Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Surveillance Podcast Hometown Keene. Along with
Speaker 1: Jonathan Ferrill and Lisa Brownwitz Jailey, we bring you insight
Speaker 1: from the best and economics, finance, investment and international relations,
Speaker 1: Fine Bloomberg Surveillance and Apple podcast SoundCloud, Bloomberg dot Com,
Speaker 1: and of course on the Bloomberg terminal. The story in
Speaker 1: Europe much more complex. It's been a tough few months
Speaker 1: to roll out this vaccine, and now Germany has outlined
Speaker 1: some plans to gradually reopen the economy. I'm pleased to
Speaker 1: say that still with us is our colleague, Bloomberg's Mat Miller,
Speaker 1: and I'm very happy to say the German finance minister
Speaker 1: joins us. Now all have Scholtz, Minister, fantastic to catch
Speaker 1: up with you, sir. I just want to start with
Speaker 1: the vaccine strategy in Europe, which you've reportedly called, and
Speaker 1: forgive me for my language, sir, a real pile of crap.
Speaker 1: It's that a fair characterization of how you see things
Speaker 1: and how you've seen things play out in Europe over
Speaker 1: the last several months. I think there was a problem
Speaker 1: in ordering enough vaccines in the last year, but now
Speaker 1: anyone is working very hard to work that we will
Speaker 1: have enough vaccines to bring it to the people, and
Speaker 1: this is what is organized in all the countries, also
Speaker 1: in Germany. What went wrong, Minister, it's just the one sentence.
Speaker 1: I already said. There could should have been more. There
Speaker 1: should have been more activity to organize more vaccines, and
Speaker 1: especially if you understand that most of the important developments
Speaker 1: for modern vaccines have been made in Europe, and two
Speaker 1: of the three big companies that develop new vaccines Moderna
Speaker 1: and que Vac and BioNTech are from Germany. So this
Speaker 1: is a good basis for doing the right things. But
Speaker 1: in the end, I think we are now on the
Speaker 1: wreck right track, and anyone is working very hard in
Speaker 1: all the countries, and we are now fascinating the people,
Speaker 1: and we are organizing that this will happen as fast
Speaker 1: as possible, and there will be in a short time
Speaker 1: millions of people that got the ability to have their vaccine.
Speaker 1: Minister Shultz, considering that those companies are German, why didn't
Speaker 1: the government act to get them first, those vaccines out
Speaker 1: to the German people right away. I think it is
Speaker 1: absolutely clear that this is something that should be organized
Speaker 1: in Europe together and it's also clear that this is
Speaker 1: something that should be part of an international collaboration which
Speaker 1: is working necessarily for saving the world. And as you know,
Speaker 1: we are already working very hard on international and global
Speaker 1: initiatives supporting those countries who have not the means to
Speaker 1: to organize the vaccines for themselves, because if we want
Speaker 1: to fight so successfully against the pandemy, it will be
Speaker 1: necessary that we give the chance to all the people
Speaker 1: on the globe. Coming back to Europe, coming back to Germany,
Speaker 1: I think we will make it well. You're responsible for
Speaker 1: dealing with the damage done now by extended lockdowns to
Speaker 1: the German economy. Our reporter Berge yain and found that
Speaker 1: the government is considering as much as fifty billion euros
Speaker 1: in additional debt spending and supplemental debt spending in order
Speaker 1: to deal with the deeper damage from the extended lockdown.
Speaker 1: Can you confirm that we will do extra activities. Yes,
Speaker 1: this is true and we are able to do so.
Speaker 1: As you know, we were in Europe the first to
Speaker 1: fight against the pandemic with fiscal means. In the last year,
Speaker 1: we developed the first a very strong recovery program, and
Speaker 1: we managed the political activity that made it possible that
Speaker 1: the whole European Union is answering together to this crisis.
Speaker 1: The effect on the German economy is obvious. We are
Speaker 1: having a very good situation at the labor market and
Speaker 1: it is much better than anyone expected the last year.
