November 23 coronavirus news

The number of Covid-19 cases in the United States could reach 20 million by Inauguration Day on Jan. 20, according to a new coronavirus modeling forecast from Washington University in St. Louis.

The model, published in the journal Nature Scientific Reports on Monday, looked at coronavirus case numbers and mobility data.

The model projected that if current social distancing measures are at a 60% return to normalcy compared to pre-pandemic levels, the US will likely reach 20 million cases before the end of January.

The importance of social distancing: Greater social distancing efforts could reduce the number of new cases even further, although the efforts vary widely across the country, the researchers noted.

If the US returned to the level of social distancing in April, Thomadsen predicted the spread of Covid-19 could be “effectively squashed.”

But this is probably a conservative estimate, the team said, because their model assumes only 10% of coronavirus cases are ever diagnosed.

“However, more recently, testing has increased, and probably more like 25% of cases are diagnosed,” model co-developer Song Yao said in a statement. “In that case, total COVID cases would increase beyond 20 million in the next few months unless we, as a society, engage in more social distancing.”

The researchers also predicted the holiday season will create “a great deal of uncertainty” in the model because people will travel more at the end of the year.??

Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Dr. Anthony Fauci said Monday he disagrees with “well-meaning governors” who plan on performing state-level safety reviews of coronavirus vaccines after they are authorized by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo has said that New York health officials will review a coronavirus vaccine after it is approved by the FDA to ensure its safety.

Fauci told PBS NewsHour’s Judy Woodruff he understands that governors want to protect their citizens, but with the mixed signals coming out of Washington, they’re missing something important about the vaccine approval process.?

Fauci said he wants everyone to understand there is no political pressure affecting the vaccine approval process.

“I?hope that they would then realize that that’s good enough,” he said.

Fauci added that if everything goes well, vaccinations will likely begin in December and the US will be able to start vaccinating the broader population “in earnest” in April and May.??

This aerial view shows people waiting in line in their cars at a Covid-19 testing site at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, California, Nov. 18.

Los Angeles?County?reported 6,124 new Covid-19 cases Monday, its highest single-day jump in infections since the start of the pandemic.?

Hospitalizations have increased more than 50% in just one week, according to Garcetti. “At this rate, our hospitals won’t have any spare beds by Christmas,” he said.

While Monday’s case numbers included a backlog of about 1,500 cases from over the weekend,?the surge is expected to trigger?new restrictions later?this week.

Los Angeles?County?Health Director Barbara Ferrer said county officials are preparing to announce a?“targeted safer-at-home order” this week?that would only allow residents to leave their homes for essential work and services for a three-week period.?

The measures come after the county surpassed a daily average of more than 4,500 cases over a five-day period.

Some context: The county already tightened restrictions on Sunday, after its five-day average number of new infections surpassed 4,000. They include:

Los Angeles County health officials and the county’s Board of Supervisors will deliberate and decide on additional closures at a board meeting Tuesday.?Ferrer said the current surge in Los Angeles is “alarming” and “much steeper” than the increase in cases seen in June and July.?

The state of Colorado announced Monday it will participate in a dress rehearsal for the federal government’s coronavirus distribution plan.

The Colorado State Joint Information Center said in a news release that the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and Operation Warp Speed (OWS) have chosen the state to participate in “a pilot run of the end-to-end logistics readiness test” for Covid-19 vaccine distribution.

Colorado has confirmed a total of 192,943 Covid-19 cases, with 2,456 deaths.

According to Colorado’s Covid-19 dashboard, the state’s test positivity rate is 11.07%, and the seven-day moving average of new hospitalizations is 239.?

Note: These numbers were released by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment and may not line up exactly in real time with CNN’s database drawn from Johns Hopkins University and the Covid Tracking Project

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has asked members of its vaccine advisory committee to reserve Dec. 17 and 18 for meetings, presumably to discuss a coronavirus vaccine being developed by Moderna, according to a source familiar with the process.?

The FDA consults with its Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee before allowing any vaccine – including a coronavirus vaccine – to go on the market.?

On Sunday, Moncef Slaoui, the head of Operation Warp Speed, mentioned a Dec. 17 FDA review for Moderna’s Covid-19 vaccine. Last week, the pharmaceutical company announced that initial data shows its vaccine is 94.5% effective against Covid-19.??

The FDA has called a meeting of the committee for Dec. 10 to consider Pfizer’s application for emergency use authorization for the vaccine it has developed with its partner BioNTech. Pfizer?says its vaccine is 95% effective against Covid-19.?

Moderna is awaiting more data on study participants who became ill with coronavirus and could apply to the FDA for emergency use authorization in the next week, according to a Moderna spokesman.?

