What A Day - As Easy As Phase 1, 2, 3

Episode Date: September 18, 2020

Two pharma companies released information about their vaccine trials, including details on their timelines and specific metrics they’ll be using to assess efficacy in early data. It’s all part of a push to gain public trust. We explain what to expect, and when. While Congress is still stalled on another relief bill, Republicans in the Senate are busy confirming federal judges nominated by Trump.And in headlines: Bill Barr says all the wrong things, the USPS wanted to send us masks but was stopped, and Banksy loses out to a greeting card company.Show links:www.votesaveamerica.com/getmitch

It's Friday, September 18th. I'm Akilah Hughes. And I'm Gideon Resnick. And this is What A Day, where we are finally processing our primetime Emmy snub. Yeah, I know we didn't technically qualify for any of the categories, but it still stings. Look, try as we might, I guess What A Day will never be the Kaminsky Method. And we've been trying. On today's show, what Congress isn't doing on coronavirus and what it is doing on judges, then some headlines. But first, the latest. And we're going to start with vaccines, since promises about

when they might be available have been a really hot topic at the White House. Earlier this week, we talked about AstraZeneca pausing and then restarting its phase three trial in the UK. That and, you know, jesters at everything have caused a push for pharma companies to be more transparent about their vaccine trials and the approval process overall. So now we're seeing a little bit more from the companies about how these trials are working. So let's get into that. That's right. So yesterday, Moderna, which is working on one of the more potentially promising vaccines at the moment, released this extensive document that was aimed at explaining how its late stage trials are going and what could come next. And as you said, the from Moderna came out in conjunction with a call to investors about progress on their work. And so reportedly, the phase three trial has recruited more than 25,000 volunteers out of the 30,000 they're looking for. And the company's chief medical officer said the rest should be enrolled in

the next few weeks. Yeah. And what else did we learn about timing and participants? So the New York Times write up of the report itself, they said that about 28% of the participants are, quote, black, Latino or from other populations that have been particularly hard hit by the disease. And a quick reminder on how Moderna's trial is actually working. Half of the people in it get the vaccine and half get a placebo of saltwater, a.k.a. Trump juice. The people taking part in the doctors don't know which is which. Then after four weeks, you get a second shot and everyone is monitored for a while after that. The participants also track their side effects as well as they go along. And then to figure out efficacy, they only count COVID cases after the second shot. And that's where we get into the crucial question of timing.

Yeah, so we should expect a few more weeks, just like Donald Trump said. Yes, exactly. No, seriously, here is the plan that Moderna presented. Once there are 53 COVID cases identified, they're saying that they're going to do a first analysis of that data with a safety monitoring board. They're promising to release those results, and Moderna is saying that's probably not happening before November. What they're looking for is at the very, very least a 60% effective rate. That could be kind of hard to figure out by the first checkpoint of those 53 cases. So the plan is for them to look again when there are 106 cases, and then to do a final analysis when there are 151. The more effective the vaccine is,

the quicker that they'll be able to assess positive results. There are a lot of moving parts, of course, impacting the timeline, including how likely people are to be exposed to COVID. But at this point, we might be talking about those later analyses taking place in the spring of next year. Meanwhile, Pfizer also put out a plan yesterday for their vaccine trial, and they said they think they'll be able to assess efficacy after a first round of data by the end of October. All right. And in the U.S., the plan is that if this pans out, doses would go out first to a limited set of people, then more widely over several months. But that's just the US and the planet, again, is 7 billion people. Yes, that's right. It's going to be a mad dash, to say the least. And yesterday,

the charity group Oxfam raised concerns about wealthy countries disproportionately buying up promised doses of the vaccine. They said that at this point, those countries, which include the US, UK, Japan, Australia, and the EU, represent 13% of the global population but have secured 51% of the promised doses. They concluded that even if all five of the vaccines currently in late-stage clinical trials get approved and fully hit their production capacity, that would only be enough for 3 billion people. That means leaving out more than half of the world until at least 2022. Oxfam is calling for a people's vaccine that would be available to everyone free of cost and would limit patent protections for the vaccine makers so that

generics could be made available. Then some pharma companies have been hesitant about that plan, saying it risks unsafe vaccines getting produced. The WHO is working on this issue as well. And separately, Bill Gates has said that he's lobbying Congress to put money towards this in the next relief package so that people in countries with fewer resources get access to these vaccines as well. On that note, Akilah, what has Congress been up to? Okay, so honestly, it seems like not that much. I don't know if you've noticed, but there's still no deal on the next relief package. So yesterday, Donald Trump called for Republicans in Congress to back a $1.5 trillion plan unveiled Tuesday by the bipartisan Problem

Solvers Caucus in the House. That plan has another round of $1,200 stimulus checks for Americans, something that was completely left out of the skinny plan from Mitch McConnell and other Senate Republicans. But congressional leaders in both parties have already rejected the Problem Solvers proposal. Republicans because it costs too much and Democrats because it just doesn't go far enough. Another wrinkle, for some reason, Congress gets to take hella vacations, and they have a recess planned from early October through the election. So time is ticking as if it's not already a dire situation for the underemployed and the millions of unemployed Americans suffering because, again, the president and Republicans have no plan for this coronavirus more than six months in.

