CNN "The Situation Room" - Transcript: Interview With Gov. Ned Lamont

Interview

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Let's get back to the East Coast right now.

I'm joined by Governor Ned Lamont of Connecticut, which announced 27 additional coronavirus cases today, bringing its total up to 68. Also joining us, our chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.

Governor Lamont, first of all, what new actions are you taking in your state at this hour?

GOV. NED LAMONT (D-CT): Well, Wolf, working with New York and New Jersey, we closed bars and restaurants, sadly, on the eve of St. Patrick's Day last night.

But we have got to do everything we can to limit the amount of social interaction. Our bars were packed up until then. And we had to send a message loud and clear. We can't allow this.

It's escalating fast throughout New England, throughout our state. And we got to make sure we have people's social distancing.

BLITZER: Yes, it's an important point.

What has the White House, Governor, communicated to you over the past 24 hours?

LAMONT: Actually, somebody from the White House did reach out to our staff.

I'd made a strong case that we needed not just testing, but PPE, the protective equipment. This is what my people need. We don't have enough of it.

The number of infections is escalating dramatically. And we will see. I have become -- Missouri's the Show Me State. I feel like Connecticut is show me too. I have got to see it to believe it. But we're ready.

BLITZER: I'm sure you are.

Governor, I want to bring in our chief medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta. He has a couple of questions for you as well.

Sanjay?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN SENIOR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Governor Lamont, an honor -- honor to speak to you, sir.

It strikes me that we -- we're hearing the -- from the White House that states should go ahead and buy ventilators and sort of get prepared. Ventilators are something that everybody on the planet wants right now, given that this is a pandemic.

I'm wondering, how do you even go about this process? Are you doing this? Are you trying to buy ventilators? Or how do you go about this?

LAMONT: We are.

I mean, our hospital association and team are out there scouring the globe right now for ventilators. But the federal government has got to take the lead on this.

I mean, lead-up to World War II, look at the thousands of B-52s they built on very short notice. We need ventilators. We need PPE, and the federal government should take the lead.

GUPTA: Yes, I mean, I have heard this analogy before, sort of being able to shore up some of the money from DOD to maybe do this.

What about the testing? I know that you -- within the state, they are doing drive-up testing now, which allows people to not leave the car, hopefully keeps the health care workers a little bit more protected.

But one of the things I think is still unclear is exactly who should get tested. And I'm wondering if that's something you thought about, the criteria. How do you approach this in Connecticut?

LAMONT: Well, we have had to be very selective, because, until very recently, we have very limited testing capacity.

A week ago, we had maybe 20 tests a day coming out of public lab. Now we're up to a few hundred. So we're making some progress there.

Sanjay, we have prioritized, one, people who are sick in the hospitals, making sure we knew who had COVID-19, so they could be appropriately quarantined as needed.

Now we're expanding that to everybody who's showing real symptoms, who comes in with a doctor's authorization. We have nine of our hospitals doing drive-through. So we're able to do the swabs, get the testing done, either through our lab, through our local hospitals, or now some of the out-of-state labs.

Maybe a little too little, too late, but we're catching up.

BLITZER: Governor Lamont, I understand you actually have, what, 200 nurses who are on furlough because they may have come into contact with the virus.

Who has -- and perhaps they haven't even been able to get tested yet. Why is that? Do you have any idea of when they will be able to get tested and get back to work, potentially?

LAMONT: We do.

I mean, across the state, there are lots of health care workers, including nurses, who maybe showed contact who are on furlough, self- quarantine. If we could get them tested sooner, we could find out whether they had COVID-19, or maybe just the flu or some -- something less than that. We could get them back to work.

Look, we got to -- we need everybody, all hands on deck, over the next week or two. You look at what's coming out of those pictures of Italy, and our team has got to be prepared.

BLITZER: I think you're going to need all hands on deck for more than the next week or two.

GUPTA: Yes.

BLITZER: This is going to continue for a while.

What's your message governor to the people of Connecticut, those watching around the country right now, who are so worried about what the next weeks and potentially months might look like?

LAMONT: Wolf, be smart.

Everybody 60, 70, stay home. No real reason you got to go out. I'm sort of intrigued. In the Stop & Shop, if you got to go out and shop, 60-, 70-year-olds can go at an earlier hour to do that.

I'm telling the young millennials, the invincibles, nobody's invincible. We need you to show real rigor here. And that's why we had to close down the bars and restaurants.

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Again, everybody's got to stay quarantined, close to home, unless you're absolutely needed at work.

BLITZER: Very good advice, indeed.

Governor Ned Lamont, thanks so much for joining us, especially on a critically busy day like this.

(CROSSTALK)

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