Melissa Harris-Perry: The Biden administration has once again renewed the Federal COVID-19 Public Health Emergency. Health and Human Services Secretary, Becerra, issued the extension on the emergency order, which was set to expire on Wednesday. This gives the Feds stronger oversight over COVID-19 related programs like data tracking and vaccine distribution. Now, the decision to extend the public emergency for the 12th time comes amid COVID's Winter resurgence. A new omicron sub variant, paired with the nation's low turnout for the bivalent booster shot, has increased COVID related hospitalizations and deaths once again. While some reports have hinted that this could be the last extension, the Department of Health and Human Services says there is no end date set.

Joining me now with more on this is Ian Lopez, Senior Health Reporter at Bloomberg Law.

Ian, thanks so much for joining us.

Ian Lopez: My pleasure. Thank you.

Melissa Harris-Perry: All Right. Help us to just understand, what is the current state of the COVID pandemic?

Ian Lopez: Well, from a health perspective, right now we have a new variant. The numbers there of infections are trending upward according to the most recent CDC data. The death rate is also tracking upward. It's not spiking, just to be clear, but it is trending upward. Hospitalization right now is trending downwards somewhat, but not in a way that is making health experts optimistic exactly.

In terms of how people are responding to this news, as well as the current state of the pandemic, clearly masking has gone a little bit down in recent months. There's a general feeling among the public that the pandemic is over. The president himself in September made a loose statement saying as much. At the same time, though, the government is continuing to extend the public health emergency with no end date in sight, which is creating a bit of a back and forth with lawmakers, as well as the administration. As we get closer to what might be the end of the public health emergency, there appears to be a significant number of loose ends that the administration and Congress would need to clear up.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Oh, the administration and Congress clearing up loose ends doesn't sound like the most likely thing to happen. What kinds of loose ends are we talking about here?

Ian Lopez: Well, for starters, there's the fact that millions of Americans, counts differ depending on where you look, but I believe one of the higher counts I've seen is about 19 million, Americans were given healthcare through the pandemic designation, specifically those on Medicaid. It's not quite clear what's going to happen to those individuals once the public health emergency ends. Congress, in it's most recent spending package, actually gave the state's authority in April to begin predetermining eligibility for many of these individuals, which puts the onus on the administration essentially to figure something out, to make sure that all these more vulnerable Americans don't lose their insurance at this time. Even if the emergency state ends, the pandemic will still be taking its toll on society, particularly the more marginalized among us.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Indeed. There's a difference between that legal designation and just the realities for human health. On the question of legal designation, though, what kinds of federal oversight, what kinds of related programs are now extended at least until April?

Ian Lopez: Well, one of them would be telehealth flexibilities. Now, Congress itself has actually extended that for the next two years as well, but it's not quite clear regulatory-wise what will happen after that period. There's been a significant change in terms of how Americans access their healthcare because of the pandemic. Telehealth has opened the doors for many Americans to get care they wouldn't have otherwise received.

One of the more immediate consequences would be the vaccine access for many Americans. As you may recall, earlier in the pandemic, numerous Americans were relying on some of the vaccine sites that were opened in more vulnerable areas. For many, those are the only ways people can access those medications. If we're still concerned about getting vaccine rates up, taking the public health emergency off the table leaves a big question mark about how many pharmacies, how many various places can be set up to distribute vaccines and other COVID treatments.

Melissa Harris-Perry: All right, y'all, we have to take a break. More of this conversation in just a moment.

We're back with Ian Lopez, Senior Health Reporter at Bloomberg Law, talking about the extension of the COVID-19 public health emergency.

When you're talking about distributing treatments and care, we're also in the midst of a national nursing shortage. Thousands of nurses across the country have also been protesting around working conditions in light of the pandemic. Talk to me about how this emergency order extension could affect nursing and nurses.

Ian Lopez: Sure. The emergency order essentially loosens some of the restrictions around staffing, particularly with the hiring of nurses and how different employees are distributed throughout the hospital structure. This has actually made it easier for many hospitals to staff up and offer beds to individuals during surges. Once the designation is off the table, it will complicate hiring and employment for a lot of these healthcare facilities. Right now we don't have a hospital shortage issue from what we can see, but whether that continues to be the case remains to be seen.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Talk to me a bit about what this extension might mean politically for President Biden.

Ian Lopez: Well, he's in a tough position, regardless of how this plays out in terms of whether the emergency is extended or not, because, on the one hand, he's for the last year, at least, we've had Republicans in Congress criticizing the President for continuing to extend the emergency as things begin to open up and cases ebbed and flowed throughout the past year. The major criticism being from the Republicans is that it's giving the presidents broad powers with funding and whatnot that he and the administration would otherwise not have. There's also been criticism from State Republican governors to a similar effect.

Now, on the other side of the equation, if the president does end the public health emergency in the not too distant future, there is the risk of criticism that he and the administration are not doing enough or not taking the pandemic seriously enough. In a way, he's in a tough spot either way this plays out.

One refrain I hear from policy experts specifically is that managing these sorts of situations is supposed to be a joint relationship between the administration and Congress. We've seen that play out in 2020 with the CARES Act, for example. Lawmakers came together, put out this massive package, got that out and were able to assuage some of the concerns going on at the moment. What we have now, though, is a very different story.

The most current Congress clearly, there was trouble electing a speaker of the House. From the RITA policy experts I've spoken with, things are pretty gridlocked on that front.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Ian Lopez is Senior Health Reporter at Bloomberg Law.

Ian, as always, thanks for joining us.

Ian Lopez: Thanks for having me. My pleasure.

[00:08:00] [END OF AUDIO]

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