captioning sponsored by wnet >> sreenivasan: on this edition for sunday, february 21: weather-battered texans look for recovery from the historic storms; as covid-19 vaccinations expand, are children next? and in our signature segment: hope and caution after president biden's muslim ban reversal. next on “pbs newshour weekend.” >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. the anderson family fund. bernard and denise schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. barbara hope zuckerberg. the leonard and norma klorfine

foundation. the peter g. peterson and joan ganz cooney fund. we try to live in the moment, to not miss what's right in front ous. at mutual of america, we believe taking care of tomorrow can help you make the most of today. mutual of america financial group, retirement services and investments. >> for 25 years, consumer cellular has been offering no-contract wireless plans, designed to help people do more what they like. our u.s.-based customer service team can help find a plan that fits you. to learn more, visit www.consumercellular.tv. additional support has been provided by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the american people. and by contributions to your pbs statn from viewers like you. thank you. >> sreenivasan: good evening a thank you for joining us. nearly a week after a series of devastating winter storms hit

the southern u.s., millions of people are still struggling to get basic necessities. in texas, with many stores low on supplies, water distribution sites have sprung up around the state, providing at least some drinkable water to texans who have had service disrupted by the storms. >> i went and i got these, ten of them, and that's what we're living on. >> sreenivasan: the state of texas has asked for more than nine million bottles of water from federal partners like fema. as of yesterday, more than two million bottles had been distributed. >> not only are we driving water in, we're flying water in. we are bringing assistance through fema, which will help people who have damage to their pipes,specially if they're uninsured. >> sreenivasan: while power is restored for many texans, some are now seeing astronomical bills because of variable energy rates that skyrocketed during the storms. yesterday, texas governor greg abbott met with a bipartisan group of state legislators and said in a statement, “we have a responsibility to protect texans from spikes in their energy

bills that are a result of the severe winter weather and power outages.” in jackson, mississippi, almost the entire city is still without water after freezing weather led to broken water mains. officials there say service is not expected to come back until midweek at the earliest. across the entire region more than 70 deaths are now being blamed on extreme weather. the coronavirus pandemic is heading into itsecond year with vaccination programs expanding and some countries beginning to ease rtrictions. in great britain, officials announced a speed-up of vaccinations today. the goal now is to give every adult a first dose of coronavirus vaccine by july 31, a month earlier than its previous target. in israel, people headed out to malls as the country reopened sections of its economy today. government officials said a return to routine activities is possible now that almost half the population has received a covid-19 vaccination. israel is also issuing a certificate and app called a "green pass.”

it allows access to gyms and health facilities for those who have gotten both doses of the vaccine or recovered from the disease with presumed immunity. in the united states, the pace of vaccinations is rising. according to "the new york times," an average of more than 1.5 millions doses are being administered per day. while cases and deaths are declining, the country will soon reach a terrible death toll of half a million people. >> i mean, if you look at what-- what has gone on now and we're still not out of it, a half a million deaths, it's just, it's terrible. it is historic. we haven't sn anything even close to this for well over 100 years, since the 1918 pandemic of influenza. it's something that-- it's stunning when you look at the numbers. almost unbelievable, but it's true. >> sreenivasan: as covid-19 vaccinations continue to expand to new groups of people, there's also the question of when children can begin to get shots. dr. fauci recently said children

as young as first graders may be vaccinated by the start of school in september. "propublica" reporter caroline chen, who covers public health, joined me for more on what we know about children and covid-19. so, caroline, it is on the mind of every parent, but also employers who employ parents, on exactly when children will get the vaccine where we are we at in that process? >> at this very moment, the available vaccines are only approved for 16 and older. so, not very available for children. i asked dr. fauci this question of when the vaccine might be available for more children, when it might be authorized, and he said that he was hopeful that the vaccine might be authorized for children down to first graders by the time school started in september. authorized is one thing. so, let's start with that. what does that mean? that means the f.d.a. says it is greenlit for children. that is different from there being, first of all, enough

supply, and that it is administered. those are different balls of wax entirely. but authorization depends on there being data. so, then i have decided i would go and talk to manufacturs and see what clinical trials were in the works. and it really turns out that this really all entirely hangs on pfizer right now. and why is that? so, pfizer has already finished enrolling its trial from 12-15 year olds and is hoping to have data, they said,ou know, pretty soon. and if that goes well, they will then move downwards into 5-11 year olds. moderna, meanwhile, is still enrolling its adolescent trial. and then, if that goes well, again, they will move downwards to younger kids, but they said they don't expect their younger kids trial-- which goes as far down as six months-- they don't expect the data until 2022. so, for fauci's prediction to come true, we're going to have to rely on pfizer, sort of, hitting all its goals. >> sreenivasan: and even if you do hit all those goals, we are

