Dr. Anthony Fauci tells Tucker Carlson he's certain efforts to slow coronavirus spread are having an impact

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Dr. Anthony Fauci tells Tucker Carlson he's certain efforts to slow coronavirus spread are having an impact

Coronavirus task force member Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, joins Tucker Carlson on 'Tucker Carlson Tonight.'

This is a rush transcript from "Tucker Carlson Tonight," March 18, 2020. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

TUCKER CARLSON, HOST: Good evening and welcome to "Tucker Carlson Tonight." The coronavirus is now in every American state. It has killed more than a hundred people here so far. That number of course will rise.

In Italy, the virus killed almost 500 people today. Nobody is invulnerable to it. Just an hour ago, Congressman Mario Diaz-Balart of Florida became the first Federal law maker confirmed to have the virus. We'll be covering every aspect of this pandemic this hour.

The economic effect of it, the effect on society, the role of China in all of this, which is significant.

We will also have an interview with a person who's recovering from the virus right now. What does it feel like? You'll hear that.

But before that, as we have every night, we want to open up with a big picture look at the current state of coronavirus and who better than Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases. Dr. Fauci joins us tonight.

Doctor, thanks so much for coming on. So the Federal government, the administration has spent an enormous amount of money responding and it looks like they're pouring all their energy and all their efforts into protecting the country from this as of now. Is it working, do you think?

DR. ANTHONY FAUCI, DIRECTOR, NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES: Well, I mean, I'm certain it's having an impact. It is not able to be measured precisely, because you have two things going on at the same time, Tucker.

You have an escalation of the infections, and you have all of the things that we've been talking about and doing over the past few days that is aimed at blunting that, but when you have these two dynamic things going on at the same time, you can't quantitatively say how much it's having an effect.

But if we're absolutely certain it's having an effect, when you do the kind of mitigation approaches that are being done right now, and all the other effort that's been going in right now, certainly, it's having an effect.

However, you're going to see tomorrow, as you just mentioned now, there will be more cases and they will continue to go up. That doesn't mean what we're doing is not having an important effect.

CARLSON: Where are we, can you estimate in the development of this?

FAUCI: When you say the development, you mean to the evolution of the outbreak, Tucker, is that what this means?

CARLSON: That's exactly right. In the evolution of the outbreak of coronavirus in the U.S.

FAUCI: Yes, it's still in the escalation phase, there's no doubt about it, because you look at the numbers. If you take a look, it's uneven. There are certain parts of the country that got hit early and had community spread like in Washington State. New York right now is having a particularly difficult problem. That's the way you're going to see it over the next few weeks.

You're going to see not a homogeneous evolution of it. It's going to be this way throughout the country.

CARLSON: What do you think the real number is? Is it knowable, or guessable? Is it worth guessing of infected patients?

FAUCI: You know, it's not worth guessing, Tucker. Certainly, as you know, when you have an evolution of an outbreak, and historically this is true for every outbreak, particularly ones of diseases that we'd never had experienced with before.

There are certainly more people out there, probably many more people who are infected who have not yet come to our attention. That's one of the reasons why the major expansion of high throughput testing is going to give us a better idea of that.

But I think it's folly to try to put a number on it when you have something that's in motion and dynamically moving.

CARLSON: That sounds right. I want to ask you a specific question that arose today. So the World Health Organization is suggesting that people not use ibuprofen, so that would be brand name, Advil and French researchers are saying the same suggesting it might exacerbate the disease -- its progression to the lungs. Is that a good guidance, do you think? Do you do you think that's true?

FAUCI: Well, you know, there is no real scientific data, Tucker that tells you that that is a fact or evidence-based. I think what they're referring to, is they want to be the better part of really being cautious because there is a syndrome that's associated with the use of aspirin in children with influenza that gives them a neurological syndrome called Reye's syndrome.

And I believe what they're thinking, since there's a relationship obviously between nonsteroidals and aspirin, that may be there will be some harm, but there's no real study that definitively proves that, but they're just trying to be very cautious.

CARLSON: Would you take it?

FAUCI: Would I take it? When I get a fever or an ache, I take Tylenol, but I've been doing that all my life.

CARLSON: That's good enough for me, Dr. Fauci. Great to see you tonight. Thank you for that.

FAUCI: All right.

CARLSON: So the economic effect of all of this is being felt across the country. The Dow Jones has fallen almost to where it was at the start of this current administration.

Meanwhile, unemployment numbers suggest the economy could shed an awful lot of jobs, may be millions in the next month. Chief breaking news correspondent, Trace Gallagher joins us with a rundown of the state of the economy. Hey, Trace.

TRACE GALLAGHER, CHIEF BREAKING NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Hey Tucker, we're now seeing the impact of all those shut down businesses across the country because we're getting the first unemployment numbers in the past five days. Connecticut has seen 30,000 unemployment claims. The typical number is 3,000.

So far this week, Ohio has 45,000 claims, last week there were 6,500 and Michigan's unemployment claims are up 550 percent.