One thing that is happening in Congress, though, is the confirmation of Trump judges. That is right. So six judges got approved this week by the Republican-controlled Senate. So let's talk about judges for a moment here. We are all aware of Trump saying he would appoint Tom Cotton and that man whose wife he called ugly, Ted Cruz, to the Supreme Court. But what about these lower courts? Right. So getting judges seated across the federal courts has been a big project for Mitch and Trump. They love to brag about it, along with, you know, that whole tax bill they passed. So far, the Senate has confirmed more than 260 judges nominated by President Trump,

with dozens more in the pipeline. So just to give you some perspective, during Obama's first term, 181 judges were confirmed, and after two terms, it was 329. So Trump and McConnell are far, far outpacing that. The quick context on why is that during Obama's presidency, Republicans in the Senate were frequently blocking confirmations, which at the time required 60 votes. About a year into Obama's second term, Democrats in the Senate got rid of the 60-vote rule so they could get judges through with a simple Senate majority,

which they still had at the time. But the very next year, Democrats lost control of the Senate. Then Trump was elected in 2016, and Mitch McConnell has now had almost four years to ram through these judges. So that's how more than a quarter of the entire federal judiciary is now Trump-appointed. And one more thing. Trump and McConnell have focused in particular on federal appeals courts. These are also called circuit courts. And they're the last stop before a case goes to the Supreme Court, if it even makes it that far. Before Trump, Republican appointees made up a majority of the judges on four of the 12 circuits.

But during his term, he's flipped another three circuits, although it's just narrowly. Right, right. And let's explain what this means, practically speaking, and why these judges and appointments are so important. Well, for starters, these are lifetime appointments. And this administration's strategy has been appointing really young judges. The average age of Obama's appointees was 57, while Trump skews much younger at 48. So their lifetime appointments are likely to be longer. But the stakes of the cases these judges hear are incredibly high and directly impact our lives and our democracy. Just yesterday, a federal judge in Washington state ruled to temporarily stop changes at the USPS and make vote-by-mail more secure.

Specifically, the motion requires the Postal Service to treat all election mail as first-class mail, regardless of the paid postage, and it requires them to replace, reassemble, or reconnect any removed mail sorting machines that are needed to ensure timely processing and delivery of election mail, among other provisions. There are nearly endless reasons to vote in November's election, but here's another. We can flip the Senate so Mitch McConnell can one, stop extending Trump's legacy with lifetime judge appointments, but also two, if Biden is elected, stop Mitch from blocking his judges. Visit votesaveamerica.com slash getmitch, and if you can, donate. And that's the latest. It's Friday, WOD Squad, and for today's Tim Check, we're talking about the gifted kids. In a study published last month in the Journal of Educational Psychology,

researchers followed up on thousands of academically gifted American teenagers from the 1970s and 80s and took a look at how they are doing way, way in the future or now at 50 years old. Are they fragile snowflakes haunted by the phantom of potential past? Are they young Sheldons but old? Turns out they're doing just fine. Psychologically balanced as hell and have overall positive life satisfaction. Good for those nerds. So Giddy, let's help the study out.

Were you a talented and gifted kid and how psychologically balanced are you feeling lately? I haven't felt psychologically balanced for a long time. How could you this year? I mean, if somebody told me that, I would say they're lying. I was never determined to be a talented and gifted kid with those terms, nor was I put into a different grade.

But occasionally when I was bored in elementary school, I was given more work to do. I was on the high school quiz team. I think those are two factors that might play into, you know, nerd territory. But no, I wasn't talented and gifted. And I don't have a grudge about it at all to this day. You're literally chilling. Well, then you can be the like control group. That sounds good. Yes, I am the dependent variable. You know, sitting here, not thinking every single second about the fact that I've been talented and gifted for a long time and no one told me I was. But most importantly, were you skipping grades?

