November 17 coronavirus news

A county health department public health nurse performs a coronavirus test on November 13 in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Utah passed a new milestone in the coronavirus pandemic Tuesday, as its seven-day average of new Covid-19 cases topped 3,000 for the first time.

The state’s department of health announced 3,178 new cases, bringing the rolling one-week average to 3,056.

Utah’s case count for the pandemic is now 158,957, with 732 deaths. All 29 counties are listed as having a “very high rate” of coronavirus.

The Pfizer vaccine trial has reached its safety milestone and the company is preparing to file for emergency use authorization, Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla said Tuesday.

Pfizer announced on Nov. 9 that its coronavirus vaccine appears to be more than 90% effective, based on early data.

But the company did not yet have enough data to seek emergency use authorization from the US Food and Drug Administration, which said it also wanted at least two months of safety data on at least half of a vaccine trial’s volunteers starting from when they got their second immunization.

Bourla said they are not yet sure how durable the protection from their vaccine will be. The Pfizer vaccine uses a messenger RNA, or mRNA, platform to produce an immune response.

“With the mRNA technology, you can boost as soon as you want,” said Bourla. People can be given an additional dose of a vaccine once immunity wears off, referred to as a boost.

Bourla said that a boost, if needed, would likely require only one dose.

Medical personnel attend to a Covid-19 patient at an intensive care unit in Muret, France, on November 17.

France has become the first country in Europe to top two million confirmed cases of coronavirus, according to data from Johns Hopkins University and the French national health agency.

In a statement on Tuesday evening, the country’s health agency director Jerome Salomon confirmed that the cumulative number of coronavirus cases in France now stands at at least 2,036,755.

“This second wave, which we are all facing, is massive, deadly and is straining all of our caregivers and our health system as a whole,” he added.

While France has now registered the highest cumulative number of coronavirus cases in Europe overall, Salomon noted that the current coronavirus reproduction rate in France is now below one, while the daily number of new cases has declined in the last week.

“In recent days, the number of new cases has declined, redoubling efforts to regain control of the epidemic,” Salomon said, adding that public adherence to national coronavirus restrictions is now “beginning to bear fruit” in France.

“All collective efforts, respect for curfews and national confinement measures serve to explain this positive trend. It is by maintaining a very high level of vigilance and mobilization that we will be able to spend the end-of-year celebrations and the winter months in the safest conditions,” he added.

According to the latest data from the national health agency, a total of 33,139 coronavirus patients are currently in hospital – down by 327 since Monday – with 4,838 of those in intensive care.

A further 1,219 coronavirus patients have died since Monday, the national health agency added, bringing the total death toll in France to 46,273.

Production bottlenecks and other shortages could slow efforts to distribute coronavirus vaccines quickly to the American public, the US Government Accountability Office cautioned in a report released Tuesday. 

A GAO review of Operation Warp Speed found several chokepoints in the efforts to develop and distribute any vaccines that may win emergency use authorization from the US Food and Drug Administration. 

They include limited manufacturing capacity, the GAO said.

“Additionally, once bulk quantities of vaccines or therapeutics are produced, they must be sealed into sterile containers, such as vials or syringes, in a process known as fill-finish manufacturing. Experts from three pharmaceutical industry groups we interviewed said there is a shortage of facilities with capacity to handle fill-finish manufacturing, which could lead to production bottlenecks,” the agency added.

The pandemic itself also has disrupted the supply chain, the report found.

Plus, good staff can be hard to find: “The ability to hire and train personnel with the specialized skills needed to run vaccine manufacturing processes may be a challenge for even experienced manufacturers. For example, we heard from representatives at a Covid-19 vaccine manufacturing facility that filling open positions for mid- to upper management positions had been a challenge.”

The GAO said it had told the Health and Human Services Department, Department of Defense and other agencies about the problems it found.

“Through Operation Warp Speed, federal agencies and vaccine manufacturers said they are working together to mitigate these challenges,” it said.

The US Food and Drug Administration has called for a meeting of its vaccine advisory committee in three weeks to consider whether the agency should authorize two Covid-19 vaccines, according to a source familiar with the process. 

The FDA reached out last week to members of its Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee, a group of outside experts, asking them to hold Dec. 8, 9 and 10 for meetings, according to the source. 

The agency could make a decision at the end of the meeting on Dec. 10 about whether to issue emergency use authorizations for the vaccines, the source said. 

Two companies, Pfizer and Moderna, say they will soon apply to the FDA for authorization for their Covid-19 vaccines, both of which have shown in initial data to be more than 90% effective against Covid-19. 

“It will make sense that in all likelihood the FDA will consider both applications together,” the source said, considering that both vaccines use the same technology and appear to have very similar safety and efficacy results from their large-scale Phase 3 clinical trials. 

If the FDA authorizes the vaccines, they can then be immediately distributed to states, according to a presentation made last month at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

However, no one can be vaccinated until a CDC advisory committee reviews the data, recommends the vaccine, and says which groups will receive it first. 