still not at a point where everyone who wants a vaccine can get one, or at least it is not very easy to do so. adding in millions of schoolchildren, that dosage question, can pfizer or anybody else ramp up that fast? >> we just put out a graphic today that shows everything that's been promised based on public statements, contracts, news reports for pfizer, moderna and, presuming it gets authorized, j&j. so, actually, we should have enough doses to cover every single american by july based on supply. so, that should not be a problem. but again, for children, even if the supply is there for the regular dose, you can't just give them to the younger kids until it's proven to be safe and effective and we know the right dose to give to them. so, there are a number of pieces that need to fall into place in these trials before it's going to be available to the younger kids. >> sreenivasan: and what do we know about children and their

ability to either get sick or spread the virus? >> a lot of parents i've talked to have said, well, we know that the chance of the kid dying of covid is minuscule, so why would i even bother to vaccinate my kid? and i think that is a totally fair question. so, i actually went to a lot of pediatricians and said, best case scenario, the trial data is fantastic, it's proven to be safe, it's proven to be effective, would you advise parents vaccinate their kids? and i talked to three or four pediatricians who are infectious disease specialists and they all said yes for two different reasons. so, on an individual level, we know that fortunately the chances of dying is extremely low. they can still get very sick with what's called multisystem inflammatory disease in children, which is sort of mysterious at this point. we don't really fully understand it, but these kids can get very sick. so, there is that risk to individual children that we don't want them to go through. so, you want to protect your kid from that. and then second, if you think

from a population standpoint, so children, so this is 18 and under, are more than 20% of the u.s. population. so, at this point, if we want to reach herd immunity as the population, we want to end this pandemic, and also the fear of variants and this notion that every case gives the virus another chance to mutate. and i don't want to be an alarmist here at all, but the ediatricians did say, you know, we're lucky right now, that the fms of coronavirus we see are not particularly scary or dangerous to kids, but we don't want the to be this chance that the coronavirus evolves to be more harmful to kids. so, we want to end the pandemic, not gi the coronavirus a chance to mutate. and what we know about children is we think that they transmit less than adults do, but it's not that they cannot transmit. so, it is important for everybody who has a chance to get the vaccine to take the vaccine. so, again, if it's proven to be totally safe for kids, very,

very important that this be shown first, that they would recommend that every kid get the vaccine. >> sreenivasan: caroline chen of "propublica," thanks so much. >> thank you for having me. >> sreenivasan: for the latest national and international news visit pbs.org/newshour. >> sreenivasan: iran's top diplomat insisted today the u.s. must lift economic sanctions if it hopes to restart nuclear talks. appearing on iranian state-run tv, foreign minister javad zarif said even though the biden administration has formally offered to return to the 2015 deal, the islamic republic will not resume negotiations until sanctions imposed by the trump administration are lifted. >> once everyone implements their part of obligation then there will be talks. we are going to discuss how we can avoid and guarantee that the actions by the united states will not be repeated. >> sreenivasan: in one of the largest rallies to date, more than 100,000 farmers and farm workers assembled in india's

northern punjab state today to protest new farm laws. prime minister narendra modi's government introduced the new laws last september, setting off a firestorm of protests throughout the country. the government insists the laws will liberalize the farm sector. critics say the laws will concentrate power in the hands of a few large corporations. the modi government has pledged to delay implementation of the new laws, but farmers unions vowed to continue fighting until they are completely rolled back. organizers are calling for a larger demonstration outside of delhnext weekend. serbia's novak djokovic won his ninth australian open men's singles tennis championship today, defeating russia's daniil medvedev in straight sets, 7-5, 6-2, 6-2. it was the 18th grand slam win for the number one seed, and the third year in a row that he has won the title at melbourne park. fourth ranked medvedev, who wo his past twelve matches against top-10 opponents, was aiming for