Were you talented and gifted? What attributions were given to you as a genius at a young age? Oh, totally all of those things. Like in fourth grade, I had to literally switch schools to go to a gifted and talented school. And then I did skip two grades. So I, you know, I think that generally speaking, it is the kids who are bored in class who are like talkative because they're bored because they like, you know, watch a lot of Sesame Street and their parents were like, go read a book. And so I don't know that you're necessarily smarter so much as they're like, we really got to get these kids to stop bothering

the teacher when they're trying to help other kids in class. But yeah, I would say that psychologically balanced is not a way I describe my year. I think, yeah, I agree with you. If anyone is like touting that as a thing that they have, I think they're liars. But yeah, I don't think that that is the greatest reason I'm anxious these days. So if they had asked me for the study, I'm not 50, but if they'd asked me, I'd be like, yeah, I guess that didn't affect me negatively. Well, just like that, we've checked our Tims. We hope that you feel talented and gifted and also psychologically balanced. Stay safe and we will be be back with more temp checks next week. Let's wrap up with some headlines.

Headlines. Attorney General William Barr made lots of news this week for saying all the wrong things. On a call last week with federal prosecutors, Barr reportedly encouraged them to be aggressive when charging people from protests in recent months. He even went so far as to suggest charging some protesters with sedition, which is a felony referring to the act of inciting a revolt against a lawful authority. Barr also asked prosecutors to look into whether they could bring any criminal charges against Seattle Mayor Jenny Jerkin for letting residents create a police-free autonomous zone in their city. Just hours after this news broke on Wednesday, Barr delivered a speech criticizing DOJ prosecutors for charging people for purely political reasons, which was pretty

ironic for him to announce considering the news that just broke. As a finale to his collection of garbage comments on Wednesday, he said that the COVID-19 lockdown was, quote, the greatest intrusion on civil liberties in American history, right behind slavery. Someone please take the mic and the Justice Department away from this individual. Honestly, please do it. I'm furious. Massive fires on the West Coast continue to burn while scientists try to grasp its long-term effects. Experts say that the smoke produced from California's wildfires alone have put around 90 million metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. For comparison, that's more greenhouse gas than some entire countries produce in total, and it's a huge jump from past smoke records. The culminating smoke from all the West Coast fires is so massive that forecasters expect it to reach as far as Europe. Scientists also predict that vast areas of vegetation in Northern California that were burned will take some 30 to 50 years to completely grow back. In a small glimmer of good news, though, the Bay Area experienced an

improved level of air quality for the first time in 30 days. I will take small glimmers. Turns out you could have saved the 12 bucks you spent on that weird novelty mask that's just a photo of your face, but a little smaller. According to documents obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, the United States Postal Service was planning to send five masks to every household during the first month of lockdown, even drawing up a press statement for immediate release. Before the statement was sent, though, the White House nixed the plans with senior administration officials citing concern from the vice president's office that households receiving free masks from a government looking out for their well-being might create concern or panic.

Look, I get it. I, too, would have thought something was gravely wrong if the Trump White House suddenly seemed like they were trying to keep me alive. The press statement is just one of nearly 10,000 pages of emails, legal memos, presentations, and other documents obtained in the information request, which detail a postal service mired by Trump's personal agenda. Stay out of our mailboxes, Trump. Don't you know tampering with our mail is a felony? Yeah, it definitely is.

Well, bad news for everyone's favorite little spray painting scoundrel. The Bart Simpson of the street art world Banksy lost a two-year-long trademark battle this week after a greeting card company co-opted one of his most famous images, the flower thrower, despite his representative successfully applying to trademark the image in 2014. The greeting card company won their case by claiming Banksy's choice to hide his identity, as well as his choice to paint graffiti on other people's property without permission, marred his ability to be identified as the unquestionable owner of his works. Banksy brought notoriety to this trademark case last year when, as a protest, he opened up a brick-and-mortar gift shop with the gag that you could only buy any of the items online from the shop. The store's name was Gross Domestic Product and sold impractical items like

disco balls made from police riot helmets. The European Union's Intellectual Property Office claimed in their decision this week that the gag shop demeaned the artist's case, solidifying that Banksy's real motivation was not for the security of his work, but to circumvent the law. Sorry, Banksy, being a little rude to the Brits can be fun sometimes, like when you mess with one of the furry hat guys, or when you and your radical friends get together and throw a bunch of tea off of a boat. But it won't always win you your trademark case with the EU. Sigh. And those are the headlines. That's all for today.

If you liked the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review, mail a free mask to your loved ones and tell your friends to listen. And if you're into reading and not just thousands of emails obtained

via the Freedom of Information Act like me, What A Day is also a nightly newsletter. Check it out and subscribe at crooked.com slash subscribe. I'm Akilah Hughes. I'm Gideon Resnick. And we demand an Emmy. We didn't put in that work for nothing. I've been studying the Kominsky method for 35 years, you know. It's the only method I know. What's up, WOD Squad?

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