Travellers exit Heathrow Airport Terminal 2 on August 22, 2020 in London, England.

Starting Dec. 15, England will introduce a new coronavirus testing strategy for passengers arriving from a “non-exempt” country where passengers will only have to self-isolate for five days, Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said Tuesday.

In a statement, the Department for Transport said the plan would replace the existing rules that require passengers to self-isolate for 14 days. On completion of the new five-day isolation, passengers will need to show a receipt of a negative coronavirus test in order to be declared coronavirus-free.

“Our new testing strategy will allow us to travel more freely, see loved ones and drive international business. By giving people the choice to test on day five, we are also supporting the travel industry as it continues to rebuild out of the pandemic.”

The statement also said that under the plan, passengers arriving by plane, ferry or train should book their test before they travel and must complete a passenger locator form.

British Health Secretary Matt Hancock said the coronavirus test of the isolation period would identify positive coronavirus cases and allow those who test negative to return to work.

“This will be done at the cost of the traveller to protect the capacity of NHS Test and Trace and ensure that any UK resident who has symptoms is able to get a test,” Hancock said in the statement.

The Transport Department told CNN that the first day of passenger isolation would take place on arrival to England.

Americans need to be prepared for the possibility that they may feel a little unwell after they get a coronavirus vaccine, if one is authorized, members of a US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advisory committee said Monday.

The CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices met to discuss whether to recommend use of any Covid-19 vaccine that the US Food and Drug Administration might authorize.

Volunteers in vaccine trials have reported they frequently feel flu-like effects after getting vaccinated, and members of the ACIP – as well as liaison representatives who take part in the discussion – said that could affect people’s willingness to get vaccinated in the first place, or to get the second dose of the two-vaccine regimen.

The whole point of vaccination is to cause an immune response in the body and that can sometimes cause flu-like symptoms such as body aches, or even fever and a headache.

Read the full story:

Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine vials.

Related article People need to be told they may feel sick after getting Covid-19 vaccine, CDC committee says

Millions of Americans are traveling for Thanksgiving this week and Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Monday that he is worried.

“What most concerns me now is, you know, the immediate situation with people traveling from different places, coming home for Thanksgiving,” Fauci said during an interview with the PBS Newshour.

Fauci said he has other worries, too.

Numbers of cases, hospitalizations and deaths are all growing,?Fauci pointed out.?“Superimpose upon that that as we get further into the late fall and early winter with the weather being colder, forcing more people throughout most regions of the country to do things indoors more than outdoors — this is something that, you know, at obviously at face value is a very, very challenging situation,” he said.

The infectious disease expert said people who have decided to travel this week “are putting themselves and their families at risk.”

Much of the time, people who are infected with Covid-19 but have no symptoms and are responsible for community spread, Fauci said.

“So what we ask people to do is to at least, stop for a moment and do what I call a risk benefit assessment of what you want to do in the holiday, what you want to do for the season where you bring people in your home,” he said.

If you have elderly people in your home or individuals with underlying health conditions, Fauci suggested, you should really weigh hosting a celebration this year.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last week advised Americans not to travel for Thanksgiving this year because of the surging pandemic.

There were more than 144,000 new cases of Covid-19 reported among children in the week ending Nov. 19 – marking the highest weekly increase since the pandemic began, according to an update Monday from the American Academy of Pediatrics.

Children now account for more than 11% of all confirmed coronavirus cases in the US. There has been a 28% increase in child Covid-19 cases over two weeks.

The AAP said 144,145 new cases among children 17 and under were reported from Nov. 5 to 19. The group, which represents pediatricians, says nearly 1.2 million children have been infected in the US as of Nov. 19. According to Johns Hopkins University, more than 12.2 million Americans have been infected with the novel coronavirus.

Severe illness and death from Covid-19 are still rare among children. As of Nov. 19, children represented between 1.2% and 3.1% of total hospitalizations, depending on the state. Between 0.2% and 5.6% of all child Covid-19 cases resulted in hospitalizations in states that reported that information, and fewer than 0.14% of all children with Covid-19 died. Seventeen states reported no child deaths.

The count is not complete, because not all states report data the same way. These numbers come from 49 states, New York City, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Guam. A smaller subset of states report information about hospitalizations and deaths by age.

The AAP says there is an “urgent need” to collect more data on longer-term impacts on children, including the ways in which the virus may hurt children physically and emotionally long-term.

An unoccupied hospital bed is seen in a Covid-19 unit at Providence Holy Cross Medical Center in the Mission Hills section of Los Angeles, California on November 19.

California continues to see unprecedented spread of the coronavirus with hospitalizations surging 77% and intensive care admissions swelling by 55% over the past two weeks, Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Monday.

