In this March 30, 2020 photo, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, left, gestures during a brief news conference as he stands beside a Rear Adm. John B. Mustin as the USNS Comfort. (AP Photo/Kathy Willens)
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo on Monday asked President Donald Trump to transition the USNS Comfort, docked at New York City, to begin transitioning to treat coronavirus patients.
The Mercy-class hospital ship was originally set up to aid with the overflow of non-COVID patients, but those cases have fallen off amid the citywide shutdown.
Now the ship's crew is quickly preparing to transition the hospital to serve as a field hospital for coronavirus patients, similar to the operation underway at the Javits Convention Center.
Indeed, the two federally run hospitals plan to coordinate their work to take advantage of their respective strengths and weaknesses.
"We're going to balance the levels of care required between the two stations," Joseph O'Brien, commodore of the Comfort's COVID response in New York City, told Cheddar.
Patients who are convalescing from coronavirus will likely go to the Javits Center, while more difficult cases will be funneled into the Comfort.
"We're taking some of the higher-complexity cases on board, due to the fact that we have a fully staffed hospital," O'Brien said.
The crew is currently working to reconfigure the ship so that it can accommodate coronavirus patients, which involves cutting the capacity in half from 1,000 to 500 beds.
This is necessary to create space so that more transmissions don't take place on the ship, O'Brien said.
One crew member of the Comfort so far has tested positive for coronavirus.
O'Brien said the entire crew was screened, not tested, five days before disembarking for New York City. Add in nine days at sea, and that almost meets the window of self-isolation. But, he said "that's the difference between screening and testing."
"Even though we did everything right. We were ahead of the curve. We were really stringent in our preps," he said. "That's what happens when you don't obey the order to stay inside."
Dr. Nasia Safdar, Doctor at UW Madison, joined Wake Up With Cheddar to discuss the implications of Merck sharing its antiviral pill, which has been shown in early trials to cut hospitalizations and deaths by half, with poorer nations around the globe.
The Federal Reserve finally announced its taper plan on Wednesday saying that it planned to scale back on bond purchases as growth slows, and would not rush to raise interest rates. Ross Mayfield, Investment Strategy Analyst at Baird spoke on whether or not a decrease in inflation could be in the country’s future amidst comments made by Fed chairman Jerome Powell. Baird also broke down ADP jobs numbers ahead of the Labor Department's October jobs report.
Going into election day on Tuesday, many of us had an inkling it might not be a great day for Democrats. History tells us the president's party tends to lose congressional seats, governorships and state legislature seats in off-year and midterm elections. Tuesday turned out to be a big wake-up call for democrats. Not only did Terry McAuliffe lose in the Virginia governor's race, Gov. Phil Murphy won re-election by an incredibly slim margin. Both races saw continued Democratic losses in rural areas and a shift of suburban voters back to the GOP. Liz Landers, chief political correspondent at Vice News, joins Cheddar Politics to discuss.
Week one of UN climate summit is coming to an end, world leaders made a number of promises to save the planet. President Biden attended the first two days of the meeting.
Alan Neuhauser, vice president of Silverline Communications, joined Cheddar Politics to talk more about the pledges that came out from the summit and their significance.
It's been a busy week for the Supreme Court. It heard arguments on three of the most watched cases in the docket for this term. The court heard arguments in two cases challenging the Texas abortion law on Monday - one filed by abortion providers and the other by the justice department. Instead of weighing in on the constitutionality of the matter itself, justices focused on the unusual structure of the law that enables citizens to enforce the law, not the state government.
On Wednesday, the court heard arguments in the biggest Second Amendment case in more than a decade. The dispute is over a New York gun law that requires people seeking a license to carry a handgun in public to show a "proper cause." The challengers in this case claim the law inhibits their constitutional Second Amendment rights.
Amy Howe, co-founder of SCOTUSBlog, joined Cheddar Politics to break the cases down.
This is the first installment of Cheddar Changemakers, where we spotlight young activists making a difference in the world and speaking up on issues regarding mental health, voting, and climate change.
Republicans are considered, and often act like, the party opposed to action on climate change. They've made a point of fighting even modest regulations on businesses related to stemming the worst effects of climate change. But Republicans aren't a monolith on climate change, and our next guest reminds us that "conservation" and "conservative" have the same word root.
Quill Robinson, VP of government affairs at the American Conservation Coalition, joins Cheddar Politics to discuss.
The mayor of Portland, Oregon, Ted Wheeler joined Cheddar News Wrap to discuss his plans to get an increase in the city's police budget for more personnel, changes to public safety response, and more body cameras. The Democratic mayor addressed the growth in violent crimes amid the pandemic, but noted the need for officers who take their roles seriously. We want officers who understand that policing is an important responsibility, it's a high calling," he said. "We also want a police bureau that is accountable and responsible to the public it serves."
More American tech companies continue to pull their businesses out of China as the Communist Party cracks down on firms — both foreign and domestic. Yahoo and Fortnite have become the latest companies to withdraw from the country, and the withdrawals come just days after Microsoft announced it would take LinkedIn offline. Shehzad Qazi, managing director at China Beige Book International, joined Cheddar to provide some insight into how the crackdowns in China would also impact the tech companies at home in the United States.
