Speaker 1: Welcome to Prognosis. I'm Laura Carlson. It's day one ninety
Speaker 1: four since coronavirus was declared a global pandemic. Today's main story,
Speaker 1: the once a decade US Census has been complicated by
Speaker 1: the outbreak. Virus fears have kept census takers from signing
Speaker 1: up and people from letting field workers into their homes.
Speaker 1: And the count already had plenty of problems pre pandemic.
Speaker 1: But first, here's what happened in virus news today. Former
Speaker 1: f d A Commissioner Scott Gottley, who has advised the
Speaker 1: White House on its COVID response, said he expects the
Speaker 1: US to experience at least one more cycle of the
Speaker 1: virus in the fall and winter. He pointed to rising
Speaker 1: cases in the South and Midwest parts of the country.
Speaker 1: Gottlieb also said he doesn't believe there will be a
Speaker 1: vaccine available for general inoculation until the end of the
Speaker 1: second or third quarter, in that contradicts President Donald Trump's
Speaker 1: earlier comment that all Americans could be vaccinated by April.
Speaker 1: In an interview on CBS on Sunday morning, Gottlieb said
Speaker 1: he hoped the virus would start to dissipate next summer.
Speaker 1: Me and mar locked down most of Yangon Province, which
Speaker 1: is home to its largest city. It locked it down
Speaker 1: for two weeks to contain a record surge in coronavirus
Speaker 1: infections ahead of the general elections scheduled for November. Today's
Speaker 1: strict stay at home order bars more than one member
Speaker 1: of a family to venture out for shopping and curbs
Speaker 1: travel to other cities except for essential work. Finally, an
Speaker 1: eighteen billion dollar initiative to deploy a COVID nineteen vaccine
Speaker 1: around the world is moving into the next phase, with
Speaker 1: a hundred and fifty six countries and regions joining the program.
Speaker 1: The initial goal of the campaign, called KOVACS, is to
Speaker 1: have two billion vaccine doses available by the end of
Speaker 1: one While China wasn't among the countries having made a
Speaker 1: commitment in a statement released Monday, more agreements will be
Speaker 1: announced later. The program is led by the World Health
Speaker 1: Organization GAVY, the Vaccine Alliance, and the Coalition for Epidemic
Speaker 1: Preparedness and Innovasions. The US has said it won't participate
Speaker 1: in the program, and now, for today's main story, US
Speaker 1: census is about to draw to a close. Bureau field
Speaker 1: workers have until September to avoid an undercount. They have
Speaker 1: been going door to door to confirm the number of
Speaker 1: people living in cities across the country, but pandemic scarred residents,
Speaker 1: fraudsters posing as census workers, and a lack of PPE
Speaker 1: are standing in their way. Bloomberg's Jordan's gas Poure has more.
Speaker 1: The Trump administration will in the US Census count a
Speaker 1: month earlier than expected. Last week, the US Census Bureau
Speaker 1: announced that only nine three percent of households across the
Speaker 1: country have been counted so far. That's a problem. Anything
Speaker 1: less than a final response rate of may lead to
Speaker 1: a flawed head count. As of Wednesday, the bureaus as
Speaker 1: it's reached households in only two states, Idaho and West Virginia.
Speaker 1: After first extending the deadline because of the coronavirus pandemic,
Speaker 1: the US Census Bureau will now stop collecting data on
Speaker 1: septemb The Bureau says it moved up the date to
Speaker 1: meet its December thirty first deadline to provide figures to Congress,
Speaker 1: But the Associate Director of the Census, Albert E. Fontineau, Jr.
Speaker 1: Said in a July webinar that it'll be impossible to
Speaker 1: meet the December thirty one deadline. Since this, experts say
Speaker 1: this decision could lead to undercounts among renters, low income people, immigrants,
Speaker 1: communities of color, and rural areas, and may cost them
Speaker 1: billions of federal tax dollars for public services over the
Speaker 1: next decade. The coronavirus pandemic is comple cating sensus outreach
Speaker 1: efforts throughout the country, but in Arizona, where there's large
Speaker 1: rural and tribal populations, getting an accurate count has never
Speaker 1: been easy. Alec Stebon Thompson with Arizona Governor Doug Doocey's
Speaker 1: office told me in July that the coronavirus has complicated
Speaker 1: since its outreach efforts in the state where many of
Speaker 1: its rural communities don't have reliable electricity and internet access.
Speaker 1: We had all of these grand ideas as part of
Speaker 1: this original plan for you know, different events that we
Speaker 1: were going to do and community based tactics, but obviously,
Speaker 1: in the world that we're living in currently, those are
Speaker 1: not options for census workers here. Physically ensuring every household
Speaker 1: gets a census form sometimes means traveling long distances and
Speaker 1: to locations that may not even appear on a map.
Speaker 1: In Census, an estimated four point eight eight percent of
Speaker 1: Native Americans living on reservations weren't counted. Someone like me
Speaker 1: who lived, you know, in downtown Phoenix with a physical address,
Speaker 1: I got a letter asking me to respond, followed by
Speaker 1: a few other mailings, and then eventually a paper form,
Speaker 1: whereas in you know, Navajo Navajo Nation, they don't have
Speaker 1: physical addresses, so those forms are physically carried to someone's
Speaker 1: house and left at the door. So the next big
Speaker 1: operation that would take place is non response follow up.
