In u. S. History will deliver checked to americans and send cash to hospitals and small businesses. Lets start at the epicenter with Brynn Gingras live in new york city. New york city is now ground zero if you will in this war against the coronavirus. Whats the latest . Yeah, john, you know, listen, a friend got in touch with me and basically said they keep hearing all these numbers. The numbers are going up, of course, but those are hard to register. What really sets in for people, she thought at least, was the pictures. I want to show you what were seeing at this hospital. We have been here for the last three days. This line gets exponentially longer every single day. We have been here in the early mornings. People start lining up before 6 00, even sometimes before that. I mean, lets keep in mind, these are people, every single one of them is wearing a mask, so more than likely, every single one of them thinks they might have coronavirus or else why else would they be in the line . They dont feel well. Theyre sick, standing hours in line in this outside this hospital just to get in to try to get some care. That really gives you a perspective of how dire really the situation is here. Now, if we go back to the numbers. Thats the big thing, right . The governor, the mayor, here of new york city, asking for more ventilators, asking for more personal Protection Equipment for the front lines. Those Health Care Workers inside taking care of all of these patients. The need is there. You can see it right here on the ground. Of course, yesterday, we saw the governor be so fiery in that News Conference saying we need more ventilators. Were going to need 30,000 when the hospitals actually reach the top of the peak, which he thinks is another two to three weeks from now. And sure, the president fired back and said hey, were giving you ventilators. Its up to you to get the rest, but the point is, we need more. And this is the situation were seeing here in new york u and it is going to be copied and pasted in other cities across the country. Were seeing already, you know, more surges in hospitals, in new orleans. Were seeing more cases in new jersey, in connecticut. I mean, again, its just being repeated all across this country, but i can tell you, we have been standing here just before the live shot and we saw four ambulances rush right into that hospital. Of course, i dont know if thats a coronavirus patient in the back of that ambulance, but the point is the optics here, its jarring. Optics jarring. A great way to put it. We focus a lot on the risks being taken by frontline Health Care Workers, which they should. Theyre putting their lives in danger to help the patients but you have new numbers about the number of new York City Police officers who now have this virus. Yeah, absolutely. More than 200 have the virus. Of those nypd members, 6. 6 of the people, the force, is calling out sick. Thats more than double what they usually see. Those are the numbers. I just had a conversation with a Police Officer not too long ago who said his partner is being transferred to a different presipg because the need is there. Theyre having to be shifted around. We also saw a van go around basically telling the community to social distance. I mean, these are all the people that were asking social distance for, the people on the front lines, not just in the hospitals but of course Police Officers, firefighters, ems. Adjustments in the sad new normal. Appreciate the reporting. Despite warnings from Health Experts saying its way too soon to talk about easing social distancing requirements, President Trump remains fixated on this idea. He wants the country back to normal by easter, saying it would be, quote, beautiful. Cnns john harwood covering that for us. What are we hearing today . You can tell the Public Health persons are trying to push the president back some. Is he bepding . I think he is bending some. President trump would like for the country to be reopened for business by easter, but as he plays at all of his campaign rallies, you cant always get what you want. The predhas felt the pushback from tony fauci, from deborah birx, from people like andrew cuomo who is going to give that press Conference Today in just about ten minutes time. Also from liz cheney in the House Republican leadership, saying there will be no functioning economy to go back to if you have got thousands of people dying, laying dying in overflowing hospitals. The president has continued to signal the increasing realism that this is not going to be possible. He just tweeted a few minutes ago that japan had made a very wise decision to postpone the olympics. Well, the olympics are scheduled for july. So by praising that decision, he is recognizing that this is going to go on for a while. Not just in the United States but around the world. So i think that the president is always pushed and pulled by people he talked to, by polls, by the stock market. We do see the stock market going up today in response to the stimulus bill. Thats good news for the economy. Ben bernanke, the former fed chair, saying this might not be a great depression. All that is going to be some comfort to the president. He said yesterday hes going to be guided by data. Tony fauci said hes going to be guided by data. I think hes backing off that very