What A Day - Not Throwing Away My Shot

Episode Date: January 22, 2021

Biden released a 200-page national plan yesterday to centralize the COVID response effort, along with a flurry of executive orders and directives targeted at the health crisis. Plus, a more candid Dr. Fauci did his first press briefing under the new administration.The vaccine goal for the Biden administration is 100 million shots in the first 100 days. We spoke with Dr. Ashish Jha, Dean of Brown University’s School of Public Health about that plan, whether it’s fast enough, the threat of new variants, and more.And we’re joined by actor and comedian Alice Wetterlund for headlines: rumors of a forbidden romance between a 30 Rock Star and a MyPillow guy, new rooster laws in France, and Instacart fires all its unionized employees.Show Links:Listen to Rubicon Season 2: https://crooked.com/podcast-series/rubicon/Follow Alice Wetterlund: https://twitter.com/alicewetterlund

it's friday january 22nd i'm akilah hughes and i'm gideon resnick and this is what the day a podcast that's devoted to protecting the endangered species that is the big gold bird on lady gaga's inauguration dress yeah these big birds are important and we need to act fast if we want future generations to enjoy how gold and big they are. Yeah, folks, it is the most beautiful animal alive. Which is why we have to keep it alive. Yeah. On today's show, a conversation with Dr. Ashish Jha about the vaccine rollout and new coronavirus variants, then some headlines.

But first, the latest. Let me be very clear. Things are going to continue to get worse before they get better. The memorial we held two nights ago will not be our last one, unfortunately. The death toll will likely top 500,000 next month. The cases will continue to mount.

We didn't get into this mess overnight. It's going to take months for us to turn things around. But let me be equally clear. We will get through this. We will defeat this pandemic. That was President Biden discussing his administration's plans to address the pandemic and the sobering reality of what we still have to face. Yesterday, on day two of his presidency, he released a 200-page national plan to centralize the response effort, which is a major departure from the last administration. And he signed another round of executive orders and directives targeted at the

health crisis. So let's just start with those. Yeah, so there are now new requirements for masks on interstate transportation, if you weren't doing that already, and new rules for international travelers to quarantine in the U.S. upon arrival, though it's not clear how that is actually going to be enforced yet. There's also the creation of a so-called pandemic testing board that is intended to boost our capacity for nationwide testing, plus a directive to research more treatments and an effort to better collect and analyze data, among many, many other things that he did on this day. Also, one of the other broader goals from President Biden and his team is to more regularly have government scientists

at press briefings, a novel idea. And to that point, Dr. Fauci was back in the briefing room yesterday taking questions. Yeah, can't keep the Fauci down. I love watching him strut up to that little podium, take off the mask. I'm like, yeah, he's forever. All right, well, of course,

there's also the vaccine part of this whole strategy, which is what we're going to focus on today. So Biden is aiming for 100 million shots in 100 days. You know, we've heard it a lot. They've said it 100, 100. We're counting. Count it down. You know, he wants to use the Defense Production Act to help expedite vaccine production. But because we're relying on two vaccines for now and a lot of facilities are at full capacity,

there might need to be some creative ways to approach this. For instance, there was mention of increasing production of a syringe that can squeeze more doses out of existing Pfizer vials. I don't know. I don't know about that. I'll, you know, I'll take what they're giving. Backwash.

Give me the whole, I want a full original vial. I'm taking what I can get at this moment. But one of the bigger questions now is whether this is going to be enough fast enough, given that we'll likely have more supply on hand in the next couple of months, the emergence of these new variants, and also what will happen after this 100-day mark when supplies could lapse. To get some answers on this, we wanted to check in with someone that's been deeply involved in tracking vaccines and how to effectively roll them out.

