to work on equal pay for women legislation, as well as a bill to prevent workplace violence against health care and social services workers. president biden's infrastructure and jobs package is not expected on the house floor until later in the spring or early summer. watch live coverage of the house on c-span, the senate on c-span two, and follow our congressional coverage anytime at c-span.org or listen on the free c-span radio app. announcer: the white house covid-19 response team gave an update on new infection rates and vaccination efforts earlier today. we will hear from dr. anthony found she, the cdc director, and the surgeon general.

>> as of today, overall, more than 112 million americans have received at least one dose, and more than 66 million adult americans are fully vaccinated. that is more than one quarter of all adult americans that are now fully vaccinated. that is up from less than 1% when we came into office 11 weeks ago. this is significant progress, and as you can see in our weekly vaccination progress report, we are accelerating our number of daily shots in arms. the current seven-day averages now 3 million vaccinations per day, up from 2.9 million last week. 3 million vaccinations per day, and this includes the lower-volume days around the easter holiday.

as the president announced on tuesday, all adult americans will be eligible for vaccination no later than april 19. that is in 10 days and ahead of the original may 1 timeline. our vaccination program is working. it is accelerating, and we are on track to meet the president's goal of administering 200 million shots in his first 100 days. this is only possible because of our whole of government response and the aggressive steps we have taken to get more vaccine supply, more vaccinators in the field, and more places for americans to get vaccinated. however, we know there is more work to do. that is why we are accelerating our efforts to get more safe and trusted places for americans to get vaccinated, and meet the president's goal that by april 19, 90% of americans have a

vaccine site within five miles of where they live. first, on the federal retail pharmacy program, as we expand to more pharmacies, millions of americans are able to get there their shot at the local pharmacy, the same way they get their flu shot. today, there are around 30,000 pharmacies participating in the program, an increase of over 70% in less than two weeks, and we are on track to meet the president's goal of more than nearly 40,000 local pharmacies by april 19. second, on federally run mass vaccination sites, our mass vaccination sites located in some of the most underserved neighborhoods in the nation are run and staffed by fema and dod personnel in close coordination with state and local officials. they have a combined capacity to administer 110,000 shots per day.

on march 29, the president challenged us to open at least one dozen sites by april 19. we have brought nine online in the last 10 days, and today we are announcing two new sites in tulsa, oklahoma, and baton baton rouge, louisiana. third, we are making progress meeting people where they are. community house underserved nearly 30 million americans, two-thirds live at or below the poverty line and 60% are racial or ethnic minorities. as we announced earlier this week, we are expanding our community health center vaccine

program so that 1400 centers can sign-up up to receive and administer vaccines. overall, across the country, there are now more than 66,000 sites where americans can go to get a shot, and by april 19, we will meet the president's goal of ensuring 90% of americans have a vaccination site within five miles of where they live. on vaccine supply, this week, a total of more than 28 million doses went out to states, tribes, and territories, and through the federal channels, more than enough supply to maintain and increase the current seven-day average of 3 million shots per day. in fact, over the past three weeks, we have allocated almost 90 million doses of pfizer, moderna, and johnson & johnson vaccine. we are working with states, tribes, and territories, and other partners, to make sure they are administering shots as efficiently and as equitably as possible.

both pfizer and moderna are on track to meet their commitment of each delivering a total of 200 million doses by the end of may. and on johnson & johnson, the company is working closely with the fda to resolve manufacturing issues. johnson & johnson is installing a new senior leadership team to oversee all aspects of production and manufacturing at the facility, and johnson & johnson will have full responsibility for the operation and will leverage the expertise of merck as well. johnson & johnson expects a relatively low level of weekly dose delivery until the company secures fda authorization. with fda authorization, the company also expects a cadence of up to 8 million weekly doses in total across state and

