical capabilities that respond to it are all in place. All the right measures are being taken and right exercises exercises are either being postponed or canceled ompletely. Clarification first and then a question for the both of you. You mentioned earlier there was modifications in training events going forward. I wonder if you have any examples. To the both of you, the marine orps is going through some major efforts with the naval and i wonder how those are being impacted whether inability to work in simulation efforts or challenges and teleworking and any impacts. In terms of training, im trying to think of a good example where you can picture it in your mind, but i would say in Something Like a pistol range where all of us might be close to each other lined up on a istol range on a detail, theyll spread them out now just like we are in this room and maybe run more relays than they would normally run to keep a spread between marines where they can. If its a Live Fire Exercise and only do so much to moderate social distancing when you are downrange. Each type of training commanders taking the measures that make sense and making sure the units on forced design, i will turn it over to the secretary. Not going to are spend time talking about it today. The quick cancer, its just harder to do electronically. Not stopped, i dont think. That is a good question. Weve been aggressive trying to look at this. Leadingty secretary is the effort to look at the structure, which we are participating in, and the new carrier study i launched as well plan andg at 355 plus how we are going to do that. A lot of that work lends itself to not having to be in the same place. I think that is fine. The concerns i have, the Budget Development process. We do that well in advance. We are still trying to get our arms around the impact of the virus in terms of readiness we have to make up. That is the only thing. We are working on this in real time. Requires heavy modeling efforts with the computer set up. That is going to be the bigger part of the challenge. We are integrating with the college on this. They have all gone virtual right now. We are going to think through how we do that. Politico . Hello. Can you hear me . Great. Thanks for doing this. I was wondering if you could tell me, the secretary in an was going to, he the pentagon was going to stop providing granular information. To give usll going updates on the numbers of people that are getting tested on the ships avenue you been doing . And how many cases on the ships and hotspots . We are trying to be as transparent as possible. Its important people understand where we are and how it is impacting us. We have to balance that around privacy concerns. We are trying to develop a balance on that. It had been our policy not to discuss which ships were impacted. Obviously the information came out and we felt it was responsible to give you the straight story about what is happening. The direction of the secretary of defense. Perspective, being as transparent as possible is the best path. Follow up on what you said about tests on ships, i thought we were told 24 hours ago there were not labs on ships. They had to do the swab testing and fly those on land. Has that changed . Do you have the ability to not can put them you through labs on board the ships . Thank you for the question. We do fly them off. We are working with industry to answer that question. Just not there yet. We can do surveillance testing. We do it across the ships. The coronavirus is a novel virus. Viruses are not novel to the navy and marine corps. We do this every day. Thank you. Say youre going to test all 5000 people on board, those will be swab, or surveillance . Let me answer this one. I just had a call with our medical people. Its going to be a combination of whatever is available. Will gettanding, we you a precise answer. Small ships dont have the ability to test on board. It is my understanding on the larger ships we have the ability to do some limited testing. Onare you short of swabs board, Something Like the roosevelt . It has 800 kits on board. We are flying more today as we speak. They will have more to solve this problem. Ok. In terms of the barbershops being opened, you are bringing barbers from outside the basis into some civilian community into the marines to cut hair . Is that a good idea . Base wheres based to they have gone from Health Protection condition. Countrywide, it has varied. Is it a good idea . We keep the commissaries open. As many functions as we can to support the families. We are planning, like the other services, to reach a point where they dont come to work and then we will adjust. You get the last question. Hello. Thank you. I understand this is a question for the secretary. I understand the mercy is scheduled to arrive on friday. What about comfort . Where do you expect that to arrive . Thanks for the question. We have accelerated the plan for comfort. We had been looking at april 3. She will be getting underway this weekend. Inefully she will be there new york by the early part of next week. Monday, tuesday . I would rather not give a firm date. Im going to be going down to the ship tomorrow or saturday. Sometime after that she will be leaving. It will to be tanned on transit well she is functioning. I would say within a couple of days. Clarification, does the roosevelt have the ability to process the test . I was confused by the initial response . Explained, there is some limited ability to do testing. You said several more sailors had tested positive, can you give us a number . There were three initial, five more were flown off the ship or were in the process. There are several others in isolation. The ship is going to be pulling in and they will figure out who needs to come off and who can stay on. Looking at the level of symptoms. Where were the initial sailors . You were hesitant about saying where they went. It was guam. That is where the ship was going. Yes. Thank you very much. Followed the federal response to the coronavirus outbreak at cspan. Org coronavirus. Once congress, white house briefings and updates from governors. Interactive maps, watch ondemand anytime unfiltered at cspan. Org coronavirus. The Economic Impact of the coronavirus is visible in the latest unemployment figures, which reached record numbers last week with 3 million jobless claims according to the labor department. Cnbc has this chart depicting the sudden rise, and points out the numbers shattered the Great Recession peak of 665,000 in march 2009, and the alltime mark of 695,000 in october 1982. In her weekly briefing, nancy pelosi talked about legislative e