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(bright orchestral music) - [Narrator] Florida This Week is made possible in part by support from the Tampa Bay Times.

-[Rob] Coming up next.

With coronavirus cases spiking in the state, the question of mask mandates comes up again.

Governor Ron DeSantis says no.

A leading Democratic candidate for governor says that DeSantis is not leading enough on the issue.

So she says she'll give regular updates on how to protect against COVID-19.

Governor DeSantis formerly asks the US Supreme Court to overturn Roe vs. Wade.

We'll discuss these issues and more coming up on Florida This Week.

(upbeat dramatic full orchestral music) - Welcome back.

Florida's seeing a jump in COVID-19 cases, rising to levels not seen since mid-January, before vaccines were widely available.

- [Rob] Governor DeSantis quietly met with mask skeptics early in the week, and made fun of mask mandates when he made a speech to ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council that was meeting in Utah on Tuesday.

The governor is resisting calls to reimpose mask mandates, even as local officials are taking more safety measures.

- Floridians are free to choose, and all Americans should be free to choose how they govern their affairs, how they take care of themselves and our families.

And they should not be consigned to live, regardless of which state in the union, consigned to live in a Faucian dystopia.

And I think it's very important that we say unequivocally, no closures, no to restrictions, and no mandates.

(audience applauds and cheers) - [Rob] Local officials, and some companies, are imposing vaccine and mask requirements for government workers, and even declaring states of emergency.

Disney World is ordering all guests over the age of two to wear masks indoors.

Florida remains one of the worst states in America when it comes to COVID-19 cases.

Orange County has declared a state of emergency, and is requiring the county's 4,200 non-union workers to get vaccinated by the end of September.

Leon County announced it's also imposing a vaccine requirement for county workers.

Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava mandated masks at all county facilities.

And in Broward County, school board officials there are keeping in place mask mandates for students in the coming school year.

That came despite anti-mask protests earlier in the week before the school board meeting.

Florida's Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, who is running for her party's nomination for governor in next year's election, announced that she will be conducting regular COVID-19 briefings.

Because she doesn't think the current governor is doing enough.

The people of Florida need and deserve access to regular, timely updates as it relates to the ongoing pandemic, not secret meetings or sporadic information sharing.

- [Rob] Also this week, Governor DeSantis signed Florida on to an effort to ask the US Supreme Court to overturn two of its past abortion decisions, possibly paving the way to eliminating the federal right to choose to terminate an unwanted pregnancy.

And this week Tampa's Police Chief Brian Dugan announced he will retire in September from the department.

He served 31 years on the force, the last four as chief.

Under his tenure, the department dealt with huge Black Lives Matter demonstrations, major sporting events, a hurricane, and the apprehension of the Seminole Heights serial killer.

Assistant Chief Reuben Delgado will take over as interim, while Mayor Jane Caster conducts a national search for a replacement.

Dugan says the time was right for him to step aside.

Well, the recent surge of COVID-19 cases in Florida due to the Delta variant has caused a rise in hospital cases across the state.

Dr. Jason Wilson is the Associate Director of the adult emergency department at Tampa General Hospital, and he joins us now.

Dr. Wilson, welcome back.

- Thanks for having me, Rob.

I think I'm gonna keep on coming back until we get these vaccine numbers up a bit though.

- Yeah, I so wish we we could talk about something else.

Okay.

So Florida's seeing a new surge in coronavirus cases.

What's the situation now at Tampa General?

Are you seeing more and more unvaccinated people being admitted?

- Yeah, over the last two weeks we've seen a pretty rapid change in our COVID hospitalizations, and the types of patients being hospitalized for COVID.

We've seen really that Delta variant starting to take over the predominant type of genetic sequence we see for the COVID infected patients.

And again, the majority of the patients that we're seeing get admitted to the hospital are not vaccinated.

First of all, it's less likely to be admitted to the hospital if you are vaccinated, it's about eight to two unvaccinated people versus vaccinated people being admitted.

And then of those that are admitted, to be sick enough to need the ICU, or to be put onto a ventilator, it's about nine to one unvaccinated patients to vaccinated patients.

Our numbers themselves have gone up by about four and a half times where we were just 10 or 12 days ago, 10 to 15 people in the hospital any given time with COVID, two weeks ago.

Now, 80 to 90 people in the hospital with COVID.

- All right.

The CDC is out with a report on Friday saying that vaccinated people are shedding the virus at the same rate as unvaccinated people.

And so I want to ask you, what does that mean to you?

And what does that say about masks?

- Yeah, this was a concerning report that came out from CDC really around a outbreak that sort of happened in Massachusetts with a high number of patients who were vaccinated.

But what was found within that data was that the patients who were vaccinated still had pretty high levels of the Delta variant.

So even though they may not have had symptoms, they still had high levels of Delta variant.