Speaker 1: We have a very good situation in the economy, and
Speaker 1: if you compare the development of the German economy to
Speaker 1: other countries in the world, you see we are between
Speaker 1: the best fighting against the economic consequences of the crisis.
Speaker 1: Can I just push a little bit harder to get
Speaker 1: a figure here in terms of the additional spending that's necessary,
Speaker 1: Mr Minister, is fifty billion euros in additional spending necessary?
Speaker 1: Or somewhere in that ball ballpark. Your colleagues from Germany
Speaker 1: asked the same question to me, and I always gave
Speaker 1: them the same answer. You will see, I didn't expect
Speaker 1: a new answer. Just follow up on. The election is
Speaker 1: coming up later this year. You're running against Chancellor Mercle's party.
Speaker 1: You have to find some kind of daylight between her
Speaker 1: and yourself on the pandemic? Where is the daylight? What
Speaker 1: would you have done differently that wasn't done? Fighting against
Speaker 1: the pandemic? Is a common task of the whole government,
Speaker 1: and I think we have to be very hard and
Speaker 1: fighting against the health crisis which is linked to the pandemic,
Speaker 1: and save the the and save the people, and this
Speaker 1: is what we do. And so I think it is
Speaker 1: not a good idea to do campaigns on this question.
Speaker 1: But obviously I think we need something which is a
Speaker 1: plan for coming out of this situation. And this is
Speaker 1: why I urged anyone to be very very concrete on
Speaker 1: the question of testing and on the question of fascinating
Speaker 1: the people. And I was also very strict in the
Speaker 1: question we discus. Asked in the beginning that there should
Speaker 1: have been more activity in Europe about producing and buying
Speaker 1: the scenes and people are seking very hard. This will
Speaker 1: be a single issue election this year. There is no
Speaker 1: other discussion in the global economy. Right now, you're saying
Speaker 1: there's no difference between yourself and the c DU on
Speaker 1: the biggest issue of the last several decades in the
Speaker 1: global economy. There is no difference in how you would
Speaker 1: handle this crisis, on how you would reopen this economy.
Speaker 1: There is no day like whatsoever. There are differences that
Speaker 1: are discussed, but to be very clear, it is a
Speaker 1: common task and I am very much urging anyone not
Speaker 1: to do party politics and the question which is responsible,
Speaker 1: in the question which is important for the life of
Speaker 1: our people. This is something no one would accept. And
Speaker 1: there is something which is different to other countries. Noble
Speaker 1: doubted that there is really a problem with the pandemic
Speaker 1: and the Corona virus, and no one doubted that it
Speaker 1: was necessary to fight against it. So there is a
Speaker 1: consensus on this question also, not not just within the
Speaker 1: parties of the government, but also with the most of
Speaker 1: the opposition parties. And so this consensus is helpful for
Speaker 1: doing the right things now and being a very honest politician.
Speaker 1: I think doing your task is the first thing if
Speaker 1: you're running for ruling the country. And this is the
Speaker 1: task we have now. And yes, we are the one
Speaker 1: fighting for the idea that this must be done, saving
Speaker 1: the economy, working on social cohesion, looking at the people
Speaker 1: who are suffering most and supporting them, and fighting against
Speaker 1: the health prices. And this is what we have to do.
Speaker 1: They are honorable goal. Sir. Let me finish with this one,
Speaker 1: because there's a big problem in Europe developing on acceptance
Speaker 1: of the vaccine. Have you had the vaccines. I haven't
Speaker 1: been vaccined because there has been uh an agreement on
Speaker 1: who will be the first and who will be the last,
Speaker 1: and the leading politicians are not in the first role.
Speaker 1: But any one of us said and I do the
Speaker 1: same that when we are at the stage where we
Speaker 1: will be fascinated, have the chance to get the vest scene,
Speaker 1: we will take it. And I will take the one
Speaker 1: which is offered to me, and I will not choose
Speaker 1: one of the different ones, because there are a lot
Speaker 1: of very successful the scenes on the Marketisa, thanks for
Speaker 1: time today. We appreciate an important conversation on some really
Speaker 1: difficult issues. So thank you for your understanding. The German
Speaker 1: finance minister, there all have shelves right now, John, this
Speaker 1: is a joy, joy joy. The answer is we only
Speaker 1: have David Blanchelow of Dartmouth and after Cardiff football wins
Speaker 1: turn in a row. They haven't lost in ten games,
Speaker 1: which is absolutely extraordinary. So Professor blanch Blanche Flowers people
Speaker 1: have allowed him to come on air. He is definitive
Speaker 1: on the job economy, from the wage curve of decades
Speaker 1: ago to not working, where have all the good jobs gone?
