Fox News "Hannity" - Transcript Interview with Greg Abbott
Interview
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Joining us now with reaction with the very latest of developments, Governor Greg Abbott.
Governor, let's go -- let's go put up some charts first. I love our friends in Texas. You've been very firm and I anecdotally have said -- I'm for masks. I'm for social distancing, use of plexiglass and opening stadiums.
I want it all. If I have to go to a baseball game, football game and wear a mask, I'll wear it, because I saw in New York at the height of this, I saw that it worked in my grocery store, and my drugstore. Nobody contracted it and they all had plexiglass and masks.
GOV. GREG ABBOTT, R-TEXAS: And that's exactly what Texas has adopted. We observed the same thing. Early on, we had some grocery stores, H-E-B, which was just ranked America's favorite grocery store, they had best practices in place to slow the spread. And that's exactly what we're doing in Texas.
Sean, know this -- we do not want to shut down business or Texas again. We cannot have that. But we can do, however, we can use these practices like will you just said and that is -- people can wear masks, we can use these other strategies to slow the spread while we are awaiting the time of when we do have these vaccines.
I do however want to add one thing because I heard on your show what I hear on every show, and that is people talk about the vaccines which will be coming. But before vaccines will come, we will have therapeutic drugs coming and maybe two or three months before vaccines will come, so that people will be treated who do contract COVID-19.
HANNITY: Well, Governor, you know, we do know that after all was said and done, it turns out the first real study on hydroxychloroquine, it turns out Donald Trump was right. Had very effective. Remdesivir is another drug showing promise.
Let me show -- I'm putting up on the screen, for example, the daily new cases in your great state of Texas, hospitalizations, positivity rate.
All right. Now, we're seeing this a lot in the Sun Belt. We have Governor DeSantis on. He pointed out something that I found, I -- very interesting, and as much as that a lot of the new cases are younger people. They are less at risk, but then they are at risk of may be infecting grandma or grandpa. That concerns me.
As you look at the charts and you been very outspoken, what do you make of it? What are you seeing, and what have we learned from the last time that you were implying?
ABBOTT: We are seeing two things. One is we are seeing a meaningful increase in hospitalizations and that's a very dangerous sign. We are seeing however, also, what you're pointing out and that is almost half of the people who are testing positive are under the age of 35.
As a result, it means that more people who are testing positive will not be going to the hospitals as before. But we do need to be very concerned about those who are hospitalized, but also we must emphasize exactly what he said that is for the young adults who do test positive, they can spread that with their parents, with their grandparents. And that can lead to the serious problem.
That's exactly why during this time period while we are waiting on medications, it's so important that people in Texas as elsewhere wear masks. Remember this also, Sean, this isn't just Texas and Florida. Remember -- see what's going on in California, in Louisiana, in Illinois, all of which have upticks in the number of cases.
My point is this: the coronavirus COVID is not blue. It's not red. It's not Democratic. It's not Republican. It's going to happen in any state and we all just need to respond in ways to contain it without crushing our economies and without killing jobs --
(CROSSTALK)
HANNITY: We can't close the country down again. Yeah, let me just say this last word --
ABBOTT: We need to protect lives and protect our economy at the same time.
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