The Daily Signal - Amid Coronavirus Pandemic, Doctor and Congressman Discusses Way Forward

Episode Date: April 1, 2020

Rep. Andy Harris of Maryland joins today’s Daily Signal Podcast. The Republican lawmaker, a physician, shares his perspective on the coronavirus pandemic, what can still be done to address the crisis, and how Congress and the president should move forward in the days and weeks ahead. We also cover these stories: President Trump is floating the idea of a $2 trillion dollar infrastructure bill as a way to help keep the economy through the coronavirus pandemic. On Tuesday Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnel said the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump this winter distracted lawmakers from the pending threat of COVID-19.  Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is working to establish a peaceful transition of power between Nicolás Maduro and the interim Government of Venezuela led by Juan Guaido. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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We'd love to talk, business. This is the Daily Signal podcast for Wednesday, April 1st. I'm Virginia Allen. And I'm Rachel Del Judas. Congressman Andy Harris of Maryland joins me on today's Daily Signal podcast. As a physician, he talks about his perspective of the coronavirus pandemic, what still needs to be done and how Congress and the president should move forward as they work to respond to the crisis. Don't forget, if you're enjoying this podcast, please be sure to leave a review and a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts and encourage others to subscribe.

Now, under our top news. President Donald Trump is floating the idea of a $2 trillion infrastructure bill as a way to keep the economy going through the coronavirus pandemic. On Tuesday, Trump tweeted, with interest rates for the United States being at zero, this is the time to do our decades-long awaited infrastructure bill. It should be very big and bold, $2 trillion and be focused solely on jobs and rebuilding the once great infrastructure of our country. Phase four. On Friday, the House passed and Trump signed a $2 trillion stimulus packaged, dubbed the CARES Act that included $250 billion, earmarked for direct payments to families and individuals, $350 billion allocated for small business loans, and $250 billion in unemployment insurance benefits. On Tuesday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump,

winner distracted lawmakers from the pending threat of COVID-19. It came up while we were tied down with the impeachment trial, and I think it diverted the attention of the government because everything every day was about impeachment, McConnell said on the Hugh Hewitt radio program, as reported by the Washington Examiner. The House impeached Trump on December 18th, and the Senate began their trial on January 16th, concluding about three weeks later on February 5th. At the end of January, senators received a classified coronavirus briefing, and Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas called the virus the biggest and most important story in the world. McConnell stated on the Hugh Who at Radio program that Tom was right on the mark. Tom figured this out early, and he was absolutely right.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and also a member of President Trump's Coronavirus Task Force, told CNN on Tuesday that discussions are being had about more than just medical workers using masks to help prevent the spread of coronavirus. Here's what he had to say in an interview with CNN. When we get in a situation where we have enough masks, I believe there will still be some very serious consideration about more broadening. this recommendation of using masks. We're not there yet, but I think we're close to coming to some determination. Because if, in fact, a person who may or may not be infected wants to prevent infecting someone else, one of the best ways to do that is with a mask. So perhaps that's the way to go. Some of your favorite retail stores are facing extreme financial challenges during the coronavirus pandemic.

J.C. Penny announced Tuesday via a formal press release that, quote, as a result of store closures, J.C. Penny has made the difficult decision to temporary furlough the majority of store hourly associates, beginning April 2nd. During this time, the company will also require a smaller corporate workforce. Beginning April 5th, a significant portion of associates in the company's home office, Salt Lake City and Soho design offices will be furloughed along with its store salary associates. Many of the company's associates in supply chain and logistics centers were previously

furloughed on March 20th and those furloughs will continue. Macy's Coles and Gap have taken similar actions, furlowing thousands of workers. Business experts say that we will see many other stores take similar actions in the coming days and weeks. CBS News business analyst Jill Schlesinger says that there are about 630,000 retail outlets that are shuttering right now in the month of March. And the National Retail Federation says that they're going to lose something like over $400 billion. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is working to establish a peaceful transition of power between Nicholas Maduro and the interim government of Venezuela led by Juan Guido. The plan from Pompeo, according to a press release from the U.S. Department of State,

