c-span, do you get it straight from the source in a matter where you are from, you stand on the issues, c-span is america's networking, unfiltered, unbiased, word for word happens here, or here, or here, or anywhere that matters, america is watching on c-span, powered by cable. next the white house covid-19 coordinator, dr. ashish jha said more than 4 million vaccine doses from children six months - five years have been delivered to about 3000 sites on the united states and joining dr. ashish jha are dr. anthony fauci and dr. rochelle walensky, it is a half an hour. >> good afternoon everybody, my name is dr. ashish jha on the covid-19 response cordwainer for the white house and first of all

apologies for the technical delays getting us started but i am excited and i'm delighted to get to going this afternoon and with two familiar faces, to colleagues who have been tirelessly battling the pandemic ises the beginning of this pandemic more than two years ago coming of the buffalo, dr. rochelle walensky and dr. anthony fauci and today were going to update youou in a realy important topic and, with that many parents really america is waited for a long time and that first covid-19 vaccines were youngestor kids, you know it's been nearly 18 months of the first set off vaccine became available for adults and just over the last week, saw the fda authorize the cdc a recommended, vaccines for children six months at all for the first time, and out this is an important moment for the families and kids under five, but it is a historic moment for our nation, because it essentially every americanic our oldest were youngest, is now eligible for thebl protection tt

vaccines provide and we know that these vaccines are extraordinarily safe and highly effective. and remember after an extensive review by career fda and cdc scientists, they were unanimously approved by an independent group of experts scientists and i like to remind people it's hard to get a group of independent scientists agree on anything and yet 21 independent scientists who served, unanimously voted in agreement that the benefits of these vaccines, clearly outweighedle the rest and then,2 independent scientists have, the makeup be a cip for recommending these vaccines were kids six months and above. twe have been at hhs, we've been planning and preparing for this moment for a long time and when the president took office, he made a commitment to keep our families safe from covid-19 across america and the availability of these vaccines, brings us that much closer to

that goal to make sure that these vaccines get to the families that the lot under love them, we have plus a comprehensive effort with trusted partners include sees local healthne departments pediatricians, family physicians rural and community health centers and pharmacies and in fact our gorgeous federal pharmacy partners walgreens and walmart and more, are stepping up and are already vaccinating children and is a many pediatricians across the country.ai and i was i have sent to all of you on many occasions, we notice vaccination program will ramp up over time and remember, vaccines cannot be shipped until they were authorized by the fdada on friday, and as of today, i can report that more than 4 million doses have been delivered within days of authorization to 00approximately 13000 sites acrs the country and is more doses received sites make those doses

available, that information will also become available on vaccines .gov and when you look at this vaccination program, for the littlest americans, he will feel a little different than the vaccination programs we run before and that is because we know, the parents will be turning to the pediatricians, the family physicians pretty and we have been guided in our approach by very clear date at t said that most parents mother vaccinate the littlest ones, in familiar settings we also know that many parents have questions. we want to encourage every parent it to talk to their physicians and to the pediatricians and family physicians and we also know the confidence in the vaccines, built over time and i reminded people that at the start of the adult vaccination programs, back in december of 2020, only one in three adults said they were eager to get the shots and

today, nearly 90 percent of adults have gotten at least one shot and we know the importance of working with trusted voices and community leaders are doing just that, hhs is partnered with over a thousand organizations and many of which working minority in rural communities and organizations like the national parent-teacher association, national medical association of both ofth them he been great partners and we've also started covid-19 community court on effort thatth is wrongo include something thousand members across healthcare's source rural, and faith organizations. andai organizations like black doctors for the covid-19 consortium ands the national - and now i want to address one issue that is very important and that is the issue is information about the vaccines and kids and covid-19 has been a big and so let's set the record straight, because the data here is actually quite clear. kids are better protected if they are vaccinated and if they

are vaccinated, they are far less likely to get seriously ill and less likely to end up in the hospital and in the icu. tens of millions of children the u.s. and around the world, have already been vaccinated against covid-19 and the safety profile of theseet vaccines, is extraordinary and i have three children, all of whom have been vaccinated in fact, every physician i know, including in particular the pediatricians, have all vaccinated therere eligible children we come a long way in fighting is covid-19 with vaccines and treatments and a other tools like testings and they become widely available and i am pleased to make another announcement today, the biden harris and ministration is making more assessable tests available for individuals with wider and visually impaired of these tests are available for free through covid-19 test .gov and we developed this plan in

