'Why Did You Dismiss The Lab-Leak Theory?': GOP Lawmakers Confront Fauci Over COVID-19 | 2021 Rewind

thanks to all of you for being here i think i'll direct this to dr fauci but i welcome everybody's answer i just want to go through so what we do know we've heard a lot about what we don't know so here are the things that we do know okay um so sars one we identified the host animal within four months mers i believe we identified the host animal within nine months it's now been 15 and a half 16 months we've still not seen and china has not produced any evidence of the host animal that transmitted covert 19 from to a human um we know that china has a history of lab accidents i think dr fauci you answered senator graham's question i think he phrased it as has ever been a pandemic that came out of a laboratory and the answer was no but we do know of outbreaks that came out of a out of a laboratory i believe uh back in 2004 two researchers in beijing uh were infected doing research on sars and and led to an outbreak china has a history of lab accidents this outbreak happened in a city that happened to be the home coincidentally of a lab which we know is involved in extensive research and what they do is they take this naturally occurring virus and they manipulate it and they change it to make it infectious to humans we know that they do that there they've published about it and it also happened in a city in a lab where a rutgers biosecurity expert raised concerns about uh its safety and our diplomats in 2018 were cabling back to washington expressing concern about the safety so i take all those facts together right sars we knew the host in four months merge we knew the host in nine we still don't know the the host in for covet even though and china's not being transparent about it even though they have a vested interest in producing the host so they can put all of us down um in a lab that we know is involved in changing viruses synthetically so that they become infectious for humans in a lab that diplomats have told us is unsafe and a country that a history of lab leaks and by the way in a virus that we know can be synthetically created because the swiss did it the swiss created an exact replica of this virus in the lab for purposes of answering it all these facts were available to us last may last april why i'll start with dr fanni why why did you dismiss the lab league theory as as credible i have always said that the high likelihood is that this is a natural occurrence i didn't dismiss anything i just said it's a high likelihood that this is a natural occurrence from the environment of an animal reservoir that we have not yet identified well and i still maintain that but as as i just mentioned in response to other questions that since you don't know 100 percent about that because no one knows including me 100 percent what the origin is is the reason why we're in favor of further investigation well given everything i've decided and if i say if anything i decided is incorrect i hope it'll be correct that i'm relying obviously it's not my field of study so i'm relying on what other experts and have published what is the basis for this like high likely what is the basis for the conclusion that it is likely to have been naturally occurring than a lab accident i asked a specific question the director of national intelligence and how i posed it is is it not true that it is the assessment that they are equally likely based on our information that we have so as i outline all of these things here is she wrong when she answered me yes and based on everything i've just cited why the what is it that we're basing the higher likelihood of naturally occurring is it simply because that's all we've ever seen in the past well we have historical experience that happened with sars kovi one it happened with mares it happened with hiv it happened with virtually all the influenza pandemics so the historical basis for pandemics evolving naturally from an animal reservoir is extremely strong and it's for that reason that we felt that something similar like this has a much higher likelihood but again getting back to what i said and let me repeat so there's no lack of clarity in that no one knows not even i 100 at this point which is the reason why we are in favor of further investigation but going back to precedent the the precedents require them to be similar the difference between this one and that one is in as i said four months we knew the hosts or sars nine months we knew the host from earth china has all the incentive in the world to produce this host and hasn't done so and then you add up all these other things i mean is it just a coincidence that happened in the city that's doing this kind of research which by the way is controversial i know you and others have been supportive of it but but it's controversial it's not widely accepted as as good my whole point is there are people out there who had facebook posts taken down were called kooks conspiracy theorists for saying publicly a year ago what we now say may be possible and i think those people deserve an apology at a minimum thank you the headline like that of this morning could very well cause some real setbacks uh i'll see my time is expired so i now yield to the ranking member for five minutes of questions thank you mr chairman uh dr fauci dr welinski we're going to be passing out some pictures these are pictures that were taken just last week during the trip that i took along with 10 of my colleagues to the southern border over in mcallen texas some from the border in mcallen at a process temporary processing center some at the donna detention facility where you can see in some of these cells they're holding people i'll let you take a look at those but while while you're reviewing those pictures i'd like to read the the cdc guidance that y'all have issued on mexico and first it says level four which is the highest level very high level of covet 19 in mexico this is cdc one travelers should avoid all travel to mexico that's cdc guidelines because of the current situation in mexico even fully vaccinated travelers may be at risk for getting and spreading covet 19 variants and should avoid all travel to mexico this is cdc you go on to say some other things then we talk about traveling back into the united states