Consider This from NPR - Optimism For A Vaccine; Strapped Unemployment Offices Leave Many Waiting

Episode Date: May 21, 2020

A new analysis from Columbia University says that roughly 36,000 people could've been saved if the United States had started social distancing just one week earlier. But that all hinges on whether people would have been willing to stay home. Sign up for 'The New Normal' newsletterResearch with mice, guinea pigs and monkeys is making scientists increasingly optimistic about the chances for developing a COVID-19 vaccine. Three studies released Wednesday show promising results after the animals received experimental vaccines. But public health success will require global cooperation. Meanwhile, state unemployment agencies are feeling the pinch as they try to keep up with unparalleled demand for their services. And as bordering towns begin to ease stay-at-home restrictions, the logistics around reopening neighboring areas is leading to quite a bit of confusion. Plus, sometimes you just need a hug. And if you're isolating alone, TikTok star Tabitha Brown has got you covered with comfort content to help you feel loved. This episode was recorded and published as part of this podcast's former 'Coronavirus Daily' format.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

36,000 people. A new analysis from Columbia University says that's roughly how many people could have been saved if the U.S. had started social distancing just one week earlier. The reality is that, you know, the United States has had a very cushy existence since World War II. The study's lead researcher, Jeffrey Shaman, had one big caveat. It's impossible to know whether Americans would have been willing to stay home before the outbreak was out of control. We've not had a lot of things that required a lot of sacrifice. We have not been primed for dealing with or thinking about infectious diseases. Coming up, some good news about a possible vaccine and why some people are still

waiting for unemployment benefits. This is Coronavirus Daily from NPR. I'm Kelly McEvers. It's Thursday, May 21st. This message comes from WISE, the app for doing things in other currencies. Send, spend, or receive money internationally and always get the real-time mid-market exchange rate with no hidden fees. Download the WISE app today or visit wise.com. T's and C's apply. Many scientists are hopeful about developing a vaccine for the coronavirus, but there are still some basic things they don't know for sure. For example, it is not yet known whether people who are infected with COVID and recover are then protected against re-exposure. Dan Baruch, a virologist at Harvard Medical School, told NPR that scientists just don't know yet if your immune system can protect you from being re-infected. And it is

also not yet known whether people who are vaccinated will be protected against infection. But scientists are getting closer to figuring that out. In a series of experiments, Baruch and some colleagues gave a group of rhesus macaque monkeys several experimental vaccines. Some of the animals were completely protected. Some were completely protected, some were partially protected, but nevertheless, what we showed was that the vaccine-induced antibody response correlated with the extent of protection. In other words, the more antibodies they had, the more protected they were. Scientists still have to figure out how to design a vaccine that can safely produce enough antibodies to protect people. And the race to do that is happening all over the world.

Somewhere along the way, we backtracked on global collaboration, which may hurt us in some ways. Prashant Yadav at the Center for Global Development studies medical supply chains. He told NPR it could be that multiple vaccines will emerge from different countries around the same time. That will make figuring out global manufacturing more challenging. The question is whether the U.S. is ready to cooperate with other countries. So some things are moving well, especially when it comes to things that manufacturing scientists and clinical scientists control, things which are about making sure that our global diplomacy is working,

things that are about making sure that we work with this in a multilateral, coordinated manner. Those are where I think we see some deficiencies. Working with the rest of the world, especially the developing world, to produce and distribute a vaccine. We can't make a vaccine for ourselves and only know how well it works in ourselves. Anthony Fauci said this week that is the whole ballgame. If you don't control an outbreak in the developing world, it's going to come right around and bite you the next season. So unless you completely stop this, you're not going to wall yourself off from the developing world. Every Thursday, the government releases a new count of people

who have filed for unemployment. And every Thursday, for weeks now, those numbers have told the same story. Millions and millions of people who are out of work and need help. The total number of people who filed for unemployment is now close to 40 million. When you actually file, you do it through your state's unemployment office.

Those offices run on tiny budgets. They often have small staffs and outdated computers. All that means people who desperately need help aren't getting it. Here's Stacey Vanek-Smith from our daily economics podcast, The Indicator. Kayla Nelson and her husband were laid off from the Subaru factory in Lafayette, Indiana, back in March. They applied for unemployment right away, and then they waited. A week went by, I'm like, OK, I have some savings saved up. Two weeks went by, I'm like, OK, it's starting to get a little bit ridiculous now.

But now it's like, OK, it's May now. We're going to have to pay rent next month. It's been more than six weeks since they applied. And Kayla and her husband still have not gotten their unemployment checks. Meanwhile, Kayla's husband got sick with COVID-19. Some of her kids have been showing symptoms. So she is trying to quarantine people, care for people, cook, clean, keep the kids doing their schoolwork, keep everybody inside. And on top of that, she's spending hours on the phone every day with Indiana's unemployment office.

Just calling the 1-800 number will drive you crazy. You're just waiting and waiting and waiting. Kayla tried email, thought maybe that would be faster. Emailed 90 different claim agents. And I only got a response back from one out of all of the 90 people. I'm like, what is going on? My name is Josh Richardson. I'm the chief of staff at the Indiana Department of Workforce Development. We operate the state's unemployment insurance

program. Josh has been working there for more than a decade. He was there during the Great Recession when things got so bad, they had nearly 30,000 people applying for unemployment in one week. So when Indiana announced a statewide shutdown, there was this one thought that went through his head. How do we possibly staff up to process benefits that people need in the time frame in which they're going to expect them and need them? Just a few months ago, Indiana was seeing record low unemployment. The staff was lean, but it was more than adequate to handle the 2,000-odd people filing for unemployment every week. And then the claims started coming in. 3,000 people. 5,000 people. 10,000 people.