federal channels later in april. importantly, johnson & johnson has also reiterated its commitment to provide at or near 100 million vaccine doses by the end of may. now, even as we accelerate our vaccination program, we are seeing areas of the country where cases are increasing. from the beginning of the administration, we have been closely tracking the data on the state of the disease in each state and territory. the cdc tracks data and outbreaks at the state and county level. since taking office, we have made this data public, and weekly, state-by-state reports were made available for the first time. our philosophy has been see something, say something. so, when we see metrics trending in the wrong direction, we talk regularly with state officials to offer our assistance,

including making sure cdc teams provide expertise. with recent case increases in some states, we are intensifying those efforts even further. we will be offering to states with significant increases in cases a set of additional tools to help them to stem the spread, including first working with states to make sure they are using all of the doses they have received. today, millions of doses have been distributed, but have not yet been administered as shots in arms. second, we are offering to surge federal personnel, including cdc response teams, fema, dod, and other federal personnel to support vaccination efforts and get more shots in arms. third, providing additional testing capacity, including increasing the availability of diagnostic testing, as well as

screening in schools and other settings. and, fourth, offering more therapeutics and treatments. all of this is on top of the more than threefold increase in vaccines that have gone to all states and jurisdictions since the president came to office. for a medium sized state, this translates to hundreds of thousands additional vaccines each and every week. and as is our practice, it has been our practice from the beginning -- we make vaccines available to states as soon as they are available. in closing, to be clear, we are working to put this pandemic behind us as fast as we can, but as the president said earlier in the week, everyone needs to do their part. that is why he has called on every governor, mayor, and local leader to maintain or reinstate mask mandates.

all of us need to keep up our guard and finish this job. so, please, please, wear that a mask, socially distance, and get vaccinated when it is your turn. and with that, let me turn it over to dr. walensky. dr. walensky? dr. walensky: thank you, jeff, and good morning, everyone could .\ i am glad to be back with you. we start with an overview of the data. yesterday cdc reported 74,860 new cases of covid-19 and cdcs most recent data shows the seven day average is little more than 64,000 per day, up about 2% from the prior seven-day period. hospital admissions continue to increase -- 5300 admissions per day is up about 7% from the previous seven-day period, and deaths have continued to decrease.

more than 20%. vaccinations continue to increase with the most recent seven-day average of nearly 3 million vaccinations delivered daily, up 4.5% from the prior seven-day period. our vaccination efforts this week have continued to accelerate, moving us closer and closer to president biden's goal of 200 million vaccinations in his first 100 days. yesterday, we reached over 158 million. earlier this week, i acknowledged the complexity of our current state in this pandemic. on the one hand, we have so much reason for optimism and hope, and more americans are being vaccinated and protected from covid-19. on the other hand, cases and emergency room visits are up, and as i have highlighted through the week, we are seeing these increases in younger adults, most of whom who have not yet been vaccinated. on this graph of the national data showing the percent of

emergency room visits for each age group for patients with confirmed covid-19. as you can see, those 18-25 in orange, 26-54 in light blue and those in green have increasing numbers of emergency room department visits. important, those 74 and older in dark blue have decreasing numbers of emergency department visits, likely demonstrating the important impact of vaccination in protecting against disease requiring hospitalization. while those are national statistics, we should recognize these trends are magnified in some regions of the country, like the upper midwest. cdc is working closely with public health officials in this region to understand what is driving cases and how we can intervene.