California added 8,837 new coronavirus cases to start the week, well below the state’s seven-day average of 11,591. New case counts are typically lower on Monday because of reporting lags over the weekend.?

People between the ages of?18-49 account for about 60% of all cases, according to data provided by Newsom, and the 14-day positivity rate stands at 5.8%. About 265,000 tests were conducted in the state on Saturday, higher than the average of 198,000.

California has millions of personal protective equipment supplies at the ready and has 11 surge facilities available which can add nearly 2,000 beds within a matter of a few days, Newsom said.

While calling the latest vaccine news “encouraging,” Newsom cautioned mass vaccinations are not expected in California until next spring or summer.

Instead, Newsom suggested widespread vaccinations will start ramping up in March through July. California has a strong vaccine network already in place and Newsom anticipates the Covid vaccine will be distributed along that same framework.

“Current planning for Phase 1a (is) well on the way,” Newsom said, adding that Phase Two of the vaccine plan will likely come about in January.

Delivering his comments remotely from home where he is quarantining with his family following a recent Covid-19 exposure, Newsom said, “I feel perfectly healthy,” though he seemed to have a somewhat raspy voice, and coughed a couple of times. He quickly acknowledged the coughs and blamed tea getting caught in his throat “and nothing more.”

A California Highway Patrol officer who was infected with Covid-19 had close contact with three of Newsom’s four children, the governor revealed over the weekend. Everyone in the household has been tested, he said. Each has tested negative. Additionally, a classmate of one of the governor’s children has been infected and the school has “paused” its in-person teaching.

“Being quarantined with children is challenging,” Newsom said expressing empathy to those who have found themselves in the same position. Newsom and his family have been officially under quarantine since Sunday.

Note: These numbers were released by the California Department of Public Health and may not line up exactly in real time with CNN’s database drawn from Johns Hopkins University and the?Covid Tracking Project.?

Experts meeting to decide who should be first in line for any eventual coronavirus vaccine debated Monday whether it would be worthwhile to vaccinate frail residents of nursing homes and other long-term care facilities first.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices discussed a draft plan for any coronavirus vaccine that would divide the first group to be vaccinated into three subgroups.?

There’s little disagreement that frontline health care workers should be in the first group – 1a. At issue is whether residents of long-term care facilities should be in this group, as well.

There’s no question it’s a highly vulnerable population.

Plus, it’s a group that would be easier to reach if the staff caring for them are already being immunized in the first phase of any vaccine that might get emergency authorization from the US Food and Drug Administration.?

But ACIP member Dr. Helen Keipp Talbot worried that this frail group might do poorly in general and damage faith in the vaccine.?

“There is such a high mortality rate in long-term care facilities,” Talbot told the meeting. “There will be a number of patients who receive immunizations for Covid and will pass away. And it will most likely be regardless of the vaccine,” Talbot said.?

“But early on as we’re building confidence, we will not be able to show any data to say that it was not due to the vaccine because there’s not been a randomized, controlled trial. And I think we’re going to have a very striking backlash of, ‘My grandmother got the vaccine and she passed away,’ and they’re not likely to be related, but that will become remembered and break some of the confidence in the vaccine.”

But others did not think that putting these residents further back in the line would help.

Dr. Paul Hunter of the Milwaukee Health Department said it would be inefficient to vaccinate health care workers in the facilities but skip residents. “Why not vaccinate people that, you know, you’ve got it all set up and ready to go?” he asked. “It’s an efficiency to vaccinate a bunch of people who could benefit from it.”

The ACIP will not make a decision Monday.

A nurse is seen at the Hackley Community Care Covid-19 curbside testing site in Muskegon Heights, Michigan on November 13.

Michigan reported 11,511 new Covid-19 cases and 65 deaths since Saturday, according to the state’s Department of Health and Human Services.

The state’s total case count is now 314,216, with 8,543 deaths.

Michigan set a record for a single-day increase in Covid-19 cases on Friday, with 9,779 cases. That broke a record set only on Nov. 13.

Deputy Defense Secretary David Norquist is reviewing a draft plan on how the Defense Department will prioritize the distribution of Covid-19 vaccines to key military and civilian personnel according to a defense official.?

Overall vaccination priorities in the military will begin with those that are the most “mission essential,” the official said.

It is expected that military and civilian medical personnel will be among the first to receive the vaccination within the Defense Department.?

An additional top priority will be those in involved in highly unique, high priority specialties such as nuclear weapons and special operations teams.

One complicating factor will be vaccines that require a two-shot dose. Because military personnel often move around, it will have to be decided to what extent any deployments will be halted while the multi-shot regimen is complete the official said.

Also to be decided is at what point new recruits will be vaccinated in order to ensure a steady flow of healthy personnel into the military ranks.

