Rep. Katie Porter On The Federal Response To Coronavirus | All In | MSNBC

We are not the ones raising the alarm about this pandemic as fake news coming out of the president into the mouths of strange states and no amount of gaslighting will hide that the House Oversight Committee held a hearing today on the

federal

response

to the

coronavirus

where dr . Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, seriously warned that the worst of the pandemic is yet to come. The testimony, however, was interrupted and ended an hour and a half earlier than scheduled because President Trump called witnesses for what President Carolyn Maloney called an emergency meeting at the White House or the members of that committee.

The one denied the opportunity to question America's top public health officials is Congresswoman Katey Porter of California, who joins me now first, let me start with that. a clear understanding of what happened this morning and why the Oversight Committee hearing was interrupted. They simply told us there was a meeting they needed to attend at the White House. We understand that the witnesses will be present again tomorrow and I believe. 11:00 a.m. m. for the hearing to continue and I look forward to questioning you and continuing to press you on the administration's

response

at that time you have expressed two concerns one of them has to do with what we were talking about in the previous segment about the cost um in a letter that you wrote to a tsar alexsei, among others, it is essential that all barriers or cost limits to covet 19 diagnostic tests be removed so that those who may be infected do not forego testing due to cost concerns.

Currently, any policy or national mandate that says anyone who gets tested can do so for free. I'm really glad you asked about this because this is exactly what I'm going to be addressing with witnesses tomorrow at the hearing, so I don't think I'm known for waving my hand at witnesses, but I really, really want you to get this answer right. when it is communicated to you tomorrow at the hearing. There is already a regulation in American law that states during a public health emergency, the CDC can pay for treatment, examinations and testing, all of those things and that is already in our code of

federal

regulations, that is already one of the tools that have been available to the Department of Health and Human Services. and the CDC all this time, so tomorrow I will publish a column about them publicly to make sure that testing and treatment are free and that ensures they pay their share, but that American families are not left without any American paying out of pocket or be deterred from receiving tests or treatments because of the cost barriers we have been trying in our own reports and I know others sit tracking what has happened with testing and the bottlenecks in it and the lack of ability.

I know it's a concern you have. One clear idea: Is there good communication with the White House about exactly what its exact status is and what the obstacles are to its expansion? In reality, there has been a real gap between what we hear in these weekly

coronavirus

briefings and what we then hear when we go home and talk to families and constituents. I had a phone call this week, a conference call with hospitals in my area, they all expressed that they don't necessarily have access to testing and if they send tests, it will take days. and days to get answers, one of the things we were exploring is that there is a team with multiple flaws in this testing process, one of them is that there are not enough swab kits, there are not enough kits distributed in the right places and with quickly enough, but it's one of the things we potentially do.

We have at our disposal many of our research laboratories use the same equipment to perform tests that is currently used in the clinical healthcare environment, so it is possible to use some of those research laboratories in universities, for example, to perform some of clinical trials. but there is a process and some administrative barriers to overcoming it, so I'm interested in continuing to explore how we can quickly leverage existing resources to address this issue. Final question for you, your ear, remember the democratic caucus, it looks like some kind of I think tomorrow the Democratic leadership will release the stimulus package, that's the indication that we have an idea of ​​that or at least you have your own kind of principles and priorities of what you absolutely want to see in a package tomorrow.

I'm going to look for something that puts families first and prioritizes public health commitments. The House already passed a big bill last week: eight point three billion, those were the things that dr. faux Qi in particular, I think has been the most trusted administration official in terms of really understanding the science behind this and what we can do to save lives, which is something we already did last week and this week we're looking to focus on understanding and protecting to families who may not be able to get meals due to transportation or school closures, trying to make sure we put families first in this.

This is not the time for the stock market to stabilize when families stabilize when health conditions stabilize. The market will respond. That's why I'm disappointed that we have a president who thinks more about the interests of special interests and big corporations than about health care and the life-or-death situation of our American families, Congresswoman Katey Porter of California, as always, thank you . a lot