ambitious timeline. We hope he follows the science. The facts of the science. John harwood, appreciate the latest reporting. Joining me, dr. Jeremy foust, an Emergency Room Physician and instructor at harvard medical school, and dr. She shaw. Dr. Foust, let me start with you first. When you say it, the number of cases in new york city are doubling every three days. What does that tell you about the arc of this, and put that into the context of the president saying, well, maybe in a couple weeks we might be ready to dial it back . Yeah, this is an important moment, and let me just say this about the president of the United States. Today is a new day. And tomorrow is another day. And if he sees fit to make policy that saves the most lives, then he can be a great president. And we see leadership, and we see lack of leadership in some places. So thats the diagnosis. But whats the prescription . The prescription is two things. Right now, in places like new york, where theres a lot of disease, you have to have shelter in place. You cannot ignore the fact on the ground that doubling time were hearing does not comport, does not agree with some of the data we have heard so far about how fast this virus moves. In places like new york, shelter in place must be continued and maybe for longer. If it comes from President Trump himself, its more powerful because it might be unexpected. The second thing is in places where maybe the disease is not as prevalent, and those places, quarantining people who enter and trying to decrease how many people come and go can help protect our citizens. Were seeing innovation, seeing people stepping up. Governor cuomo yesterday gave us, e. R. Doctors like me Legal Protection so we could make decisions normally people would second guess, and i am looking for governor baker to do the same. It makes a difference when people step up. It certainly does. We appreciate the medical heroes in the community. Dr. Shaw, i want toput onthe screen, u. S. Cases over time. The steady growth of the cases here in the United States. Some of this is because theres more testing so you have higher numbers. Had you just see the ramp up like that, when the president says he hopes theres soon a day where you can send at least much of america back to work, dissect, help me dissect that, if you will. You certainly cant do that in new york city right now. You cant likely do that in new york state right now. Are there places around the country, might the president be right, pockets of america where were getting close to that moment or is it way too soon to know that . Yeah, so good morning, john. Thanks for having me. Listen, all of us hope that there is a day sooner rather than later when we can open back up again. Its going to have to depend on the facts on the ground. And the facts on the ground are going to be determined by how much Testing Capacity we have, how many people are infected, what the rate of infection is. Right now, we are in a bad situation. Its not just new york, i think, as your reporter mentioned earlier. New orleans, atlanta, parts of florida, these are the places that are going to be hit very hard. New jersey, very hard over the next week or two. What i want to see is a massive rampup on testing, smart testing, and then we can decide, are there places that can open up a little . But deciding right now is very hard. Deciding right now very hard. To that point, i want to read a tweet from the president of the United States, hes happy that u. S. Testing is better, in a better position today than several days ago, and thank god, several weeks ago. He said just reported the United States has done far more testing than any other nation by far. In fact, over an eightday span, the United States now dust more testing than south korea does in an eightweek span. Great job. Is it a great job . Are we in the right place now as opposed to a few weeks ago when we were way behind or just in a better place with a long way to go still . I see progress. But the only way to do this successfully is to take the south korean model and do what america does best, which is to supersize it. And were starting to do that. And but its delayed. But then, what do you do next . We have to know what to do next with that information. And people are stepping up. My publication brief 19. Com, we broke news the other day that the cdc will be rolling out a much, much more comprehensive reporting system on every hospital in the country as to where the disease is, how many beds are filled, how many ventilators are being used. This is information thats going to help public officials, local officials, and even some of that detail will be available to the public, some of it will not be, but it will help nonprofits like get meppe. Com org. We have to play the ball, we have to know where to put our resources. People are really participating. When my little publication, where doctors and emergency doctors and Health Policy experts, when we broke that news, and we beat every other news agency, people just reached out and said good job. Congratulations. How can we help . Theres a camaraderie right now across the board. My friends at the cdc are telling me theyre seeing more camaraderie and people working together than they have ever seen. We see it, were in a fearful moment, but theres hope if we Work Together