over this new variant. when the economy suffers, that is actually bad news for the people in power. who happened to be joe biden and the democrats. and of course, it's a new variant turns out to be serious, if it is more dangerous in some way god forbid. that would obviously be bad news, not just for democrats, but for everyone on this planet. we'll take a few weeks to get more data about omicron, to answer those unknown's and much more. like whether the current vaccines and treatments will actually work well against this variant. joining me now is somebody who will be watching this data closely and analyzing as it comes in. doctor francis collins director of the national. it's let's just start off with the basics here. what do we know so far about omicron and what do you think are the most critical questions that we need to answer in the next couple of weeks? >> well those are the right questions, and i know everybody wants answers and it's going to take a little longer. we do know that this is a variant that has the largest