Unemployment numbers. 1. 48 million more americans filed new jobless claims last week. That brings the total to some 47 million over 14 weeks. For some context, thats about the combined populations of florida, pennsylvania and illinois. And for americans looking for help from government, this news, painful to report. A Government Watch dog now telling corning that more than 1 million americans that are no longer living received covid19 stimulus payments. Those payments totaled about 1. 4 billion, billion with a b. Well have more in a moment on how precisely Something Like that can happen. We start with the ongoing cases and admissions in texas and arizona. In texas more than 11,000 new cases in the last two days. Houstons mayor says 97 of icu beds there are in use. Meanwhile, in arizona with cases and deaths rising, around 88 of that states icu beds are now full. We have nbcs sam brock in houston. Houston has become the epicenter of this pandemic in texas. Nbcs joe fryer is in scottsdale, arizona. Sam, ill start with you. Weve just learned over the last hour or two that texas governor, republican Governor Greg Abbott suspending elective surgeries in the states four largest counties including Harris County where you are there in houston. It would seem to be, sam, thats the latest indication of how dire the situation has gotten there in texas. Reporter thats exactly right, craig. He has foreshadowed, governor abbott, that he was going to do Something Like this. Within the last hour, the announcement of suspension of elective surgeries. What youre seeing in houston, craig, is essentially a stress test. Hospitals are being pushed to the brink. You mentioned the figure, 97 icu bed hospitalizations. I was talking to someone who says the reality, they can add more beds, add more capacity, but whatever it is, its a really acute problem right now. This is a recent development. For months, hospitals in the area have had enough resources to deal with the surge in covid19 patients. Now in recent history, this worst of patients and maybe the most concerning thing right now, craig, is the positivity rates. For the community yesterday it was 10 . But for the Emergency Departments at houston methodist, 30 positivity rate. Here is dr. Neil gandhi talking about what he is seeing on the ground level here every day in the hospitals. I think over the past seven days, things have significantly crescendoed and theres been a massive uptick in cases. With the hospitalizations, were seeing a slight predominance towards younger patients. We suspect the covid virus will be with us for a very long time. We need to find ways to treat both the covid virus and patients who come in with regular medical issues as well. Reporter interesting that one of the messages that dr. Gandhi wanted to get out, if youre having an emergency issue, whether its a broken bone or chest pain, go to the hospital. Theyre not shutting down their Services Just because of whats going on with covid19. As we mentioned, craig, there is a suspension of elective surgeries with the Health Crisis in this city crescendoing. Back to you, craig. All right. Sam brock in houston. Let us go now to arizona. Joe fryer, how are businesses, how are hospitals handling the surge there . Reporter we know several hospitals are certainly having a tough time right now. As you mentioned, 88 of icu beds across the state are full right now. Thats up from just 84 earlier this week. Of course, some hospitals have been hit harder than others. But we can tell you where we are here in maricopa county. They have seen over a third of their total cases for this entire pandemic in just the last week. About half of those cases are people who are under the age of 45. So theyre less likely to be hospitalized. Still we spoke with a 30yearold who says he went out to a bar earlier this month. A few days later he ended up with covid19 and had to go in the hospital. He said at the time he wasnt wearing a mask, wasnt social distancing. Hes learned that lesson now. We know that businesses here in arizona have not had quite the same restrictions in reopening as some of the other states throughout the country. Some of those Business Owners are starting to grow concerned as we see these cases surge. I spoke with Rashida White who owns a restaurant called brunch and sip in the phoenix area. They were supposed to open in march. It was delayed because of the pandemic. They ended up opening, not reopening, opening in may facing a lot of challenges, masks and gloves, constant cleaning, disposable menus. Because of social distancing guidelines, capacity limited to about 40 . I spoke to her about some of the challenges theyre facing. Take a look. I worry about if i bring something home to my husband and we go down, were the owner of these businesses. We are the front line. I cant stay at home and expect my employees to be here on the front line without supporting them. We dont know what tomorrow holds. If people decide, they get so afraid of covid and decide not to eat with us, yeah, it will be really sad. So well see. I dont want to risk anyones life either. Thats why we try to do what we can to keep everybody safe. Rasheedah and her husband own other restaurants that have been able to do takeout so theyre fairing better. She says she deals with the occasional customer who doesnt want to wear a mask inside her restaurant. Craig. Joe fryer in scottsdale, thank you. Across the country were hearing just how bad things have gotten from the nurses, from the doctors, from the medical staff who are dealing with this virus every day. Its just been awful to watch these patients in such severe distress and see how bad they get, and just seeing how alone they are and how scared they are and how much they miss their family. Its awful. Im used to encountering in my professional and even my personal