What that means is that those virus numbers are high in their bodies.

And so any action, coughing, talking, sneezing could spread virus very easily.

And that means in a place like we are right now in the Tampa area in Florida, where a large number of people are un-vaccinated, even if I'm vaccinated, get COVID, feel no symptoms, but cough, sneeze, and have Delta variant, I can easily spread that to other people, definitely those non-vaccinated patients, or people.

And that's what really led the CDC to make this change in the recommendation around mask wearing with vaccinated people.

Because even if I'm vaccinated, have COVID Delta variant, don't know I have that variant, cough or sneeze, I could spread that very easily.

Hence the mask change.

- So masks are still important.

Some politicians are saying that this spike that we're seeing now is seasonal.

Is it seasonal?

- Well, here's the one thing we know a year and a half into this.

Where we saw hospitalizations and deaths drop drastically was when we saw vaccines become widely available.

The other thing that we've seen as well is we've seen surges and spikes in different time periods, in winter, in summer and spring, we've seen spikes now with the COVID virus.

What we've seen change things is vaccination.

What leads these spikes are large numbers of unvaccinated people, and variants like the Delta variant.

These variants can arise with the risk factor being not being vaccinated.

That's how these variants start to arise over time.

- So, how close do you think we are to achieving herd immunity?

- Well, you know, right now in Florida, we're really stuck around that 50% mark for vaccination.

And you know, herd immunity is a theoretical, mathematical concept built around vaccines, and built around how many people do you need to get vaccinated given a certain virus, and its transmissibility.

And we've sort of estimated that number to be, and it depends on who you ask, but somewhere in that 70% range.

Certainly we'd be much better off in that 70% range, than we are in this 50% range we're stuck in now.

The data we're seeing clinically is backing that up, because we've seen a shift of older patients being the predominant people with COVID, to younger patients now being the predominant people with COVID.

And what I mean by that is our older population here in Florida has actually done a pretty good job of getting vaccinated.

Some counties, those numbers close to 90% of elderly individuals having both doses of vaccine, really not seeing high spread of COVID.

So I'm not sure we've hit herd immunity per se, but we've certainly hit a level of immunity in that population where we've got good protection.

- Well, Dr. Wilson, thanks a lot.

Thanks for coming back, and it's always great to see you.

And I wish we were talking about something else.

- Yeah, maybe different circumstances next time Rob, but great to see you too.

Thanks for having me.

(dramatic full orchestral music) - Well, the new CDC guidelines this week concerning masks have led to protests at school boards across the state.

That includes at Hillsborough County where mask-wearing by students still remains voluntary.

Jessica Vaughn is a member of the Hillsborough County School Board in District Three, and joins us now.

Jessica, welcome back.

- Thank you.

Thank you for having me, it's always an honor.

- So as you know, some parents in Hillsborough County are petitioning, asking that you, your school board that you sit on, institute a mask mandate.

Two other counties have done that in defiance of the governor, Gadsden County and Broward county.

The governor says he's gonna issue an executive order, banning any mask mandate in schools when they get underway next month.

What are your thoughts about that?

- Well, I haven't actually seen the petition sent to us from the district level, but I have seen it online, and I'm very concerned.

I think that there's two different issues here.

There's the issues of being able to keep our children safe.

And that's the biggest concern to me.

I ran on a platform of student safety, and keeping our kids safe.

And then there's the issue of state overreach.

Whether or not the governor has the ability to tell local districts and local municipalities what's best for their district.

So on both areas, I'm concerned, I'm concerned about the state overreach, especially as we see our state pushing back against federal overreach, and really fighting for their right to self-govern our state.

I believe that we also, as municipalities, know what's best for our district.

And in general, and I know we'll talk about this, all the science is saying that this is a much more aggressive, and contagient variant of the COVID, and that it's gonna affect our children.

And for me, the top priority is making sure that our students are safe when they come to school.

- If masks are optional when the schools get underway next month, what do the scientists say about some kids wearing masks, some kids, not, some kids being vaccinated, some not?

What do you say to parents who might be worried about their kids' safety and what do you tell them?

- So we're not getting a huge amount of input from the scientists as far as how effective mask wearing for yourself versus everybody else wearing masks are as far as percentage-wise.

But they all are resolute in the fact that the more people have masks on the safer everyone's gonna be, and the more we're gonna control the spread.

In general, the CDC has said masks should be mandatory in all places.

The Academy of Pediatrics has said the same thing.

Our partners at TGH have said we should mandate masks.

So my concern is that we're not necessarily listening to our medical advisors, but telling parents, I would say absolutely.

If it's important to you, make sure that your student is in a mask at all times, that they know how important it is to wear it.

That they're practicing good hygiene, they're washing their hands before they put things in their mouth, or washing their hands in general.