Dr. Ashish Jha is the dean of the Brown University School of Public Health. I spoke with him yesterday, and here is that conversation. So we're talking to you just as the Biden administration has taken over. They've laid out a plan to do 100 million doses in 100 days. Does that on its own seem doable to you? And if so, is that a pace, you know, about a million or so a day that is going to be fast enough here? So first of all, I think it's doable. They are left with without a great plan from the Trump team

and without a lot of stockpiles. So there's going to be a lot of work to get there. So but I do think they can do it. Unfortunately, I'm worried it may not be enough. The Trump team had promised that 50 million people would be vaccinated by the end of January. We're at 17 million on the 21st of January. We're not going to get there. So given everything that's happening, I'm pretty worried that 100 million per over 100 days, while achievable, it may not be enough to keep us out of trouble. Yeah. And so along that course, there are some challenges of ramping up at this point. You know, many more doses have been shipped out to states than have been administered. I think the ratio

right now is something like 30 something million to 17 million. What do you see as the source of the mismatch that exists there? And do you see signs of improvement since we've started? Yeah, yeah, both. So I do see signs of improvement, but there are still some challenges, right? So the first question is, why have states been so slow? Why has this gone so slowly? Right. And the short answer is because the federal government did zero planning, put no resources in, did not help the

states, and said to states, you're on your own. And no surprise, states have not, didn't hit the ground running. The good news is states are getting better. Over the last week, we've been seeing kind of 800,000, 900,000 a day from states. The states, the things that are slowing them down still, there's a lot of complex rules. States don't have enough staff. They don't have enough resources. Again, all places where I think the federal government could help. Left unto itself, I think states will kind of plot along and do okay.

But the Biden team's been pretty clear. They're going to put the resources in from the federal government, FEMA, Public Health Service, National Guard or other sources as needed, and a lot of dollars. Put all that into states, I think you're going to see states really be able to ramp up a lot more. So in an ideal situation, how many shots per day would you want to set as a goal? Let's say there aren't limitations to supply or distribution or communication between federal and state resources? Yeah. If there were none of those restrictions, Gideon, and I'm sure I'm going to drive the Biden people crazy by saying this, we really should be vaccinating two to three million people a day

because we got a problem, which is this variant that is the UK variant that is starting to circulate in the United States. It's a bad variant of this disease. It is far more contagious. It is going to cause a huge spike in infections. And we have two choices. We can do a national lockdown, which I don't think there's any political appetite for, or we can get a lot of people vaccinated very, very quickly. I would love to see every person over 65 who wants a vaccine to be vaccinated in the next six to eight weeks. We're going to need to be doing millions of doses a day in order to hit that. Right, right.

And to the point of the variant, there were other places like the UK taking an approach where they get first shots out to more people, or at least that's what they were talking about. I don't know exactly where they are at the moment and delay the timing of the second dose if necessary while those supplies are limited. Where do you fall on that particular strategy? Yep. This has been a little bit controversial. First and foremost, everybody should know that everybody needs two doses. So there's no like one dose strategy. The strategy question that comes up is, do you give two doses by 28 days, which is what was studied in the clinical trials, or do you live with some proportion of people getting vaccinated, let's say a week or two or three later than ideal as a way to make sure that

you get all the vaccines out. So if you have, let's say you have 10 million doses, you can give out 5 million and keep the other five in reserve, or you can give out all 10 million and then hope that your production keeps up so that you can get everybody their second dose on time, but not sweat it if somebody's a week or two late. I am more of the latter category. I feel like it's very reasonable to let things, you know, things are delayed by a couple of weeks. It's not a big deal. I don't want to delay by months. I definitely do not want to only do one dose. You've got to do two. But I think it's totally fine if everybody gets their second shot within two months. But there are people who really are

uncomfortable with that. The clinical trials really only looked at 28 days. Again, I think there's good scientific reason to think that what I'm proposing, what many of us are proposing, would be okay, and it would have the huge upside of being able to get all the doses out into people's arms and get that first dose in. But it does make people uncomfortable, and I understand that. Right. And to the point of the variants also, and, you know, the question of vaccines and treatments that are existing in the world right now, how concerned are you about those new variants? I understand, you know, there are different ones, South Africa, the UK, in terms of how the vaccines and the treatments are responding to them at the moment. Yeah, it's a very good question.