calls for the establishment of a broadly acceptable transitional government to administer free and fair presidential elections and a pathway to lifting Venezuela-related U.S. sanctions. It builds on the proposals put forward by the intern government of Venezuela headed by Juan Guido. On Tuesday, Pompeo tweeted, Today, the U.S. presented a framework for democratic transition as a clear, equitable, and common sense path to end the political crisis in Venezuela. Economic pressure will continue until Maduro accepts a genuine democratic transition. In Idaho, biological men will no longer be allowed to compete in women's sports. Republican Governor Brad Little signed a new bill into law on Tuesday that will prevent transgender individuals,

participating in sports teams that differ from their biological gender. The ACLU of Idaho lashed out at Governor Little over Twitter saying, quote, no one including at Governor Little can keep trans people from existing. We will continue to fight every day so that trans people have the same rights as every other Idahoan. According to the Daily Color News Foundation, just 29% of Americans support allowing biological men who identify as women to compete in women's sports. Next up, Congressman Andy Harris of Maryland joins me to talk about the coronavirus pandemic. We know that everyone's highest priority right now is staying healthy through the coronavirus pandemic.

And our priority at the Daily Signal is making sure you have the information you need to stay healthy. Here is Dr. Deborah Burke's head of the White House Coronavirus Task Force explaining who should be tested for COVID-19. So right now, as we're rolling out testing across America into these high-speed testing laboratories that can get diagnoses back quickly, we're asking all of you to prioritize those in the risk groups to be tested, and those first responders and our health care delivery workers who really need to know whether they're positive or not. As we get everyone tested, that really needs it for a diagnosis because they're so ill, we can move on to those who are less sick. I'm joined on the Daily Signal podcast today by Congressman Andy Harris of Maryland. Congressman

Harris, it's great to have you back on the Daily Signal podcast. Great to be with you, Rachel. As a physician, can you tell us about your perspective on the coronavirus pandemic? Well, this is something that we certainly haven't seen in a while. We, of course, have seen, you know, the SARS and MERS and H1N1, but this is one that I think is going to affect many more Americans than those other viruses. And it's going to be with us for a while, but it's something that we'll work our way through. Congressman, data from the CDC for Monday showed that the U.S. now has a total of over 140,000 cases of coronavirus and over 2,000 deaths.

How would you rate the response from President Trump as well as health care officials? Well, look, again, this is something that's unprecedented. In every flu season, we obviously get millions and millions of people. tens of millions of people who have the flu, tens of thousands of people who die from it. So I wouldn't be surprised if those numbers continue to go up. Obviously, this virus is about 10 times more lethal than the flu, but yet much less lethal than Ebola virus or other viruses. And again, this is unprecedented in the United States. I think the president has done the appropriate thing and developed public-private partnerships

to make sure that we have all the things we need to mitigate this, as well as to develop treatments and vaccines. On Friday, Congressman, as you well know, the House passed the coronavirus age package or CARES Act. What was your perspective of that legislation? Well, you know, this is an example of never let a crisis go to waste. The bottom line is that they took good components of the legislation, certainly needed to help our small businesses.

We certainly needed to cover unemployment. but what they did is then they added on provisions that for the first time in unprecedented fashion, people will actually get paid more not to work than to work, which I think is a bad policy move. That's why I voice voted against the bill. It obviously passed and went to the president for signature. But I think that that was a major flaw in the bill. And one that, of course, was added in as an omnibus bill, that's what happens. These kind of things creep into bills, not to,

mention the $75 million for corporation for public broadcasting for national endowment of the arts, national endowment of the humanities, $25 million for the Kennedy Center. It's just not the way we should do business. As the ink is barely dry on that package, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has been talking about having a fourth stimulus package. Does Congress need to do more on legislation for coronavirus in the near future? What is your perspective? Well, we have heard that the speaker is putting a package together. I don't think she's going to ask for Republican input. You know, the House doesn't really function like the Senate where things have to be done in a bipartisan fashion. I think the Speaker feels perfectly adequate to do everything in a partisan fashion in the House. So I'm sure some of the

measures like the Green New Deal and some of the voting, and I put in quotes, reform measures that the Democrats wanted in a third bill, they'll put into a fourth bill. But hopefully the Senate will, you know, we'll see through that. What we have to do in the fourth bill, one thing we do have to do is we have to go back and make sure that there's no double-dipping going on. You know, people who need the aid, get the aid, but no one should be profiting from this terrible crisis. And that is possible if we don't take the right precautions. On Monday, Congressman, your governor, Larry Hogan, issued a stay-at-home order. What is your perspective on his approach?