close partnership with members of the disability community an issue raised consistently was thatid individuals who were blid or low are often unable to utilize rapid self testsn on their own but the president has been clear that he is committedm to addressing the needs of individuals with disabilities regardless of where they live, or the level of community transmission and entering everyone is equitable access to covid-19 testing and all of the critical mitigation strategies is of the utmost importance and so in closing, the numbers and are fighting is covid-19, speak for themselves and nearly three months after cases beganon to re in the u.s., the deaths are actually on and down 90 percent since the day president took office, why, this has not happened randomly. the denser down because two of the three markets are fully vaccinated half of them are boosted because we have widespread availability and therapeutics like hospitals and

yes, we have made a lot of process better job isve not don, and the pandemic is not over, and we still have a lot of work to do, it is worth celebrating milestones and this week, as well as members of our society begin to get vaccinated, we need to take a moment and reflect of the good news that is not right with that i'm going to turn it over to dr. rochelle walensky, who will updatele us on the scee and the pandemic andnd the importance of getting vaccinated and getting children vaccinated. >> thank you and good afternoon everyone as per usual i was art by walking through the latest data and some recorded average cases is about 99400 and the represents decrease of aboutut 4 percent of the entire week and the average of hospital admissions is about 4400 a day which is an increase of about 2 percent of the prior week and as noted the 70 average is about 250 per day which is a decrease

of about 16 percent of the prior week and the cdc does follow covid-19 immunity levels and allows individuals and community to take action to protect themselves and others based on their local community level and this allows us to focus our efforts on protecting those who are most at risk of severe covid-19 illness pretty and last week the cdc reported 21 percent of the u.s. population, when living in a high covid-19 commuy level in nearly 40 percent living in a medium communityty living in 39 percent was living in a low community level and we will have updated covid-19 community levels posted tonight and we do see things shooting across the country and so go to cdc .gov or you can find more covid-19 community level online is a doctor noted, the past week and other important forward in her fight against covid-19 and following rigorous scientific

review and transparent and comprehensive discussion by them on the wii immune response and and ability of the vaccine to protect children against disease and the cdc expanded his covid-19 vaccine recommendations to all children six months, five age this makes nearly 20 million additional children eligible for vaccine i know there has been a great anticipation for the parents surrounding the authorization recommendation covid-19 vaccines for our youngest children and for many, the opportunity to vaccinated children comes as a welcome relief for those who may still be hesitant, how want to emphasize the covid-19 vaccines have and continue to undergo the most intense safety monitoring and history. parents is okay if you still have questions and ifns you do i encourage you to talk to your child's divider and local pharmacist, doing more about the benefits and safety of these vaccines in the meantime i would like to outline by covid-19

vaccinations or our children are particularly important to how we do know the covid-19 illness can be serious for children and then as parents we are always looking to do what is right to protect them against harm is especially concerning to see severe outcomes in our youngest children and the hospitalizations and children should not need to be hospitalized they should not need to go the icu to be on the ventilator and certainly they should not lose their life to this virus is such a young age and during that omicron way we saw a huge in covid-19 cases in children in the highest possible fossilization recent children and in other point in this pandemic and especiallyin among youngest, agencies must through four years who have had the highest rate of fossilization among any age groupat under the age of 17. we have lost 215 children since