life, but this is not the same. In some ways its almost Like Fighting a ghost because we just dont know what youre up against. I want to bring in our doctor on duty for the hour, dr. Steve corwin, president and ceo of new york presbyterian hospitals. Steve, the exhaustion from the medical professionals that we just heard, i know that sounds familiar to you as someone who ran a hospital in new york during the height of the pandemic there. What advice do you have for your counterparts across this country who are seeing their spikes in cases now . This is just so disheartening. I empathize tremendously with all the frontline workers. As they these cases start to increase, it becomes almost overwhelming. Youre talking about 95 of icu capacity, 90 of icu capacity. Youre not talking about regular patients in those beds. Youre talking about the covid patients. Once you get to the point in the communities where you have Widespread Community spread, its impossible to contact trace, and then you are left to reap the whirlwind. I hope that whats happening in houston now does not reach the proportions that happened in new york city. Its devastating. To your earlier point with your er doctors, patients were afraid in new york to seek er care because the ers with overwhelmed with covid. So patients who need care defer care. The covid care is time intensive. Its very, very disconcerting. No matter what we want to convince ourselves about in terms of 20, 30 and 40yearolds, there are 30 and 40yearolds that die from this. There are 30 and 40yearolds that infect their immunecompromised sister of their mother or father. The curve you just showed in texas starts to mimic the curve we had in new york and its extremely disheartening. The administration the Trump Administration planning to end federal support, steve, for covid19 testing sites. Seven of the 13 federally supported sites are in texas which, of course, seeing a Record Number of cases. How does that move impact the ability for states to fight, to try and contain this virus . Lets just deal with the science. The virus doesnt know zip codes. It doesnt know red states or blue states. Masks are masks work, point number one. Point number two, you have to do a lot of testing. When the viral load in the Community Starts to go down, your positive testing starts to dip. You want to see it below 10 . Ideally you want to see it below 2 or 3 . In new york its clearly gone way down. In california its at about 4. 8 now. In texas, i dont know what that number currently is. But anything above 10 positivity when youre testing, youve got a problem. Testing less doesnt mitigate the problem. You need to test more. You need to wear masks. You need to socially distance. Otherwise you get an epidemic that becomes out of control. When its out of control you overwhelm hospitals and their icus. Dr. Corwin, stand by for me if you can. We continue to follow breaking news also related to unemployment in this country. Weve learned almost 1. 5 million americans filed for unemployment last week. Thats more than the entire population of the state of maine in just one week. And its worse, slightly worse than what economists initially were predicting. That now brings the total to some 47 million unemployment claims filed in just the last 14 weeks since all this started. Nbc news Senior Business correspondent Stephanie Ruhle is covering this part of the story for us. Steph, what do these numbers say about the strength of our economy right now and where we are on this long road to recovery . All right, craig. Over the last 14 weeks, youve got almost 50 million americans on unemployment. So the idea that were going to reopen and snap right back, were not. We are seeing hiring at some of the big box stores, but across the board you know this reopening is complicated and its slow. We still dont have federal guidelines for reopening for most businesses out there. Every day another Small Business closes. So this idea that were bounding right back, were not. You can say to me, well, stephanie, why does the stock market do as well as it does. Here is the perverse game. The worse things go for an unemployment perspective, it gives investors confidence that the federal government will step in with more stimulus. Thats obviously a positive for them. Thats kind of how twisted this thing is. These 50 Million People on expanded unemployment, that thing is running out next month. When youve got 50 Million People not receiving those expanded benefits, things are going to get a lot more bleak. While i have you, let me ask you about Something Else with regards to the stimulus that you just mentioned. Frankly, its pretty unbelievable. Government accountability report, gao report says the Treasury Department spent about 1. 4 billion sending checks to dead people, more than a million checks went out to people who cant cash them. Theyre not alive. Its a hard pill to swallow for the millions of americans looking for help right now. How does Something Like that happen . Its a hard pill to swallow. Im not going to make you feel better. But in the categories of this stinks, this is corrupt, somebody is getting paid that shouldnt, this is more about gross incompetence. The plan was, how do we get this money out as quickly as we can. The first three batches of stimulus payments were done in a way that they were told not to crossreference with death certificates which should be available through Social Security numbers. Thats number one. On number two, the irs did post if you received a check and shouldnt have, ie, for a dead person, send it back. The gao is putting forth no plans to recoup any of that money. This is just absolute incompetence. I know its very, very hard to get this much money out to this many people. But to your point, think about the millions of people struggling in this country. It certainly