The New York Stock Exchange is seen in New York on Monday, November 23.

US stocks finished solidly higher Monday on growing optimism about vaccines that will allow the economy to reopen next year.

Here’s how the market did on Monday:

Some more context: The rally comes after AstraZeneca announced its experimental coronavirus vaccine showed an average efficacy rate of 70%.?

Investors also cheered signs that the US economy is withstanding the latest Covid-19 surge. A new survey released Monday indicates US business activity grew at the fastest pace in more than five years, led by an acceleration in manufacturing.??

Oil-and-gas stocks rose sharply, with the energy sector surging 7%. Occidental Petroleum, Apache and Diamondback Energy all rallied double-digit percentages.

Holly Yoder pours a beer for a customer at the Sly Fox Taphouse in Wyomissing, Pennsylvania, in July.

Pennsylvania will suspend the sale of alcohol at restaurants and bars the night before Thanksgiving, Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine announced on Monday.

The suspension will be in effect?from 5 p.m. ET Nov. 25 until 8 a.m. ET Nov. 26 , Levine said.

The state reported that there were 7,075 new cases of Covid-19 on Saturday, and 4,762 on Sunday, with 41 and 28 deaths respectively.

There are 3,379 Pennsylvanians hospitalized with coronavirus, with 775 of those in intensive care units. The state’s seven-day positivity rate from Nov. 13 through Nov. 19 was 11.1 percent, according to Levine.

“Transmission of Covid-19 is reaching new heights that we have not yet encountered,” Levine said.

Levine and Wolf also announced a new stay-at-home advisory for residents?starting Monday, though they took pains to clarify that it was a not a not shut-down order.

Indoor dining remains at 25 to 50%, while retail can continue at 75%, Levine said. Gyms, salons and other personal care businesses can continue to operate at 50%.

Beginning Nov. 27, businesses must allow employees to work from home.?Large gatherings are reduced, with prohibitions against events with more than 500 people indoors or 2,500 outdoors, according to Levine.

Staff were on hand to guide and help people through the new saliva COVID-19 testing site at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport on November 12.

New Covid-19 cases are spiking across most of the US. Here are the latest updates from some of the states in the midwest.

Illinois

Kansas

Minnesota

One thing to note: These?numbers?were released by?the states’ public?health?agencies and may not line up exactly in real time with CNN’s database drawn from Johns Hopkins University and the?Covid?Tracking?Project.?

Regeneron scientists work on an antibody therapy at a facility in New York on October 2.

US Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said that distribution of Regeneron’s Covid-19 antibody therapy will begin Tuesday.

The therapy has been given an emergency use authorization by the US Food and Drug Administration to be used in patients age 12 and older who have a mild to moderate case of Covid-19 and who are at a high risk of progressing to a more severe form of the disease.

President Donald Trump received the therapy, called REGEN-COV2, when he was?hospitalized?for coronavirus. The treatment has to be infused into the bloodstream and is meant to mimic an immune response to infection.

Azar said there will be 30,000 doses of the Regeneron treatment ready to go out Tuesday, with more to come in the next few weeks.

Americans won’t be charged for the drug itself, Azar said. HHS is working with payers to cover the cost of the administration of the drug.

Azar also called the emergency use authorization of Regeneron’s treatment “incredibly exciting news.”

There is also an Eli Lilly antibody treatment being used under an emergency use authorization that helps patients with mild to moderate forms of Covid-19. In the last two weeks, more than 85,000 patient courses of the Lilly product have been delivered to more than 2,400 sites around the country, Azar said.

Azar added that while there has been good news about vaccines and antibody treatments lately, Americans still need to remain vigilant to prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus.

“Encouraging news about vaccines and therapeutics should be all the more reason for Americans to double down on the measures like masks, hand washing and social distancing, that we need to beat this pandemic,” Azar said.

He also encouraged those who are within three months of recovery from Covid-19 to donate their plasma to provide convalescent plasma treatments to Covid-19 patients.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said he doesn’t necessarily agree with states – such as New York and California – reviewing Covid-19 vaccine data for safety and efficacy on their own.

Fauci added that the nation’s review process for vaccine development remains thorough.

?“The process really is a sound process,” he said.

“Hopefully, I can appeal to them to say, yes, you can look at the data – but everybody should be looking at the data, there’s nothing wrong with that — but trust the process,” he said about the states. “Because it’s a sound process.”

A percentage of people who recover from Covid-19 experience a set of symptoms – a post Covid syndrome – that is raising concern, Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said during a live video interview with The Washington Post national political reporter Robert Costa on Monday.

For people who get seriously ill and are in an ICU intubated on ventilation, “even if it isn’t Covid-19, anyone that goes through that is not going to feel perfectly normal for a considerable period of time,” Fauci said.