this is only if you're an american citizen all air passengers coming to the united states including u.s citizens and fully vaccinated people are required to have coven 19 test results no more than three days before travel or documentation of recovery from coven 19 in the past three months before they board a flight to the united states that's a cdc guidance document so first dr wilinsky should everybody who comes in the united states follow this guidance not just american citizens but everybody coming into the united states the cdc guidance by air is guidance not just coming from mexico it's air travel from all over the country guatemala for example it's all over the globe europe everywhere el salvador should follow this guidance all over the globe if you travel by air you appreciate it thank you i appreciate you answering that because we'll get to that in a minute because on my flight back from mcallen back home to new orleans about half of the plane were some of the people that are in these pictures who were getting on these flights not being tested for covid in violation of your guidance so let me ask you and this is by the way secretary mayorkus just recently testified that he admitted that apprehended migrants were released before getting a kova test who came from mexico from el salvador and getting on an airplane is that in violation of cdc guidance the cdc is providing technical assistance to the office of refugee resettlement uh from the people who are leaving the dhs and customers so let me ask you specifically if somebody came from one of those countries that you just listed you said every country but here you're specifically talking about mexico if they came from mexico and then got on an airplane without a kova test does that violate cdc guidance this is guidance it's not law but this is the recommendation okay so does it no it doesn't say recommendation this says all are required that's not a recommendation dr wolinski that's a requirement by the federal government for american citizens is there an exemption for people who come here illegally to this guidance it's a yes or no question should everybody comply everybody coming into the united states by air is supposed to have a test of one to three days before coming in three to five years well then let me just advise you that that this the director of homeland security has testified that that's not happening and so i know y'all meet with the president more than me i've requested i know our leadership's requested a meeting with the president and he's yet to meet with us you will meet with him before i do can you let him know that he's violating your own cdc guidance and how he's running the southern border right now because look at these pictures dr fauci does this look like social distancing to you that you require when you talk about six feet no so in these cells as you just said they're violating the very guidance that you tell americans to follow a restaurant in the united states would be shut down today if they were being run like this yet the federal government the biden administration is running this facility you can see all of these young children who are next to each other six inches apart many without masks by the way does that follow your guidance that you've issued no well then why would the biden administration not go and stop this i think one of the reasons is president biden and vice president harris won't even go see this for themselves that's why i keep urging strongly that they go to the border i'd love for you all to go to the border to see this so you can at least give recommendations they're violating every guidance that americans are required to follow again you look at the cdc guidance on mexico it's off the charts saying how dangerous it is if you're an american citizen with the vaccination you have to not should have to get a covet test saying you're negative to come back home to america yet if you're coming here illegally the homeland security secretary admitted in a hearing just the other day that they're not testing people who come here illegally dr fauci do you think that sends the right message to america who people are trying to recover and get back to the real life that if you're a citizen you follow this set of rules but if you come here legally you don't have to follow any of your rules no doubt it's a very difficult situation at the border uh congress do you think this should get fixed excuse me do you think this should get fixed and they start following the same rules that you and i have to follow i mean obviously everyone would like to see that situation fixed i know but it's a very difficult situation that is americans want to get back to their life but uh but they don't want two sets of rules either and that's what's happening right now at our southern border mr chairman i go back i thank the ranking member for you chairwoman uh dr fauci i believe you have testified that that you didn't give any money to the wuhan lab to conduct gain of function research is that right that is correct how do you know they didn't lie to you excuse me sir how do you know they didn't lie to you and use the money for gain of function research anyway well we've seen the results of the experiments that were done and that were published and that the viruses that they um studied are on public databases now so none of that was gain of functions so how do you know they didn't do the research and not put it on their website there's no way of guaranteeing that but in our experience with grantees including chinese grantees which we've had interactions with for a very long period of time they're very competent trustworthy scientists i'm not talking about anything else in china i'm talking about the scientists that you would expect that they would abide by the conditions of the grant which they've done for the years that we've had interactions so you don't think the chinese would lie to you well when you say the chinese the chinese are a rather broad group i know the scientists that we've dealt with have been trustworthy you think all the scientists uh have told the truth in terms of the origin of the wuhan virus and not been influenced by the communist party of china do you i don't have enough insight into the communist party in china to know the interactions between them and