for example, in michigan and minnesota, there are an increasing number of cases linked to those variants, and in both states there is concern about transmission youth sports, club sports and sports affiliated with schools. what is happening in michigan and minnesota is similar to what we are seeing across the country -- increasing reports of cases with youth sports. i want to be clear, as cases increase in the community, we expect the cases identified in schools will also increase. this is not necessarily indicative of school-based transmission. if fully implemented, the cdc's operational guidance for schools and community-level prevention measures can reduce or prevent transmission in schools. we have not yet seen evidence of significant transmission of covid-19 within schools when

goals have fully implemented cdc's mitigation guidance. in addition to educator vaccination, which we spoke about on wednesday, testing remains an important tool in our overall efforts to stop the spread of covid-19, including in our schools. this week, cdc is awarding $10 billion through the american rescue plan to support covid-19 testing in schools across the country. being able to rapidly identify new cases among students will help us slow the spread of covid-19 while we simultaneously work to expand equitable access to vaccines. with this funding for testing, every state will have access to millions of dollars to set up screening programs to add an additional layer of protection for schools, teachers, students. this funding can be used to test teachers, staff, students, with any symptoms of covid-19 -- those that may have been exposed to the virus, and to establish sustained screening programs across school systems.

we recognize that establishing a testing program is a new venture for many schools. that is why cdc is committed to continue our work alongside state and local health departments by providing technical assistance and support to assist schools and states in standing up and implementing these programs. as these are rolled out, we strongly encourage parents, staff, and students to participate, to keep our children and our staff safe in school. these initiatives, alongside strict adherence to public health prevention precautions and getting a covid-19 vaccine will help us turn the corner on this pandemic. with that, i will turn things over to dr. fauci. dr. fauci: thank you very much, dr. walensky. what i would like to do over the next few minutes is to answer a commonly asked question --

namely how could it be possible that you went from discovering a new virus in january, 2020, to approximately 11 months later, to actually have a vaccine that goes into the arms of individuals in december of that same year when we know generally vaccines take multiple years to develop. and this has often led to some degree of hesitancy on the part of people wanting to get vaccinated. so i would like to answer that question. yesterday, science magazine published an editorial that i wrote which tried to give an explanation of the story behind the vaccines. the bottom line is the speed and efficiency with which these highly efficacious vaccines were developed, and their potential for saving millions of lives are due to an extraordinary, multidisciplinary effort involving basic preclinical and clinical science that has been

underway, out of the spotlight, for decades before the unfolding of the covid-19 pandemic. next slide. one can look at vaccine development in two major buckets -- platforms and immunization design. next slide. with regard to a platform, what we mean by that? next slide. a platform is a type of vaccine you use. there is genetic immunization such as dna and rna, viral vectors, protein, such as novavax, and a number of others shown on the right hand part of the slide. next slide. with regard to the mrna vaccine, this work started a decade and a half ago when two people were

working on rna and were able to modify the molecule to include a key inflammatory component that would have made use of the vaccine impossible. this led to the use of mrna as a platform. next slide. with regard to the virus, the one used by j&j, the nih has been funding for decades a highly skilled and accomplished person from harvard medical school who had been working on this for a considerable time and demonstrated how immunogenic this particular vector would be. next slide. then you get to immunogen design -- really the most fascinating component of this story, and it goes to a different discipline. next slide. and that is the crystallography

and capability of investigators throughout the country who are working to get the right confirmation of the hiv envelope trimer -- nothing to do with coronavirus. they were using these technologies to develop an hiv vaccine. next slide. this work was done was done with great intensity also at the nih vaccine research center, and i circled two investigators on the slide pit the one in the lower left is peter, who is predominantly an hiv investigator, and the one on the upper right is much more interested in respiratory virus. next slide. what peter did is that he used this structure-based vaccine designed to get the right confirmation of the hiv envelope in what is called a pre-fusion

form, which would be the most immunogenic and combined to broadly neutralizing antibodies. next slide. when bonnie graham took his interest in virus and collaborated in the same lab with two others, they had a major breakthrough developing mutations that stabilize the immunogen to make it be used successfully for an rsv vaccine, but the story goes on. next slide. when mers came about, they did the same thing in an attempt to develop a coronavirus vaccine, namely taking the spike protein and stabilizing it by mutations into a pre-fusion form.