The story is much the same in every state. In fact, New York's unemployment website crashed with traffic levels that compare to the days after 9/11 and the numbers of course will rise because auto makers including Detroit's Big Three: Ford, GM and Fiat-Chrysler have now agreed to temporarily shut their manufacturing facility.

So we're not making cars and we're not placing bets, at least, not in Vegas where all casinos are shutting down. In fact, the Cosmopolitan will close in 48 minutes.

The theme here is that paychecks are scarce. Workers are scared and you need only spend 10 minutes on social media to see exactly how concerned your fellow Americans are -- Tucker.

CARLSON: They are. Tracer Gallagher, thank you for that.

GALLAGHER: Yes.

CARLSON: Well, the coronavirus is exposing this country's dangerous close to suicidal level of dependence on China for essential goods because we need to live. That has to change, of course.

Right now, the White House is thinking through an executive order that would expand Buy American requirements. Peter Navarro is White House Trade Adviser, he joins us tonight. Peter Navarro, thanks so much for coming on.

PETER NAVARRO, WHITE HOUSE TRADE ADVISER: Thanks, Tucker.

CARLSON: So how close are you all to issuing this order on Buy American?

NAVARRO: Well, it's going through the final phases of it. It's basically a three-pronged approach, Tucker, consistent with what President Trump did back as candidate Trump, which is to say buy American, make it here, deregulate, so it's easy to make it here and innovate so that it is low priced to make it here and we can compete. Those are the three main portions of it.

The big picture here, Tucker is we buy about $120 billion worth of pharmaceuticals from the rest of the world. Of the 20 largest ones, which account for over 90 percent, only 10 of them have already imposed export restrictions on things like protect protective personal equipment, and three more during the last crisis with swine flu, imposed restrictions. So well over half.

I mean, that means basically we are alone when push comes to shove. So that's one of the reasons why we have to do this.

CARLSON: May I stop you there. I want to make absolutely sure that our audience understands what you're saying. So there are companies in China, American companies in China that are making medical equipment we need like masks, and the Chinese government is saying no, you, American company cannot export that to America.

NAVARRO: So, Tucker, this is not about China. China is a big player in this, but there's 20 different countries around the world that are involved in supplying us with our pharmaceuticals. Ten of them have already imposed restrictions, including China, and three of them in the last one did impose restrictions. So 13 out of those 20 imposed restrictions on us.

That's why we have to be self-sufficient at a certain level and the philosophy of the executive order, Tucker, is to make sure that our government procurement is Buy American.

We've got $49 billion worth of medicines that we buy primarily at the V.A., the DoD and H.H.S. and right now we're not enforcing Buy American.

Get this Tucker, over 60 countries because of our free trade agreements are treated as if they were American. It's crazy.

So one of the things I have to say, though, this order if signed will not interfere with any way with anything we can get to treat the current crisis. It has a blanket waiver, we'll get anything we need from any source from anywhere at the price we otherwise would have got it.

But what it does, Tucker is it sets in motion a long-term plan to bring that back, and in the short term, it also helps us bring advanced manufacturing to domestic soil.

I've got projects that are ready to flip switches in 30 to 45 days if we can simply get the deregulation moving, and the incentives for the innovation. That's where we're headed.

Tucker, the other things I'm doing, I am trying to make sure we have enough masks, sanitizers and things like that. We're working 24/7 across the street on that.

CARLSON: I can tell you are. I've got to say this now, I remember when you were hired by this administration at the beginning, you've been talking about this stuff for decades, and people mocked you -- all your Buy America talk, make it in America talk. That's stupid. Peter Navarro is crazy, and it turned out you were completely right -- completely right.

So God bless you for that. Peter Navarro. Thank you.

NAVARRO: I appreciate it, and God bless you for what you do, Tucker.

CARLSON: Many parts of the economy have already been hit hard by coronavirus, but maybe none harder than the retail sector. With restaurants, hotels, bars, casinos, cruise ships all shutting down, many thousands have lost their jobs.

The huge spike in unemployment claims around the country this week is one measure of what's happening. Most of these workers have no meaningful savings for them. This is a tragedy and in the current news maelstrom, it hasn't received nearly the attention it deserves.

But what if the country understood that the plight of a waiter in San Antonio could materially affect people's retirement plans across the country and in fact, it could.

To a much greater extent than many of us realize, the American economy is interconnected, virtually every part of it. Think it through.

A restaurant in Cleveland closes. Many have closed. In fact every bar and restaurant in that state shut down on Sunday night. With no revenue coming in, it isn't long before the restaurants owners can't pay their rent, so they don't pay it. This is a crisis for their landlord. He's got a mortgage and after a while he stops paying it.

The problem is that mortgage likely has been sold to somebody else. Who exactly? Well, with commercial mortgages, that's not always clear. It could be insurance companies, foreign investors, investment funds, among many others.

The point is that mortgage is no longer held by the bank down the street. It is now bundled with a lot of other mortgages like it is now a financial instrument. Investors have bought it with the expectation of regular income from payments that are no longer coming in.

Those investors, pension and retirement funds control much of America's savings. Now, they're in trouble, and so were the people who rely on them. Families of retired auto workers in Oakland County, Michigan; firemen in Sacramento, retirees in Sun City and Cape Coral and The Villages, a lot of the country.