And that they're trying to keep their distance from other students.

So just going by the guidelines that we've all followed for so long, I would absolutely encourage parents to make sure their kids understand that, and are practicing that in our schools, regardless of which way this goes.

- I heard the suggestion earlier today, and that is that if there are no mask mandates in schools, maybe classes should be divided.

So the class, or the school, the kids that want to wear masks can be in one class, and the kids that don't want to wear a mask can be in another class.

What do you think about that idea?

- I think that's a good idea.

I wouldn't call them divided as so much, but I would say that we could make cohorts, and it would really be reflective of parent choice.

The parents who wanted to make sure their kid wasn't in a classroom where other parents have decided that they would want their students to be masked, can have that option.

And for parents who feel like it should be optional, or aren't that concerned with mask, they can send them in another classroom.

It would be for a very short amount of time.

And that's really based on parental choice, which the governor has really highlighted as the number one issue that he wants to promote in this decision.

So I think that would be a good compromise to upholding parental choice, but also giving parents the room to send their students into an environment where they feel best fits their needs.

So I think that would be a great idea.

- Are you expecting to see large numbers of students returning to the classroom next month?

- Absolutely.

Absolutely.

We're no longer offering e-learning, so the only options are virtual schools, which some parents are taking advantage of.

But other than that, we're gonna be full on brick and mortar.

And so I'm expecting, we're gonna have way more students than last time.

We also have larger classrooms due to the cuts that we have to do a few months ago.

So space is gonna be very tight.

And with, again, with this disease, or this virus being more aggressive and specifically targeting a younger generation, I'm not only concerned about the safety of our students, but also just the, how are we gonna quarantine?

How many kids are gonna be out?

What happens when the virus spreads?

How are we gonna meet those needs?

So even if you're not worried about just your child getting sick, understanding that this is gonna affect whether or not they can even attend school.

Or if they're in quarantine it's gonna be logistics we have to think about as this disease, as this virus spreads.

- Well, Jessica Vaughn from the Hillsborough County School Board.

Thanks a lot.

Thanks for coming on Florida This Week.

- Thank you.

Thank you so much.

(dramatic full orchestral music) - Joining us now for our next segment are Yvonne Fry, a businesswoman, and a consultant and a Republican, and Rita Ferrandino, a businesswoman, and the CEO of Arc Capital and the Democrat.

So great to see both of you, thanks for coming on the show.

Let me ask you about the tension this week, between the governor and Nikki Fried.

The governor, who's famous for wanting to reopen the state quickly.

He doesn't want to go backwards, he doesn't want mask mandates, he doesn't want vaccine mandates.

He doesn't want to close anything down.

Nikki Fried, who's the Democratic agriculture commissioner who's running for the governor next year in the Democratic primary, came out and said, "The governor's not doing enough to update us."

And so she's gonna give us regular updates about COVID in the state of Florida.

First of all, is the governor updating us regularly?

Is he telling us what the science is telling us?

And is she right to come out, and do these regular updates as agriculture commissioner?

Or is she showboating?

And Rita, let me toss that question to you first.

- Well, I think that my friends at the YMCA, or my friends that are doing their grocery shopping, what they want to know at the bottom line, is what's going?

What do we have to do to protect ourselves and our families?

So I think that the consumers, the constituents, they just want facts, and they want to be able to make their decisions accordingly.

- And do you think the governor is doing the right thing?

Is the governor putting out facts every week?

- Absolutely, he should be.

He is not doing the right thing.

Absolutely, he should be communicating in a transparent way with the people of Florida.

- All right, Yvonne, what do you think about this?

- This is of course, a very dynamic and serious situation.

And we have been riding the waves, the ups and downs, the ins and outs as we try and figure it out as we go.

I know that our governor is certainly committed to staying open for business, and that's a top priority.

As well as we've seen evidence of wanting to keep people safe.

And I think where we're at right now, I don't think we anticipated this new surge, and the severity, and what all's happening.

And we're trying to get our arms around, what does it mean?

Our health professionals, we've got great leadership here in the Tampa Bay region, certainly, and across the state, that are trying to make sense of it all and give us good advice.

Our businesses are trying to navigate it, what's right for them?

As our families of how do they keep themselves safe?

How do they continue with work, and school, and all the different things?

It's a difficult situation for everybody.

- Do you think the politics of this by my even bringing up Nikki Fried, and her attacks on the governor this week that that politicizes it?

- It does.

- And scares people away from listening to what the science says.

- People are worn out on all fronts.

They're worn out of the divisive politics of this.

They are tired, it's been a hard struggle for everybody.

And I think the more that we can inform, and give people facts, and the things that they need to be able to make good decisions for their families, for their business, in their schools.

All the touch points in this that are so divisive right now, that's what we need to be doing, and not politicizing this.