Well, you know, I think that the approach that Ron DeSantis took in Florida was probably a better approach, which is recognizing that, you know, areas of the states are different. You know, in Virginia, obviously, there's population congestion up in northern Virginia, but in many parts of rural Virginia, if they're like my district and the rural parts of Maryland, really have very low numbers of coronavirus. And measures short of stay-at-home measures probably would be adequate. So I think a better approach is probably to take an approach on a county by county basis instead of a statewide basis. But again, governors, I think throughout the county, throughout the country, most of them are taking statewide approaches. But I think some of the jurisdictions, especially the more rural jurisdictions, would be best left without such rigorous guidelines. What are you hearing, Congressman, from hospitals in your state as well as colleagues in medicine, do they have, have enough medical supplies and staff? Well, you know, I speak regularly with the, with our Secretary

of Health. We are ramping up. We, we are not anywhere near capacity at this point in time, but the number of cases is increasing, and the number of patients who are hospitalized and the number of patients who require ventilators and intensive care support is increasing. But we're, we're a long ways from saturating our hospitals right now, and of course, we're setting up an emergency hospital on a convention center. And we are organizing our ambulatory care centers so that surgical centers so that they could be overflow areas. So I think we're going to be all right.

So governors have stepped up and they've done the appropriate thing, which is to make sure their states are ready. I'm not sure that the federal government needs to tell states what to do. I think their governors should be able to do that. But the federal government is an important clearinghouse for things that the state need. So for instance, we know that New York, which has a overwhelming number of COVID-19 patients, does need more personal protective equipment, for instance, and did need the hospital ship sent there. But that's not true in all jurisdictions. So the federal government can be an appropriate

clearinghouse to make sure that what various jurisdictions need they get. The coronavirus pandemic has prompted a lot of people to talk about how reliance the United States is on China for pharmaceuticals and other medical supplies. Do you think we rely too much on China for medical supplies and what should be done if we do? Sure. I think, you know, that there are, and I'll put it in quote, silver linings to this coronavirus cloud. And one of them is that I think it's a wake-up call to the United States that we have outsourced a lot of things that probably shouldn't have been outsourced.

So in this instance, we found out that a lot of our pharmaceutical raw materials, as well as some of our pharmaceuticals that are necessary, including antibiotics, come from China. And China is, you know, China is not a friendly nation to us. They are competitors. And in the case of a pandemic like this, every country in the world will want access to the same pharmaceuticals and the same raw materials. So I think it's, after this is over, I think what we're going to do is we're going to have to provide the Senate. for manufacturers, just like we do for Department of Defense items. If we have an important items that are important during an emergency, they should be sourced in the United States, and we should have the ability to supply our own needs. What else needs to be done to combat the

coronavirus pandemic? I think the private sector has stepped up. Our first class pharmaceutical companies have vaccines in production and in testing already. So I think I'm pretty confident that by the end of this year or beginning of next year, we're going to have a vaccine in place. They've stepped up with testing antivirals such as resdemovir. We have obviously hydroxychloroquine has been approved by the FDA for usage. So our companies have stepped up and done what they need to do. And truly, our world-class companies, testing companies, have stepped up with testing companies have stepped up with, that now will take under five minutes.

Abbott just released a test that'll take five minutes to do. In-home testing is possible. So America is actually going to lead the world and a lot of the innovation that the world will need in order to deal with this pandemic. Because we know that China was the first nation to have a big problem, then South Korea, then Italy, then Europe, now the United States. But continents like Africa, which have a small number of cases now, obviously, by this time next year could be overwhelmed with it,

but by then American ingenuity and biotechnology, I think will go a long way towards solving the world's problem with coronavirus. Congressman, looking at small businesses and private industries in your state of Maryland, are there any that are helping combat coronavirus in Maryland? Absolutely. We have a defense contractor called Hardwire in my district,

a great company, family-owned, family run. they make shielding for our troops. They make the battle shielding for our troops. And they've converted their assembly lines to making face shields for our medical providers in our hospitals. And we're seeing examples of this everywhere. So, you know, Americans step up. When they need it, they step up, we unite. We're going to get through it like the president says.