then, the combination of the story, next slide, when we had sars cov 2, when they were able to make a stable component of the pre-fusion spike protein. why is that important? because that is a highly immunogenic protein that has been used in five of the six vaccines we are currently involved with. next slide. and so, on this last slide, what you see on the left are the five platforms, the three platforms, the nucleic acid mrna, the adenovirus, and the protein. with that we already have three successful vaccines that have a high degree of efficacy in good safety profile. so the bottom line is this did not happen in 11 months.

it was due to an extraordinary, multidisciplinary effort involving basic clinical and preclinical science that had been underway, out of the spotlight for decades before the unfolding of the covid-19 pandemic. and with that, i will pass it over to dr. murphy. dr. murphy: thank you so much, tony, and it is good to be with all of you this morning. before i start, even though it is late, i wish dr. rochelle walensky a happy birthday. i will spare you my rendition of "happy birthday." but happy birthday from all of us. i want to take a moment to talk about where we are with vaccine confidence and our education campaign. you have heard a lot from us about the state of the covid pandemic. we have talked about it in terms

terms of cases and hospitalization numbers, but i want to start by showing a little more about what we learned about the toll of the covid-19 pandemic. for many americans, because not only impacted our physical health and well-being, but also the mental health and well-being of our children. this week we learned an estimated 40,000 children in america lost a parent to covid-19 according to new models by researchers. we found one yet eight people with covid-19 were diagnosed with a new psychiatric or neurological condition and anxiety and depression were among the most common conditions. millions of people are experiencing symptoms of anxiety and depression right now, and research from the cdc shows that younger adults, racial and ethnic minorities, essential workers, and unpaid adult caregivers have experienced

disproportionately worse mental health outcomes during the pandemic. these numbers are sobering, but they are not altogether surprising. many of you know intuitively of the struggles -- maybe you or a loved one has been wrestling with mental health challenges. we may not be talking about them as often, but we experience them nonetheless. the administration is taking mental health challenges related to the pandemic seriously, providing nearly $3 billion to states and territories to address mental illness. the american rescue plan included around $3.56 billion for the prevention and treatment of mental health and substance abuse disorders. the mental health consequences of covid are yet another reminder of why people getting vaccinated are still important. it is the quickest path to ending the pandemic and for all the suffering covid-19 can bring, i have seen firsthand the joy and relief vaccines can bring. just yesterday a friend sent me a picture of her two children hugging their grandmother for the first time in 16 months and she wrote three simple words --

hugs are back, and i myself find myself breathing easier because i know they are vaccinated and when i received my own second dose not too long ago i felt a wave of hope i had not experienced in months. these vaccinations were made to help us return to our lives and the people we love, and that is why the president has asked that by april 19, just 10 days from now, all adults be eligible for the vaccine. as more and more americans gain access, i am happy to share vaccine confidence is rising across the country. in december, a survey showed 34% of respondents were ready to get a covid vaccine "as soon as possible," and the same survey in march, just three months later, found that 61% of people reported wanting to be vaccinated or receive a vaccine as soon as possible. this is an encouraging trend,

but we still have more work to do. millions of people still have questions about the vaccine and misinformation, disinformation continues to spread. that is why we are working hard to get people the fact about covid-19 through a variety of channels, the most important of which is trusted messengers. research tells us people want to hear from people they know and trust. for example, a survey in january showed more than three and four adults said they would likely turn to a doctor or nurse or other health-care provider when deciding to get the vaccine. in the same survey, more than half of people say they would likely turn to family or friends about whether to get vaccinated. that is why last week we launched the covid-19 community core and we are working with partners to deliver science-based information to community members, friends, and family, and in one week since our launch, we have gone from 275 partners to nearly 5000, and