the scientists sir right why are we giving them money in the first place well that's a very good question and thank you for giving me the opportunity to to answer it well sars kovi one started in china in guangdong province and it went from a bat to a civic cat to a human yes and excuse me doc for interrupting you but our time is so yeah no no i'm going to be real quick time is so limited why are we giving money to the labs in china to study virology well i'm i'm going to give you a rather succinct answer to that sir i appreciate that and that's why i was saying the sars kovi won clearly the bats that have the viruses that are the coronaviruses are in china as i said a couple of times it's not in fairfax county virginia or is it in new york it's in china so if you want to show and study importantly the animal human interface that's where the bats are yeah the bats i want to be sure i understand your testimony you didn't give money to the wuhan lab to do gain of function research that is correct and you believe they didn't do gain of function research because they told you they didn't we've seen the results of the studies that they conducted and they were not including any private studies excuse me including any private studies i'm not sure what you're getting at sir here's what i'm getting at you gave them money and you said don't do gain-to-function research correct and they said we won't correct and you have no way of knowing whether they did or not except you trust them is that right well we generally always trust the grantee to do what they say and you look at the results have you ever had a granting live to you i cannot guarantee that a grantee has not lied to us because you never know yeah can we agree that if you took president xi jinping and turned him upside down and shook him the world health organization would fall out of his pocket i don't think i can answer that question sir i'm sorry what do you think that the president xi jinping has undue influence over the world health organization do you i have no way of knowing the influence of the president of china over the whole okay so you think the who is a completely independent body and level playing field call it like you see it and they really want to get to to to the bottom of the origin of the virus do you believe that my interaction with the who and for dr tedros the director general has been one okay that i do believe he's a person of high degree of integrity i want to i want to ask one last question why did you guys spike not guys and ladies why did y'all spike the prior administration's uh investigation into the origins of the coronavirus and whether it could have come out of the muhan lab sir i i we did not spike anything in the prior administration i'm not sure what you mean by spike but we have no influence the state department spiked the the the prior administration's uh study but that has nothing to do with the national institutes of health they didn't consult with y'all they did not did they consult with you dr collins i read about it in the press this morning doc they just spiked it without talking to their experts you don't want to answer that one do you i just read about it thank you madam chair senator murphy don't have a score on exactly what the grant programs would be contemplating here but whatever the cost would be i'm my amendment would just simply fund those from the unobligated funds for the american rescue plan it's pretty simple uh pretty simple amendment but while i have the floor here i do want to speak to another issue that i think is important to this committee um this committee is the senate oversight committee when i was chair for for six years i know there was some support for investigations on my oversight sometimes there wasn't but when we have hearings on nominees we ask them a question whether or not they will comply with legitimate congressional oversight requests and they always say yes and that's also true of for example the help committee five senators from this committee sent letters to the nih and the cdc and then separately to the cdc and hhs and we invoked uh 5 usc 2954 which states that an executive agency on request of the canadian homeland security or any five members thereof shall shall submit any information requested of it relating to any matter within the jurisdiction this committee now again this committee has broad oversight jurisdiction we have not gotten those oversight letters responded to not not effectively not not in in a complete format um mr chairman i sent you a letter also signed by five senators requesting that you utilize this committee's power to compel the agencies to follow the law they shall supply the information now i just want to use one example a letter we sent to hhs secretary becerra requesting the unredacted emails from anthony fauci that were provided under four requests to a number of different outside groups we requested those same emails unredacted by the way congressional oversight is not subject to the redactions under foia we should have received those completely unredacted proof of the fact that the redactions are not valid i just have copies of one of the emails this is a email from peter dasik dated april 18th and it's just thanking anthony fauci for basically covering for eco health alliance you can see in what was produced to the committee and employee requests we have a big redaction here and now it was redacted supposedly because it was related to an open law enforcement investigation we basically got the same 4 000 pages the five senators except on this one email they failed to redact that so now we know what's under the redaction let me just quick read you what supposedly was related to an open law enforcement investigation it says it's been very a very hard few months as these conspiracy theorists have gradually become politicized and hardened in their stance especially because the work we've been doing in collaboration with chinese virologists have given us incredible insight into the risks that these viruses represent so we can directly help protect our nation from bat origin coronaviruses we're fighting to keep the communications open with our chinese colleagues so that we can better under we can better address future pandemics like covert 19. i have no idea why that would be redacted in