“But there’s something else that’s going on with Covid-19,” he continued.

Even in people who haven’t necessarily had serious disease, Fauci said that they are finding anywhere from 20% to maybe 30% of people who have had symptomatic disease “have what’s called a post-Covid syndrome.” The exact percentage isn’t known yet, but a larger cohort study is being done, he said.

“They have a constellation of symptoms and signs that seem to be consistent when you talk to different people,” he said. These include extreme fatigue, shortness of breath – even among people who are athletes – temperature control problems, sleep disturbances and sometimes what is described as brain fog, or difficulty focusing or concentrating.

“So, there are these effects that we’re concerned about,” Fauci said.

The coronavirus pandemic hit a new peak in Turkey with the country’s health ministry reporting the highest number of daily deaths and cases since the start of the outbreak.?

The Turkish health ministry reported 153 Covid-19 related deaths over the last 24 hours, topping the previous high last Friday of 141 deaths.?

The ministry announced 6,713 new Covid-19 “patients” – this is the highest daily number recorded since the start of the pandemic.

Turkey’s daily reported cases are not comparable with the rest of the world.

Since July, the country releases the number of “patients” – this number only includes people showing symptoms and people who have positive PCR tests. The publicly available data does not include asymptomatic cases or those who present clinical signs of Covid-19 but test negative, according to previous health ministry statements.?

The number of new Covid-19 “patients” recorded Monday is higher than any daily cases reported before the decision to exclude asymptomatic cases from public data began in July.

Occupancy rates for ICU beds are now at?71.3% – the highest since the start of the pandemic – with overall hospital bed capacity at 54.7%, the ministry said.

Stricter measures went into effect last week, including limited weekend curfews, age-specific daily lockdowns for people over the age of 65 and under 20, as well as the temporary closure of movie theaters, tea houses, pool halls, and internet cafes. Restaurants and cafes have been restricted to delivery and take-out only and schools have been moved online. In Istanbul, the local pandemic board has also started implementing outdoor smoking bans in certain neighborhoods, squares and streets.?

A researched at the Jenner Institute in Oxford, England, works on the coronavirus vaccine developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford.

Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases,?said on Monday?that AstraZeneca’s vaccine candidate showing 70% efficacy on average is “good news,” but he is waiting to be briefed on the data.

AstraZeneca’s announcement noted that the 70% efficacy of its vaccine is actually the average of two very different vaccination schedules tested in its trials in the United Kingdom and Brazil.

One schedule included?2,741 study participants who were given a half dose, followed by a full dose at least one month apart – that showed an efficacy of 90%.?The other schedule included?8,895 study participants who were given two full doses at least one month apart – that showed 62% efficacy.

“To have a 90% efficacy in one of the components – mainly one dose range of the components, which was a half a dose first followed by a full dose – that’s good news,” Fauci said.

“What that tells us now is that this is the third vaccine that we have giving a very high degree of efficacy, which bodes well for vaccinology in general, in the context of Covid-19,” Fauci said. “We would like to have multiple candidates that are highly efficacious.”

There have been at least?12,282,123?cases of coronavirus in the US, and at least?256,934?people have died, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

So far today, Johns Hopkins has reported?35,274?new cases and?152?reported deaths.

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

The Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington predicts that by the start of January, more than 2,000 people in the US will die every day from Covid-19.

It warns, if behavior doesn’t change, total US deaths could reach more than 471,000 by March 1, and the group says hospital systems, particularly ICUs, are expected to be “under extreme stress in December and January in 18 states.”

That’s why CNN’s Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta says he won’t be spending the holidays with his family this year and is advising others to follow his example.

In a CNN article he wrote on Saturday, Gupta says:

However, if you are planning on hosting or attending a holiday gathering, Gupta suggests some modifications you can make to limit the risk.

Watch his tips here.

People wait in line for a COVID-19 test at a medical clinic near the Staten Island neighborhood of Tottenville on November 20 in New York City, New York.

New York, New Jersey and Connecticut — known around New York City and its outlying suburbs as the Tri-State Area — have jointly surpassed one million Covid-19 cases, according the Johns Hopkins University’s Coronavirus Resource Center.

Here’s a breakdown of the Covid-19 cases by state, according to JHU:

Combined, the three states’ total is 1,003,690 identified positive cases.?The US has?surpassed?12 million Covid-19 infections and 256,000 deaths.

Two states have each surpassed 1 million cases alone, as Texas has confirmed at least 1,153,612 cases and California has reported 1,114,524 cases since the onset of the pandemic.?

Florida is close behind, at 938,414 cases.

Oklahoma reported Monday more than 3,500 new Covid-19 cases. It is the third day in a row the state has reported more than 3,000 new cases.?

