Her test was positive. Thats bad news for the British Health minister. Its bad news for the British Government. Before she was tested, she reportedly sat in not only on cabinet meetingings a inings ant government business, she attended a reception at number 10 downing street with boris johnson. Shes now not only positive for coronavirus but shes symptomatic. Today the british Prime Minister told the british people basically to steel themselves for whats ahead, saying in public remarks, quote, many more families are going to lose loved ones before their time. The chief scientific adviser to the British Government said although the number of officially confirmed cases of coronavirus in the uk is just under 600, he believes as the top science adviser that a more realistic snapshot of how many cases there are would be more like five to 10,000. The British Government announced yesterday that they will move to rapidly upscale the number of tests they are doing. They are currently carrying out 1,500. They will move to 10,000 tests per day. They are trying to quintuple the rate of testing immediately. Its stark to see the chief scientific adviser to the British Government saying he believes theres 5,000 to 10,000 cases in the uk. Never mind that theres under 600 official tests. For us here at home, thats a snapshot of whats going on in another country. Another ally of ours dealing with the rapidly escalating crisis of this virus. Because its the uk, just taking that little view, that shortterm view of the circumstances there today, the news abo s about coronavirus t today, gives lie to the randomness of what our government is doing in terms of our National Response. Our own governments response is basically just a splatter painting from the president and from this administration. Just look at one days worth of headlines of whats going on in the uk in terms of coronavirus. The number of cases in the uk versus other countries. The circumstances that the uk government believes itself to be in. The fact that a Senior Member has herself tested positive. Just look at one days news out of the uk. Its clear, theres no scientifically rational reason why our government just instituted a travel ban from europe that doesnt include the uk. Why do that . No matter how much you like the uk, you know, or enjoy british detective stories im right there with you. No matter how much the president might have a personal affinity for the Prime Minister or the queen or whatever, it makes no rational sense. This european travel ban excluding the uk is random. Why is our own government behaving in a random manner . Our federal government response to this epidemic is not rational. Its not well designed, its not likely to accomplish its stated aims. Sometimes its stated aims make no sense, either. Theres no reason why the main thrust of the u. S. Governments top level response to the virus at this point should be a travel ban from anywhere. Let alone on the day the World Health Organization declared this say globis a global pandem. That tells every country, you cant escape by virtue of your geography. Thats the day we institute a travel ban . The president last night calling this a, quote, foreign virus. In a way that may have been a little blessing for us. That is so wrong. It is such an irrational, unscientific, nonsensical way to talk about this that maybe something that dumb coming from the president in a prime Time Oval Office address, maybe that is clarifying. Maybe that simplifies our National Understanding of where were at. Because that alone should clarify for everybody beyond any shred of a doubt that the u. S. Response will have to be led from somewhere other than the top of the federal government, because at the top of the federal government its a fountain of nonsense. You know, it is one of the odd through lines in this Global Pandemic as it evolves that people at the very top of governments around the world are themselves at risk. Theres the British Health minister who we told you about. In spain, they have had a cabinet minister test positive. That resulted in the entire spanish cabinet announcing they would be tested as well as the spanish king and the spanish queen. They have been tested. They are awaiting test results now. The leader of the far right vox party in spain has been tested as well and is positive. In brazil, we reported last night on the delegation of top brazilian officials who not only came to the United States, they specifically went to maralago this past weekend to meet with the president and members of his family. We reported last night that a press minister from the brazilian government seen here in a photo with the president at maralago, that man on the right in the brown make brazil great again hat, he is the press minister of the brazilian government. He was undergoing testing for the coronavirus. He has now tested positive. The president of brazil, who was also at maralago this weekend, also meeting personally with President Trump and shaking his hand, he himself was today tested for the coronavirus and expects to receive his results tomorrow. Not only President Trump but vicepresident pence who was leading the u. S. Response, they had relatively extensive contact with this brazilian delegation over the weekend. We know that because a photo and video documentation. Even as the white house insists, despite our lying eyes that they definitely arent going to be tested for coronavirus despite the contacts because the white house says there wasnt much contact at all. Really, we swear. At this point, the white house insistence that the sitting president of the United States, wont stop shaking hands. No need to. The number relatively large number of people who have been exposed to the virus with whom the president has had close face to face contact and shook hands within the past few days, none of that warrants