Defense Production Act to ensure manufacturers can produce the ventilators needed to fight COVID-19

President Trump expanded his recent DPA order to support the emergency production of ventilators, of which hospitals face a shortage amid the COVID-19 crisis. Yahoo! Finance's Anjalee Khemlani joins The Final Round to discuss.

Video Transcript

MYLES UDLAND: All right. Let's go to Anjalee Khemlani now for a little bit more on what is happening with the coronavirus. And Anjalee, unfortunately, another day and another milestone in terms of the number of cases around the world that we need to discuss.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Yes, we do, Myles. Unfortunately, really in that span of that last hour, we have surpassed that 1 million mark of cases. This coming, as we know, with increased testing across the country and globally with more countries starting to report more cases. So that is where we are right now.

The World Health Organization did predict this happening this week. It has happened within a day of that prediction, including a surpassing of that 50,000 mark of global deaths, led by Italy at 13,000-- nearing 14,000, honestly-- and the US at more than 236,000 cases right now. As we know, New York being the epicenter with more than 93,000 cases, and really, you know, assuming that we're going to hit that surge somewhere in the next several weeks between a week or three is what Governor Cuomo said earlier today.

Meanwhile, we did also just get some news out of the White House that the president has signed and invoked an executive order for the Defense Production Act, enforcing suppliers of the ventilators that GE, Medtronic, and others are making in tandem with those car markers, Ford and General Motors, as we know, to make sure that the supplies are available. And so that is a really big step. I'm sure we'll be hearing more about that at the president's briefing later today. Myles.

MYLES UDLAND: All right, Anjalee Khemlani with the latest on the coronavirus outbreak.