and act on the information that we are receiving. We need more. We need more information. That is certainly effective. Let me close the conversation. Whats missing . As somebody watching at home who doesnt have your expertise, what is missing from conversation, either from us in the news media or from our leadership to help the average american out there decide what to do next, today, tomorrow, and next week . Yeah, so john, i think one of the things were missing is that we have to understand this is the long ball. This disease does not go away next week or two weeks from now or by easter. Its going to be with us for 12 to 18 months, until we have a vaccine thats effective. So we should be thinking about the long ball here. We should be making decisions today on how were going to get through the next 12 to 18 months, how were going to preserve our economy, keep people safe. I feel like every decision is what are we doing tomorrow, what are we doing next week . We also have to think about what do we do next month, over the next 18 months. Hopefully we can keep that context as we cover the daytoday developments. Really appreciate your insights and expertise. Be sure to watch our next town hall on cnn, 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cnn. Were expecting to hear from andrew cuomo, his daily update on the coronavirus numbers and response in that state. Well bring you that live as soon as the governor gets under way. Managing lipids, like very high triglycerides, can be tough. You diet. Exercise. 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This morning, the Senate Democratic leaders, Senate Republican leaders each had their own respective Conference Calls with their caucuses to walk through what exactly was agreed to, because this deal sweeping as it is, most expensive rescue package in american history, was really only concocted by a handful of members. The leadership on both sides of the aisle, as well as ahandful of people within the Trump Administration and the white house, meeting on five days of marathon negotiations. Ultimately cutting a deal at about 1 00 a. M. Earlier this morning, and now, the details are still coming out. Their drafts of this legislation circling on capitol hill, but formally, this bill has not yet been introduced, nevertheless, Senate Leaders are pushing to get this approved today. They need to insure none ofthies members will object and prevent passage of these sweeping measures. Members are eager to read through the bill text, but it will be doubtful sorry to interrupt. We need to go to andrew cuomo. Worked with me for a long time, from the Attorney Generals Office and hes part of our s. W. A. T. Team. We have the president of empire college, dr. Howard zucker, health commissioner, the secretary to the governor, we have a lot of interesting news today. Things are moving. Current status, we still have the trajectory going up. We have not turned the trajectory, nor have we hit the apex. Remember what that line is going to do. Its going to go up, reach a high point, tip, go back down. Were still on the way up the mountain. Number of infections that have been coming in, 80 still self resolved. About 15 of the people who test positive require hospitalization. And then there are degrees of hospitalization. But the total universe that requires hospitalization is 15 . We use projection models. We have cornell weil, which is a great medical institute that does projection models, we use mckinsey, the department of health does projection models. The projection models are important because they are projecting the possible trajectory and projecting the possible need. So were planning for a need. The projection models do that. The projection models are just that. They are models of projections. Theyre not necessarily definitive, but its the only device we have to plan. Follow the data, follow the data, follow the data. The actual hospitalizations have moved at a higher rate than the projected models, than all of the projected models. So that was obviously concerning. Because that higher infection rate means faster, higher capacity on the hospitals, and thats the critical point for us, is the number of people going to hospitals. Right now, what were looking at is about 140,000 cases coming in to the hospitals. The Hospital Capacity is 53,000 beds. Thats a problem. Were looking at about 40,000 icu cases coming into the hospitals. We have about 3,000 icu beds. Thats a challenge. What is an icu bed for these purposes . Basically, a bed with a ventilator. The ventilator is the most critical piece of equipment for an intensive care unit bed because this is a respiratory illness and people need more ventilation than usual. What do we want to do . Reduce the number of cases coming into the hospitals. Slow the number of cases coming into the hospitals. Thats what dr. Faucis talking about on tv every day. Flatten the curve, flatten the curve, flatten the curve. Slow the number of people coming into hospitals so we can deal with them in the hospitals. And we are working on that. At the same time, increase your Hospital Capacity. Right . So try to slow the number of cases coming into the hospital. Meanwhile, raise your Hospital Capacity. We are working on both simultaneously. We have been from day one. Reduce the number of cases coming in, f