Coronavirus latest: Tuesday, August 4

Regeneron announced findings that its vaccine cocktail used to treat coronavirus was successful in creating antibodies in animal subjects. Yahoo Finance’s Anjalee Khemlani breaks down the latest news about the coronavirus on The Final Round.

Video Transcript

SEANA SMITH: You know, it's interesting just in terms of what the investors have been able to shake off. And you mentioned the fact that we continue to see the rising number of coronavirus cases across the country, and I want to dig into a little bit more on that just in terms of the latest developments that we are getting on that front. As it stands right now, 152,000 deaths-- over 152,000 deaths, more than 4.7 million cases nationwide. But despite the jump in cases, it's interesting when you take into account the rhetoric that we've been getting from President Trump. President Trump insisting here that the virus is under control. He said that in an interview with Axios last night.

So for more on this, I want to bring in Anjalee Khemlani. And, Anjalee, I mean, this is interesting words that we've gotten from President Trump because I think many of the experts that we've been talking to here on the program on Yahoo Finance would disagree with what he has to say.

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: That's correct, Seana, not just the experts that we're talking to but his own health advisors and scientific team. Whether you're talking about Dr. Deborah Birx or Anthony Fauci, we've heard them both say that things are not OK right now. Dr. Birx over the weekend really frustrating Trump by saying that we are in a new phase and things are going to get worse. And Tony Fauci saying that, you know, the US didn't respond to this correctly in a interview yesterday with "JAMA," mentioning that, you know, the other parts of the world-- Europe, Asia-- were able to get things under control by doing a nearly 95% lockdown in some instances, and Trump responding to that by saying that there cannot be a total lockdown and it would, in fact, make things worse.

But we have health experts calling for that and saying that they're still lacks a national plan in the country, and that is why we find ourselves where we are today. And without any sort of a path forward, if you will, there is no really end in sight, some saying that this could be a recurring cycle for at least the next year. Meanwhile, we're seeing companies, you know, look at an opening of offices or voluntary work from home well into next year.

SEANA SMITH: Yeah, Anjalee, it's interesting here because a lot of that depends on the treatment and, of course, eventually a vaccine. And we get some encouraging headlines like we do today with respect to, I guess, just take Regeneron for example, the antibody drug that prevents and treats coronavirus, tested in animals. A good step here and positive results from that. So what is the next step in terms of what we could expect for treatment and then ultimately a vaccine?

ANJALEE KHEMLANI: Right. So those antibody treatments are the ones that really have the most hope. Experts are saying they're essentially a bridge between now and when a vaccine is available because they do have some of those blocking properties of the virus.

And so what we did see from Regeneron was the preclinical-- information about the preclinical data. We haven't seen, you know, all the details just yet. It hasn't been peer reviewed yet. And just a reminder that that is something that increasingly we need to be cognizant of.

And Eli Lilly, meanwhile, is starting a couple of trials for their antibody treatment. So a lot going on in that space, and that's been something that health experts have actually been focused on for a while, even though there was a lot of buzz about, you know, antivirals and such before. It seems like this is really where all the hope is for right now.

Meanwhile, we also know that Kodak-- you know, we're looking at how we are looking at increased production, the federal government's backing companies like Flow and Kodak to help produce a lot of these raw materials for drugs here in the country. Some questions arising about the trading and stocks of company executives right before the announcement of that 700 plus million dollar loan from the government. And so a lot of questions arising. The Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating, according to several reports, but details about that and whether or not there will be any wrongdoing eventually found remains to be seen. Seana.