Tuesday, March 3, 2020

91,320/3118. POTUS and VP visit NIH today. Amazing day! Testified with Steve Hahn, Anne Schuchat, Bob Kadlec before Senate HELP Committee chaired by Lamar Alexander. Patty Murray complaining about lack of testing availability in Washington State where there is increased community spreading now with 6 deaths most in nurtsing home. In the middle of the hearing Sen Keane asked me why I was disinvited to the Democratic caucus lunch. It was scheduled that after the Hearing, Hahn, Birx and I should make comments first at the GOP Senate caucus lunch and then the Dem. In reality someone in the VP’s office screwed up and felt that I would not get to the NIH in time to greet the POTUS who was coming up on Marine One. They did not know that I was supposed to ride in the motorcade with Pence. Anyway when the VP’s office heard about the outrage of Keane, they immediately re-invited me. Keane thought that this wa another example of them “muzzling me”. A real cluster. However, the VP spoke so long at the Dem lunch that it was clear that the POTUS would arrive before me, who was supposed o greet him. Finally Azar and I raced up in his car with no motorcade to NIH. Amazing that the POTUS got to VRC/NIH before me and Azar and actually waited in the holding room for me. Yikes! We did our thing; I made a presentation, we had a press conference in the VRC. Graham and Kizzmetia Corbett made presentation on 2nd floor and then the POTUS invited me and Azar to return to White House with him on Marine One. After we got off Marine One, the POTUS and I held a press conference on the lawn. Amazing. We then had our Task Force meeting followed by another press conference. Importantly, I have been pushing for blanket testing throughout the country on symptomatic and asymptomatic people to get some data. CDC and FDA are promising this now, but I doubt if they can deliver. I am beginning to quedtion the competency of CDC and the innocent inexperience of Steve Hahn and FDA In the middle of this, Larry Corey calls me up and mentions that they did in Seattle a screening of people presenting with Flu like sxs in 4 emergency rooms, and of 380 people, 4 were positive for Coronavirus. This is bad since this is 1%. I told Larry to call Bob Redfield and let him know. This may be the beginning of a major outbreak in the USA PRESS: Good Morning America with George Stephanopoulos; multiple press conferences, including one on White House Lawn after getting off Marine One with the POTUS