his first major championship. djokovic is now only two grand slams behind roger federer and rafael nadal's 20 titles, in a race for the most major men's singles titles in a career. >> sreenivasan: it was a day of funerals, vigils and protests throughout myanmar today. outside the u.s. embassy in yangon, hundreds held a candlelight vigil for those killed in protests during the last 21 days. a procession of motorcycles and cars followed the hearse carrying the body of mya thwate thwate khaing. the 20-year-old protester died yesterday after being shot by the police on february 9. opposition to the february 1 military coup continued with huge crowds gathering throughout the country-- many holding photographs of jailed leader aung san suu kyi, and signs in english imploring the united natis to take action. for more on what's driving the protests in myanmar, and the military coup, i spoke with

rudabeh shahid, nonresident senior fellow at the atlantic council south asia center. i began by asking about the most recent demonstrations. >> at this point in time, what's happening is that in myanmar, a lot of people are without the internet from 1:00-9:00 a.m. and during that time, a lot of people are detained, including n.l.d. leaders, then a lot of, a lot of filmakers and civil rights activists. people have found very interesting ways to protest during the day when the internet comes back on. for example, they are blocking the roads and then they're banging pots. it's going on for the past few days. >> sreenivasan: who is deciding to stand up to the military junta? >> so, it's a very interesting situion. so, you know, it's-- at this point in time, we have all kinds

of people joining the protests who are not part of the military. so, any civilian. so, doctors, engineers, teachers. and this is kind of unprecedented. the military did not see this coming. the last time this happened, by the way, was in 1988. and this was a very big movement against the military dictatorship. and, obviously, that did not go well. and it was-- it was crushed very badly. but one thing that emerged from that movement was, you know, the n.l.d. and aung san suu kyi. so, maybe the youth of myanmar at this point, they're getting, you know, this opportunity to mobilize and they'll come up with another, you know, political party or at least another political movement that would be challenging the military.

and it seems like every activist and people who were not even, you know, part of politics remotely, they are all joining these protests. so, it's a very interesting situation that we have at this point in time. >> sreenivasan: one of the populations that a lot of us focused on a year and a half ago or so were the rohingya and what was happening to them as they were being expelled, as they were crossing the border into bangladesh. i know you've visited some of the camps where they live now. what is their status as the country goes through this upheaval? >> it's a very interesting situation now. so, the rohingya, as we know, they're originally from this western state in myanmar called rakhine. about 1.1-- 1 million people, rohingya are in bangladesh, and of them, 700,000 came in 2017 with the military crackdown in

the rakhine province. however, there are a few rohingya still remaining in the rakhine province, about half a million. >> sreenivasan: do they feel like if aung san suu kyi is released, if she is able to take power, that their plight will improve? >> initially, when she ran for office, the rohingya were overwhelmingly supportive of, of the n.l.d., her party. but that was very disappointing, because this genocide that happened in 2017 was under the n.l.d., if we look at it that way. but the problem at this point in time is that it's not like the military dictatorship is better in a sense. and there was some kind of a power sharing for the longest time even, you know, with the restoration of democracy.

so, in a sense, the-- not just the rohingya, but all the ethnic minorities in burma are very supportive of democracy. and they were the people who suffered the most under the military dictatorship of about half a century. they're very cautious, i guess, but, you know of aung san suu kyi at this point in time, but that's probably the best bet that they have. >> sreenivasan: rudabeh shahid, the nonresident senior fellow at the south asian center at the atlantic council. thanks so much for joining us. >> thank you, hari. >> sreenivasan: on his first day in office, president biden issuedn executive order rescinding tru-era travel restrictions on majority-muslim and african countries known as the muslim travel bans. immigration advocates praised the reversal of what they saw as discriminatory policies. but as newshour weekend's ivette

feliciano reports, they now say biden policies must go further, and that their work is far from over. >> reporter: in january of 2017, sarvin hahghighi, was gearing up to head back to her home in chicago, illinois, after visiting family members in australia. but two days before her flight, she got the news that in his first executive order, donald trump had banned foreign nationals from seven predominantly muslim countries from visiting the u.s. for 90 days. hahghighi was not a u.s. citizen, and her native country of iran was on the list. >> i cannot tell you the feeling, just this feeling of not knowing what's going to happen... the feeling that you're not welcome to go back home to your husband and to your friends. >> reporter: hahghighi moved to the u.s. in 2013, and had a u.s. green card when the ban was implemented in 2017. nevertheless, her lawyer warned

her that in the immediate aftermath of the executive order, there was chaos at u.s. airports, with many travelers being detained, despite possessing visas and green cards. she waited for another week before flying home, and canceled her layover in texas. >> i wanted to land in chicago. just in case something happens i wanted to have access to my lawyer. >> reporter: the stress of the situation took its toll. >> after that, once i got back here, i had to do therapy for a few sessions because i didn't sleep or really eat. you know, at some point we were even disssing to move to canada and it was just heartbreaking. >> reporter: as a u.s. citizen herself, libyan-american anwar omeish was more worried about her family living under threat in libya, ich was in the midst of a civil war. >> conditions in libya were-- have been so unstable, and so it was almost like a, like a double strike, right.