There are now 177,874 total cases in the state, up 3,544 since the last report. The Oklahoma State Department of Health also reported 15 new deaths, bringing the total to 1,649.

The state’s dashboard shows that only 5% of the state’s intensive care unit beds are available. There are currently 1,495 patients hospitalized with the virus.

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.???

Pennsylvania’s top health official says latest models show the state “could run out of ICU beds within a week,” according to a news release.

Newly reported data shows hospitalizations increasing, an increase in the use of ventilators, and a percent positivity which Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine calls “worrisome.”

Pennsylvania reported a seven day case increase of over 36,000 cases and a statewide positivity of 11.1%, according to the release.

That data, as of Nov. 19, shows an increase of 8,807 more new cases across the state over the past week compared to the previous week.

The statewide positivity jumped from 9.6% to 11.1%.

A volunteer receives an injection at the Chris Hani Baragwanath hospital in Soweto, Johannesburg, on June 24 as part of Africa's first participation in a COVID-19 vaccine trial developed at the University of Oxford in Britain in conjunction with the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.

AstraZeneca’s coronavirus vaccine candidate comes with the advantage of requiring refrigeration at temperatures that are easier to reach, compared with some other vaccine candidates, a World Health Organization official pointed out during a news briefing on Monday.

WHO Chief Scientist?Dr.?Soumya?Swaminathan?said that the vaccine can be stored and is stable in temperatures of 2 to 8 degrees Celsius. In comparison, Pfizer’s vaccine needs to be stored at about minus 75 degrees Celsius.

Regarding AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine candidate, “The advantage of this vaccine is that it can be stored in the ordinary refrigerated temperatures,” Swaminathan said.

“That of course has huge logistical advantages for transporting and delivering this vaccine to cities and towns and villages and rural areas around the world. And we hope there will be more vaccines like that, which are more heat stable,” Swaminathan said.

“We have to also continue to encourage all the other developers who are doing clinical trials and were in early phases of development, because we do need a variety of vaccines out there that will target different groups that will have different storage conditions,” Swaminathan said. “The issue of affordability is also important to keep in mind.”

Texas Governor Greg Abbott speaks at a press conference at the Texas State Capitol in Austin on May 18.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced the state’s Covid-19 vaccine allocation process today.

In a statement released by his office, Abbott and the Texas Department of State Health Services (DSHS) said that the process will serve as a foundation for the initial distribution of Covid-19 vaccines throughout the state.?

Allocations will be based on criteria that includes protecting health care workers, frontline workers and vulnerable populations, according to the release. Criteria for the vaccine also include mitigation of health inequalities and geographic diversity.

The recommendations by the Expert Vaccine Allocation Panel (EVAP) and approved by the DSHS Commissioner of Health will give health care workers and other vulnerable residents the first round of the vaccine.

Recommendations will also be made by the EVAP on when and how to roll out the vaccine to other groups.?

“This foundation for the allocation process will help us mitigate the spread of COVID-19 in our communities, protect the most vulnerable Texans, and safeguard crucial state resources,” he continued.

Although a coronavirus vaccine is not yet approved, states are beginning to outline their plans for distributing the shots among key sectors of their population.

Florida?posted a “draft”?Covid-19 Vaccination Plan?on its Department of Health website?likely updated last week.?The 50-page document says the state is planning to use a “time-phased” strategy that prioritizes health care personnel, essential workers, people with medical conditions that place them at higher risk of complications, and people?over age 65.?

According to the draft document,?Florida?is waiting on additional guidance and materials from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention regarding Covid-19 specific training materials.

Here is a look at what the phased strategy would look like:

The document warns that prioritization of vaccine recipients has not been finalized by the?CDC,?and priority groups may vary based on the vaccine that is ultimately approved.

The vaccination plan comes as the number of reported Covid-19 cases per week in the state has tripled since Gov. Ron DeSantis reopened Florida in late September.

In a video address last week, DeSantis announced the state purchased millions of needles, syringes and alcohol swaps to prepare for the distribution of a vaccine.

The state has identified five hospital systems across the state that can store vaccines at extreme cold temperatures.

CNN reached out to the?Florida?Department of Health regarding the “draft” vaccination plan and has not heard back.

Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine vials.

Drugmaker AstraZeneca announced on Monday that its experimental?coronavirus?vaccine has shown an average efficacy of 70% in large-scale trials ?— the latest of several vaccine trials worldwide to post their results this month.

The news follows Pfizer and BioNTech announcement Friday that they submitted to?the?US Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization for their coronavirus vaccine candidate. The agency could make a decision early next month about whether to issue an emergency use authorization, according to a source.