an oversight response to congress it i have no idea how that paragraph could be related to an open law enforcement investigation so i i won't go in i won't describe this any further other than to again make the point this law that we are invoking that required that tells the agencies they shall turn over this this information this is a hundred year law it's been modified two times most recent time in 1994 signed by bill clinton the supreme court has affirmed congress's need to have information to write effective legislation for too many years and again i i was i was the brunt of it for six years of chairing this committee government agencies regardless regardless of the the administration have thumb their nose at congressional oversight they just simply refuse to comply so we end up being completely ineffective in an incredibly important constitutional duty and responsibility of congress now again there is no reason that they have the emails all they have to do is provide them to the five senators have requested them in unredacted fashion by the way our other oversight request is the cdc regarding any contact between the teachers unions and cdc regarding their reopening of school guidance was that based on science was that based on political pressure i think the public has a right to know so again as the senate committee on oversight if we sit back and do nothing administrations in the future regardless whether they're republican or democrat whether democrats are in the majority in the senate or republicans are administrations will continue to ignore our oversight requests and we will not be able to fulfill our constitutional duty and responsibility to our constituents so i would hope that every member on this committee would join those five senators to join me and use this committee's power to subpoena those records to s say in a very strong unified unanimous voice congress will not be ignored our oversight responsibilities are important and we demand we insist that the administration provide us this information but mr chairman i'm asking that you work with me to prepare subpoena hopefully we don't even have to vote on it you have the power to issue it i would certainly hope that senator portman would not uh send a letter of disapproval but we can get this subpoena out forthwith and fulfill our constitutional responsibility to oversight thank you mr chairman thank you senator johnson and certainly i concur that we need to get information we need to do our job here as an oversight committee and make every effort to make sure we're getting information necessary to to conduct uh oversight uh and i'm happy to consider any request i'm happy to continue to work with you on this issue as well because i think it is something that we need to pursue but i'm going to note that you requested the documents under 5 usc section 2954 in december and the dc circuit court of appeals held that section 2950 for 2954 confer standing on a minority of members of the committee to obtain agency information but the court recognized that the statutory right conferred by section 2954 is entirely distinct from the committee's subpoena authority and use of uh subpoena is inconsistent uh with this authority that you're invoking that's my understanding of the law but we will i'm happy to continue to work again we can put pressure on the agency from you know using that statute or committee subpoena well so again the the way to affirm congressional's right to this information is for this committee to act separately from our request and support what we're trying to do here or if because if we don't administrations of the future can continue to thumb their nose and and we might as well close up shop from a standpoint of oversight well as i mentioned senator i'm happy to work with you we're going to continue to work together on this appreciate that thank you madam chair my first question for dr wolinski as a physician we always want to be able to know and discuss the benefits and risk of anything that we're prescribing including a vaccine it's estimated that 40 maybe 50 of children have already had the covet virus what are the additional benefits to the vaccine to a child who's already had the virus i think it very much depends on what that variant that child might have had whether they could potentially be infected or reinfected and you know one thing i just want to note with the children is um i think we fall into this flawed thinking of saying that only 400 of these 600 000 deaths from covet 19 have been in children um children are not supposed to die and so 400 is is a huge amount for uh for a seas a respiratory season thank you thank you dr woodcock how many children are the age of 18 without a pre-existing condition a significant health condition have died from covet in this country i don't i don't have that at my fingertips i'm sorry dr over for over 400 without pre without that i don't i that i don't i think the answer is probably zero so i think if you if you take a deep dive most of the children that have died i had some type of annoying health condition dr fauci in my hand is a three three dimensional printing of the covet spike uh something that's certainly a scientific um just just baffles me in so many ways that it's composed of two units as you know there's an s2 subunit and an s1 and i'd like to talk you to talk about the s2 subunit for a second can you explain the significance of the furin cleavage site the double arginine cgg codon if you would and and how that works clinically for us yeah the few thank you for that question senator the furin cleavage site is the site of a set of amino acids which is at the point where the enzyme furan can cleave it so that the virus can then bind to the receptor cell and then enter the cell so it is seen on a number of viruses it's been seen on it's on the source cov2 and it's also seen on other beta corona viruses you asked also about the double cgg codon right that is a codon again that is unusual but it is also seen on a number of beta coronaviruses it's it is not a very common uh uh codon for the amino acid in question but it is seen in coronaviruses dr david baltimore a nobel laureate i'll quote him here when i first saw the furin cleavage site in the viral sequence with this arginine codons i said to my wife it was the smoking