2286 mustache 20 to enter 20 years to put that through april 2022, covid-19 was among the top five leading causes of death and every age group that children under the age of 19, and a number one infectious cause of death in children and no parent should have to face the stress of it children to severely ill protecting them from covid-19 vaccination could be the difference between hospitalization and hospital vir even saving a child's life. and that's great news for parents and we all want to do what is best for children and for the safest vaccine and protection against covid-19, dew point future child covid-19 vaccinated in young children do not need to have an underlying a risk foro be severe did see a disease and over happen children hospitalized with covid-19 were otherwise healthy, and had no

underlying medical conditions in children who previously had covid-19, and also to benefit from a covid-19 vaccine pretty finish on the vaccine immunity results in a rod or neutralizing antibody response, and that is broader protection against varis impaired with infection and so is apparent in a physician and cdc director, i strongly encourage all parents to give tr child vaccinated and fighting is covid-19, is not over as dr. ashish jha printed but were in a much better place we are now armed with vaccines were very youngest and we have these in our toolbox to face ths head-on the think you know about turn things over to dr. anthony fauci. >> thank you very much dr. rochelle walensky, and what i would like to do is just -underscore in answer primitively some of the questions that dr. rochelle foue received over the last few days since the announcement was made

and thus look at a very quick review of the questions that people asking for example, parents ask how did they come to the conclusion what wasus the da of the approval and recommendation as you know with these vaccines, we have two in question, moderna and pfizer, have both of those have gone under extensive it placebo blinded controlled trials which is theed gold standard of the targeting of the efficacy of the safety if we go first into the moderna trial, 6400 children and infants, and the important point to emphasize, is that this vaccine, which is to doses, we support, and importantly the immune responses, that were elicited by the vaccines, were comparable to those responses andth younger adults and in adus that were receiving higher dose that unequivocally in these

trials, led to a clinical benefit and so even though this is mostly in immunological blue-chip study, the fact remains in that it is highly correlating with a good clinical effect andnd what about the safy of the moderna and when you do vaccines, addressing the reactive - mainly what is the immediate local or systemic effect and very briefly the reactive of this vaccine was essentially the same or better of worse than what we've seen with any of the numbers of chilf hood vaccines that we regularly minister and there was no incident for this system inflammatory system for the children for the pfizer which is a bit different first dose separating by three weeks by eight weeks and again the bridging situation indicated

that theth responses that were elicited become a hike this vaccine, was equivalentt to two tthe responses in other studies including young adults, and adults which were barely associated for the beneficial clinical response and with regard to r the safety data the same thing, for example, fevers, pain atca the site, comparable o what we seen vaccines that all of us had been administering door children for years and years, in light of all this, the fda valuation and analysis of the safety and effectiveness in manufacturing dated hundred rigorously encumber his only lookout known potential benefits clearly outweigh known potential risk this pediatric population

if we want to make sure that you understand parents, there trying to make the decision to authorize recommending these vaccines, the fda's and cdc's independent advisory committee, as you heard, were consulted it and c voted unanimously in suppt of the authorization and the recommendation and therefore wen are all very enthusiastic about getting your children vaccinated is now available products and back to you dr. ashish jha. >> thank you dr. anthony fauci and dr. rochelle walensky let's go to questions and i'm going as my colleague to get us going on that kevin. >> thank you and i say this a lot but we have to keep one question per person so please do that so we can get through as many as we can cheryl, new york times. >> hi and thank you for doing this call i'm going to immediately violate asked two questions, firstsk is about the

kids vaccine, i noticed on the vaccine .gov, that a lot of these pharmacy say will vaccinated ages three adept and i wondered why that is and if there is a problem with getting the vaccine to the youngest children for this for dr. a anthony fauci and think a lot of americans are just wondering how you are feeling and what your experience with covid-19 was an how you got infected and i wondered if you could share a little bit of that. >> when we startrt there, give s an update on how you're feeling. >> actually feeling really fine, i had mild symptoms last tuesday at a check my antigen test on wednesday, he was positive and monday symptoms and i started on wednesday on the medicine for five days and now finished it and i'm still feeling really quite fine anything of an example given my

age, of what were talking about today and i'm doubly boosted vaccinated in a believe if that were not the case, i very likely would not be talking to you looking as well it is i do i thank you so so all is well and thank you for asking. >> you look great and something goodness for vaccines and also for paxlovid on the issues of kids under three, and vaccinated kids under three this is really about the act and dr. rochelle walensky i don't know if you know more about the details behind this, the comment about why it is that some will vaccinate under three in a place not. >> i was a much of this may be relatively to the fact that the ability for the pharmacies to handle young kandiss and also the willingness of the parents to potentially want to take the younger kids to get vaccinated and weathers a little clearly will center or their local