Speaker 1: Danny Blanche Flower to the right and the left owns
Speaker 1: a high ground. He joins us now from Dartmouth College, Hanover,
Speaker 1: New Hampshire. Danny, you have a chapter in Not Working
Speaker 1: where you say where is the wage growth or the
Speaker 1: lack of it? With the government induced inflation, we're going
Speaker 1: to see, well that give us a legitimate wage growth
Speaker 1: in the good feeling from it? Well in a while.
Speaker 1: Obviously the big reality was the wage growth was very weak.
Speaker 1: The Fed really didn't interpret it correctly, didn't have an
Speaker 1: explanation for it. A big story going for it will
Speaker 1: be what happens to wage growth. But we have a
Speaker 1: puzzle right now because during the doing two thousand twenty
Speaker 1: and coming in to two one, wage growth has jumped.
Speaker 1: It's jumped to about seven or eight percent, but not
Speaker 1: credible because that's because the dropping of the lower end
Speaker 1: of the labor market to be like so it's just
Speaker 1: a batting average effect. So watching wages is going to
Speaker 1: be really important. Measuring it's going to be very hard,
Speaker 1: but in some sense that I think, yeah, you're right
Speaker 1: you said a minute ago, look at g d P.
Speaker 1: But I think the big deal will be look at
Speaker 1: wage growth, look at what happens um and see if
Speaker 1: it sustains itself in a way that it that it hasn't.
Speaker 1: And and then the major reason in a sense for
Speaker 1: that is the people at the lower end have got
Speaker 1: to be lifted. They've been impacted hard by the pandemic.
Speaker 1: They didn't see really strong wage growth in the last
Speaker 1: decade or so. So I think wages, they're really central
Speaker 1: toward this. Within wages being central to it, it is
Speaker 1: about jump start in the economy. What is the character
Speaker 1: of six or seven percent g d P. What kind
Speaker 1: of economy will that be? Well, it'll be it'll be
Speaker 1: a pretty good economy. I mean, we have we have
Speaker 1: to put all of this in context, Jenny. Is it
Speaker 1: an economy for the elites the bottom line? That's exactly
Speaker 1: the concern. I mean, the K shaped recovery, strong recovery
Speaker 1: for some, no recovery for others. And I think that's
Speaker 1: really the concern. I mean. The great thing in a
Speaker 1: sense of that Biden and stuff is he's focused on it.
Speaker 1: He has two really strong appointees in Treasury and at
Speaker 1: the Council, Janet Yelling and cc Rousse, who said in
Speaker 1: the in their nomination speeches, this is what we're going
Speaker 1: to focus on. But the reality of that is it's
Speaker 1: really hard. It's really hard to bring everybody along together.
Speaker 1: And look at look at the stock market. We've looked,
Speaker 1: we've seen that that's doing pretty well. Wall streets doing fine,
Speaker 1: You've been talking about it. But the issue in some
Speaker 1: sets around the world is what happens to main street?
Speaker 1: And because main street has not done that well, this is,
Speaker 1: in a sense of the explanation of populism. It's the
Speaker 1: explormation in the US of a of a push to
Speaker 1: Trump is an explanation in the UK pushed to Brexit.
Speaker 1: So this is central to what happens in this recovery.
Speaker 1: Do you bring everybody along in the UK? Does the
Speaker 1: British Prime Minister? Is he able to do things for
Speaker 1: the fifty constituencies that used to be labor that went
Speaker 1: to him to vote for Brexit. You've got to deliver
Speaker 1: and the question is are you going to be able to?