gun for the origin of the virus these features make a powerful challenge to the idea of a natural origin for sars2 and again this is nobel laureate dr david baltimore saying saying this right would you agree or disagree with dr baltimore well dr baltimore who is an extraordinarily uh accomplished scientist has backtracked on that statement and says i wish i had not used the word smoking gun when it was pointed out to him that the actually this is seen in a number of coronaviruses including one of the common cold coronaviruses so i believe if you would ask do you disagree with him well i i i agree with his second statement where he backtracked and said he wished he had not so you disagree with his first statement though and he disagrees with his first statement so i can answer the question we also have the s1 sub unit and i refer to the timeline behind me here that there was a moratorium placed for viral gain of function in 2014 and i think you'll agree with me that the nih funded research that led to this uh an s-1 spike that looks very similar not exactly to what's on the covet 19 spike um what are you referring to senator can you please be more specific yeah so i'm talking about the s1 sub unit of the current coven 19 spike what about it i'm i mean are you talking about an experiment are you talking about a paper that was published so i'm talking about uh viral research that was done using nih funding with the north carolina lab and dr she developed this s1 subunit spike that looks exactly like what we have on the current cover 19 spike yeah is that not true no i i'm not sure exactly what you're referring to are you referring to the paper of barrick and she and nature immunology is that what you refer i need to know specifically so dr barry can she printed uh studies on the this s1 unit that was basically the development of the key to the door that was specifically took a the original sars virus and made it so it would bond to the human lung cells no there was no ga if you're referring senator to gain a function by the definition okay that's my question well would you would you agree that that but the spike that was developed there is what's also on the current yeah but that's that's that's irrelevant to anything until you have a context in which you're putting it you're talking about an s-1 and a spike in what context if you're talking about a paper that was written by them but you agree or disagree that it's the same spike i'm not sure what you're talking about senator i'm really not sure what you're talking about okay thank you all right thank you uh senator casey thank you chair murray and i want to thank the thank you madam chair i want to thank our witnesses for being here and for their diligent work in developing the vaccine for covet and for working with its distribution i want to first start by quoting from a 2011 uh opinion piece that dr fauci and dr collins wrote for the washington post a flu virus risk worth taking where it includes that you conclude along with support for this research comes a responsibility to ensure that the information is used for good safeguarding against the potential accidental release or deliberate misuse of laboratory pathogens is imperative the engineered virus developed in the ferret experiments in your column are maintained in high security laboratories the scientists journal editors and funding agencies involved are working together to ensure that access to specific information that could be used to create dangerous pathogens is limited to those with an established and legitimate need to know so when i'm looking at a letter that uh congressman mike gallagher sent to you back in early may says that uh that funding uh for the sorry five this year that uh funding was uh about 17 million dollars was directed to echo health alliance and rather than 600 000 uh much of that was sent to the wuhan lab can you account for the 17 million that was allocated to echolab and speak to the uh disparity in the in the amounts that you're discussing dr fauci yeah congressman klein uh it is absolutely correct that about 600 about 800 000 was was allocated and about 600 000 was spent over a five-year period no more than that that comes to anywhere between 125 and 150 000 per year that went to the collaboration with wuhan so the number of hundreds of thousands as opposed to millions is correct the millions number is incorrect eco health had several millions i don't know the exact amount that went to eco health but would be happy to get to that precise number i see it now 13.7 that was that was allocated to eco health 17 projects sponsored by niaid providing over 17.7.9 million in federal awards for the research of viral emergence from bats in southeast asia echo health alliance passed some of its funding to wiv the wuhan lab and in 2020 nih made efforts to obtain information from ecohealth alliance about wuhan lab related to concerns about the origins of covet 19. it says that in your in your letter to echo health it's our understanding that one of the sub-recipients is luvon lab it's our understanding that wiv studies the interaction between coronavirus and bats and there are now allegations that the current crisis was precipitated by the release of from wiv of the coronavirus responsible for covet 19 given these concerns we're pursuing suspension of wiv from participation in federal programs it's in the public interest that the nih ensure that a sub recipient has taken all appropriate precautions to prevent the release of pathogens that it's studying would you say it's come to your conclusion that the wuhan lab was not engaged in the safe in ensuring the safety of its facility as you wrote back in 2011. is that your conclusion i i don't i'm i'm sorry congressman klein i'm not sure what you're reading for i didn't write anything and i i don't believe in 2011 you had you're reading from something that i don't have in front of me was that something that i signed this is an april 2020 nih letter to eco health alliance uh i think that was from building one perhaps but that's not from me okay let me just go ahead and ask real quick uh have you responded to the uh letter to congressman gallagher uh dated may 5th dr collins there is a draft of that letter that's in the process of going through appropriate clearance and should