If the FDA authorizes the vaccines, the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, an independent panel of experts, will meet within 24 to 48 hours, according to a CDC spokesperson. 

At that meeting, the committee will determine if everyone should get the vaccine, or if some people should be excluded. It will also decide which groups should get the vaccine first. 

“We have all been alerted on ACIP we should be very flexible with our calendars because it’s likely there won’t be a lot of advanced notice given for this meeting. It will be done very, very quickly,” said Dr. William Schaffner, a committee member. 

Once ACIP issues its recommendations, vaccinations can be given. 

The nation’s top infectious disease physician, Dr. Anthony Fauci, told CNN earlier this week the first vaccinations in the US could take place “towards the latter part of December.” 

States are currently working out the details of running vaccination clinics. The Pfizer vaccine is particularly complicated, since it must be stored at minus 75 degrees Celsius, and doctors’ offices and pharmacies typically do not have freezers that go that low. 

The first groups expected to receive the vaccine are health care workers, the elderly, essential works such as police officers, and those with underlying medical conditions. 

The National Football League and NFL Players Association announced 17 new confirmed positive Covid-19 tests among players and 35 new positive tests among other team personnel in the past week of testing.  

The numbers from the most recent testing window are comparable to the totals from the previous week, which saw 15 players and 41 team personnel test positive. The past two weeks have seen a marked increase in positive test results in the NFL, which the league’s Chief Medical Officer Dr. Allen Sills attributes to the increase in Covid-19 cases nationwide.  

The NFL and NFLPA have been monitoring Covid-19 testing results for 15 weeks this season with 40% of the positive cases among players and staff coming in just the past two weeks. 

In its annual forecast on travel and tourism, New York City’s tourism promotion agency predicts that the city will get only a third as many visitors in 2020 than it did in 2019 due to “uncertainty generated by the pandemic.”

NYC & Co. said the NYC travel industry started 2020 with a “very strong performance in January, February and early March,” but that the measures put in place to address the pandemic “put practically all leisure and most business travel on hold.”

“Given the uncertainty generated by the pandemic for economic recovery and consumer confidence in travel, the conservative outlook takes us to 2024 to top the 2019 benchmark,” the forecast said

NYC & Co. said the current level of visitors is 66% below 2019 levels. The international market fares far worse — down 80% compared to last year.

The group said it’s worth noting that international travel after Sept. 11, 2001 took four full years to recover.

“While the full recovery of global tourism will be gradual following the wide distribution of successful vaccines in 2021, we are bullish on New York City’s recovery and its enduring appeal to travelers. Given significant pent-up demand, we target regaining half our 2019 volume by end of 2021 and to be fully back three years from then,” said NYC & Co. President and CEO Fred Dixon.

Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine announced a statewide curfew today to help combat the spread of Covid-19 in the state.  

Starting Thursday, the curfew will be in effect from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. and will last for 21 days. It includes closing all retail establishments and asking everyone to be home by 10 p.m.

Hospitalizations throughout the state have increased over the past month.

The governor went on to describe the increase, saying that 1,000 people were hospitalized with the virus on Oct. 13. That number increased to 3,000 by Nov. 12. He said the number of hospitalizations now stands at 3,648. 

The number of patients in intensive care units also increased in the past month from 280 to 900, DeWine said. 

The Ohio Department of Health has reported a total of 312,443 coronavirus cases since March.  

Note: These numbers were released by the state’s public health agency, and may not line up exactly in real time with CNN’s database drawn from Johns Hopkins University and the Covid Tracking Project.

Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer defended North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and said he doesn’t have any regrets about his home state not acting sooner to institute mask mandates, adding that “North Dakotans are free people who love freedom.”

North Dakota remains the state with the most cases per 100,000 population, followed by South Dakota, according to recent state reports from the White House coronavirus task force. 

On Friday, Burgum announced a new measure requiring face coverings in indoor businesses and indoor public settings as well as outdoor public settings where physical distancing isn’t possible.

Asked Tuesday if he has regrets this wasn’t done earlier, Cramer said, “No, no.”

He stressed that his concern lies mostly with the economy and the effect that new restrictions might have on North Dakotans’ livelihoods.  

“I am hearing from dozens and dozens of restaurant owners, motel, hotel owners that are very concerned about their survival. So, that’s as big, if not a bigger concern for me, is the loss of jobs, the loss of businesses and small businesses and loss of an economy that’s going to be hard to rebuild if we don’t reopen it in an appropriate manner,” Cramer said.

Phoenix, Arizona, Mayor Kate Gallego has asked Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey to issue a statewide mask mandate, she tweeted today. 

Arizona is one of an ever-shrinking number of states without a statewide mask mandate. Ducey, however, has allowed individual communities to mandate mask wear. Scottsdale was the first to make masks mandatory starting on June 19. Other major municipalities with requirements include Phoenix, Tucson and Flagstaff.