special precautions for the president at all let alone testing the president. At this point, the handling of the president s personal susceptibility to this virus is getting a little bit weird. Its getting hard to believe our own government even about that. As i say, that is one element of a federal government response that is largely irrational, inexplicable and needless to say ineffective. Republican u. S. Senators graham and scott were both at maralago this weekend. They both reportedly interacted with that same brazilian delegation that interacted with President Trump and vicepresident pence. Both senators are under quarantine. They at least take steps to try to protect themselves and anybody else who they might infect given they were exposed to the virus if they got it. Its quite a number of members of congress and members of the senate who have potentially been exposed and who have isolated themselves because of it. Theres one Senate Staffer to Maria Cantwell who tested positive. Senators announced they would close their d. C. Offices even as Mitch Mcconnell announced the planned Senate Recess next week would be canceled and senate would stay in session. At last count, its 30 u. S. States that have declared a state of emergency to try to speed State Government response to the virus. Schools across the great states of ohio and maryland and kentucky will all be closed. We learned that tonight. A Large Public School district in houston, texas, fourth largest city in the country, and san francisco, california, both large School Districts announced their schools will be closed. The smithsonian and the national zoo as is Arlington National cemetery as is the metropolitan museum in new york and broadway in new york. Tonight, disney world announced they are closing on sunday. Disneyland is doing so as well. Disneyland is only closed three times in the last 50 years. They are closing because of this. New york city has declare ad a state of emergency. There are bans of gatherings of large numbers of people. The u. S. Capitol is closed to visitors. The Supreme Court is closed to visitors. As you have no doubt seen today in a cass kacade of announcemen sports have been shut down. Pro sports have been suspended if not called off. As of this time last night, we thought the Ncaa College Basketball tournament would be a series of games played in front of empty seats. As of tonight, the tournament itself will not happen. The season is over. Its called off. I dont think theres been a single individual Tipping Point at which our country started to wake up to the magnitude of this crisis and what is coming in terms of the strain that is about to be put on our Public Health system, our economy and all other governing systems we have got. I dont think theres a single Tipping Point. But this past 24 hour period it does feel like enough shocking things happened in short order that again, there wasnt one point but we have tipped. We are in a different head space as a country about this. We are on a different footing as a nation than we were 24 hours ago. I think part is the sports stuff being canceled, honestly. In terms of the psychological reset that we are undergoing. Even if you dont care about the news, if the only live media you ever consume is sports, well, your life just changed drastically. No matter how much you like to your head in the sand, its unavoidable now, even if you have been not paying attention to any of the stuff. I think part was also the president s bad speech last night from the oval office, confusing, strange, a little alarming in terms of his strange affect. If that speech was meant to reassure the country about how the government has this under control, boy, did it do the opposite. I think part is also that the economic ditch just keeps getting deeper. They had to stop trading today on wall street. They hit one of the circuit breakers. Even still, once they turned it back on, the markets kept falling off the cliff. Even with the fed announcing hundreds of billions of dollars in basically grease for the wheels. The dow today down more than 2,000 points. Selloff by percentage thats larger than anything that happened during the 2008 financial collapse. Go back as far as black monday wall street crash in 1987 to find a plunge deeper than what we had today. After the president s Oval Office Address to reassure us. Jp morgan is predicting a u. S. Recession this year. Understanding really getting how bad it is and how bad it is likely to get, even if we are in that different head space, if we come to a new understanding about this, people who run sports leagues and states and colleges and malls are figuring it out and acting accordingly, it leaves all of us regular citizens with the day to day decisions about what we are supposed to do and what we can do to protect ourselves and to protect our families and contribute to our country trying to handle this as well as possible. We are not leaving this to the government and they will do it. Its us doing the right thing as best we understand it. I could do breaking news on all the things closing and shutting down and changed because of the virus for the course of this hour. I will stop there. Tonight, were going to talk to reporters. We speak with somebody who has very valuable experience in successfully forcing improvement in what was a terrible government response to a Health Crisis. There are people who have gone before us who have suck seeceed forcing a terrible government response to a Health Crisis to get better. We should learn from them now. We do ultimately only have one federal government. We have to try to survive this crisis and improve our National Response to this crisis with the government we have. Lets just look at one very specific slice of this. A public service. We all have figured out that one of the fiascos, if not the fundamental fiasco