be received by congressman gallagher fairly soon have you uh responded to the letter from uh house commerce ranking committee member kathy mcmorris rogers she's written two one dated march 18th one dated may 6th have you responded to either of those again those responses are in the works uh those were very detailed with some 29 questions and 11 pages and 40 footnotes so it's taking us a little while all right and you have a may 20th letter from several senators uh that is waiting for an answer as well we do indeed on similar topics uh from senator johnson and others and that is also in the works all right thank you let me ask is is a congresswoman thank you very much thank you for being here today testifying dr rolinski uh you've been in your current post uh since january you're in the top position and you surely have heard critiques of the job uh cdc has done so far in each this administration even the last you usually learn from some things that happened in the past what would you say to those who look to the cdc and say that change is needed that perhaps the agency needs a bit of restructuring thank you for that question certainly during during what would you do different what would i do differently um you know certainly during the times of pandemic we i came in on january 20th we had our pedal to the metal shall we say moving forward to try and do everything that we could to get us out of the pandemic we've made a lot of progress we've had to be humble about what this virus can do and a lot has changed just in the last six months we need a public health infrastructure in this country that allows cdc and our states and local health departments to be prepared for a pandemic and so in that process of restructuring we need long-term disease agnostic funding that isn't like a roller coaster that comes with one pandemic and our one infectious disease threat and and uh disappears when that threat is gone we are going to be dealing with this um when when when god willing everybody is vaccinated and people are well and the pandemic is largely behind us we have long coveted we will have boosters to be thinking about we will be dealing with mental health issues for a very long time to come and we need the public health infrastructure to do so that would be my biggest my biggest ask and change thank you dr woodcock the fda currently has emergency use authorization for three coveted vaccines but they have not yet received the full fda seal of approval what would you say to the vaccine hesitant people who don't feel comfortable taking a vaccine that hasn't been fully fda approved well first of all i would say we did not cut any corners in these thirty thousand patient trials and these forty four thousand patient trials and all the surveillance you've been hearing about of potential rare side effects so compared to other vaccines they'd be looking at these have really gotten the full court press as far as evaluation and study and they've gone through the fda process and they've gone to the acip the cdc's advisory committee and it's strongly recommended that people take them that said uh it is public that uh they're uh one of the companies put a marketing application before us and we are going to do everything we can to review that in a timely manner but of course i can't say anything more about that kind of timeline do you think that we'll have full approval that's the kind of thing i can't talk about thank you thank you dr fauci we've made this way too political this has been tough on the american people we all know that everybody's worked hard to try to get through this politics has played a huge role in this we've all watched it from close and afar but i think people need a unifying message uh from all of us because in my state of alabama we don't have everybody taking a vaccine and we're having outbreaks as we speak uh we've had operation warp speed general pair here in a committee not in this committee but another committee he took a beating saying how poorly a job he did and the american people saw that you know a lot of people voted for donald trump a lot of people in the south a lot of people in my state vote for donald and we have to have a unified message we can't be blaming this or that we've got to go north with this we can't go south we can't go the other direction so dr factor can you understand it unless this administration acknowledges the efforts of the last one a large part of the americans they're going to continue to feel like nothing's positive they're not going to take the vaccine you understand what i'm saying i understand exactly what you're saying senator and thank you that's a very appropriate question that i would be pleased to answer having been present through the last year which was the year when covid began the last year of the former administration i can tell you that no doubt that the former administration deserves a considerable amount of credit for the effort that was put into operation warp speed that was able to allow not only the rapid development and testing but also the implementation of the vaccine so there's no doubt in my mind as someone who has been on both sides of the fence to say that's the case but we with regard to your unifying mesh message if i might sir i think what we need to appreciate is that we are dealing with a common enemy and the common enemy is the virus the virus doesn't know if you're a republican democrat or independent the virus just knows that it makes people ill and it kills people and we have an extraordinarily efficient tool against that common enemy and what i would hope the message would be the unifying message is let's all pull together and utilize that tool which is vaccination to really crush that common enemy i think we have it within our capability to do it and i would hope that that would be the message positive attitude plus effort equals performance and if we keep that positive attitude we can get through this thing we just need to quit fighting in the media and get everybody believing in the same thing we're all on the same team thank you very much thank you senator hickenlooper

Channel: Forbes Breaking News

Views: 1,307,852

Keywords: Dr. Anthony Fauci, Omicron, COVID-19

Id: 9ly-Cp4u3nE

Length: 43min 12sec (2592 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 23 2021