pediatrician. >> next question. >> thank you for taking my question, president biden was recently asked if there r is enough supply vaccines for these children and he said, we will get through at least this year with a currentr level of funding and i'm hoping can verify whether that is the case and also expand out, his or enough funding for every american needs a vaccine if one is developed to be able to get that. >> so he was asked i think we i was there, he was largely being asked about the current campaign for the kids saw me be clear that had when more than enough moderna and pfizer for every child who wants winner every parent of a child and wants one for this campaign and as you all know we been very open that we have moved money from other critical programs at hhs, to an

effort to buy some vaccines and we do not believe that we actually just based on again without getting into the details of the contracting, which has not happened yet, we will not have enough vaccines for every american who wants on this fall and winter and so that's of course but were talking about hand we should have enough for potentially high risk individuals one of the reasons we been asking for additional funding from congress we funding to make sure that every american who wants a vaccine, should one be authorized by the fda, has the ability to do that. >> thank you this question is for dr. ashish jha revisiting the morning you had me last month that the u.s. could potentially see 100 million covid-19 infections of congress is notio improve more funding based on preliminary and early

data from the experts and i'm just wondering whether now, more than a month later we have an update or revision for the fall winter artist of 100 million new infections still fall somewhere in the middle of the projections you have been studying. >> is a set about a month ago, we are confidently looking at a whole range of data of internal models developed by government scientists as well as external model no funding for a range of scenarios come up one of the ranges that we have, as we could see a substantial wave of infection and expecting new data models in the upcoming week and dagain it's always hard to make these longer-term projections as we get closer to the data coming out and you know, my feeling is that we are going to update with people with what we are sing in the modeling data, but also kinds of different scenarios and at the end of the day, we try

not to be in the prediction business and we try to be in the planning business and we have to plan for a range of scenarios and obviously always helping them get a very mild winter and very few infections but hoping is not a strategy and we are planning for a range of different scenarios. >> so is a hundred million, still summer in the middle of the range of the projections that yout have seen, from last month. >> it was a couple of months ago and i think it was money and one of the many things we seen with godd not it not got an updated that i can report back on. >> think you for doing this just quick, do you know how many of these pediatric shots have been administered this week not just delivered and can you talk about how her life u.s. became the first country in the world to offer these vaccines from zero - four years old, it seems like places like israel forav other

places beat us to the punch. >> willt be starting the second data on the data and then dr. rochellet walensky we been amog the first in getting vaccines almost every troop and certainly on mrna vaccines we were the first to do that for adults, then we have moved very quickly and getting authorization as a fork is 12 - five - 11, now three zero -ou four is a combination of really rigorous scientific work been done by the companies in close partnership with the fda is been veryda transparent of the centers required to get these authorizations i things been a lot of very proactive work on these vaccines that is actually mid-america pretty consistently certainly on the mrna vaccines in terms of authorizing it or the population at. and on the issue of the kids

being vaccinated andd, administered doses alternate over to dr. rochelle walensky. >> the plan to be in terms of the administrator numbers, we have been for all of the totals of children and adults getting vaccinated and infecting it was run over doing the work of delivering courses administration working with her eimmunization partners in jurisdictions received have them in a more complete fashion will be able to report this more publicly. >> next question. >> thank you, one quick question, the critical guidelines from the cdc data said the doses can be primary series with thefo lewis kids, fr or three depending on moderna are pfizer up to eight weeks and how would you advise the parents to think about how far they

should space out those doses and then brother you talk about individual protect against severeiv disease from these vaccines and lawrence on the social effects we having this vaccine available things like you won't have to quarantine threeon daycare i think like tht of what would be the effect of the parents and families. >> dr. rochelle walensky. >> i was a part of the reason for the range of recognizing that maybe hardec to keep especially during the summertime with travel and gives encampment maybe hard for three or four weeks but i t would say that if you're at risk for out risk certainly you want to be able to be fully protected a soon as possible and so out there on the earlier side of that administration course pretty and with regard to guidance for families and updated guidance, u know we are actively continuously looking at thehe guidance and i was a most important thing tont do is get your child vaccinated and family