Arizona, like almost every other state in the country, has seen a rise in Covid-19 cases in the last few weeks. The state has reported more than 2,000 new Covid-19 cases on seven different days in the last two weeks, the state’s Covid-19 dashboard showed.

The last time Arizona reported more than 3,000 new Covid-19 cases was July 31 and the highest ever daily new case count was 4,877 set on July 1.

Arizona has reported at least 279,896 cases of Covid-19 and 6,312 deaths since the pandemic began.

Vaccines do not work unless enough people get them, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Tuesday. 

Vaccine uptake will determine whether the country is free of the pandemic by next fall. 

“Whenever you talk about vaccines, there are two elements of it,” Fauci said during a New York Times DealBook virtual seminar.  

There is a challenge ahead, he said, due to hesitancy around getting vaccinated. Outreach needs to be done to make sure that the overwhelming majority of Americans get vaccinated, Fauci said, “because if we have an effective vaccine and 50% of the people don’t take it, you still have a considerable public health challenge.” 

It takes “a blanket of protection” to stop an outbreak, Fauci said. “So, you’re asking me what things are going to be like in the fall, I can tell you, that really depends on whether or not we get the majority of the people, the overwhelming majority of the people, vaccinated.” 

And a vaccine won’t mean an end to other measures, such as hand-washing, mask use and social distancing. 

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell testifies during a Senate Banking Committee hearing on September 24 in Washington, DC.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell doubled down on his remarks that the economy as we know it is over during a virtual appearance at the At the Bay Area Council Business Hall of Fame Awards Ceremony.

He also reiterated that people in lower-income jobs, and specific industries hadn’t recovered as much as others and that workers in the services industry might need more help going forward.

“The recovery is incomplete,” he said, warning of near-term risks surrounding the resurgence of Covid-19 infections. “We have a long way to go.”

Meanwhile, Powell said it wasn’t the right time to worry about the fiscal health of the United States. Rather, that should be an issue to address when unemployment is low and taxes are rolling in. “That’s the time to really focus,” he said.

Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds said Tuesday that hospitalizations have more than doubled since Nov. 1.

There are 1,510 people in the hospital with Covid-19, she said during a news conference. At the start of the month 14% of patients had Covid-19. Today, that number is 28%.  

Reynolds said hospitalizations have been climbing over the past two weeks “and in some cases have been significant.” 

The Iowa Department of Public Health reported 2,003 new cases of Covid-19 and a 17.1% positivity rate Tuesday, according to the Covid-19 dashboard. At least 2,025 people have died from the virus since the state began its reporting.  

Sen. Chuck Grassley speaks on Capitol Hill on October 14 in Washington, DC.

An aide to Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley won’t say who the person is that exposed the senator to Covid-19.  

The aide also said people who have been in contact with the senator have been “appropriately notified” about the potential exposure. 

Here’s a statement from Grassley aide Michael Zona:

Earlier today, the Iowa GOP senator announced in a statement that he had been exposed to Covid-19 and was quarantining.

The White House coronavirus task force has again ramped up its warnings to states in a weekly report as the pandemic continues to aggressively worsen, raising alarms on the potential impact of rising cases on hospitals. 

The language in the weekly reports, which offer the administration’s most unvarnished picture of the pandemic, has become progressively more dire in recent weeks, matching the severity of the current situation as the President himself remains silent on rising cases, focusing instead on positive vaccine developments in his only public event on the matter in a month last Friday. 

North Dakota remains the state with the most cases per 100,000 population, followed by South Dakota, then Iowa, Wyoming, Wisconsin, Nebraska, Illinois, Minnesota, Kansas, and Montana. Hawaii is the state with the fewest cases per 100,000 population. 

This week’s reports also included a comparison to Europe, which is experiencing, per the task force, “a fall surge similar to the USA.” Europe, however, is “showing early signs of improvement,” the reports said, citing mask requirements in public settings, with most European countries imposing fines for non-compliance, as well as “significant restrictions on gathering size.”

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told NPR’s Rachel Martin on Morning Edition Tuesday that his Thanksgiving is going to change significantly this year.

His three adult daughters, who live in separate parts of the country, got together and said that they did not want to put him, as an elderly person, at risk. Fauci is 79 years old. 

He and his wife will have a meal and Zoom with his daughters to spend time with them.

“I don’t like it that way, but I think they’re making a prudent decision in trying to protect their father and I’m proud of them for that,” he said. 

People shop at the Westfield Santa Anita mall on October 7 in Arcadia, California.

US retail sales grew at a slower pace than economists had predicted last month — prompting worries about a “difficult winter” with lower consumer spending before a recovery next year.

Retail sales increased by 0.3% to $553.3 billion on a seasonally adjusted basis in October, the Census Bureau reported on Tuesday. That’s below expectations of a 0.5% increase, and it’s down from a revised 1.6% in September.