- Rita, the governor took issue this week with Norwegian Cruise Lines requiring that its passengers have a vaccine passport, proof that they've received the full regiment of vaccines.

Disney World is requiring people now to wear masks when they go indoors at Disney world.

I'm just wondering, is this an issue where the private employers, and private businesses should be allowed to have these mandates?

And if they're allowed to have them, why shouldn't government, if it's a local government, if it sees a need for a mask, why shouldn't it be allowed to institute a mask mandate?

- Well, I think what the real issue is facing private and public employers, especially as they look at mandating masks and vaccinations, is that it's a pure economics issue.

It is not a personal freedom issue.

It is an economic issue.

And that's because private and public employers are being hit daily with these massive insurance claims from COVID cases.

These healthcare expenses are directly hitting their budgets and their bottom lines.

Most big corporations, self-insure their healthcare benefits.

So when a employee, or their family gets COVID, and they're hospitalized, they have to pay every expense.

Almost all US federal, state, and local governments, self-fund their healthcare benefits, and that's tax dollars.

So taxpayers are footing the bill for these people who are getting sick, who are unvaccinated and unmasked.

It's this unvaccinated, unmasked gamble, especially when you're looking at our local federal, state and local governments, it's really gambling with our tax dollars.

And those dollars that are used to pay for those healthcare expenses are tax dollars that we can't spend on products and services to help run our state.

So that's really the issue.

And that's why Orange County's tax collector came out this week mandating all of his staff gets vaccinated.

He got hit with some really big, massive claims, and it's costing the taxpayers of Orange County.

- So Yvonne, within the conservative part of the spectrum here in Florida, around the country, folks are saying, "Look, wearing a mask, or getting vaccinated is a personal choice.

If I don't want to get vaccinated, or if I don't want to wear a mask, I live in the US, it's my right not to get that vaccination.

It's my right not to wear a mask, or send my kids to school with a mask."

What do you think?

- We do have a responsibility to each other always.

And you see that evidenced in other ways in society of, you know, traffic laws and so on.

And I think that that generally people are mindful of that.

If they want personal liberties, if they want to take responsibility, and ask government to step back on the mandates, but we still do have personal responsibility in that.

So I think that's a good balance.

And you know what I would encourage folks to remember this is a very serious thing.

The death numbers, the cases in ICU are continuing to climb.

It's very real.

And we just all need to make decisions that make sense accordingly.

- Let me switch gears a little bit.

The governor signed on with other Republican governors around the country, and he has asked the US Supreme Court to overturn Roe V. Wade.

And Yvonne, if I could start with you, what do you think of the governor...

The state of Florida's taken a position on similar questions before the high court in the past.

What do you think about trying to overturn Roe V. Wade?

- This has always been a watershed issue.

Republicans, Democrats, or however you fall with that.

I mean, I don't even know that you can define it as Republican, Democrat.

It's how you feel on this.

Clearly our governor has higher aspirations, and is well positioned.

And this is a political issue that he is willing to step out and take a bold stand on and move accordingly.

And that's what he's doing.

- Rita, what do you think about the governor getting involved in this issue?

- Again, we're in crisis.

We've got our hospitals being overrun with COVID cases.

Our ICU's are overflowing.

And what does our governor do?

He picks a wedge issue to take a stand on.

So I think it's nothing more than political posturing.

If you look over here you're not gonna see what's happening over here.

And I just want to come back to what I said earlier about the state of Florida, by not mandating its employees get vaccinated, that is such a big fiscal issue that's hitting our state, and it's not getting anywhere near the attention.

I mean, when somebody is in an ICU, that's at least $400,000 to $500,000 per person, and that's costing our state huge amounts of money.

And that's an issue I think I'm gonna be focused on.

- Well, back in the old days, we used to wrap up these shows by asking you the other big story of the week.

So Rita, let me ask you, locally, nationally, internationally, what's the other big story of the week?

- Sarasota's so proud of the Olympic athletics that we sent to Tokyo.

And we've had a few competing in the finals.

One of our rower friends, Clark Dean, was rowing for the US in the finals.

Our big story, my big story of the week is the Olympics, and how we're being well-represented.

- And Yvonne, another big story of the week.

- Oh, I would absolutely echo that, but tie in with that, what gains we have made in the conversation around mental health for everyone.

Not just athletes, not just our young people, but for everyone.

And I think that is such a critical issue.

It ties into what we've talked about today with COVID, with everything that we've been through.

That to me is one of the most critical issues that we face in our world today.

And I'm so glad to not only celebrate our Olympic athletes, but to have really changed the game on how we're approaching and dealing with mental health.

- It took a lot of courage for those athletes to even raise it.

- It did.

- And they did, all right.

- Yvonne Fry, thank you very much.

Rita Ferrandino, thank you.

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