where it's like, on the one hand, we can't see them, and that's sad enough. and on the other hand, we cat even offer them safety if they need it. one of my cousins, like, wasn't able to come back for her, for school. and she was one of the people who was turned back at the airport. >> reporter: omeish protested in boston, where she lives, and at the capitol building in washington, d.c., demanding an end to the so-called muslim ban. >> it was a very scary and difficult time. you know, i'm, like, a visibly muslim woman. i grew up after 9/11. i am not a stranger to islamophobia and feeling unsafe or uncomfortable in a lot of spaces, but i would say the fact that that was validated at the highest levels in that period was definitely-- was scary. >> reporter: aarti kohli is executive director of the civil rights organization asian americans advancing justice: asian law caucus.

it is a core member of the "no muslim ban ever campaign," a coalition of more than 100 organizations that formed in the weeks following trump's executive order. >> many people come here for the freedoms that america, you know, espouses, right-- the freedom of religion, that you will be judged as an individual, not by your ethnicity or race. for muslim and immigrant communities, this was a political awakening. >> reporter: a cascade of grassroots activism and lawsuits led to several blocks of the ban by federal court judges. that was followed by department of justice appeals, and multiple iterations of the ban. then, in 2018, the supreme court upheld a third-version of the ban. it largely restricted citizens of predominantly muslim and african countries from emigrati to the united states, and barred them from working, studying or vacationing here.

>> thousands of people have been impacted for four years and have been suffering these consequences. >> reporter: in 2018, the state department reported an 80% drop in visas for citizens of the five countries consistently on the travel ban list, including iran and libya, compared to 2016, when no ban was in place. in 2018, five years after starting the naturalization process, sarvin hahghighi obtained her u.s. citizehip. but under the new restrictions, her elderly parents, back in iran, weren't able to come visit her in chicago. in 2019, she gave birth to her first baby in australia, so that her parents could join her, and meet their grandchild. >> every time that i talk about it, i just think about all these months that my parents could be here with my son and the fact that my son cannot really experience the love of his grandparents up close and personal, that-- that's something that i can never, you

know, get back. >> reporter: back in december, members of the no muslim ban ever campaign met with president biden's transition team, outlining specific steps they want the administrion to take in the coming mont, such as expediting the denied visa applications from people in the countries impacted by the bans under the trump administration. >> they applied, they paid fees. we asked them to ensure thhe state department would identify those people and create a process that was accessible so that those people could continue their visa application. >> reporter: kohli is hopeful about the biden administration's response. biden included a "no ban act" in the u.s. citizenship act of 2021 unveiled in congress last thursday. if passed, the act would prevent any future administration from imposing similar bans to the one imposed by donald trump. for anwar omeish a sarvin

hahghighi, a "no baact" would be just one step toward healing a wounded relationship between the u.s. and it's muslim community. >> for me, and like a lot of other immigrant families and advocates, like, this is the baseline. like, we really want to be doing better than this. undoing what trump did is not necessarily progress. it's just fixing the regress. >> it doesn't matter that now, we have a president that is standing with us and supporting us. but what if what if somebody like trump comes back again? we need to make sure that we have the right policies in place. that's when we can have the united states of america, because no matter where you're from, what religion you follow, what color your skin is, you all can live together. >> sreenivasan: that's all for this edition of “pbs newshour weekend.” for the latest news updates

visit pbs.org/newshour. i'm hari sreenivasan. thanks for watching. stay healthy and have a good night. captioning sponsored by wnet captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org >> pbs newshour weekend is made possible by: sue and edgar wachenheim iii. the anderson family fund. bernard and denise schwartz. the cheryl and philip milstein family. barbara hope zuckerberg. the leonard and norma klorfine

foundation. the peter g. peterson and joan ganz cooney fund. we try to live in the moment, to not ms what's right in front of us. at mutual of america, we believe taking care of tomorrow can help you make the most of today. mutual of america financial group, retirement services and investments. additional support has been provided by: consumer cellular. and by: and by the corporation for public broadcasting, a private corporation funded by the american people. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. you're watching pbs.

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