Meanwhile, the waiters from the shuttered restaurant in Cleveland are still hurting. One of the first payments they'll likely stop making is on their credit cards. Now, no one is weeping for the credit card companies, they are still charging an average of 19 percent interest at a time when the Fed is shoveling cash at the banks pretty much for free.

But it's more complicated than that. MasterCard will not suffer alone. As with mortgages, a lot of credit card debt has been sold to investors. Once again, America's retirement funds could take a big and unexpected hit.

This is what happens when buying and selling debt becomes huge business on Wall Street. A crisis in one sector of the economy very quickly affects the rest of it. Everything is connected. There are no firewalls.

Remember back to 2008, the value of real estate assets that year dropped seemingly overnight, and this didn't just affect realtors. Some of our biggest financial institutions teetered on the edge of collapse and some did collapse.

Many homeowners discovered they owed more on their properties than the properties were worth, so they defaulted. And that began a chain reaction that led to the worst economic periods since the 1930s in this country.

When it came time to untangle that mess, owners couldn't figure out who owned a lot of the empty properties. The mortgages on them had been bundled and sold sometimes many times, they'd been financialized.

Despite many promised reforms, that really hasn't stopped happening. Our economy is still heavily dependent on regular interest payments from the middle class. In other words, when you don't pay your credit card bill, it has ramifications that you may not have known existed.

Now, this arrangement has made a small group of people fantastically rich, but has left many others dangerously exposed. We could soon learn why it matters to everyone when they close the bars in Miami.

Ray Washburne is a businessman in Dallas. He operates shopping centers as well as 65 bars and restaurants. He is both a landlord and a tenant. So he's experiencing this moment from both sides. From 2017 to last year, he ran the Overseas Private Investment Corporation for the Trump administration. He joins us now.

Ray, thanks so much for coming on tonight. So you've been in the restaurant business, essentially since college, probably close to 40 years. You've seen a lot of ups and downs. Have you ever seen anything like this? How is this different?

RAY WASHBURNE, BUSINESSMAN: Well, Tucker, thank you for having me on tonight because the restaurant business much like a family. All our employees over the years have worked for us for a long, long time. We've embraced them through ups and downs. And now we've come to something like this yesterday, tens of thousands of restaurant employees all over the country were let go and it's like having to let family go.

But there is no alternative as the cash crunch being shut down that there is no income to pay these people.

CARLSON: So what are the ramifications of that apart from the tragedy of having to lay off people who work for you, and in some cases you love. What does it mean for the rest of the country when that happens?

WASHBURNE: Well, our biggest concern and I'm both a landlord with other restaurants as tenants, and also our own restaurants is April 1st, two weeks from today is a day of reckoning in my opinion, because you're going to have rents that are due, you're going to have mortgages that are due, you're going to have bondholders that are due, as well as vendors that are owed money for the last two or three weeks.

Two weeks ago, everyone was having a booming year in the restaurant business. And now two weeks later, we're totally shut down. And so in the next two weeks, the Trump administration, which so far has been incredibly, positively responsive to all the trade associations that have gone to him, whether it's the shopping center trade or the restaurant -- National Restaurant Association, they've been very responsive to our needs and what we need.

But really the biggest need that we have right now has been business interruption insurance. Right now, business interruption insurance which all businesses carry don't cover pandemics. They cover things like hurricanes, floods and things like that. They don't cover this.

And so, and the same for landlords. They don't cover it for landlords. So everyone is looking at each other going, what happens two weeks from now if we don't get this -- our arms around it and get the legal side of this equation figured out?

CARLSON: So the last question, I mean, the deadline as you said is April 1st, most people -- me, I am not in business, I didn't know that. What will happen to the businesses if they don't get assistance in making that deadline? Like, will some of them may not come back, do you think?

WASHBURNE: A lot of it isn't going to come back. A lot of retailers that are teetering on this internet disruption already probably won't come back. But one solution is business interruption insurance, if the U.S. government would back insurance companies and say that a pandemic is business interruption, then a lot of this can be worked out pretty quickly and the insurance industry could work it through.

It wouldn't have to be a big bureaucracy set up by the government. It would just be a government guarantee of insurance companies and then the chain that goes all the way up between the tenants, to the landlords, to the bondholders, that would be the backstop, very easy to put into place.

CARLSON: Right. It's amazing how complex something as simple as a restaurant turns out to be and how key it is in the American economy. And we thank you for explaining that Ray Washburne, great to see tonight. Good luck and Godspeed.

WASHBURNE: Okay, thank you, Tucker.

CARLSON: Well, all of a sudden, Americans are living in a less secure world. They're feeling economically vulnerable for the reasons you just heard. They're uncertain of what's going to happen in the very near future.

In any crisis like this, it is important that leaders help the public feel safe, secure, and confident. All of a sudden, those daily briefings from the President have been helping, I think in that way.

But in some parts of the country, the authorities are doing just the opposite. In Los Angeles, Cleveland and other cities, officials have begun releasing prisoners early. They wanted to do that anyway, of course, but now they can say it's to contain the coronavirus. They're not explaining how exactly, they are just doing it.

Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley wants the federal government to join in this by releasing its own prisoners. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. AYANNA PRESSLEY, D-MASS.: You know, what is the guidance both for those that are incarcerated and for staff? And that the BoP use their full powers, I think now would be the time to commute some sentences, to exact clemency and to take care of our most vulnerable.

Ten percent of those that are incarcerated are over the age of 60 and already have an underlying condition. We should be using compassionate release.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Notice there's no compassion for the normal people huddled in their homes, sitting there as thousands of criminals are released onto the streets. Nobody cares about them. She doesn't. That's obvious.

But there's more. In many cities, authorities are actually ordering police to stop protecting the public, to stop doing their jobs.

In the City of Philadelphia, police have been ordered to avoid arrest even for significant crimes: Drug offenses, prostitution, vandalism, obviously are tolerated. But now, burglary and car theft get a pass.

A person could break into your home in Philadelphia and not be arrested. Imagine that.

Instead, the police will issue a summons for a later court appearance and send them on their way with a prayer that they'll show up.

In Fort Worth, police are no longer make arrests for theft under $100.00 or for vandalism -- vandalism -- in a moment when people are really on edge.

In Los Angeles County, that's a jurisdiction with nine million people living there, the Sheriff's Department is only arresting 60 people a day.

In a jurisdiction of nine million, it was down from 300 a day before coronavirus.

All of this is exacerbating, obviously what is a very volatile situation. Schools are closed, meaning that there are millions of teenagers who have nothing to do. Most of them are good kids, obviously, but they are teenagers, and some will be troublemakers because that's what they're like -- young people.

So how will they behave when they realize they can loot stores, steal cars or trash public places without the police responding to it? What do you think this is? You know what it is. It's a recipe for chaos and people can feel it.

That's why across the country, gun sales have surged in the first half of the month. It is rational. If the police announced they're not going to protect you, they're not going to do their jobs because the politicians controlling them won't allow them and then they're releasing criminals back into your neighborhood, what does that mean? It means it falls on you to protect yourself and your family. But you knew that.

But some in power can't handle that idea. The Mayor of Champaign, Illinois, for example, is claiming emergency powers that include the right to suspend gun sales.

The Mayor of New Orleans is claiming even more power. She claims if she wants to, she can ban the transport of weapons, too, effectively abolishing concealed carry.

Obviously, it's tyranny, but it's deeper than that. So the government fails to protect you. It makes your life more dangerous, and then it tries to prevent you from protecting yourself. What is that? Think about that for a minute. It's really ominous.

Nicole Malliotakis is remember the New York State Assembly and ran for New York Mayor against Bill de Blasio. I wish she had won, she didn't. But she's here tonight, and we're happy about it. Nicole, thanks so much for joining us. Are you worried about this combination of factors -- all of them created by our leaders, that it's going to make our streets more dangerous?

ASSEMBLYWOMAN NICOLE MALLIOTAKIS, R-N.Y.: Absolutely. It's absolutely disgraceful that we have elected officials that are actually entertaining this during a crisis emergency situation. We should be instead calming people down. We should try to relieve their anxiety and work with them to make their lives easier, not put them in a situation where they are more scared of what may potentially be happening.

I think what we're hearing from members of the squad and members across the country that are pushing for this is absolutely unacceptable. And the idea here in New York that we would even consider this when, as you know, I've been on your show multiple times talking about this dangerous bail law that took effect January 1st, already 90 percent of the arrested population is being released.

So what's left in Rikers Island are suspected murderers, rapists, gang members, heavy drug traffickers, and certainly that's not what we should be releasing back on to our street during this particularly difficult time or ever.

CARLSON: So I'm not a paranoid person, I assume good intent among the people I disagree with, you know, I think most people kind of want to make the country better.

But if you see a concerted effort to make the country more dangerous and more chaotic, what are you looking at? Why are they doing that? What's the idea behind this, do you know?

MALLIOTAKIS: You know, I think in many ways, it is a power grab. I think they do want to cause disruption. And I think that's something that's very disturbing.

Look, I may be running for Congress right now, but I am currently a state legislator. And I could tell you here in my community, we're working together bipartisan fashion to get things done, whether it be looking to expand beds in our community for those who are going to be ill, expanding testing, making sure that we're working to give economic relief to our business and to our residents. That should be the focus of all elected officials across the country right now, not what individuals like the member that you played earlier is talking about just to create chaos.

CARLSON: She's a disgrace. She's a disgrace to Congress, that person.

MALLIOTAKIS: Public safety has to be first.

CARLSON: Of course. Well, of course it does, and to use a crisis to push your own creepy little hobbyhorse that will make America worse and put people's lives in danger, you should be ashamed. That Ayanna Pressley should be ashamed of herself. I mean that. Assemblywoman, thanks so much for joining us tonight.

MALLIOTAKIS: I appreciate it. And hopefully, we will have a conservative squad in Washington.

CARLSON: I hope you go to Washington, too.