Here’s a look at the major developments announced by Covid-19 vaccine makers:

Pfizer?

???Moderna

AstraZeneca??

Johnson & Johnson??

Novavax??

Medicago-GSK??

A person walks through an arrival lobby at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport on November 16 in Atlanta.

Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport – the world’s busiest – is expecting 1.1 million passengers around the Thanksgiving holiday, down 1/3 from Thanksgiving last year, airport officials said Monday.??

The airport’s general manager John Selden said the busiest day of the period – which begins today and goes through the weekend — will be Sunday, where some 190,000 passengers are expected to pass through the airport.?

Selden also debuted a revamped South Terminal TSA checkpoint that will employ three dimensional CT scanners, which he says will create greater efficiency by reducing the amount of bag searches.??

New York City Health Commissioner Dave Chokshi speaks during a press briefing on November 23.

New York City Health Commissioner Dave Chokshi issued caution ahead of the Thanksgiving holiday, warning a major source of Covid-19 spread in the city – and the country – is from small social gatherings.

“A major source is smaller social gatherings, as we head into the holidays knowing that people from different households may be gathering, may be convening, it is so important to stay safe,” Chokshi said.?

Earlier Mayor Bill de Blasio echoed Chokshi’s guidance, saying “please don’t travel,” but if you do, “take every conceivable precaution.”

Dr. Scott Gottlieb, former commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration, testifies during a Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee hearing on April 5, 2017, on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C.

Amid a rush of Thanksgiving travel, accelerating infection rates and no significant change in mobility data, “many Americans could take one simple step to protect themselves: Buy a better mask,” Dr. Scott Gottlieb, former commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration, wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed on Sunday.

“While there are still some shortages of medical masks, health-care workers have dedicated supply chains,” Gottlieb wrote. “It’s time to revise the guidance to consumers.”

N95 masks and their equivalents offer the best protection against the novel coronavirus, Gottlieb said. If used properly, they can filter out at least 95% of infectious particles. Equivalents include the KN95 from China and the FFP2 from Europe.

Surgical masks are the next best option, which could offer protection of about 60%, Gottlieb said – but quality matters. Many masks sold on Amazon say they are for dust and allergens but aren’t surgical masks. Real medical-procedure masks are cleared by the FDA and offer one of three levels of protection, with a level 2 or level 3 mask generally being best.

Finally, cloth masks are the least protective, Gottlieb said. If it is the only available option, it should be thick, snug-fitting and made of cotton-polyester blends, as these will generally offer more protection.

“But even a very good cloth mask may only be about 30% protective; scarf or bandanna, 10% or less,” Gottlieb wrote.

While it may be more expensive to buy better quality masks, having a few available for high-risk settings can reduce transmission risks, he said. The Department of Homeland Security has also published online instructions for disinfecting and reusing N95 masks, which can extend their life.

“Slowing the current cycle of spread will be difficult,” Gottlieb wrote. “But encouraging Americans to wear higher-quality masks is a simple step that might make a difference.”?

People line up outside a CityMD urgent care clinic offering COVID-19 testing in the borough of Manhattan in New York City, New York, on November 19.

The percent of people who tested positive for Covid-19 city wide is at 2.95%, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said today – with a seven-day rolling average of 3.06%, he said.?

The mayor said the number giving him “tremendous” concern is the new reported cases on a seven-day average, a threshold of which the city has “blown by many times over.”

Starting last Thursday, New York City closed down its public school buildings after the city’s seven-day average reached the 3% positive testing rate threshold. All students transitioned to remote learning.

With regard to new reported cases on a seven-day average, NYC reports 1,381 cases. The city set threshold is 550 cases.

The daily number of people admitted to hospitals for Covid-19 is at 100, under the 200 threshold. The confirmed positivity rate for Covid-19 for those patients is 43.27%.

“That positivity rate has gone up,” he said “that’s a real concern.”

“The 100 patients, too many but again we see an interesting gap here in that that number has not grown consistently so far, we are not out of the woods,” he said.?

He added that intensive care units have not been as full as expected.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio reiterated that he believes the city is heading toward the “orange zone” designation based on the trajectory of the state’s numbers, and outlined his initial plan for bringing schools back online. In the orange zone, indoor dining and gyms will be closed.??

Remember: New York City closed down its public school buildings starting last Thursday after the city’s seven-day average reached the 3% positive testing rate threshold. All students transitioned to remote learning.

The mayor said there is a “strong strong likelihood that in a matter of days the state of New York will determine that NYC is an orange zone according to state standards.”

De Blasio stressed that he is not speaking for the state but is taking the trajectory of their numbers and analyzing them, adding “basing on what the state has said already there’s a likelihood as soon as next week even that NYC will be declared and orange zones.”