Speaker 1: I mean, the question is what is power going to
Speaker 1: say about those people who are who are at the
Speaker 1: lower who've been furloughed and potentially their firms won't what
Speaker 1: won't kick started again? Danny, There's a lot there. Let's
Speaker 1: unpack a little bit of it this idea of you know,
Speaker 1: people come on this show and they say that the
Speaker 1: markets outperformed and did really well even though main Street
Speaker 1: lagged behind for a long time. Now we're entering a
Speaker 1: new paradigm where main Street can perhaps do better and
Speaker 1: the and markets may perhaps underperform a bit. Are you
Speaker 1: saying that's hogwash, that that's not true and that's not
Speaker 1: the trajectory that we're on. Well, I mean, I see that.
Speaker 1: The central part of what we're seeing is that the
Speaker 1: Fed is going to do in the bank of eing them.
Speaker 1: They're going to do quantitative easing. They're going to keep
Speaker 1: doing that. That's going to push our asset prices. The
Speaker 1: question then is how does that quantitative easing, How does
Speaker 1: that help people at the lower end. The answer is
Speaker 1: relatively so, it doesn't. So the focus on the Biden
Speaker 1: package is actually about jobs, helping people at the lower end,
Speaker 1: and restoring employment to those who are furlowed, those who
Speaker 1: have been taking these unemployment betters. I should just go back.
Speaker 1: So when the unemployment rate rises, we have never as
Speaker 1: of last April, we have met to we have never
Speaker 1: seen wage growth rise dramatically. So why is that the
Speaker 1: bottom ten percent or so of the wage distribution dropped out.
Speaker 1: They're not working, they're furloughed. And the question is if
Speaker 1: are the firms that are furloughed actually going to reopen?
Speaker 1: And if they're not, we're in really big trouble. The
Speaker 1: government's going to have to do something about that, um
Speaker 1: and we know that we've never seen anything quite like that.
Speaker 1: The reality is that this is a big problem. I
Speaker 1: gotta jump in, sir, and we've gotta go back to
Speaker 1: your time in the Bank of England. You're at the
Speaker 1: Bank of England at that really crucial time oh six
Speaker 1: o nine, right before the crisis, coming out of the
Speaker 1: crisis as well, when you sat there with Governor King,
Speaker 1: did you tell him you don't like the idea of
Speaker 1: QUI because you thought this would happen. Was it anticipated
Speaker 1: at the time when this grand experiment really got going.
Speaker 1: Absolutely not. I mean, I think the reality was that
Speaker 1: this central banks were basically unprepared, unprepared for having to
Speaker 1: do this. But I think the biggest thing, John was
Speaker 1: that two things. Nobody really had a clue about the
Speaker 1: transmission mechanism and how it was going to work. And
Speaker 1: nobody had a clue how about this thing would ever end?
Speaker 1: And of course it hasn't ended and it continues. So
Speaker 1: I think the answer is no. I mean that's the
Speaker 1: other part of it is think of the debate going
Speaker 1: on at the Bank of England. The committee is now
Speaker 1: arguing in public about whether they think they should go
Speaker 1: to negative rates. I mean I remember being told then
Speaker 1: that half a percent was the lower bound. You couldn't
Speaker 1: go lower than a half. So the answer is this
Speaker 1: is this is an unheard of territory John. You know
Speaker 1: we will see, um what what what assets? Will they
Speaker 1: continue to buy? What will the Bank of England do?
Speaker 1: Will the US go to negative rates? I mean, I
Speaker 1: think pals made all the right noises, but the question
Speaker 1: is do they have any ability really to impact them?
Speaker 1: And does a hundred billion of QUEI today are its
Speaker 1: effects the same as it was in two thousand monements?