Boosting that figure significantly were sales of cars and car parts. They have been buoyant since the summer and continued to increase at a faster rate last month, pushing the overall sales numbers up. Stripping out cars, retail sales increased only 0.2% in October.

Meanwhile non-store sales, such as online purchases, jumped 3.1%. Economists said that was probably largely due to Amazon’s Prime Day in mid-October. In-store sales declined further.

Sweden has recorded another 15,084 cases of Covid-19 since Friday, including 2,178 registered in the last 24 hours, according to official Health Agency data published on Tuesday.

This is a slight decrease in the number of cases recorded during the same period last week. 

There were 6,743 new cases recorded on Friday alone, the highest daily toll recorded since the start of the pandemic. 

A further 61 deaths have been recorded since then, taking the country’s total number of lives lost due to the pandemic to 6,225. 

In a reversal of its lax approach to the pandemic so far, the Swedish government on Monday announced plans to introduce a ban on public gatherings of more than eight people, including in bars and restaurants.

A German airlines Lufthana-owned cargo team is gearing up to push out the potential Pfizer coronavirus vaccine once it is approved. CNN went inside this pharmaceutical logistics hub in Germany, which is the biggest in Europe.

The timeline for transportation at this hub is quick.

“They come here, they want to spend as little time as possible in a place like this, and then get it out,” CNN’s Fred Pleitgen reported.

Once the approval comes, things can move quickly. However, there are logistical challenges.

Currently, the vaccine needs to be stored at about minus 75 degrees Celsius, which is about 50 degrees colder than any vaccine currently used in the United States. So the coronavirus vaccines will be transported in special cooling containers that can be cooled down to minus 105 degrees Fahrenheit by using big amounts of dried ice.

Here’s the challenge: The colder a vaccine needs to be stored, the more difficult it is to transport that vaccine. And the more dried ice you put in a container, the less space it will have for vaccines.

This cooling container setup also emits a lot of carbon dioxide, and too much of it in an airplane cabin can be dangerous for the crew. This puts another layer of limits on how much you can transport in a single round.

Take a look at the distribution facility and setup:

Navajo Nation President Jonathan Nez speaks with CNN on Tuesday, November 17.

The Navajo Nation, which spans parts of Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, has issued lockdown orders as coronavirus spreads in the area.

Jonathan Nez, the president of the Navajo Nation, said strict measures like this lockdown have helped the community avoid one of three pandemic waves.

He urged loved ones outside of the Navajo Nation not to visit the area as a way of curbing the spread of coronavirus.

“Stay local and stay safe. And that means, stay on the Navajo Nation. Our family and friends off the nation now is not the time to come home or visit. We’re all in this together,” he told CNN.

While it comes to vaccine development and possible distribution, Nez said indigenous people “have a seat at the table” with the incoming Biden-Harris administration.

“We are hoping — of course, you have to be hopeful for your people that we will be on the list of vaccine when it’s available,” he said.

Watch the interview:

Dr. Anthony Fauci on CNN's "Newsroom" on November 17.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, told CNN’s Jim Sciutto on Tuesday that, even as some sites close, schools should stay open as much as possible. 

But, Fauci said, in many cases, schools can be kept open safely.

 “The default position to be is try as best as possible to keep the schools open, but you’ve got to have not one size fits all, you’ve got to take a look at what is going on in the particular location where you’re at,” Fauci said. “But we should be trying to keep the children in school as safely as we possibly can.” 

One way to do that, he said, is getting resources to schools to allow, for example, hybrid schooling with some physical distancing or with some alternating of classes. 

“I don’t want to dictate that from here to the school, because I’m not there,” Fauci said, “but, do what you can to keep the children and the teachers safe, but try as best as possible to keep the schools open.” 

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Sen. Chuck Grassley walks in the Hart Senate Office Building in Washington, DC, on October 23.

Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley was exposed to Covid-19 and will immediately quarantine, according to an announcement from his office. 

Grassley issued the following statement: 

There have been at least 11,214,231 cases of coronavirus in the US and at least 247,356 people have died, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases. 

 So far today, Johns Hopkins has reported 11,251 new cases and 154 reported deaths. 

From left, on CNN's "New Day" on November 17: Dr. Michael LeBeau, president of the Bismarck region of Sanford Health in North Dakota and Dr. Nancy Babbitt, a family medicine physician at Creekside Medical in Rapid City, South Dakota.

North and South Dakota health officials say that doctors and nurses are struggling to keep up with the number of coronavirus patients. 

Dr. Nancy Babbitt, a family medicine physician at Creekside Medical in Rapid City, South Dakota, said that there are not enough nurses available to help Covid-19 patients use the bathroom. 

“When we look at the South Dakota Department of Health website, it does indicate that there are beds available and hospital capacity and ventilator capacity, but when I speak to physicians that work at the hospital and I speak to nurses that work at the hospital, they’re struggling because of staffing issues,” Babbitt said. 

There was a day last week where her county hit 88% positivity, Babbitt said.