Speaker 1: That's when a census employee will show up to a household.
Speaker 1: The Census Bureau strives to hire census takers to work
Speaker 1: in their own communities, because, after all, they know the
Speaker 1: area best. Door knockers began going to homes on July
Speaker 1: six in various parts of the country. Last month, five
Speaker 1: hundred thousand census takers nationwide were in the field for
Speaker 1: the first time, knocking on the doors of households who
Speaker 1: haven't responded to the Census. Bureau. Officials acknowledged that they're
Speaker 1: losing door knockers because they're afraid of contracting the coronavirus.
Speaker 1: I contacted a number of Sensus store knockers to talk
Speaker 1: to them about their experiences. Three got back with me,
Speaker 1: but declined an interview because they were afraid of losing
Speaker 1: their job. Last month, the CDC said in a joint
Speaker 1: statement with the Census Bureau that taking part in an
Speaker 1: in person interview with the bureau employee quote should present
Speaker 1: a low risk of transmission of COVID nineteen. The Census
Speaker 1: Bureau says door knockers received online training and will attempt
Speaker 1: to conduct socially distanced interviews with every household that hasn't
Speaker 1: responded to the Census. The lasso wear masks, sometimes gloves,
Speaker 1: and have hand sanitizer. After knocking, Census employees will communicate
Speaker 1: with residents outside and at least six ft apart. The
Speaker 1: bureau says it's protocols have been reviewed by both the
Speaker 1: Department of Health and Human Services and the c d C.
Speaker 1: The Census Bureau says it will need to visit about
Speaker 1: fifty six million homes to collect responses in person after
Speaker 1: COVID nineteen complicated SINCEUS efforts, the Bureau has been scrambling
Speaker 1: to find employees. Last month, the Commerce Department Inspector General
Speaker 1: said the Census still needs to employ eighty thousand field workers.
Speaker 1: Census officials anticipated needing three hundred thousand field workers by
Speaker 1: the end of last month, but at that time had
Speaker 1: only trained and deployed two. Carmen Taylor Jones, Census director
Speaker 1: at the Los Angeles based Black Women for Wellness advocacy group,
Speaker 1: says the Bureau has rushed putting field workers on the ground.
Speaker 1: They're scrambling, and I hope that the scramble does not
Speaker 1: lend itself to any compromising of the operation, because this
Speaker 1: thing is so important to our future on so many
Speaker 1: different levels that you cannot compromise in. Carmen trained field
Speaker 1: workers as the former Southern California Area regional manager for
Speaker 1: the US Census Bureau. I told people all the time,
Speaker 1: bring your a game. This is a short project. I's
Speaker 1: not gonna last forever. Bring the best that you have.
Speaker 1: And if you do that, and you open up your
Speaker 1: soul to this work, you will walk out of here
Speaker 1: a much better person. Carmen is quick to point out
Speaker 1: that this decade since this has been fraught with many issues,
Speaker 1: everything from a last minute timeline cut two, partisan politics
Speaker 1: over a citizenship question and then the Cope nineteen pandemic.
Speaker 1: She recognizes that it hasn't been easy for the bureaus
Speaker 1: field workers who now face the final month to confirm
Speaker 1: the number of people living in their city. I have
Speaker 1: so much respect for this operation simply because it is
Speaker 1: one something that is for everybody, you know. I tell people,
Speaker 1: only people we don't count are those babies that are
Speaker 1: still inside of their mother's wounds. Other than that, if
Speaker 1: you're on life support, we count. You. Don't let anybody
Speaker 1: rob you of the opportunity to document your existence. To
Speaker 1: throw another wrench into census plans, the Bureau and now
Speaker 1: that in person counting now ended as early as last
Speaker 1: Friday in some parts of the country. This is nearly
Speaker 1: two weeks before the count officially ends nationwide. The Bureau
Speaker 1: said in a statement that the last minute change is
Speaker 1: quote based on the rates of completion, self response rates,
Speaker 1: and the number of hours are available workforce can work.
Speaker 1: That was Jordan Gaspoure, and that's it for our show today.
Speaker 1: For coverage of the outbreak from one D and twenty
Speaker 1: bureaus around the world, visit Bloomberg dot com slash coronavirus
Speaker 1: and if you like the show. Please leave us a
Speaker 1: review and a rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. It's
Speaker 1: the best way to help more listeners find our global reporting.
Speaker 1: The Prognosis Daily Edition is produced by Tophah foreheads Jordan Gaspore,
Speaker 1: Magnus Hendrickson, and me Laura Carlson. Today's main story was
Speaker 1: reported by Jordan Gospore. Original music by Leo Sidrin. Our
Speaker 1: editors are Francesco Levi and Rick Shine. Francesca Levi is
Speaker 1: Bloomberg's head of podcasts. Thanks for listening.