Speaker 1: How do we have a proper conversation about this? Because
Speaker 1: I know from sources that when you were at the
Speaker 1: Bank of England, Governor King told you guys not to
Speaker 1: go out there and say quie won't work. Once you
Speaker 1: decided to do it, that was it. You all had
Speaker 1: to get on the same page. You don't have to
Speaker 1: tell me right now on the record whether that was
Speaker 1: true or not, because I know from talking to people
Speaker 1: it happened. So Danny, when are we going to have
Speaker 1: a proper conversation about whether this works or not and
Speaker 1: not be dictated by just a couple of people who
Speaker 1: have made some big decisions. Oh, I think the answer
Speaker 1: was a thing. Eventually, by around November two thousand and eight,
Speaker 1: it was clear that you couldn't cut rates enough and
Speaker 1: that you had You know, you can't cut the price
Speaker 1: that cut the price of money, so you raise the quantity.
Speaker 1: I think it's go back to your earlier question. I
Speaker 1: mean the answer is it's unclear what QUI has done.
Speaker 1: I mean, I think what you just asked me, what
Speaker 1: has QUI done? But it has to be in combination
Speaker 1: with zero or zero or someplaces negative rates, and so
Speaker 1: the attempts to work out what it's done are difficult.
Speaker 1: I mean, I take the view actually is that if
Speaker 1: we haven't done it, unemployment rates would have been That's
Speaker 1: the Blancie line. So I think certainly in two thousand
Speaker 1: eight nine it worked, probably diminishing return set in, but
Speaker 1: it certainly seems to me to have had positive effects
Speaker 1: on stock markets. Why else is the stock market rising
Speaker 1: because there's this buyer of assets that's out there. So
Speaker 1: I agree with you, um, and we're I'm looking back.
Speaker 1: Basically we had no idea what to buy, to think,
Speaker 1: do you buy ten years fifteen five? So the Bank
Speaker 1: of England bought pretty pretty long stuff that didn't mature
Speaker 1: very quickly. Um. So it's not just what it q do,
Speaker 1: but what should you buy? What are its impact? What
Speaker 1: you know? What duration stuff do you buy? So all
Speaker 1: of that's still in the air, and the answer is
Speaker 1: that when you're floundering, you have to do everything. So
Speaker 1: I think and Powell has been cautious, and I I don't
Speaker 1: think sensible, more sensible and cautious than people at the
Speaker 1: Bank of eng and how they instid inflation is going
Speaker 1: to take off based on no evidence. So I think
Speaker 1: you know the story out of the Fed looking back
Speaker 1: saying they've got it. They got got two eighteen rong,
Speaker 1: which I said on your program, I think every month
Speaker 1: for three and a half years. So so I'm hopeful,
Speaker 1: but these are tough time, Danny. Good to see you,
Speaker 1: always good to catch up. Downmouth Carlige, Professor of Economics,
Speaker 1: let's get this back on track, Chrisma Rank your Belly
Speaker 1: Funds co Chief investment of Chris. We're not going to
Speaker 1: do London Derbys and all of that stuff. Let's talk
Speaker 1: about the markets. Do I position for better growth? Do
Speaker 1: I position for higher inflation? And what's the difference between
Speaker 1: the two? Yeah, I think your position for both. Listen,
Speaker 1: Goldilocks died probably a year ago. UM. The era of
Speaker 1: low inflation and low rates UH and good growth is
Speaker 1: probably over, and you know were it might be likely
Speaker 1: to see much higher inflation going forward. The question is
Speaker 1: how much why are we getting inflation? Is a good inflation?
Speaker 1: Meaning is it because everybody wants to go on vacation
Speaker 1: in August? Or is it because OPEC is squeezing us?