“That is devastating for our community because it tells us that we are grossly under-testing. … It’s just still shocking to me how far into this we are and people are still complaining of not enough tests,” she said. 

Dr. Michael LeBeau, president of the Bismarck region of Sanford Health in North Dakota, said his facility has no ICU beds left. 

While administrators are working on different plans for the near future, it’s up to the public to help stop the spread, he said. 

Babbitt said she tries to “educate, educate, educate” patients who are still skeptical of the pandemic. South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem still maintains that she will not implement a mask mandate.

“I think our governor should acknowledge [she has] no experience with a viral pandemic. She’s not alone. Nobody did really. Go to the experts and lay out a plan associated with all of the information that we’ve been given and that we know. We have learned so much in the last six, seven months. There’s absolutely no reason why we shouldn’t be going to the experts for this advice,” Babbitt said. 

Watch:

Dr. Anthony Fauci on CNN's "Newsroom" on November 17.

The nation’s top infectious disease expert Dr. Anthony Fauci sais he will take the Covid-19 vaccine and will recommend it to his family once it is scrutinized and approved by the scientists at the Food and Drug administration.

He added:

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Dr. Anthony Fauci testifies at a hearing on September 23 in Washington, DC.

While it is OK to celebrate news about vaccine efficacy, it’s not a signal to pull back on public health measures, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said on Tuesday. 

Fauci said he had previously said that he would feel good if there was a vaccine that was 70 to 75% effective, which, combined with public health measures, could have had an impact on the outbreak. The Pfizer and Moderna vaccine candidates have a 90% and 94.5% efficacy, respectively.

“94.5% for this and more than 90% for the Pfizer candidate, to me, is a very, very important advance in our armamentarium of trying to stop this outbreak,” he said. 

However, vaccines won’t do it alone.  

“That’s the important point, this should not be a signal to pull back on the public health measures that we must continue to implement,” said Fauci.  

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A person walks past empty tables at a restaurant and bar in Pullman, Washington, on November 16.

The US has now recorded more than 100,000 daily infections for two weeks straight and on Monday reported more than 166,000 new cases. On the same day, another new high: more than 73,000 Covid-19 hospitalized patients nationwide, according to data from the COVID Tracking Project.

More state leaders have in the past week announced new restrictions in efforts of helping to slow the spread. Here’s a look at some of those measures:

These are the states with the highest number of Covid-19 cases, according to Johns Hopkins University:

UK charity Bloody Good Period is reporting a surge in the number of menstrual packs they have donated since the beginning of the pandemic.

The charity — which donates packs of menstrual products to refugees, food banks, staff at the UK’s National Health Service staff and homeless people — reports that it has given more than 54,000 packs of period products since March.

Usually, BGP donates 2,000 products a month, according to data from the organization. This year, the charity reported surging numbers came in April, May and June.

In April alone, 10,631 packs were distributed. This huge increase is partially because of stockpiling, among other factors.

BGP has focused its donations on groups that support asylum-seekers and refugees. To date, these groups have received 30% of the overall donations, according to the charity.

BGP is bracing for the situation to worsen, though.

A health care worker collects a swab sample for a Covid-19 test on October 29 in Mumbai, India.

Daily coronavirus infections fell in India to their lowest levels since mid-July on Tuesday, with 29,163 cases reported in 24 hours, bringing the total to 8,874,290, the Health Ministry said. 

While the number of cases decline nationwide, the Indian capital region of Delhi is experiencing a third wave and cases are at a “record high,” Rajesh Bhushan, secretary for the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, said at a press conference on Tuesday.

The government is responding to the surge in infections by increasing hospital beds, including intensive care beds, doubling testing to 100,000 to 120,000 per day, focusing on contact tracing and enforcing containment zones where required, Bhushan added.  

Delhi has nearly 4,000 so-called containment zones, areas identified as hotspots where strict lockdowns have been imposed.

President Donald Trump speaks in the Rose Garden of the White House on November 13.

President Donald Trump’s refusal to coordinate with President-elect Joe Biden on the critical Covid-19 vaccine is bringing a staggering possibility into clearer view: that an outgoing US commander in chief is actively working to sabotage his successor.

Trump’s denial of his election defeat, his lies about nonexistent mass coordinated voter fraud and his strangling of the rituals of transferring power between administrations are not just democracy-damaging aberrations.

Given the current national emergency, they threaten to cause practical fallout that could damage Biden’s incoming White House not just in a political sense. There are increasing concerns that Trump’s obstruction will slow and complicate the delivery of the vaccine that brings the tantalizing prospect of a return to normal life amid stunning news from trials showing doses are effective in stopping more than 90% of coronavirus infections.

The distribution operation will be a massively complex and historic public vaccination effort targeting hundreds of millions of Americans – many millions of whom have resisted following basic safety protocols like wearing masks because Trump has encouraged them not to. The inoculation campaign will require a high level of public trust and will involve sharp ethical debates among officials about who should get the vaccine first. The entire program could be damaged if it is politicized. But unless something changes, the Biden team may face the task of tackling those issues afresh, in a frantic catch-up operation.

