21% tested positive for coronavirus antibodies in NYC, Cuomo says

University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Public Health Epidemiologist Suzanne Judd, Ph.D. joins Yahoo Finance’s Seana Smith to discuss the latest coronavirus developments, as a new CBS poll reveals 70% of people think curbing the spread of the coronavirus should be the top U.S. priority right now.

Video Transcript

SEANA SMITH: I want to bring in Suzanne Judd. She's an epidemiologist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Public Health. And Suzanne, let's just start with what we were just talking to Anjalee about, and that was the latest news that we got out of the-- Gilead, it's drug Remdesivir, the fact that it might not be as effective as we were hoping that it would be, or it might not be a viable treatment for coronavirus. What does this tell us about where we stand for potential treatments and just I guess what it could mean for our efforts to contain and treat the virus here in the very short term?

SUZANNE JUDD: Well, unfortunately, we still don't have a medication that we know for sure works. That's why it's in so many clinical trials here in the US, too. I don't think it means that that-- this particular drug won't work. Like they said, it's small numbers that they had in China. And whenever a trial stops early, you really can't make conclusions from the data.

The data are very inconclusive when you get small sample sizes. So I think the comments from Gilead are very sound, and we have so many trials going on right now. We'll have big numbers in the US, and they should come out shortly. So we'll know whether or not this is a potential drug target.

SEANA SMITH: Well, Suzanne, one of the results that we did get, Governor Cuomo was talking about in his press conference today. And he was saying that today, 21% of people that were tested for coronavirus antibodies in New York City had them. So this result, I want to point out, is preliminary. But what do you think it tells us about just how widespread the virus is, compared to what we initially thought?

SUZANNE JUDD: It tells us it's much more widespread than what we initially thought. In a lot of ways, that's good. That means that we have herd immunity, which means enough people that have been infected that we can start letting people interact a little bit more. It's almost like getting a vaccine if people have already had it. So in many ways, this is positive news, and many experts have been saying that this was what was going on anyways. We saw findings in Boston in a homeless shelter very similar, that many people were actually infected even though they weren't showing signs.

So this is positive that we continue to see, from zero-prevalence studies, that it potentially is out there more than we though. It's also negative because it means it's much more difficult to contain. If we don't know who's sick, it will be very challenging for us to contain it.

SEANA SMITH: Yeah, exactly. It's so contagious, and it is extremely difficult to contain. Going off of that, what do you make of the administration's efforts and really I guess on a state level efforts being made, specifically in some of the southern states, to already begin rolling back some of their stay-at-home restrictions?

It was interesting, there was a CBS News poll that was out this morning. And they said that 70% of respondents believe that the country's top priority should be to slow the spread of coronavirus by keeping people at home, even if the economy is hurt in the short term. From your perspective, do you think that states should be proceeding with reopening their local economies at this point?

SUZANNE JUDD: I think they have to evaluate it on a case-by-case basis. There are certain states where they might have lower levels and they could start reopening slowly. We really need to make sure that people continue to maintain the behaviors they've already started, in terms of wearing face masks, washing their hands before they talk-- touch their face, staying six feet away from people whenever possible.

Those are the types of things that companies that reopen and businesses that reopen are going to need to factor in when they begin to reopen. We know social distancing works. We know we've been able to decrease the number of cases through it, so it's very important that if a state, if a locality does decide to open, they follow good practices when they do that.

SEANA SMITH: Suzanne, it was interesting, we were talking to Dr. Brian Garibaldi yesterday from Johns Hopkins, and we were talking about the timing of some of these states reopening their economies. And he was saying that if it is done too quickly that we could be back in panic mode that we were just a month ago. Do you think that that's in the realm of possibilities at this point?

SUZANNE JUDD: Absolutely, absolutely. If we reopen and say, let's have big concerts where thousands of people are getting together in one time or let's reopen schools, where schools-- children get very close to one another. They don't understand stay six feet from each other. They touch each other. Then yes, we could absolutely be right back where we were. On the other hand, if we go slowly and reopen businesses with appropriate gear, so people are wearing masks and they're washing their hands and there's hand sanitizer available, then we can probably keep that from happening.

SEANA SMITH: Suzanne, how critical is the antibody test in order to do this, and what do you think is likely-- or I guess-- yeah, likely timeline that we will have that within the next month or two?

SUZANNE JUDD: The antibody test is critical for our peace of mind. If we had the antibody test, we would start letting people get closer together. That said, it's not critical to get the economy reopened. We already know that people have been infected. We already know how to slow coronavirus through the exact things that I was talking about. So whether or not we know whether or not someone has antibodies, that shouldn't be the big driving factor.

And the reality is, we've all seen how slow testing comes online. This will be the same way. To get everybody in the US tested is just not realistic, in terms of getting the economy back up and going again.

SEANA SMITH: Suzanne, what about the likelihood of the virus having a second wave of infections. Because it's interesting, when we look at even the White House, the administration's coronavirus task force, we're getting conflicting messages almost on a daily basis. On one hand, you have President Trump and Vice President Mike Pence, they're talking about the fact that it won't be that likely that the virus will still be around or really have a resurgence in a couple of months. On the other hand, you have Dr. Fauci saying that it could very well in fact have a second wave. Where do you stand on that?

SUZANNE JUDD: The data you mentioned from New York where 21% of the population may actually already be immune, that tells us that maybe the fall won't be as bad as it could be. However, here in Alabama, we estimate that only 2% of our population has been infected. If that's actually the case, again, when our schools open-- when children get together, that is one way that we really start to see the spread of disease. Children just get in much closer contact than adults do. So there are lots of things in the fall that could drive it.

The other big scare in the fall is that influenza will come back. It does every season. And so then we're going to be dealing with both COVID-19 and influenza in our hospitals at the same time, which will make battling COVID-19 that much harder.

SEANA SMITH: Suzanne, a lot of our viewers, a lot of people around the country just want to know when life will be, quote, "back to normal," when we could expect to be living the life-- living our lives the same way we were doing in the beginning of January. When do you expect that to be, and is that something that won't be possible until we have a vaccine?

SUZANNE JUDD: Probably not possible until we have a vaccine. It's probably at least 12 months away. We're going to have to make it through these school opening and closings to figure out how that impacts society. We're going to have to figure out how to take care of vulnerable populations, like prisons and nursing homes, homeless shelters, places where people can't maintain that six feet of space that are needed to stop the spread of disease. And so it'll probably be 12 months until we have enough immunity in the population to start feeling normal again. And that's probably roughly the time that we'll get a vaccine as well.

SEANA SMITH: All right, Suzanne Judd, epidemiologist at University of Alabama at Birmingham School of Public Health, thanks so much for taking the time this afternoon.

SUZANNE JUDD: Thank you, bye.