And we will be better when we get through this because we'll be ready, I think much more ready for the next one to come along. when it comes along because it's not if it comes along, but in this day and age, we know that these viruses mutate naturally and in an era where genetic manipulation of viruses is so readily available throughout the world, we have to be ready for a virus used as a bio-weapon at some point as well. How hopeful are you for the anti-malaria drug trials that are being used to treat coronavirus? There were what we call anecdotal evidence, so evidence of use of hydroxychloroquine and chloroquium plus zinc and azithromycin.

And some of the reports have been quite encouraging. But of course, we will get much more experience now that the FDA has approved it for use on an emergency basis. And, you know, unfortunately, New York has a lot of cases. But fortunately, we will have much better data about the use of these drugs and the efficacy of these drugs. I think very shortly, I suspect within two or three weeks, we're going to know whether the anti-malarial drugs, combined with zinc and azithromycin actually work. I hope they do. I hope the president's hunch is right about this.

Certainly, I will tell you that if I got sick right now, I would certainly take them. I think the evidence is good enough that it's worth taking. And then when we get enough experience with enough patients, we'll know whether or not it actually works. President Trump had talked about wanting to get people back to work by Easter, but then announced on Sunday that he's going to be extending the national social distancing guidelines for another 30 days. What's your perspective on this? You know, I think the president was right in extending it a bit.

I think hopefully the next step will be, again, this will be being much more selective about which areas we take the more rigorous precautions in. Certainly social distancing is a good idea in any flu season, and this is no exception. But what the president realized, I believe, is that once we get readily available rapid testing, again, which is, you know, will be an American breakthrough, we're going to be able to much better pinpoint where the hotspots are and where they aren't. We'll also be developing a test very soon available that will test whether or not you have had it. So not whether you actively had it, but whether you have had it in the past by measuring the antibodies in your blood. And once we know that, and we can confidently say that someone has recovered, they have antibodies, then there's no reason that person certainly can't go back to work because they're not at risk for getting the coronavirus again.

Given what President Donald Trump said about extending social distancing guidelines, how do you think the country should proceed in the coming weeks, recognizing the threat of the virus while at the same time being prudent about the implications it has on the economy? Well, I think we have to do, again, we have to follow what the president has suggested. We have to maintain social distancing. We have to minimize our contact with others. If we get sick, we should obviously quarantine ourselves until we know whether we've had where we're tested positive for COVID-19.

Clearly now, the rapid tests, which are deployed really nationwide now, will greatly improve that circumstance. So what we have to do is we have to pay attention to keeping ourselves. healthy as possible. And then again, Americans are stepping up. A lot of companies that were not in the business of doing things or making things that are important for this epidemic are in the business of doing that now. So, you know, I want to thank all the Americans who have done that. And especially we should thank and every American should thank our health care workers who are really on the front line.

They're putting technically and really putting their life and health on the line in order to take care of other people. And that's, again, that's a great calling they've had, and we should be very thankful to them. And lastly, Congressman, what do you think the U.S. can learn from how COVID-19 has affected other countries across the world? We certainly learned from how China and South Korea have handled it. Of course, we can't do what China did, which, because, you know, they're an authoritarian state and, you know, separated families and quarantined families separately. they did things that you can't do in a country with freedom and liberty. South Korea, again, by rapidly instituting social distancing and quarantining, we're able to get a hold of their pandemic very, very quickly. Well, Congressman Harris, it has been a pleasure to have you on the

Daily Signal podcast. Thank you so much for joining us today. And that'll do it for today's episode. Thanks for listening to The Daily Signal Podcast. We do appreciate your patience as we record remotely during these weeks. Please be sure to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, or Spotify. And please leave us a review or a rating on Apple Podcasts and give us your feedback. Stay healthy and we'll be back with you all tomorrow. The Daily Signal podcast is brought to you by more than half a million members of the Heritage Foundation. It is executive produced by Kate Shrinco and Rachel del Judas. Sound designed by Lauren Evans, Thalia Rampersad, Mark Geine, and John Pop.

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