Read more of Stephen Collinson’s analysis here:

Related article Analysis: Trump's transition sabotage threatens vaccine rollout

A patient in Seattle receives an injection on March 16 during a Moderna safety study for a potential coronavirus vaccine.

The World Health Organization’s chief scientist said Monday that she was encouraged by early results suggesting Moderna’s vaccine was nearly 95% effective, but that questions remain.

Moderna is the second vaccine in the US to have a stunningly high success rate. BioNTech and Pfizer announced last week that their jointly developed vaccine was more than 90% effective.

One of the major differences between the two vaccines is the temperature at which they must be stored, which will have a big impact on their distribution. Pfizer’s vaccine has to be kept at minus 75 degrees Celsius — or about minus 103 degrees Fahrenheit. Moderna’s vaccine can be kept at minus 20 degrees Celsius, which is about minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel speaks to the media on November 16 in Berlin.

The coronavirus situation in Germany remains “serious, even very serious,” Chancellor Angela Merkel said Tuesday, adding that restricting contact between people was one of the toughest decisions she has had to make in office.

Speaking at an economic forum hosted by the German daily newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung, Merkel warned that 2021 was going to be “demanding.”

The Chancellor also spoke about the vaccine jointly developed by German company BioNTech and American pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, which was shown to be more than 90% effective in early data released by the drugmakers last week. Merkel said she was happy to have vaccines that are making progress.

People walk along the Kaerntner Strasse pedestrian shopping zone in Vienna, Austria on November 16, the day before a strict nationwide lockdown came into effect.

People in Austria will be banned from leaving their houses apart from a few specific reasons as the country imposes stricter lockdown measures to curb the spread of Covid-19 from Tuesday.

Here’s what the restrictions mean:

The stricter lockdown measures are scheduled to run until December 6, according to the Interior Ministry.

Austria has reported more than 208,000 coronavirus cases, including 1,887 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.

South Australian Premier Steven Marshall speaks to the media during a Covid-19 briefing at the State Administration centre on November 17 in Adelaide, Australia.

Health authorities in Adelaide, South Australia have ordered 4,000 people into quarantine as the Australian state fights a new coronavirus outbreak.

South Australia reported five new coronavirus cases on Tuesday, bringing the total number of the latest cluster to 21. More than 6,000 tests were conducted Tuesday, according to the state’s Premier Steven Marshall.

The cases are all considered to be linked to a worker in a medi-hotel, where international arrivals into Adelaide are required to quarantine for 14 days.

The cluster broke South Australia’s seven-month run without local transmission.

There are currently 34 active cases in the state, including imported cases.

In this December 12, 2019 file photo, a 3-ounce serving of breast milk is ready to be shipped out to nearby hospitals from the Mountain West Mothers Milk Bank in Salt Lake City.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued revised guidance on Monday for women who are breastfeeding while they have suspected or confirmed Covid-19, saying breast milk is “not a likely source of infection.”

Previously, the CDC had said it was not known whether mothers could transmit the virus via breast milk.

In the latest guidance, the agency said a woman with suspected or confirmed Covid-19 should follow guidelines on home quarantine or isolation. The child being breastfed should be considered a close contact and be quarantined during the parent’s recommended period of home isolation and for 14 days thereafter.

The guidelines also suggest precautions while breastfeeding for those with suspected or confirmed Covid-19:

If the mother prefers not to breast feed or bottle feed their child while sick, the CDC said a healthy caregiver who is not at risk for severe illness from Covid-19 may feed expressed breast milk to the child.

If the child has suspected or confirmed Covid-19, the agency recommends mothers wear masks while breastfeeding and wash hands frequently.

A lab technician freezes packs of convalescent plasma donated by recovered Covid-19 patients for shipping to local hospitals at Inova Blood Services on April 22, in Dulles, Virginia.

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has warned against using blood from people who have received experimental vaccine shots when taking convalescent plasma to treat coronavirus patients.

The FDA also extended the enforcement discretion for its emergency use authorization (EUA) for convalescent plasma through the end of February. 

Some context: The agency issued an EUA in August for the use of blood plasma from people who have recovered from coronavirus infections to treat hospitalized patients with Covid-19. Their plasma is filled with antibodies against the virus and can kickstart a patient’s immune response – although the levels of antibodies and other immune compounds varies depending on the donor. 

The limbs of a lifeless body hang off a stretcher in a hospital ward as coronavirus patients battle for their lives just a few feet away. An elderly woman gasps for breath, her desperate panting a grim soundtrack to one of many disturbing cell-phone videos emerging from hospitals across Russia.

“This is how our nights look: horrifying,” says a male voice narrating the footage, given to CNN by a prominent opposition-linked Russian doctors’ union, “Doctors’ Alliance,” which says it was recorded in mid-October by a hospital staff member in Ulyanovsk, a city around 500 miles east of Moscow.

