COVID can 'still surprise us' despite falling infection rates: Doctor

Federal health officials have spent months preparing for a new era of COVID-19. Yahoo Finance Health Care Reporter Anjalee Khemlani and Dr. Ashish Jha, Former White House COVID Coordinator and current Dean of the Brown School of Public Health, discuss new virus regulations, the ongoing need for vaccines, and the public health crisis.

Video Transcript

- Federal health officials have spent months preparing for a new era of COVID-19 as the battle with the disease that caused a global pandemic begins to regulate. Dr. Ashish Jha was key in orchestrating those plans, spending the last year as the White House's COVID-19 coordinator before stepping down to return to his position as the Dean of the Brown Law School of Public Health. Dr. Jha joins us now alongside Yahoo Finance's Anjalee Khemlani.

A big welcome to you both. And we, of course, thank you for all the work that you've done here. Please get us up to speed here on where we are now in the management of COVID and the longer term impacts of it as well.

ASHISH JHA: Yeah. So good morning. First of all, thanks for having me here. We're obviously in a much better place with COVID. And part of it has been the work of the administration in making sure that people got vaccinated, that treatments became widely available. And the virus right now is in retreat. And so while it will be with us for probably forever, we now have the ability to manage this virus in a way that we did not two, three years ago.

And that makes all the difference there is. We have plenty of vaccines, we have treatments, we have testing. We've put into place the kinds of things that allow us to manage this virus, wherever it goes in the future. But certainly, it is in a much, much better place right now.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Dr. Jha, thanks so much for joining us again. Tell me a little bit more about that in terms of how much of a threat is COVID to us? What kind of way could we think of it as an ongoing threat to us here in the US, and also how to contextualize the fall vaccines and the ongoing push there.

ASHISH JHA: Yeah. So one of the things that I think a lot of people have gotten into trouble with is predicting where COVID is going. This is a virus that continues to evolve. We've had an extraordinary six-month period where infections have fallen dramatically. Mortality, deaths have fallen dramatically. We are at the lowest number-- some of the lowest numbers of hospitalizations and deaths we've seen. And there is a temptation to say it's all over and we don't have to think about COVID anymore.

The way I look at it is the virus can still surprise us. And so instead of spending a lot of time predicting what are the chances that we're going to get a new variant? What are the chances that it will be disruptive again? What we need to have done is prepared. And that's what we really spent our time at the White House, is doing, is making sure that if the virus makes a comeback, that we are fully ready for that with tests, treatments, vaccines, and all the tools that are absolutely necessary.

One of the things that includes, Anjalee, is the idea that people need to get vaccinated on a regular basis. For most Americans, that's probably once a year. That's what we're going to see with a fall vaccine campaign. It's not that different than what you do for a flu vaccine every year. For high risk people, elderly, immunocompromised, it may be twice a year for a while until we have more durable vaccines. But right now, the idea of getting one shot a year and staying up to date on your vaccines and that really protecting you against serious illness, it feels like a pretty low burden and a very easy thing for people to do as a way to keep themselves healthy and safe.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: One of the things I know that you had to deal with and, of course, a lot of your peers is the doubt in public health officials and including this push for vaccines, but also the origins of COVID. I know we've recently gotten a peek at that intelligence community report. What can you tell us about what you sort of looked at your time in the White House and what we should be thinking about in terms of how this came about?

ASHISH JHA: Yeah. Yeah. So on the issue of origins, it's really remarkable to me how certain people seem to feel about what we know. What the truth is, when you look at the data, you look at what is available, it is unclear whether this was a natural spillover or this was a lab leak or not. There has been a lot of efforts. The intelligence agencies-- the President directed the intelligence agencies to do a comprehensive review. And the intelligence agencies did not come to a single firm conclusion just because there hasn't been the kind of transparency and openness that we really need here.

So I think this is an open question, and I think this is one where we need a lot more transparency and openness from the Chinese government and I think just in general would be helpful to be much clearer on where the origins are. That said, the truth here is that there has been in the last 3 and 1/2 years an erosion in public health that we have to work on getting back. This is one of the things that has driven me to come back to Brown as Dean of the Public Health School to help rebuild that trust.