doesnt make sense to them. No. Stephanie ruhle, thank you. Thank you for trying to help us make some sense of it. Let me bring back the docktobe tore on duty, steve corwin, president and ceo of new york presbyterian hospitals. Dr. Corwin, to stephs first point there, as states and businesses reopen, safety measures, really just one piece of the puzzle. Virginia is poised to create the first Pandemic Workplace safety mandates in this country, a potential model for other states. The governor there says that the rules are necessary because of a lack of enforcement by the federal agency thats supposed to be upholding workplace safety. How concerned are you about a lack of a nationwide plan . What kind of rules should be in place for companies to keep their employees as safe as possible . Very concerned. The reality is we built into our psyche theres a false equivalency. You either have the opening of the economy or you have the suppression of the virus and the tween cant meet. You have to do both. You have to suppressi the virus. Otherwise the economy will never get restarted and rebooted. So you have to have testing. 50 of our employees will be working from home. We have testing procedures, cleaning procedures, sanitizing procedures. Temperature checks, et cetera, all of which should be federal mandates. I applaud governor northah in virginia for what hes doing. You have to protect workers. Otherwise people will not have the confidence to return to work. You will have many issues with th that. Theres another issue we have to deal with as a country which is, if you dont have paid sick leave, you are encouraging people who are sick to come to work and not report their symptoms. That is a prescription for disaster, craig. We have to deal with that aspect of this as well. Weve got to eliminate some of the blue red, democratic republican rhetoric and realize, if were going to lose 180,000 lives in this country from this pandemic, weve got to do bipartisan support for Public Health measures that make sense. You make good points, dr. Corwin. Thank you so much. Dr. Steve corwin, thank you. This afternoon the house set to start voting on their Police Reform bill. Even if that bill passes, even if it passes the house, how likely is it to become law . Were going to talk about that with Democratic House member Eleanor Holmes norton. Since shes the only elected official representing washington, d. C. In congress, were also going to talk about that historic vote set for tomorrow on d. C. s statehood. She calls it deeply personal. Plus major warning signs for the trump campaign. New polls show joe biden leading the president by a wide margin in several battleground states. Helps you redefine whats possible. Now. From the hospital shifting to remote patient care in just 48 hours. To the university moving hundreds of apps quickly to the cloud. Or the City GovernmentGoing Digital to keep Critical Services running. You are creating the future on the fly. And we are helping you do it. Vmware. Realize whats possible. Right now protesters in frankfurt, kentucky are rallying for justice in the death of b e breonna taylor. Three months ago she was shot and killed by Police Serving a noknock warrant. These protesters are pushing for criminal charges to be brought against the three officers involved in her death. So far just one of the three officers has been fired. A live look in frankfurt. Also in a few hours, the house set to vote on the policing reform bill produ, called the George Floyd Justice in policing act. It would ban no knocks warrants and chokeholds as well. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi talked about the bill last hour. Today we have the opportunity and the obligation to ensure that his death and the deaths of so many others are not in vain. When we pass this bill, the senate will have a choice to honor George Floyds life or to do nothing. Nbcs casey hunlt is covering this story from the hill for us on this thursday. Kasie, what should we expect to see in this house vote today especially since the republicanintroduced bill in the senate failed yesterday . Reporter we do expect this bill to pass in the house because, of course, nancy pelosi and her Democratic Party are solidly behind it and they control the chamber. So the question, of course, remains, is there going to be major legislative action on Police Reform. We know americans are demanding it. We see it in all of the polling. We see it in the people who are out on the streets. We see it, frankly, even by the fact of republicans in the Senate Feeling as though they need to be at least seen doing something, which is part of why you saw them push forward with their version of this legislation, the justice act. Senator tim scott who i know youve spoken to at some length worked very hard on this legislation. But over here in the senate, frankly, the level of trust between Chuck Schumer and Mitch Mcconnell is at possibly an alltime low. Democrats simply werent willing to take a chance on a process that they thought was set up to work against them from the very beginning. So pelosi, as you heard there, is going to send her bill over here to the senate and essentially say to them, okay, either you take this up or look as though youre being the ones who are obstructionists. This has turned into a bit of a political backandforth with each side saying that the other is acting in bad faith. The reality is there are significant differences between the house and the senate bill. The house bill goes much farther in terms of all these policy issues that you laid out. Republicans in many cases want a study and to report on some of these issues. Thats why democrats dont want to move forward, craig. All right. Kasie hunt there bringing us up to speed on the legislative part of it. Kasie, thank you. I want to turn to representative