This grisly video is just one of several obtained by CNN that reveal appalling conditions inside overcrowded facilities. Some footage shows morgues with bodies, stripped naked, piled on top of each other on grimy floors, in scenes that look like war zones more than hospitals.

As Russia struggles to get the pandemic under control, the videos are one of several signs pointing to an actual death toll far higher than official figures suggest.

Russia says as of November 16 more than 33,000 people have died of Covid-19. But that number is disputed by critics who say the Kremlin is underreporting the numbers.

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CNN's Matthew Chance with Andrey Shkoda, the chief doctor of Krylatskoye field hospital in Moscow, in November 2020.

Related article How bad is Russia's Covid crisis? Packed morgues and excess deaths tell a darker story than official numbers suggest

The United States reported 166,045 new Covid-19 cases and 995 additional virus-related deaths on Monday, according to Johns Hopkins University.

The US has now recorded at least 11,202,980 cases, including 247,202 fatalities.

The totals include cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases. 

CNN is tracking US Covid-19 cases:

Visitors wearing face masks as a precaution against the coronavirus, sit on chairs while maintaining social distancing in Seoul, South Korea on Monday, November 16.

The Seoul Metropolitan Area will strengthen social distancing rules from Thursday, South Korea’s Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said, as the country reported more than 200 Covid-19 cases for a third consecutive day.

Health Minister Park Neung-hoo said at the same briefing that unlike previous waves of infections, recent trends show small but numerous clusters occurring in restaurants and gatherings.

The city’s social distancing measures have now been upgraded to level 1.5, the second highest of five levels. The new rules include:

At a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, President Moon Jae-in acknowledged the negative impact of these measures on small businesses, but urged the public to cooperate.

South Korea recorded 230 new Covid-19 cases for Monday, of which 137 cases were found in Seoul. The country has recorded a total of 28,998 cases and 494 deaths, according to the Health Ministry.

A sign warning non-residents to stay out of the Navajo Nation town of Tuba City during a 57-hour curfew, imposed to try to stop the spread of the Covid-19 virus through the Navajo Nation, in Arizona on May 24.

The Navajo Nation began a three-week “stay-at-home lockdown” period on Monday in response to a surge in coronavirus cases,

Residents are allowed to leave their homes only for emergencies and “essential activities” like shopping for groceries or working at an essential business. Those businesses must close each day at 3 p.m.

The Navajo Nation – which is located within parts of New Mexico, Arizona and Utah – announced 197 new Covid-19 cases on Monday. That raises the tribe’s total number of recorded infections to 13,596 since the pandemic began.

Last week, the Navajo Department of Health identified 34 communities with “uncontrolled spread.” Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) shows that across the US, Native Americans infected with Covid-19 are about 4.1 times more likely to be hospitalized than non-Hispanic White people. 

Read more about the Covid-19 hospitalizations here:

AUSTIN, TEXAS - AUGUST 07: EMS medics transport a man with possible Covid-19 symptoms to the hospital on August 07, 2020 in Austin, Texas. Nationwide the African American community continues to be disproportionally affected by the coronavirus pandemic. Austin-Travis County EMS has seen the number of new hospitalizations decrease, even as Covid-19 deaths continue. (Photo by John Moore/Getty Images)

Related article Covid-19 is sending Black, Latino and Native American people to the hospital at about 4 times the rate of others

Drugmaker Pfizer announced on Monday it would test distribution of its coronavirus vaccine candidate in four US states: Rhode Island, Texas, New Mexico, and Tennessee.

Pfizer said last week that preliminary data indicated its experimental vaccine is more than 90% effective in preventing symptomatic infections in people. The company still has to gather more data before it can apply to the US Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization for the vaccine.

Temperature testing: A key part of this testing will gauge how hard it is to deal with a product that has to be kept at temperatures well below the capacity of standard freezers.

State and local health officials, hospital representatives and others have expressed concern about the difficulty of distributing a fragile vaccine that needs constant, ultra-cold refrigeration. Careful records will also have to be kept, to ensure that everyone who gets the vaccine receives two doses, spaced three weeks apart.

The four states: “To build on our coordination with the relevant U.S. agencies, Pfizer launched this pilot program to help better support the states’ planning, deployment, and administration of the Covid-19 vaccine candidate,” the company said in a statement.

It did not say what, precisely, would happen in the pilot program but said it would learn from the scheme to help create plans for other states. 

The four states were selected because of their differences in size, population diversity, and their varied urban and rural settings, Pfizer said.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, emphasized on Monday that the vaccine development process is safe and transparent.

It is not possible to “sneak through” a vaccine that is not safe, Fauci told the American Medical Informatics Association 2020 Virtual Annual Symposium.

Just because Covid-19 vaccines have been developed quickly, it doesn’t mean safety and efficacy have been compromised, Fauci noted. 