MALLIOTAKIS: Well, right now, we have a job to do and we're working together to do it.

CARLSON: Yes, and tell it to her face.

MALLIOTAKIS: Thank you. Thank you, Tucker.

CARLSON: Amen. Thank you.

Across the country, Americans are literally the lining up outside gun stores ahead of what could be some kind of shutdown.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and now gun supplies. Lines, weave around gun shops.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I've been robbed before, you know, who says that the people aren't going to start robbing for food, and that's scary.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: When you feel uncertainty about your security, you want to do something about it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Many of them are first-time firearm owners who are learning how to use a weapon to protect themselves and their families.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Coronavirus uncertainty has led to a spike of guns and ammo sales at his store.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They sold upwards of 40 to 50 guns yesterday alone.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: That is a big uptick from a typical day.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Owner Andrew Chernoff says sales are soaring as fears of coronavirus continue to climb.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We got in a bunch of guns, I'm sure by the end of the day, we will be out of guns again. We are now seeing a lot of first time gun buyers who never would have thought to buy a gun before who are now saying I need to have something to protect myself.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: And just to be clear, a lot of these people who have never owned a gun before, if the public believes their leaders would protect them, they wouldn't be buying guns, but they know their leaders won't and so they are and this infuriates Democrats.

In New York, Nassau County Executive Laura Curran attacked people for trying to protect themselves amid this uncertainty.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LAURA CURRAN, D-NASSAU COUNTY EXECUTIVE: Guns are not going to fight the virus. What will fight the virus is people staying home and isolating themselves and not having birthday parties and weddings and clustering together in big groups.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: Arrogant, stupid, totally uneducated, nasty. That's the face of it right there, Laura Curran.

Tim Schmidt is President of the U.S. Concealed Carry Association. He joins us tonight. Tim, thanks so much for coming on. I mean, it does seem pretty clear that when you trust that the authorities are going to keep you safe, you're probably not fixated on protecting yourself because you don't have to be. People know that they need to protect themselves, correct?

TIM SCHMIDT, PRESIDENT, U.S. CONCEALED CARRY ASSOCIATION: Of course, Tucker, and as you're talking about before, our law enforcement professionals and police departments, they had their hands full before the coronavirus, and so now, it's only going to be worse.

Now more than ever, people need to understand that they need to be their families' first line of defense.

CARLSON: Well, of course, and by the way, I thought there was a constitutional right guaranteeing that, and if there was ever a moment to invoke it, it's now. So how can leaders lead? Air quotes around it, leaders like Laura Curran, the one we just saw right there from Nassau County, New York, how can she -- I mean, how can any of them get in the way of your constitutional right to protect yourself?

SCHMIDT: Well, you're right. They shouldn't be, and honestly, I applaud all of these brand new people that are buying guns, but Tucker, what I'm about to say is going to become a little bit of a shock to you, especially coming from a guy like me, and that is that that so many -- 90 percent of these brand new people buying guns have never owned guns before. They've probably never even touched a gun.

And that means they're untrained. Now, don't get me wrong, Tucker, I personally think that firearm ownership is a natural born right of free people. But with that, right, comes a tremendous responsibility and that responsibility is to be trained.

And so I will make a request right now if you're watching this and you just bought a gun for self-defense, get training. Get training as fast as you can, whether it's in person or even online, it will help you be a better defender, which we all know you're going to have to be.

CARLSON: I think that's really wise advice and anyone who has hunted a lot or has had guns, you know, they tend to have real respect for firearms because they're dangerous tools. Thanks so much for that. Tim, we appreciate you coming on tonight.

SCHMIDT: My pleasure, Tucker.

CARLSON: Well around the world, thanks to this pandemic, countries are rediscovering the value of borders. Canada, believe it or not, has announced is closing itself off from foreigners. Obviously, it's time we did the same.

And yet remarkably, until this very afternoon, the United States was still resettling refugees in the country, many of them from countries battling coronavirus outbreak. Let's repeat that. Until this afternoon, our State Department was resettling refugees in your neighborhood from country with virus outbreaks.

To stop a virus, while millions of Americans can't go outside, the State Department was still dropping outsiders, foreign nationals into their communities. We're glad the Trump administration put a stop to that. Thank God, at least for now.

Well, the media is attacking the administration and the President for calling this virus by its rightful name. We want to hear the response to those complaints ahead. Line of the day.

Also, what is it like to have the coronavirus? We decided to go straight to the source, a woman recovering from it joins us in just a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: On January 1st of this year, The Global Times that's an English language Chinese propaganda outlet reported that eight people had been arrested for spreading "rumors" about a pneumonia outbreak in Wuhan in China.

Those rumors were shared by eight physicians. They described the illness on WeChat. That's a Chinese social media app. Now, it's obvious what they were warning about.

During the week of January 11th through January 17th, Wuhan authorities insisted there were no new cases of this mysterious disease. That of course, was a lie and a deadly one. We've got to emphasize that.

This calamity, this pandemic was avoidable. It happened because China hid the truth about what was happening from the rest of the world. They're still trying to do that.

Whether from stupidity or greed, people outside of China, including in this country are playing along as if on script.