And some of that has been obviously the public health community has done extraordinary work in the last 3 and 1/2 years but they haven't gotten everything. And I think we need to own the places where we've made mistakes, have honest and open conversations about how we do better, but also we've got to work on making sure that we're providing people with good information because there's a lot of bad information out there that we have to counter as well.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: I'd love to-- I'd love to ask you to expand on that because I feel like there is a lot that goes into that when it comes to social media or the like. There are some people asking, why should I bother getting an additional vaccine when I'm already protected largely against it? It doesn't seem like I need to. It doesn't seem like anyone knows where this came from. There's a lot of doubt still permeating through the US. And I just wonder what are your thoughts and what are the tools available really to fight this?

ASHISH JHA: Yeah. It's a great question. So here's how I think about this. Wherever it came from, the truth is the virus is around. It's continuing to infect people. Again, while infections are down, hospitalizations and deaths are down, they're still affecting-- we're still getting probably tens of thousands of infections happening every day, hundreds of people ending up in the hospital, somewhere around 100 people dying every day from this virus. So still a real problem.

And what I say to folks is the advice I give my family and friends. I have elderly parents. They get vaccinated twice a year in the last couple of years. I've been getting vaccinated annually. These are incredibly safe vaccines, and they're very effective vaccines. And again, if you think about it, one shot a year, the way you've been doing it for flu vaccines for years, it keeps-- reduces your risk of infections, substantially reduces your risk of serious illness. It's a very low price to pay. These vaccines are largely free. So the cost benefit here is very clear in my mind for all Americans, but particularly for high-risk Americans it's really important.

- And, Dr. Jha, I mean, unfortunately, COVID did become a political football. I mean, this was something that a lot of us hadn't experienced in our lifetime, having a vaccine come to market this quickly. So when you combine that with also perhaps preparedness for where we are for the next pandemic or the next major health scare, how prepared would you say the US is?

ASHISH JHA: Yeah. So the good news is we are clearly more prepared than we were 3 and 1/2 years ago. I think there's some effort to go back and say, oh, we're even worse off than we were 3 and 1/2 years ago. That is just not true. Over the last 3 and 1/2 years, particularly over the last 2 and 1/2 years under President Biden, we have built up a National Wastewater Surveillance System, we have restocked our Strategic National Stockpile. If you remember, we had no masks no gloves, no gowns in our Strategic National Stockpile. Those have all gotten repleted.

We have taken the lessons of Operation Warp Speed, which I think was an enormous success under President Trump, and we have built on that by launching a new thing called Project NextGen, which will build a newer generation of vaccines. So we're in much better shape, not as ready as we need to be. There's still important work to do. But the bottom line is we're in better shape. And I think the truth is, we have to bring down the political rhetoric on this virus. It is a virus that has killed over a million Americans. It has killed Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives. It has killed Americans. Of course, it's killed people around the world. Turning down the heat on the rhetoric and focusing on protecting Americans, that should be the goal for all people.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Dr. Jha, final question for you here on the outlook for really public health. I know that we had the fires, the wildfires from Canada, the haze that descended upon New York. And I just wonder what do you plan to focus on now that you're back at Brown?

ASHISH JHA: Yeah. Actually, there are some enormous challenges facing our country and facing the world. For the first time in a century, we have seen a decline in life expectancy. Other high income countries have started recovering. The United States is not. What that means is people are dying younger, they're dying unnecessarily. There's opioids. There's gun violence. Climate change represents one of the biggest threats. Of course, we're seeing that manifest itself. So there are enormous challenges in front of us.

I think our School of Public Health, Brown School of Public Health is uniquely poised to tackle some of that. But my goal over the next few years is to make sure that we're taking those issues head-on, making progress on them because that's how you protect people, that's how you protect lives. That's how you make sure that America and the world continues to be healthier as the years go on.

- I know you'll still have your hands full even post-COVID. We do appreciate you taking the time to join us this morning. Dr. Ashish Jha, Dean of the Brown School of Public Health and a former White House COVID coordinator, along with Yahoo Finance's Anjalee Khemlani. Thank you to you both.

ASHISH JHA: Thank you.