Speaker 1: And is it structural? Um? And you know, those are
Speaker 1: all questions we think about. UM. The market obviously is
Speaker 1: it's very focused on the interplay between rates and inflation,
Speaker 1: and that has fed the rotation into value stacks, which
Speaker 1: has started, you know, six months ago and has benefited
Speaker 1: people like us. Chris. We have a conversation with the
Speaker 1: leadership of x on today here at Bloomberg. Give us
Speaker 1: your update on hydro carbon's Gabelle is is ancient for
Speaker 1: a love of industrial companies where Mario was ween your thoughts,
Speaker 1: I'm big oil. Yeah, so listen. One of the one
Speaker 1: of the big themes coming out of this earning season
Speaker 1: has been E s G Environmental social governance. Everybody's talking
Speaker 1: about it, everybody's gonna write about it in their annual
Speaker 1: report um. And the irony, of course is that over
Speaker 1: the last several months it's been these big dirty companies
Speaker 1: like Excellent who who have done much better. Again, longer term,
Speaker 1: we'll see how that plays out. We actually just launched
Speaker 1: a sustainability fund, our first sustainability fund called Love Our
Speaker 1: Planet and People. It's our first ETF, and you know,
Speaker 1: we we think there's a bright future for companies who
Speaker 1: are trying to uh go green, and particularly big industrial
Speaker 1: companies that are trying to pivot to green. And you've
Speaker 1: seen that with GM and data and air products and
Speaker 1: to a certain extent Excen, who's interestingly focused on carbon
Speaker 1: capture and sequestration as opposed to some of the other
Speaker 1: things that the other in gradets are focused on. Chris,
Speaker 1: I want to go back to something that you said,
Speaker 1: Goldilocks died a year ago. And this speaks to the
Speaker 1: it's not too hot, not too cold, not to the
Speaker 1: very character Well, I mean, honestly, see how it could
Speaker 1: get pretty morbid. I am curious though, going forward what
Speaker 1: that means. Who loses? Because in everything is perfect kind
Speaker 1: of world with nothing is too hot and too cold,
Speaker 1: everything can kind of rise. At the same time, who
Speaker 1: suffers when Goldilocks dies? Yeah, well, I think you're seeing
Speaker 1: it in what's happening with the nastac. You know, this
Speaker 1: is a perfect environment for the big growth companies, um,
Speaker 1: big internet companies in particular that I don't have to
Speaker 1: show profits in the near term um and whose profits
Speaker 1: in the future are being discounted at very low rates
Speaker 1: but by the market. So I think there's going to
Speaker 1: be more of an impetus to to be profitable, to
Speaker 1: have rational economic models, and that you know, should favor
Speaker 1: the traditional incumbent companies, which now include probably many of
Speaker 1: the thing which are you know, enormously profitable and have
Speaker 1: very strong market positions. Much a bit of child and
Speaker 1: shooting into this show this morning. See the founder of
Speaker 1: the bomber. That's great. What is this you accidentally put
Speaker 1: on Bloomberg? It's gonna Nurst the children because they're in tears, Like, so,
Speaker 1: what is this Chris las guess serious on So honestly,
Speaker 1: this is something that people have been talking about. Yes, look,
Speaker 1: we don't want to talk about Goldilocks. But at the
Speaker 1: same time, not too hot, not too cold is a question?
Speaker 1: Is at dead? I mean you'd say these are some
Speaker 1: of the key questions and investing all of that good stuff, Chris,
Speaker 1: active management. Now do you think you've got a stronger
Speaker 1: argument for that this year? I think we do. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm reminded we're talking about commodities. The cure
Speaker 1: for high prices is more high prices in the case
Speaker 1: of passive the cure for passive in the eyes of
Speaker 1: active managers is more passive. Um. You know, we've seen
Speaker 1: you know, mindless flows driving the market over the last
Speaker 1: ten years or more. Uh. And to the extent that
Speaker 1: we can do price discovery and add alpha that benefits us,
Speaker 1: I think now is the time to do it, because
Speaker 1: the playing field is changed Goldilocks. If Goldilocks is in
Speaker 1: fact dead, that everybody's gonna go up. We're in the
Speaker 1: three or four accounting statements. Is the alpha general water
Speaker 1: or is it even dies? It distinctions of cash flow.
Speaker 1: What's the line that matters to the Gabelle shop. It's
Speaker 1: clearly the cashalist statement. You know, cash is king. It
Speaker 1: always has been. Um, it's not about a revenue multiple.
Speaker 1: And so that's why we're looking. Chris always got to say,
Speaker 1: Sir christmin Rank, give out a fund Colley, Chief Investment Officer,
Speaker 1: thank you. What we've tried to do now, pushing on
Speaker 1: a year and evermore, is the medicine of this pandemic.