On January 15th, the World Health Organization parroted the Chinese government. WHO claimed there was, "No clear evidence the coronavirus could spread person to person." The World Health Organization said that and of course, it was a lie.

Every day at White House news conferences about coronavirus, brainless reporters waste the public's time with complaints that administration calls it the Chinese coronavirus, Chinese. Today, an ABC reporter did it. Watch.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

QUESTION: Why do you keep calling this the Chinese virus? There are reports of dozens of incidents of bias against Chinese-Americans in this country. Why do you keep using this? A lot people say it is racist?

TRUMP: It's not racist at all. No, not at all. It comes from China. That's why. It comes from China. I want to be accurate.

As you know, China tried to say at one point -- maybe they stopped now -- that it was caused by American soldiers. That can't happen. It's not going to happen, not as long as I'm President. It comes from China.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: It's racist. That's what the media is talking about in the middle of a life threatening pandemic. And the Chinese know this, they know that wokeness is our Achilles heel, and they know they can control us with it.

They know that any conversation in this country no matter how serious, can be shut down instantly by somebody, maybe a mindless ABC correspondent saying racism, and that's why they're pushing it.

On MSNBC, people who could be informing the public about the virus, instead lectured on how certain thoughts about the virus are naughty and wrong.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So he shifted now and he shifted to xenophobic wartime Trump, where he thinks the only path now is to basically declare the virus public enemy number one, to paint it in somewhat racist terms.

KARINE JEAN-PIERRE, MOVEON.ORG, CHIEF PUBLIC AFFAIRS OFFICER: The xenophobia and the racism and outbreak is such a common thing. We've seen it in past health outbreaks that we've seen in this country's history.

The problem is, it is coming directly from the President of the United States and it is incredibly dangerous. It is problematic and it is scary and I just really want to call that out.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

CARLSON: These people aren't just -- they are beneath loathsome. But even most journalists -- and it is saying a lot -- are too smart to believe what they're saying. They know there's nothing scary about calling the Chinese coronavirus Chinese, it is.

What is actually scary and what ought to other you quite a bit is what these people believe about their viewers, including you, that they should be lied to and controlled.

So how painful is the coronavirus, this illness we've been talking about for weeks? And what exactly is the recovery process like? You've heard a lot about it, but very rarely from someone who has experienced it personally.

So rather than go to a doctor, we're trying to do the job ourselves. We've decided tonight to talk directly with someone who suffered from it and we're honored to be able to do that. Amy Driscoll contracted coronavirus earlier this month, went through a lot, is still recovering and has agreed to join us tonight.

Amy Driscoll, thanks so much for coming on.

AMY DRISCOLL, RECOVERING FROM CORONAVIRUS: You're welcome.

CARLSON: This is one of those things I think every American is thought a lot about. You're one of the relatively few who has had to suffer the hell of having it. Tell us if you would what it's like physically and emotionally to have coronavirus.

DRISCOLL: Yes, it was -- it was quite the experience. I wasn't prepared to be sick. When I got sick, I really wasn't thinking about it and I went from being, you know, doing my everyday life and then, you know, 10 hours later, I was really suffering, struggling to breathe, struggling to take a deep breath, my chest hurt, fever, cough that was very heavy but didn't produce anything.

It was just really quite scary and unlike anything I'd ever had before. So, you know, when I -- my heart was racing when I woke up from my -- having fallen asleep on the couch after I'd gotten home from work. My heart was just racing. It was kind of all over the place. And I just really struggled to get a deep breath in my chest hurt terribly.

And felt like I had a vise grip around my chest. So it was really just not like anything I'd ever had before.

CARLSON: That's horrifying. So you said you got home from work. So it sounds like it just came over you really quickly.

DRISCOLL: Yes, in the afternoon I had been at work, feeling fine. And then, you know, half an hour later, just really wasn't feeling fine.

I felt like I was very rundown all of a sudden and very tired, kind of worn out feeling, and I could tell that I was developing a fever. You know, that feeling you get where you're just kind of starting to get a fever kind of going.

CARLSON: Yes.

DRISCOLL: So that's really when I kind of knew that something was coming on and actually stayed the rest of my work day and then finished, left, went home and came home, took a little bit of Motrin, got in my kind of comfy clothes and laid down on the couch and fell asleep, and then woke up at three in the morning in quite a state.

CARLSON: That's unbelievable. Last question for you, and I appreciate you're doing this. How long did it take to feel good enough to say, talk to us tonight to get better, a little better?

DRISCOLL: So today is a week since I got ill, and I am still not better. I struggle to go up and down the steps. I feel like my brain says go ahead and do the things you want to do, and then I get up and my body is like, oh, no, we're not doing that.

I just feel extremely weak, tired. Napping. Now the cough is gone, the fever is gone. The headache still lingers. It's just really been quite a recovery, but I'm starting to feel a little more myself every day.

CARLSON: Well, you certainly, at least in our conversation, have a cheerful positive approach to it and we appreciate you coming on. Amy, good luck. Thank you for that.

DRISCOLL: Thank you so much. I appreciate it.