And the short answer is it's a moving target. We don't know for sure. But all the evidence I have seen through this morning, there's some more data coming out this morning, all the data so far suggests that the UK variant is gonna be susceptible to the vaccine, meaning the vaccine will protect people against the UK variant.

There's some data that the South Africa variant may be a little bit trickier, but again, I think our vaccines are going to provide a good level of protection. And then we can change our vaccines. We can actually make changes in our both Moderna and Pfizer vaccine to be more responsive if it ends up being that our vaccines don't work. But so far, all the data I'm seeing suggests that our vaccines are going to work. But this is one of the reasons we got to get these vaccines out very, very quickly into people's arms. They certainly aren't working if they're sitting in freezers. Also on the topic of variants, I saw some limited reporting on this, that there were some European countries that are discussing the necessity of higher grade medical masks given the contagiousness of the new variants. What do you make of that? And is that something that should be discussed here? Because

I think one of the large concerns that people have right now is what the United States might look like in March or springtime if this is the dominant strain that exists. Absolutely. Look, I think we're still underestimating how big a deal this variant is. It's really bad. And you can look at the data from the UK and that should make you nervous about this. UK has turned things around by doing a very vigorous national lockdown. I don't see that happening here. So if we're not doing that, and we've talked about vaccines and how do we get vaccines out, but what else can we do? I do think upgrading the quality of mask is going to be really important. You know, I, even over the summer, used to wear cloth masks

all the time and not worry about it. I have upgraded my own mask wearing. And then as the variant has started really coming into play, I started rethinking my own strategy on masks. I think cloth masks are probably not enough for any high-risk situation. Look, if you're out for a walk with your dog, a cloth mask is fine, as long as you're not in a large group. But when you go inside a grocery store or some other place that's more high-risk, you should be wearing a higher quality mask. So what might that mean? There are KN95s, KF94s. I wear a KF94. These are made in South Africa,

I'm sorry, in South Korea. They're really pretty high quality masks. You can buy them on Amazon. You don't need any like special. But also in really high risk situations where you're gonna be in a room with 10 other people, first of all, you should try to avoid those. But if you are, double masking is another way to do it. where you wear a surgical mask with a cloth mask on top. But ultimately, I want more

and clearer guidance on this stuff from the federal government, from the CDC. I want to help people buy and wear more high quality masks. That's going to end up making a really big difference. So I think there are lots of things the government could be doing to be helpful to people here in terms of sorting out quality of masks. Most people can't sort this stuff out on their own. You really do need expertise on this. Right. I completely agree with that. Yeah. They're, you know, more clarity, the better. Well, Dr. Ashish Jha, thank you so much again for taking the time today. I sincerely appreciate it. Thank you for having me on. It was a lot of fun. And that's the latest.

Stay safe and we'll be back after some ads with a very special Headlines guest. Let's wrap up with some Headlines. Headlines. So we've got a very special guest with us today, actor and comedian Alice Wetterlund. Hi, Alice. Oh my god, hi. I am so excited to be here. We're so glad that you are joining us. I'm a fan. I gotta say, I listen every day I wake up with you guys. And I'm just looking for a way to go to sleep with you guys, so this is perfect. Yeah, this is a great opportunity. How weird would it have been?

How strange would it be if I was like, I also wake up with you? How? Not strange at all. I have a huge ego. I'm like, yeah, most people do. Watch my special. Yes. Love it.

Well, Alice, if you want to do us the honors, you can get us kicked off. Okay, great. We have some good headlines today. The very first one was created when the simulation computer overheated. Okay, 30 Rock's Jane Krakowski allegedly had a romantic relationship with, drumroll please, the MyPillow guy. Mike. No, that's not.