of the u. S. Government response to this crisis is that there isnt any testing really. We are probably the worst in the world, certainly in the industrial world, at testing and screening for this virus. We have got it. We have got it in probably every state in the country. We have states of emergency in 30 states. Were still not broadly testing populations anywhere. Virginia congressman done beyer who is selfquarantining, he a sitting member of congress, just outside the nations capital, he is unable to get tested while he is under quarantine because we dont have tests that are not only do we not have widely available testing, if you are a sitting member of congress, you cant ifget a test unless you he the right connections. Whether you are in one of the Nursing Homes where there has been deaths in Washington State or you got off a cruise ship that had positive coronavirus cases on board, a cruise ship held offshore or you went to a conference, or somebody at your has tested positive, if you believe theres a good chance you have been exposed to this highly contagious virus, chances are still this deep into this, this long into the crisis, if you are seeking testing to see if have been exposed, you will have a hard time getting it. Even americans who have returned from countries that have raging out of control outbreaks have found once they get here, even if they want to get tested, theres not necessarily a way to do it. While the government is trying to scale this up, tony fauci saying its a failure of the u. S. System that we have been unable to scale up our testing. Its a failure, acknowledging its a failure is a good first step to fixing it. The cdc director saying under questioning from democratic members of congress that, yes, testing will be provided regardless of whether you are able to pay. The government clarifying that for the first time today. Cdc director saying that coronavirus treatment will be provided whether or not you are able to pay. Thats a check that his mouth wrote today that i am looking forward to seeing them cash as the federal government. I dont know how they will guarantee. The cdc director promised it under tough questioning in congress. They are trying to improve all of these things. Right now, wee are watchi iwe a numbers go out. We know what the infection curves look like. We still dont have testing. More than 1,000 confirmed cases in the country, an epidemic of unknown proportions because we dont have testing. Americans who believe they have been etch pose exposed have to something. If you believe you have been exposed, the general advice is that you should isolate yourself. Selfquarantine. Ish. Americ if they believe they have been exposed to someone with the virus, what they found is that instructions people are getting about how exactly you do selfquarantine, how exactly you do isolate yourself, these instructions are wildly diverg divergent. It is impossible to get an authoritative answer as to what americans are supposed to do. Right now with no vaccine and no treatment and very, very, very little testing in this country, thats all weve got. We have these mitigation factors we can take as a society to close down likely transmission, large crowds, school settings, sporting events. For people who have believe they have been exposed, we have one thing to do. In the absence of testing, this is all any of us can do if we believe we have been exposed. What is it . The lack of clear, consistent advice about how to handle this specific part of americas response to coronavirus is something the federal government could fix over the course of a single day. If they put their mind toward clarifying and directly specifying best practices for isolation and quarantine. They issued that advice nationwide. If they had the authority and wherewithal to do it, they could do it. As of right now, even this far into it, it appears to just be chaos. Joining us now is one of the reporters on this piece that investigated the extent of the range of advice people are being given. Caroline chen, thank you very much. Thanks for having me. Im wound up about this. I dont expect you to be. Im not asking four your opinion on these matters. Im wound up, too. Okay. You are reporting to me with something i suspected was true but i find it the wide range of advice people are being given to be shocking. I was surprised, too. I had gotten some ink ling frli seeing stories ondecided to sta out stories and comparing stand artdstand. Dale standards. People are trying to get information and are unable to get information. Theres a patchwork about what you should do if you think you have been exposed or you have been exposed across the country. This is people calling the county, state, their doctor. What i think your reporting indicated is that nobody knows who to call to check what it is they are supposed to do if they believe they have been exposed. Yes. I think the advice is call your medical provider. If you have one. Yes. If you have one, which not everybody in the United States has. What i have seen i have been impressed and moved by is how persistent people are. They are concerned. We have seen a lot of stories and heard stories of people who either heard about somebody who was positive, for example, a woman who went to a wedding and saw a server at the wedding tested positive. She wanted to protect herself and her family, anybody especially. And her community. Also i spoke to a mother of a daughter who came home from a school trip to italy. When she developed symptoms, her first step was to go to her daughters pediatrician. The pediatrician started by saying, well, i dont think she has covid19. She has an upper respiratory infection. Shes probably fine. The mother pushed more and said, we live in manhattan in a neighborhood that has elderly folks. Is it safe . Just out of her own sense of wanting to do the