Speaker 1: Giving us original leadership in February of last year was
Speaker 1: Peter Hotez. He's dean of the National School of Tropical
Speaker 1: Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine. He has been ubiquitous.
Speaker 1: I would suggest, you know, it's almost like Dr Fauci. Peter,
Speaker 1: you have been everywhere giving us wisdom on the vaccine.
Speaker 1: Have you spoken to the governor of your Texas I've not.
Speaker 1: I've not had the opportunity to speak with the governor
Speaker 1: or his staff. Of course, I'd always welcome that opportunity,
Speaker 1: and I have in the past, but not not over
Speaker 1: this latest issue. If well, over the latest issue, it's important.
Speaker 1: I'm hearing anecdotally of people just literally trying to leave
Speaker 1: the state. They're so furious about this. And yes there's
Speaker 1: people in support of the governor. What would be your
Speaker 1: counsel to the governor right now of the differential equations
Speaker 1: of more vaccinations, better vaccinations, better statistics against his political philosophy. Well,
Speaker 1: there are two reasons not to dial back masks and
Speaker 1: social distancing at this point. One is we've got this
Speaker 1: terrible United Kingdom variant as some people call it. I
Speaker 1: call it the B one one seven variant that first
Speaker 1: a rose out of southern England in September, and now
Speaker 1: the data showing it's much more aggressive in terms of
Speaker 1: its ability to be transmitted. And also now the UK government,
Speaker 1: although the second part is not being peer reviewed, if
Speaker 1: the UK government's put it up on their website, looks
Speaker 1: pretty compelled that the death rates higher. So this is
Speaker 1: a bad actor and it's racing through the country at
Speaker 1: a high rate, really really bad. In Florida right now,
Speaker 1: maybe ten of the isolates virus isolates are this B
Speaker 1: one one seven variant from the UK. And so that's
Speaker 1: so we can even know the number of cass been
Speaker 1: going down pretty steadily, it's not plateaued. And now many
Speaker 1: of us think that's going to start going back up
Speaker 1: to be a fourth wave. That's issue one. And then second, Um,
Speaker 1: you know, vaccines are not here yet. Um. Now that's
Speaker 1: been disappointing. Operation Warp speed promised vaccines upon emergency use
Speaker 1: authorization for the J and J vaccine that's not delivering. Um,
Speaker 1: they will come. The President two days ago committed to
Speaker 1: having every American wants to be vaccinated. Can't be vaccinated
Speaker 1: by late spring, early summer. So that's good news. So
Speaker 1: hold off, you know, don't don't dial back the masks
Speaker 1: and social distancing right now. This is the very worst
Speaker 1: time to do it. Dr Hotez, This may be premature,
Speaker 1: but looking forward, based on where we are in the
Speaker 1: inoculation schedule as well as a technology that's been discovered
Speaker 1: through this process, are we closer to the next pandemic
Speaker 1: or further away? Well, I think we're we're closer to
Speaker 1: vaccinating our way out of this current one. And and
Speaker 1: I say that because there's some exciting news that came
Speaker 1: out of Israel last week published in the New England
Speaker 1: Journal of Medicine. We've known that that that two doses
Speaker 1: of the Visor vaccine and likely the Madarina vaccine as well,
Speaker 1: can uh can stop symptomatic illness and keep you out
Speaker 1: of the hospital or the intensive care unit. Reduction, But
Speaker 1: the data from Israel shows a reduction also an asymptomatic transmission,
Speaker 1: meaning people who become PCR positive. So that's a game changer.
Speaker 1: It means that you can enough people get vaccinated, and
Speaker 1: if the other vaccines have a similar performance, which I
Speaker 1: think they will, it means that we can halt transmission,
Speaker 1: and that means that we can vaccinate our way out
Speaker 1: of this epidemic. In the United States. It means uh,
Speaker 1: get I don't know that things will go completely back
Speaker 1: to normal, but I would have a much more optimistic outlook,
Speaker 1: maybe even mass coming off later in the summer fall.
Speaker 1: So a lot to look forward to it now. It's
Speaker 1: not the time to screw it up by relaxing measures.