Okay. Sleep Boy Q. So this is until the summer of last year and you know these two seem pretty different but the truth is they're both TV stars. One of them was the best on the best sitcom of all time and then the other

one does loud smiley monologues about neck support approximately 20 times per commercial break on Tucker Carlson. So it's like sort of the same. And if you think about it, if those commercials were a bit, I'm pretty good. Pretty solid.

Right. Like if this was all part of 30 Rock the whole time, fine. And it seems like it is. It does. So you're like, holy shit, Liz Levin.

So far, the story has only been reported by the daily mail so we are proceeding with caution but here's what we know quote unquote no really lindell and krakowski started seeing each other about a year ago with the king bed kingpin wooing the actress with gifts and flowers she admired his rags to riches story and saw him as a role model for her son but then she broke it off after uh meeting him in person oh no that's scratched out um meeting someone else is right after she met someone else in the hamptons and for all we know that might have set off a chain reaction of events that ended last week with a heartbroken lindell telling

trump something like, You need to turn the Lincoln Memorial into a megazord of Rome through the city crushing limbs on the monster's feet. I'm so alone. I'm so alone. I think that was a great Mike impression. I thought it was JFK. I thought it was Spock. It was Mike as JFK Jr.

He is the JFK of pillows. Yeah. Yes. So for their part, both Lindell and Krakowski have denied the rumors, of course. Anyway, all this is to say that Mr. Lindell is single and looking to mingle. Looking for somebody to fluff him up.

Fully. Fully. You know, can't be me. I'm single and not even happily so. Just not desperate, I guess. I just love the fact that he wooed her with gifts. Right. Pillows of different sizes. Maybe miniature pillows? I don't know.

Oh, wow. That guy's dripping in them. He loves it. Well, look, there is some great news for people who enjoy the serene sounds of loud birds and the sweet smells of petting zoos. So not me, I guess. Lawmakers in France approved a law yesterday that protects the sensory heritage of the French countryside. So this law comes amid rising tensions between longtime rural residents and a wave of newer arrivals, which residents are calling neo-rurals, which is not the easiest to say.

But good for them. In French it is. Mieux que vous. Right. Oh, beautiful. Wow. I can't do any of it. Well, look, you know,

we use babble here. So, the new folks came to the countryside expecting the pastoral paradise of their cottagecore dreams, but they were disappointed to find that animals there could be loud and frankly reckless when it comes to personal hygiene. Like, come on, animals, get it together.

Well, one lawsuit that was emblematic of this tension was the case of Maurice the rooster. He has a whole name. His farm gentrifying neighbors didn't appreciate his natural morning calls and filed a suit against his owner to shut him up. The judge ended up siding with Maurice. OK, go off chicken, along with thousands of supporters who signed a Save Maurice petition, which I'm sure he read to completion. Turns out the issue of should animals be allowed to talk is pretty cut and dry. So France's new law recognizes and protects the sounds of things like cowbells,

tractors, and roosters as part of France's natural heritage. Oh my God, this is the basis for a children's song. It is. The tractor goes, a children's song. It is. The tractor goes, and it's totally illegal. Exactly, and we're all fine with it. Yep. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the NRA today

since the New York judge rejected a bid to transfer an existence-threatening lawsuit against the company out of state. That might have given the NRA a better shot at beating the case so they could keep doing what they do best, freaking out about how McDonald's won't let you open Carrie in the play place anymore. Don't. Yeah. I swear, I miss my childhood.

How do you defend yourself in the play place? I don't really know. Throw plastic balls. Work hard, play hard. Here's a recap of what the NRA is up against in August. New York's AG Letitia James, Stan, huge Letitia James, Stan here, filed a lawsuit that said, NRA executives use millions of company dollars on things like vacations, private jets, and more. Yes, the Second Amendment is mainly the right to bear arms, but it turns out NRA execs actually care more about a lesser-known cause, the right to

eat, pray love. James's lawsuit is backed by an 18-month investigation, and it seeks to shut the company down. That's why the NRA filed for bankruptcy last week in an attempt to shield itself against legal culpability. Their attempted relocation to Texas served the same goal,

but it's not going to work and the lawsuit against them will go forward in new york soon soon maybe guns will have no one to defend them and they'll get scared and melt themselves down into highlighter powder for instagram influencers oh i hope so. To use in their tutorials. That beautiful gun metal. Yeah. The guns are like, we have to stay relevant.