they include faith-based organizations, civic organizations, industry groups, individual, health professionals, sports leagues, and so much more. in the last week alone, i have heard stories about doctors and nurses that are going door to door to help people learn about the covid-19 vaccines. i have heard about churches setting up vaccine education and administration sites in their building. i've met grandparents talking to their kids and grandkids about the importance of getting vaccinated -- to end this pandemic, this is where we -- what we have to dupe you we have to step up and protect one another. we have to step up. i am asking people to do two things -- get vaccinated as soon as you can, and help the people you care about get vaccinated as well. ask your family and friends if they have a plan to get vaccinated. if they have questions, encourage them to talk to her

their primary care provider. we have made extraordinary progress on the vaccine campaign, and what we have already accomplished gives us faith that we can accomplish the task ahead, but it will take all of us stepping up to help the people we love get vaccinated. thank you very much. and we we look forward to your questions. jeff: thanks, doctors. let's open it up to a few questions. >> thanks everyone for joining -- just a reminder, we are running tight on time. first, we will go to kaiser health news. >> thank you for taking my question. i was hoping to learn a bit about how you plan to reach the almost quarter of seniors who are not yet vaccinated, and many of them say no one has talked to them about whether it is safe -- who are maybe homebound, and are there specific state or local

efforts in partnership with you all to make sure people are getting the message about vaccines? jeff: dr. murphy? dr. murphy: sure. thank you for the question. it is important because we know people above the age of 65 are at the highest risk of poor outcomes of covid. so we want to make sure they are vaccinated and that is why we are very proud that over 75% of people over the age of 65 have received at least one dose. more than half of the people over 65 have been fully vaccinated. we are not done yet. part of the effort involves working with community organizations that can reach people who are older. we are doing that at a local basis, working with sports leagues, groups like aarp, the american association of retired

people, and faith organizations that can reach seniors in different ways. we have to keep going. because the effort is hyper local, our partnerships with states and local communities matter. that is why will continue to work with local elected officials who know their communities really well to make sure we are getting the message out to as many people as possible. jeff: the only thing i would add is i think it is important to bring vaccinations to where people are -- mobile clinics, community health centers -- we are also providing me for seniors who need transportation, transportation options so they can get vaccinated as soon as possible. dr. walensky: just this week cdc distributive funds to reach those at risk, disabled elderly who are at their home, reaching people that are homebound. jeff: next question. >> let's go to josh at bloomberg.

josh: hi there, thank you for taking the time. jeff, can i ask a little bit more about the j&j situation, just for clarity? you say if authorized production will rise up to 8 million per week by the end of the month? is that correct? and the spike we saw last week, i assume that was because of the authorization of the other plant, and also if you could give us an update on astrazeneca working with the u.s. government to find new production? have they found it and do you have any thoughts on whether you will continue to loan from that stockpile? jeff: first, j&j is working with the fda to get the baltimore facility authorized. during the period, where it is not yet authorized, we expect a relatively low level of weekly doses distributive to states, tribes, territories and our federal channels. what the company has told us is once they have authorization,

they will be able to have a weekly cadence of up to 8 million doses per week by the end of the month, and yes, hhs is working with astrazeneca to find a new facility. part of what has happened here is j&j has taken over the management of the baltimore facility. the baltimore facility, at one point, produced both j&j vaccine and astrazeneca. it will now only produce j&j vaccine, and hhs is working with the company to find another facility for astrazeneca vaccine. i think i covered the bulk of your questions there. next question? >> let's go to shannon petty peace at nbc. shannon: i just wanted to follow-up on the j&j question a

little bit more, actually. so, when do you think they will get to the 8 million doses a week? you mean that will be the end of the month, in week or two they will get to those 8 million doses, and when do you think there will be that fda authorization, just to make sure we are clear on that based on josh's question? and bigger picture, i know it is complicated and you are talking about things you are doing for the states, but can you explain why, again, you are not going to shift additional doses to states like michigan and new jersey -- why not give more doses to them now? is it because you feel they have enough doses, they are just not getting them to the areas they need them, or people are not being receptive to taking them? jeff: the first part of your question is when will j&j receive the fda authorization, which is the important step for