Josh couldn't believe what he was seeing, and the numbers kept climbing. Yeah, it was like 120, 130, 140. 140,000 people filing for unemployment in one week. That's almost five times what Josh had seen during the Great Recession. This was just really different than what we were expecting and what we were built for. In the last eight weeks, Josh has brought on hundreds of people. He now has roughly 650 people working with him. But they're trying to assist 640,000 Indianans who've lost their jobs. People like Kayla. To go from being our

own backbone and our own source of income to just waiting and you don't know when it's coming. I was very like, I was at my lowest yesterday. I was over it. Like I quit. Josh Richardson says he and his team are working as fast as they can. But he says he knows that for a lot of people, people like Kayla, it's just not fast enough. NPR's Stacey Vanek-Smith. For a few weeks now, the CDC has been promising to release detailed guidance for businesses and schools on how to reopen. They finally did this past weekend by updating their website without much fanfare or even a notice to businesses. So in the absence of clear federal guidance, state and local leaders have been coming up with their own plans for weeks. If you want a picture of how messy that

can be, look at Kansas City. Aviva Okas and Haberman reports from member station KCUR. You need a three-page spreadsheet to piece together all of the different requirements and reopening dates around Kansas City. The region crosses two states and spans nine counties. And because of that, there are now weekly coordinating calls for local leaders to discuss strategy. They started in early April. On one call earlier this month, Gladstone Mayor Carol Suter told her fellow elected officials that they've created an almost impossible situation for people to navigate. We look like chickens running around with their heads cut off. How can it be safe to have a wedding on this side of the street, but it's not

safe to have a wedding across the street. Non-essential businesses in her city started opening May 4th. Well, less than 10 miles away, Kansas City gyms and hair salons had to wait about a week and a half longer to open. Souter is concerned about confusion resulting from the piecemeal approach, but she argues that cities like hers that haven't been hard hit should be able to reopen sooner. That's where Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas disagrees. I figured I'd hop in because Carol and I always love a good back and forth. Kansas City has roughly seven times the number of cases as Souders County. Lucas says easing restrictions too early in one place poses a danger for everyone in the region.

He's quick to note that an outbreak at a meat processing plant roughly 50 miles away led to a surge in Kansas City COVID cases. The thing that this group, and maybe we will never get to this, but the place that we actually need to get is all of us recognizing we're one place. Reopening conversations like these are happening across the country. Irma Esparza-Diggs with the National League of Cities is seeing tension about reopening plans. There's confusion in places clearly, in particular where you have a difference in city infection levels. When suburban businesses near the city started reopening, that pressured Kansas City

Mayor Quinton Lucas to reconsider his plans. But he mostly worries that some people around the region don't grasp the threat of COVID-19. I have people who tell me all the time, you've had more people die of homicides during the stay-at-home orders than you have of COVID. So why should I care? Like in much of the nation, in Kansas City, the virus has disproportionately affected minority communities. Mayor Lucas says he gets comments from people saying the virus hasn't hurt their area. And it makes me as a Black mayor of a city with more Black people than anybody in this metro or this region, it has frustrated me tremendously. Lucas says there was a sense of unity when leaders throughout the region issued stay-at-home orders in late March. Now comes the hard part, figuring out how to move forward.

Casey Uar's Aviva Ok Oakison-Haberman. A couple of months ago, when all this was just starting, Tabitha Brown's 18-year-old daughter had some advice for her. Mom, you need to join TikTok. I said, why in the world would I get on TikTok? It's for the kids, right? And she kept saying, because I think you would be like a good, like comforting mom for the people on there. I think you just add some, like, really good energy.

And I was like, I don't know about that, girl. That was in March. And today, Tabitha has 3 million followers. You need a hug. Well, sometimes potato wedges make you feel like they hugging you. At least that's how I feel. Let's make some. She posts about food.

She gives advice. Honey, wrong won't build in a day. And baby, everything that you want ain't going to happen overnight, but it will happen. So take it easy on yourself. You're doing great. A lot of TikTok users are a bit younger than Tabitha. And she told NPR's All Things Considered those are the people she hears from the most. Well, you know, when I first got on and saw the response and all the young kids and what they

were saying, they kept saying, oh my God, your voice, it sounds like a hug. It helps my anxiety. You know, I feel like, oh, you're the mom I never had. Or, you know, I wish you were my aunt. All these different things. And it instantly, to me, became a responsibility. Tabitha Brown talked to Ari Shapiro. A link to more of their conversation is in our episode notes. For more on the coronavirus, you can stay up to date with all the news on your local public radio station. And from earlier in this episode, Jeffrey Shaman at Columbia University talked to NPR's Narit Eisenman. Vaccine maker Dan Baruch talked to NPR's Jill Palka. And Prashant Yadav talked to All Things Considered host Mary Louise Kelly about the global vaccine supply chain.

I'm Kelly McEvers. We will be back with more tomorrow. This message comes from NPR sponsor CNN. Each day on the Coronavirus Fact vs. Fiction podcast, Dr. Sanjay Gupta answers your questions around COVID-19. Check out Coronavirus Fact vs. Fiction on NPR One or wherever you get your podcasts.