Speaker 1: You don't want people losing their lives before all the
Speaker 1: good things to come. And I guess that Dr Hotels
Speaker 1: looking forward to the next pandemic, the post covid era,
Speaker 1: We're still dealing with the different coronavirus is that could
Speaker 1: be out there, and frankly, based on some estimates, it's
Speaker 1: kind of amazing. We haven't had a pandemic like this
Speaker 1: until now. Do we feel prepared to deal with it
Speaker 1: in a better way than we deal dealt with this one,
Speaker 1: which by many accounts really could have been handled a
Speaker 1: lot better. Yeah, you know, with one of the things
Speaker 1: that I always point out that things have gotten better
Speaker 1: with each pandemic, we do learn something. After Stars in
Speaker 1: two thousand three, we put an International Health Regulations i
Speaker 1: h R two thousand five after H one and one
Speaker 1: the Global Health Security Agenda, and stepped up influenza surveillance.
Speaker 1: After after Ebola and Zeke at Davos, to successive Davos meetings,
Speaker 1: the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovation SEPPI was launched. So
Speaker 1: each time we do learn something, we make incremental advances.
Speaker 1: This one, I think we'll have more far reaching effects
Speaker 1: because of how it's devastated that the economy globally and
Speaker 1: how it's become a global security issue. Dr Hotez, As
Speaker 1: you know, there's always a kink in the smooth curves.
Speaker 1: If you take the wonderful smooth curve of the vaccinations
Speaker 1: success of people like you, it's a curve down through
Speaker 1: the years, where is the kink for you, or we
Speaker 1: can say all clear. Is it it fifty years old?
Speaker 1: Is it forty eight years old? Do you have in
Speaker 1: your head forty two years old? Where is that tipping
Speaker 1: point as we moved to young adults, Well, and there's
Speaker 1: no Well, it's it's really a gradual, uh, gradual, gradual slope. Um.
Speaker 1: But you know, one of the things we've learned also
Speaker 1: is that even younger individuals of comorbid conditions can get
Speaker 1: pretty serious illness. You know. The thing that worries me
Speaker 1: the most, quite quite honestly, is I think the US
Speaker 1: is other than the spring, which is going to be rough.
Speaker 1: I think the US is going to manage its way.
Speaker 1: We'll probably see a third immunization with the Fiser and
Speaker 1: Madarina vaccine, maybe tailored to the variants, maybe a second
Speaker 1: dose of the Johnson and Johnson vaccine. Don't be surprised
Speaker 1: if you see that happening. The thing I'm worried about
Speaker 1: is other parts of the world. Africa is scaring me
Speaker 1: right now because you have that's what's called the South
Speaker 1: African variant to be one three five one. Now it's
Speaker 1: accelerating into Malawi and Mozambique and into Tanzania, and we
Speaker 1: don't have a lot to offer. Those two mRNA vaccines
Speaker 1: are still pretty fussy in their ability to scale up
Speaker 1: production in the freezer chain requirements. I don't think they're
Speaker 1: going to have a big role in helping Africa. The
Speaker 1: astra Zenica vaccine is a good vaccine for the UK variant,
Speaker 1: it looks like it's not working against the South African variant.
Speaker 1: The murk is out, so when you know, go down
Speaker 1: the list. We don't have a lot to offer the
Speaker 1: freaking continent. We're trying to scale up aggressively our recombinant
Speaker 1: protein vaccine, but I'm really worried about the destabilization of
Speaker 1: Africa right now. I told that you have touched on
Speaker 1: the issue I think, and we appreciate your time and
Speaker 1: let's continue the conversation in the ways to come. Dontor
Speaker 1: Peter hot that's that Dan of the National School of
Speaker 1: Tropical Medicine Bailor College of Medicine. This is the Bloomberg
Speaker 1: Surveillance Podcast. Thanks for listening. Join us live weekdays from
Speaker 1: seven to ten am Eastern. I'm Bloomberg Radio and on
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Speaker 1: And subscribe to the Surveillance podcast on Apple podcast, SoundCloud,
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Speaker 1: Tom Keene, and this is Bloomberg.