The grocery delivery app Instacart let go of all of its unionized employees yesterday as part of mass layoffs within the company. Yikes. Almost 2,000 employees were laid off, including the 10 employees who formed the first and only union on the platform. That can't be a coincidence. Instacart might not be as big as Uber or Lyft, but it wanted the other gig apps to know it's just as good at exploiting its workers.

The company said the layoffs were part of reorganization efforts before they go public later this year. Then in other food union news, workers at Hunts Point Produce Market in the Bronx continued to protest for fair wages for the sixth day in a row yesterday after management refused to grant them a $1 raise and better health care. Seems easy enough. On Monday, the NYPD attempted to disrupt the picket line and made several arrests. And on Wednesday, the workers were joined by AOC. There's no working person in New York City that I can hear of or even think of that would think

that what you're doing is wrong. Everybody's behind you. Everybody's behind you. You know someone means business when they have a megaphone. That's just the rule. The market supplies a significant percentage of the fresh produce to New York City. So if management wants to keep those delicious red cabbages rolling, maybe they should listen to what the people who work there have to freaking say. Wow. That's right. People hate health care.

Yes. They hate health care and people who own businesses hate giving out cheese and lettuce. Oh, is lettuce a slang for money that I don't know about? It was. It is. Yes. I totally. I'm cool. Whatever. TikTok. Yeah. I totally. You thought on test. I'm cool.

Whatever. TikTok. Yeah, yeah. I have all the grocery lingo. Whatever. Yeah, I'm like, follow her on Snapchat. All right. Well, Alice, this has just been a dream.

Thank you so much for being on the show. Is there anything that you would like to promote? The floor is yours. Thank you so much for having me. I actually have a show coming out on Sci-Fi Network next week. It's called Resident Alien, and it premieres January 27th at 10 p.m. 9 Eastern. Is that right?

9 Central. I'm sorry. Look, it's going to be online. Yeah, like it's definitely a thing that you're going to watch when you get to watch it, when you choose, because that's how we're living. It's going to be on the Sci-Fi website and you can go watch it anytime and they won't make you sign up for cable either. They're just going to let you see it.

Because they don't care about rules. It's a great show and you guys do a great show so thanks for having me. Well thank you so much for being here. Everybody check out Resident Alien. I don't know if you're the alien. No spoilers here. But those are the headlines. No here. But those are the headlines.

No spoilies. And those are the headlines. One last thing before we go. The first episode of Rubicon season two is out today. Join our editor in chief, Brian Boitler, as he walks us through Biden's first 100 days. Today's episode features Faz Shakir, Bernie Sanders' former campaign manager, and a discussion about the political challenges Biden faces and how Democrats can overcome them. Yeah, it's a fantastic listen, so go check it out. And don't forget to subscribe to Rubicon

wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes drop every Friday. That is all for today. If you like the show, make sure you subscribe, leave a review, run from the link in Megazord, and tell your friends to listen. And if you're into reading and not just the court transcripts of rooster lawsuits 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 enjoy the first democratically controlled weekend. I feel just relaxed. I just feel so good. Blood pressure down, shoulders down. Might even crack a cold one. Look at me go. I'll get some ice cream. Mmm.

What a Day is a production of Crooked Media. It's recorded and mixed by Charlotte Landis. Sonia Tun is our assistant producer. Our head writer is John Milstein and our executive producers are Katie Long, Akilah Hughes, and me. Our theme music is by Colin Gilliard and Kshaka.