them to get into the weekly cadence they speak of of up to 8 million doses per week. those conversations, that process, is between the fda and the company, and i don't know, or i won't speculate on how long that will take, but once they receive the authorization, the company believes they will be able to achieve that 8 million per week cadence. in terms of the situation and states that are experiencing increases in cases, you know, this pandemic has hit every state and every county hard. thousands of people -- hundreds of thousands of people have died, and more are dying each day. there are tens of millions of people across the country in each and every state and county who have not yet been

vaccinated, and the fair and equitable way to distribute the vaccine is based on the adult population by state, tribe, and territory. that is how it has been done, and we will continue to do so. the virus is unpredictable. we don't know where the next increase in cases could occur, and you know we push out all vaccine as soon as it is available, and we are not even halfway through our vaccination program, so now is not the time to change course on vaccine allocation. we are going to stick with the allocation system of allocating by state adult population. that said, it is a challenging situation in many states and we want to do all we can to help those states. and that is why we are working

with states to make sure every dose they do receive is administered as efficiently and equitably as possible. we will also send more federal personnel to help with getting needles in arms and other aspects of fighting the pandemic. we are increasing testing, both diagnostic testing and screening testing, sending those resources to states who have increases in cases, and as i also talked about earlier, we will also make more therapeutics and treatments available. this is all in the context that we delivered 90 million doses across the last three weeks and will continue to get doses out to states, tribes, and territories, through our federal channels, as soon as they are made available. next question? >> let's go to caitlin collins at cnn. caitlin: thank you very much.

i have two questions today. one, with these breakthrough cases where people are testing positive more than two weeks after being fully vaccinated, what is the administration's level of concern with this, given the trials, which of course, where smaller, showed there were no deaths? and jeff, on j&j, you said to expect on even numbers, but i uneven numbers, but i don't think anyone was expecting an 80% drop, so why are they down 80% now, and why his j&j struggled with production more than any other authorized vaccine in the u.s.? jeff: let's go to dr. fauci on the first question of breakthrough cases. dr. fauci: caitlin, with the number of breakthrough cases, the important thing is to look at what the denominator of vaccinated people is, because it is very likely, and what we are hearing, at least indirectly, and we are certainly going to be confirming that, that that

number of individuals who were breakthrough infections is not at all inconsistent with the 90% incompatible with the 90% efficacy. so i don't think there needs to be concerned with the efficacy. the other point you were pointing to is i believe there were a few deaths in that group. the group there with the breakthrough were predominantly elderly individuals, and it is not surprising when you look at the scope of the ability to mount an adequate immune response to protect you, if anything, it is likely that elderly individuals, particularly if they are frail or have underlying conditions, might not have responded as well to the vaccine, to which anyone is frail or might have an underlying condition, it is not

fortunate, but not surprising that you might have a couple of deaths in the 200 or so people that broke through. there is nothing there yet. it is a red flag and we will keep an eye on it very, very carefully, but i don't see anything that changes our concept of the vaccine and its efficacy. jeff: caitlin, on j&j, we talked about this a few times -- they are obviously earlier in their manufacturing process. they are not in the weekly cadence, regular cadence that moderna and pfizer have both achieved. when you talk about the doses being down significantly week to week, i think it is important to remember that a week or so ago johnson & johnson delivered 11 million doses all at once. so that we got into the market immediately. this past week, i think it was closer -- i think it was just under 2 million doses.

