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Dr. Fauci testifies before senate, says opening schools in the fall is 'a bridge too far'

Dr. Anthony Fauci testified before Senate today to discuss reopening the economy during the coronavirus pandemic. Yahoo Finance’s Jessica Smith breaks down the latest developments.

Video Transcript

JESSICA SMITH: Yeah, Adam, Dr. Fauci is testifying before the Senate Health Committee, as you mentioned, with other health officials, including the head of the CDC and the FDA. We heard from the chairman of the committee in his opening remarks, saying that staying at home indefinitely is not the solution here. So he wants to hear more about the plans to get Americans back to work and back to school.

Dr. Fauci, in his opening statements, briefly gave an update on how developments for vaccines and treatments are going. We also heard from the head of the CDC who said that we're not out of the woods yet. He wanted to emphasize that people still need to practice social distancing at this point.

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We actually, just in the past couple minutes, got to the questions here. And Dr. Fauci was asked about students returning to college campuses in the fall. And he said he doesn't think that you are going to have that vaccine and treatment available for students as they go back to campus this fall. He says he thinks that is just a bridge too far.

And he, as we were just getting ready to talk to you, started to talk more about reopening. And he did tell "The New York Times" last night that he wanted to stress that there would be needless suffering and death if places around the country reopen too soon. He said that would set the US back, as it tries to get back to normal.

So we'll be watching that to see what else he has to say, but this Senate hearing really is an example of how the Senate is getting back to work in these times. It's kind of a hybrid hearing. You have certain lawmakers who are teleconferencing in. You have all of the witnesses joining by video as well. We have people in the room who are six feet apart wearing masks.

So that's just an example of how the Senate is trying to get back to work in this situation that we're in right now. We do expect this to go on for at least another hour and a half or so. So we'll keep you updated on any headlines coming out of this hearing, Adam.

JULIE HYMAN: Jess, I want to jump in here and ask you what is the sort of goal of this hearing, right? Getting the testimony from these various health care officials, what then is the Senate going to do about it? Because, you know, the president-- the ones who have sort of taken leadership on health care action have been the administration, the president and his cabinet, and then the individual states. So what is the Senate trying-- or what is this particular committee trying to achieve here?

JESSICA SMITH: Yeah, we heard from the chairman in his opening remarks. And he says that he wants to look at the plan for reopening, but he also wants to see how the government can better prepare for the next pandemic, so not just looking at the coronavirus here, but looking ahead to what the US can do better next time.

Senator Murray, the top democrat on the committee, said she wanted to see very specific guidelines, not just a list of these-- these goals that they'd like to do that are kind of vague. She wants to see a very specific plan for reopening. So this really does give Democrats, especially, a chance to grill Dr. Fauci and the other officials here. So-- so we'll just have to keep watching throughout the day.