Independent safety monitor: Data from the vaccine trials are analyzed by an independent data and safety monitoring board “who answer to no one, is not beholden to the administration. They’re not beholden to the company,” he said.

Some context: Moderna announced on Monday that its coronavirus vaccine is 94.5% effective against the virus. Last week, Pfizer announced that early data show its vaccine is more than 90% effective against the disease.

Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR) is testing a clerk robot in Osaka that detects if customers are not wearing masks.

A store in Japan’s Osaka prefecture is experimenting with a new “clerk robot” that can detect if a customer is not wearing a mask.

The robot is designed to move around the store and provide customer service such as guiding customers to products, according to a news release from the developer, Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR).

It also uses an attached camera to monitor customers for “unsuitable actions” like not wearing a mask or social distancing.

ATR developed the robot in November, and is testing it at J-League soccer club Cerezo Osaka’s mega store in Osaka.

The release added that robot development is essential for tasks because of labor shortages from a declining birthrate and ageing population in Japan.

“Demonstration experiments of a clerk robot that simultaneously provides customer service and alert service while moving in a small environment such as inside a store is the most advanced attempt in the world,” ATR said.

Japan reported 952 new Covid-19 cases on Monday after a run of seven consecutive days with more than 1,000 new infections. The nationwide total stands at 120,038. 

Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti urged residents to stay at home as much as possible for the next few weeks, as coronavirus cases surge across the county and California.

The county is currently seeing the highest daily case numbers since the middle of July, according to Garcetti. Infection rates are rising, and hospitalizations are increasing. 

“The situation in L.A. is more concerning than it’s ever been,” he added. “I don’t say this to scare you, I don’t say this to try to spin the numbers, it is just the truth.”

Coronavirus response: The county is expanding its testing sites and will be offering testing for passengers and employees at Los Angeles International Airport, where results can be expected within 24 hours. 

Travel during the holidays: Garcetti strongly urged residents to cancel any non-essential travel plans.

“If you don’t have essential travel, don’t travel,” he said. “If you don’t have to take a trip as an essential worker or because of a family emergency, don’t travel.”

A statewide travel advisory was issued on Friday asking all California residents to avoid non-essential travel to other states or countries. 

There are now more than 70,000 people hospitalized in the United States with Covid-19, according to the Covid Tracking Project.

On Monday, 73,014 people were hospitalized with Covid-19, according to CTP. This is the highest number of Covid-19 hospitalizations the nation has ever experienced, and is at least 10,000 more hospitalizations higher than its spring and summer peaks.

The US currently averages more than 3,500 new hospitalizations per day, CTP data shows.

According to CTP data, these are the highest hospitalization numbers:

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, said countries allowing the coronavirus to go “unchecked” are playing with fire. 

Tedros did not name any particular country, but said there will be further needless deaths and suffering, and there are a significant number of people who are experiencing long-term effects of the virus. Health workers are facing extreme mental health pressure and cases are burdening health systems severely in too many countries, Tedros said. 

He said that health workers went into medicine to save lives, and they must not be put in a position where they have to make impossible choices about who to care for. 

“We need to do everything we can to support health workers, keep schools open, protect the vulnerable and safeguard the economy,” Tedros said. 

“There is no excuse for inaction. My message is very clear: act fast, act now, act decisively,” Tedros said. “A laissez-faire attitude to the virus – not using the full range of tools available – leads to death, suffering and hurts livelihoods and economies.” 

The UK government has reached an “initial agreement” with pharmaceutical company Moderna to secure 5 million doses of their candidate vaccine, should it be approved by regulators, UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock announced Monday. 

Earlier on Monday, Moderna announced that early data shows that its vaccine is 94.5% effective against coronavirus, making it the second vaccine in the United States to have a stunningly high success rate.

The Moderna vaccine is 94.5% effective against coronavirus, according to early data released Monday by the company, making it the second vaccine in the United States to have a stunningly high success rate.

Moderna heard its results on a call Sunday afternoon with members of the Data Safety and Monitoring Board, an independent panel analyzing Moderna’s clinical trial data.

“It was one of the greatest moments in my life and my career. It is absolutely amazing to be able to develop this vaccine and see the ability to prevent symptomatic disease with such high efficacy,” said Dr. Tal Zacks, Moderna’s chief medical officer.

Vaccinations could begin in the second half of December, Fauci said. Vaccinations are expected to begin with high-risk groups and to be available for the rest of the population next spring.

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Moderna COVID-19 Vaccine Trial Underway in DeLand, Florida Tony Potts, a 69-year-old retiree living in Ormond Beach, receives his first injection as a participant in a Phase 3 COVID-19 vaccine clinical trial sponsored by Moderna at Accel Research Sites on August 4, 2020 in DeLand, Florida, US. Potts is one of 30,000 participants nationwide to be recruited for the Moderna trial who will receive two injections about a month apart and be monitored for two years. (Photo by Paul Hennessy/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Related article Moderna's coronavirus vaccine is 94.5% effective, according to company data