so that is to decrease you talked about, the fluctuation you expect, until they are able to get through the fda process and open the additional plant. so we do expect week to week lower levels until the plant is approved by the fda and those conversations are between j&j and the fda. i do think that the company is doing everything they can. as we talked about, they now have complete responsibility for that whole facility. they have their best people at that plant. they are partnering with merck, who has expertise, and we are optimistic that once they have the fda authorization, they will be able to deliver, as they told us, at that 8 million per week cadence. i do want to remind everyone we have had 90 million doses delivered across the last three weeks, and that we more than tripled the production of doses and the delivery of doses. under this principle, once a

dose is available, we deliver it right away, across the 11 weeks or so we have been in office. dr. murphy: jeff, may i add one thing to caitlin's question about the vaccine efficacy? to build on what tony said, we still have high confidence the vaccines are effective, but because it is not perfect, that is precisely why we are urging people to be cautious, why we have such an emphasis on getting the overall case numbers down, which we can only do by vaccinating, and making sure that people, until we have a critical mass vaccinated, are wearing masks, keeping distance, washing their hands, avoiding indoor gatherings. so i just want to emphasize we have great confidence in vaccines. we understood vaccines were not perfect, but that is why we have to be careful in our approach until we had a critical threshold of vaccination in our country. jeff: we have time for one more

question. >> last question, liz wise at "usa today." liz: hey, thanks for taking my question. on a different note, i realized herd immunity is a somewhat problematic term, but given the data out of israel with plummeting. rates, where do you think the u.s. will have to get to see that kind of payoff and is anything like heard immunity possible there? dr. fauci: i think you said it correct that herd immunity is an elusive commodity, because we don't know the percentage of people that are protected by vaccination, as well as those who were infected and have recovered and now have protective immunity. again, we can only surmise what that is. i have said in the past and it is purely an estimate, that

would be somewhere between 70% and 85%. i think we need to get away from waiting for this mystical, elusive number, and getting as many people as we possibly can get vaccinated as quickly as possible. israel has not had the overwhelming majority of the population vaccinated yet, however, they are seeing a very, very beneficial effect already, so whether or not they will have reached herd immunity, again, it is an elusive concept. the one thing we know and israel is a classic example, that as you get people vaccinated, you are going to start seeing diminution in numbers of cases, which will be followed by diminution in hospitalizations, which will ultimately be followed by diminution in deaths. that is what we are striving for . and the important thing we keep emphasizing is every day that goes by, when we get 3 million

to 4 million people vaccinated, we get closer and closer to the end point where we want to be. dr. walensky: it was one of the reasons i showed the slide of emergency department visits, to show that in the areas where we have the majority people vaccinated in demographics that are greater than 65, we can already see those effects with decrease in fossilization's. jeff: thank you, everyone penned , the clear message here is get vaccinated when it is your turn. i appreciate everyone joining today, and look forward to monday's briefing. thank you. dr. walensky: thank you. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2021] announcer: go to c-span.org/coronavirus for the federal response to the coronavirus pandemic. if you missed our live coverage, it is easy to find the latest briefing and the biden administration's response. use the interactive gallery of maps to follow the cases in the u.s. and worldwide. go to c-span.org/coronavirus. announcer: today, republican

congressman matt gaetz of florida it speaks at the safe american summit in miami. coverage begins at 7:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, online at c-span.org, or listen live with the free c-span radio app. announcer: congress returns from their holiday recess next week. the senate returns monday at 3:00 p.m. eastern to continue work on the nomination of the deputy transportation secretary, the number two post undersecretary pete buttigieg. later in the week, senators work on more nominations, including was determined to be deputy secretary of state, and the chair of the security and exchange commission. the houses back tuesday for legislative business. this week, members are expected to work on equal pay for women legislation, as well as a bill to prevent workplace violence against health care and social services workers. president biden's infrastructure

and jobs package is not expected on the house floor until spring early summer. watch live coverage of the house on c-span, the senate on c-span2 , and follow our congressional coverage anytime at c-span.org or listen on the free c-span radio app. announcer: c-span shop.org is the new online store. go there today to order a copy of the congressional directory, a spiral-bound book with information for every member of congress, including biographies and committee assignments, and contact information for state governors in the biden administration cabinet. order your copy at c-span shop.org. every purchase supports he spends nonprofit operation. >> hello and welcome to this conversation about vaccine