vaccinated will deliver the most protection for you and her family allow you to not be a risk for severe disease. >> that's go to the next person. >> thank you for doing this in a follow-up the issue of the covid-19 funding, examining vaccines you're able to purchase with money that you diverted when my be able to announce up for stilledf negotiations and what is a plan to cover all americans since seems like it's off the table to give the people vaccines even if they're not from the government. >> we can talk about the numbers because the novitiate ande negotiations have asserted so no numbers to report and to be very clear, talk about these vaccines it would be purchased for this fall and winter. and they've not been authorized

yet we think will be authorized but we are not sure so first of all, more from the fda next week and then negotiators, on behalf of the u.s. government entering with moderna and pfizer come up with research is that we been able to pull together for vaccines with a full is very clear were not going to have enough vaccines for every adult who wants one but and then we continue to have conversations i will continue to havee conversations with both republicans and democrats on the hill and look, i'm an eternal optimist and i remain convinced that congress is not going to walk away and at this point the pandemic when we have made so much progress, and as we are looking into fall and winter, with a new generation vaccines them i don't believe congress will walk away and say, i'm not going to make sure that every american he wants vaccine, is able too get one and there is nt a commercialization plan to

somehow would be ready in time this fall and winter and so we really have to make sure that we get the resources we need to the people who were the vaccine this fall and winter from this new generation of vaccines which will know more about from the fda next week or so we make sure that it's available to every american. >> next question. >> thank you i just follow-up in the last question, has any country cut in front of the u.s. on the contracting funding, dr. ashish jha said we needed the money now and to start the contracting process to prevent other countries, clarifying that the u.s. [inaudible]. and your last point there, he said there's no data or plan in place for the fall and so if u.s. does not have money for these free vaccine for the populations for the adults, they

will even be able to buy those vaccines, there's just out of luck and is that the message. >> so first of all, the issue of the country, this talk about what is public andt germany has signed contracts for next generation of vaccines. and i believe both with moderna and pfizer not hundred percent sure they certainly know that many european countries are far thalong in their use contract negotiations with the countiesom we have not entered into negotiations were about to because we pull the resources together and so you know, we want to make sure that when these vaccines get authorized by the fda and the produced that americans are able to get them in time before we see any kind of a fall or winter surge where we see one and so, one of the reasons that we pull the resources from other critical programs was sound like we could

not wait any longer if we waited much longer, we would not be able to getet these vaccines certainly for high risk individuals in time to protect them and certainly we got an early infections we would not have the vaccines we needed and in terms off what to do for people are not high risk for whom we may not be able to purchase vaccines, this is a huge challenge as a said, there is not an obvious way to get these things commercialize and if you think about it from the perspective of these companies, the negotiating with countries around the world, and they have certain limitations to their production capacity and it was not an easy way to make sure that the commercial purchasers somehow get in and beat out of the countries to have product available and so we are looking at all of the contingencies and we don't get to walk away and this one thing for congress to say were not going to support this, the administration does not get to do that, we are in this and we want to figure out s solutions but it would be a

whole lot easier to make sure every american once a vaccine can get want to be protected and if we can get funding from congress. >> we are done dr. ashish jha. >> thank you everybody for telling us, just want to say to my colleagues, to dr. rochelle walensky and dr. anthony fauci come his way to see you and i'm glad you're doing better dr. anthony fauci thank you for joining us is happening and we will be back again to give you more updates but really appreciate people taking your time and think you for your patience and be getting money and when we had technical issues and have a great day and thank you. >> american history tv, saturdays on "c-span2", exploring the people and events that tell the american story and at 11:00 a.m. eastern on lectures, university of south carolina professor, in the 1960s rights movement and the involvement of martin luther king jr. and robert kennedy, asked by the racial unrest in urban areas such as detroit the

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johnson announces a deal with moderna to build his abilities around the uk and the announcement came as a prime minister really questions from members of the house of congress and other topics included the economy and inflation and support the refugees and this is half an hour. >> before we come to the prime minister's questions, sign language and interpretations and we know that is stars with questions prime minister. >> today, actual monuments the acknowledgment of generations are astounded of to produce and also be a permanent place of reflection and mr. speaker as part of this am delighted to host and members across the house are