CARLSON: The U.S. Navy has announced it is deploying several hospital ships to relieve the pressure on healthcare facilities in New York and along the West Coast.

Fox medical contributor, Marc Siegel of NYU Langone has been on this from day one and joins us tonight with an update. Hey, Doctor.

DR. MARC SIEGEL, FOX NEWS MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Tucker. How are you?

CARLSON: Great. So hospital ships. It seems like it makes sense. Is this a good idea?

SIEGEL: I think it's a tremendous idea. What we're actually seeing here and you saw this from Amy is how much patients are suffering with this. And, you know, one thing that by the way, in terms of getting more supplies, I have to think as I'm listening to her, that something called a pulse oximeter, something to tell the oxygen level in your blood is something we doctors need for patients like her who are at home, whether they're actually getting better or not.

How much -- how are you breathing? How's your oxygen? But patients like her, unfortunately, many are swamping our hospitals and we're seeing people overflowing into the hallways in New York. We're seeing people on ventilators. We don't have enough care.

And so I am so heartened to today to hear that the US Navy ship, Comfort is coming here. And let me tell you, it's not to have overflow patients. The viewers need to know it's not so that people will go on the ship who would have otherwise gone into our hospitals in New York.

It's that we can then use that ship for patients that can't get the care that don't have coronavirus, that don't have COVID-19.

CARLSON: Right.

SIEGEL: That hospital -- I want people to understand what's inside there. You're looking at it now. It is a thousand beds. It is 12 operating rooms. It is ICUs. It has got radiology suites. It's got x-rays, CAT scans. It has got laboratories. That is literally a huge floating hospital and what a comfort it is at a time like this, at a time of great overwhelming have our own hospitals here.

After all, we have well close to 2,000 patients with COVID-19 here in New York, a burgeoning number and we're not seeing a slowdown anytime soon.

CARLSON: Twelve operating rooms. That's remarkable. Doctor, thank you for those details. Great to see you tonight.

SIEGEL: Incredible well -- it's a pride of the U.S. Navy. Thank you, Tucker.

CARLSON: It's amazing. Coronavirus shutdowns are barely a week old, travel is paralyzed, of course. From airplanes to hotels, how many flights will be canceled?

Also a lot of us have been sitting indoors online all day, and that makes you anxious and afraid. What's the best way to manage that? We will speak to one of the calmest, wisest clergyman we know about that question. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Coronavirus has already posed a bigger threat and a bigger blow to the travel business than 9/11 did. Airlines are announcing big cuts to flights. Hotels are not doing much better, in fact probably worse.

Matt Finn is in Chicago tonight with more. Hey, Matt.

MATT FINN, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Tucker, tonight major U.S. airlines are dealing with what's considered unprecedented plummeting revenues.

Delta now announcing that it will cut 70 percent of its capacity, expected to lose nearly $2 billion this month alone. About 10,000 workers taking unpaid leave.

JetBlue's cancellation rate, 10 times the normal. And United reporting one million fewer passengers compared to this time in March of last year.

A $50 billion Federal stimulus package for airlines is being considered. One condition, limiting executive pay until loans are repaid.

And another example of the COVID-19 pandemic on airlines and crucial services, tonight, the air traffic control tower at Chicago's Midway Airport remains closed, suddenly shutting down yesterday. Employees positive for coronavirus.

Three hundred eighty six flights have been canceled. Pilots have had to manually communicate with each other.

And the CEO of Hilton Hotels says the majority of its hotels in U.S. cities will close -- Tucker.

CARLSON: We need the airlines. It is a continental country. Matt Finn. Great to see you tonight. Thank you.

FINN: Thank you.

CARLSON: Coronavirus is obviously a physical threat, but it's also been very tough on people's spirits. Millions of people stuck inside sometimes cut off from loved ones. It's a period of chaos. It's a period of economic uncertainty.

People are afraid to lose their parents, lose a spouse, lose their job. Some are losing their jobs. That means stress, a lot of it. How can people remain calm and resolute amid this crisis?

Reverend Billy Cerveny is the Founder of Redbird Ministries. He's a Presbyterian Minister. We're happy to have him join us tonight. Billy, thanks so much for coming on.

REVEREND BILLY CERVENY, FOUNDER, REDBIRD MINISTRIES: Hi, Tucker.

CARLSON: You talk to a lot of people about a crisis in their lives. There are more of those than ever right now. What would you tell them?

CERVENY: Well, first of all, when we think about this pandemic, and the coronavirus, the first thing I'd say is you're not crazy. I mean, when we consider this stuff, we are being forced to consider realities that we've never had to think about, certainly through this lens before.

And the first is that, we're not as in control as we thought we are. Right? And the second one is we've got to deal with the realities of our own heart that when we face this thing, we look up and we say what's bigger than me? What is more powerful than me that's got this?

And when we experience this kind of chaos, that's when people's -- and my own -- our fear and our panic can kick in and that's where it feels like Jesus is pushed back from the table. He's left the building, and he's left me with a bill that I can't pay and a situation I can't resolve.

But the good news is this, when you read the story of the Bible, chaos is never evidence of God's absence. It's the arena in which he moves. It is where he dwells. And if that's true then, it's true now that God is moving in this pandemic.

Now, he might not be moving the ways I want him to and I might not see all that he sees, but I know He is good. And know He is moving.

The second thing is he moves in the chaos among our hearts and all of our hearts when all this comes up, that this God, he pushes in, and he says, I've got this. It's still good. I'm still powerful and I'm still leading you forward in this.

CARLSON: So how would -- those are very comforting ideas and realities to Christians, but for the many secular people shut in apartments in New York who know they're not in control. I think it's such a beautiful point that you made. We're not in control. This shows it. How can they experience some of the certainty secular people, people of other faiths -- how can they be assured that if they're not in control, something larger than them is?

I think part of it is when you look at all the craziness that's going around us, we slow down and we look and we open our eyes and we can see there's still so much good in play.

A couple weeks ago, we had a tornado in Nashville, and the houses were devastated. But as I walked through the wreckage, and helping to pull telephone poles out of car windshields, I looked around and I saw hundreds of volunteers and they were these flashes of light, and if there's one thing that Jesus said, I am a light that shines in the darkness, and it's still true. It's true now and a pandemic cannot make that untrue.

And also I would say to that as we look and we, as Christians and non- Christians alike, we think, how do we move forward in this? What are some practical ways that we do it? And one of the ways I would say is we let God quarterback this and how does he quarterback? He always calls us to love.

And how do we love? We stay at home. So we don't -- we don't help spread this, we be aware of our elderly neighbors, of people that are less fortunate around us or people that have HIV or people that have lung disease and having this virus would be devastating.

CARLSON: Yes.

CERVENY: And we ask how do we step in and care for them. And also, I'd say too, and Tucker, you know this, situations like this, things like this, this changes a country like when we get to the other side of this we will be different.

CARLSON: That's for sure.

CERVENY: And you know that -- and you know, that we've never been more different and we proceed with love, if we proceed in caring for each other, well, we can be a country marked by love and grace, and I mean, what better thing to be said for that.

CARLSON: Well, that is the hope -- that is the hope right there. Billy Cerveny, thanks for joining us. Appreciate it.

CERVENY: Thanks, Tucker.

CARLSON: Thank you. Well, there is progress in the fight against coronavirus and we want to highlight it on the show every night. Drugs created to fight malaria are showing real promise as a treatment for this virus. We'll tell you how after the break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CARLSON: Well, the massive disruption everyone in the country is enduring at the moment isn't just meant to give our hospitals time to prepare. It's also buying us time to figure out how to treat the coronavirus. This is a country of science and we will defeat this at some point, the sooner the better.

Fortunately, there's some good news to report tonight on that front. Early evidence suggests that chloroquine, that's a cheap antimalarial drug may be effective in treating coronavirus. Gregory Rigano is an adviser at the Stanford University School of Medicine and he joins us tonight.

Mr. Rigano, thanks so much for coming on. So tell us what this is and why you think it's promising, please?

GREGORY RIGANO, ADVISER, STANFORD UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE: So the President has the authority to authorize the use of hydroxychloroquine against coronavirus immediately. He has cut more red tape at the F.D.A. than any other President in history.

And for example, in 2017, a new drug was approved for muscular dystrophy that in a clinical trial -- for a clinical trial that enrolled less than 15 patients, and it was generally uncontrolled in an open setting.

Hydroxychloroquine has been in the market for over 50 years with a quality safety profile, and I'm here to report that as of this morning, about five o'clock this morning, a well-controlled peer reviewed study carried out by the most eminent Infectious Disease specialist in the world, Didier Raoult, MD, PhD, out of the south of France, in which he enrolled 40 patients, again a well-controlled peer reviewed study that showed a 100 percent cure rate against coronavirus.

The study was released this morning on my Twitter account RiganoESQ, as well as our most recent website, covidtrial.io.

The study was recently accepted to the International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents by Elsevier.

CARLSON: So obviously, I only know what you're telling me, but I do know it's very unusual for a study of anything to produce results of a hundred percent. I mean that's remarkable, isn't it? Or am I missing something?

RIGANO: That is remarkable. In fact, to be able to cure a virus was said to be mathematically impossible and the first company that did it was a small biotech called PharmaSet that was acquired by Gilead Sciences in the cure to hepatitis C.

What we're here to announce is the second cure to a virus of all time.

CARLSON: Well, that's -- I mean, remarkable I mean, of course, it's our job to be skeptical of all and any claims. However, I very much want to believe this, and I think we need obviously immediately to run it down.

The Federal government needs to find out if this is true, because if it is, you know, that's the biggest news of this moment. So I'm so grateful that you announced that on the show, and I hope we're hearing a lot more about it very soon. Thank you so much for coming on.

RIGANO: Thank you. Please disseminate it to the scientific community immediately.

CARLSON: I would hope they'd be on it. Thank you. We're out of time. We will be back, 8:00 p.m. tomorrow. The show that's the sworn enemy of lying, pomposity, smugness and groupthink. Sean Hannity standing by live from New York.

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