“Once that happens we will be in a position to take additional measures to reopen schools,” he said.

The clear protocol for that involves a lot more testing he said, and a very “aggressive” approach, he said.

Testing would be done in advance of children and staff returning to school on top of much more testing throughout the school year.

A lot of details have to be worked out between the city and state he said.

The first focus will be special education, or district 75 schools, followed by youngest grades including early childhood education and then elementary.

He did not elaborate further on the plan.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks to members of parliament on November 23.

National lockdown restrictions in England will end next week as scheduled, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Monday.

Gyms, shops and salons will be allowed to reopen but there will be regional tiered restrictions.

“We are not there yet,” Johnson said to members of parliament as he?laid out his plans to return to a tiered system after Dec. 2.?

Johnson said he plans to lay out which parts of the country is in which tier on Thursday.?

Patios sit empty in the Distillery District in Toronto on November 22.??????

Toronto, Canada’s largest city, was placed into lockdown for 28 days on Friday, with officials shutting shops, businesses and restaurants and banning indoor gatherings to curb a growing spike in?Covid-19?cases.

Here’s what you need to know about the restrictions:

More than 1,400 new coronavirus cases were reported in Ontario on Friday, taking the province’s total case since the start of the pandemic beyond 100,000.

The region has been battling a rapidly rising rate of infections, with Toronto particularly badly hit; the city broke its record for new infections on Tuesday and has reported several hundred new cases each day this week.

On Tuesday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the country is “not there yet” when asked whether a new national lockdown would be imposed.

Read more here.

Wall Street started the holiday-shortened week on a strong note as further progress on the Covid-19 vaccine front gives investors more confidence about the outlook for 2021.

Here’s how things looked at the opening bell:

The rally comes despite skyrocketing Covid-19 infections around the US and the return of health restrictions that will pressure the economy.

The good news: AstraZeneca announced its experimental coronavirus vaccine showed an average efficacy rate of 70%, making it the third vaccine candidate to show promising results.

People in cars line up for Covid-19 tests in Miami Gardens on November 22.

The US has recorded over 3 million Covid-19 infections already in November — and the month isn’t over yet.

If you’re just reading in now, here are the latest coronavirus headlines coming out of the US.

Here’s a look at where Covid-19 cases are rising across the country compared to the previous week, according to Johns Hopkins University data:

Sen. Chuck Grassley speaks during a confirmation hearing in Washington, DC, on October 14.

Sen. Chuck Grassley, who tested positive for the coronavirus last week, tweeted on Monday that he expects to be back on the Hill next week.

A spokesman told CNN Friday that Grassley remained symptom free and was resting at home in isolation.

US Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams attends a hearing on September 9 in Washington, DC.

“The most reassuring thing I can say to you, America, is that when they tell me that I can get the vaccine, I will get it, because I know that’s the best way to protect myself and to protect my family and my community,” US Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams said on “Good Morning America” Monday.

Adams said that he has been traveling around and talking to people, including presidents from historically black colleges and universities, trying to help people understand that Covid-19 vaccines were developed safely.

When asked how to be sure there won’t be any future prolonged side effects from the vaccine, which is the first of its kind, Adams said that he speaks every day to Dr. Robert Redfield, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases; and Dr. Deborah Birx, the White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator.

“Here’s what they tell me. Normal studies only have about 5,000 people in them before a vaccine is approved. These studies have 30 to 60,000,” he said. “These vaccines, at the point of being administered to the American public, will have more data than any other vaccine developed in history.”

Adams reiterated he would get a vaccine as soon as he was able, saying, “Again, I will be in line to get it when they tell me that I can get it. That’s how much confidence I have this will be safe – 95% plus effectiveness.”

Adams said he would hate for there to be a vaccine that could end the pandemic and that people don’t trust it, saying he would continue to work with any organization out there “to help people understand the safety that went into this process, not just the speed.”

People undergo Covid-19 tests at a makeshift testing center in Tianjin, China, on November 21.

Here are the latest coronavirus headlines in Asia, as countries continue to battle the pandemic:?

In China, the northeastern city of Tianjin has gone about testing 2.25 million people as health authorities attempt to get on top of a new cluster of the coronavirus.

Authorities set themselves three days to test 2.6 million residents after five new cases were reported in a residential compound in the east of the city.?

In Shanghai, chaotic scenes at the airport as all cargo workers have been forced to get tested, another cluster of 5 broke out among that workforce last week.

Pictures posted to social media showed authorities?at Shanghai Pudong International Airport working to contain crowds after the decision to test all the staff in the cargo areas.

In the semi-autonomous Chinese region of Hong Kong, a fourth wave has been declared, after a cluster emerged around 21 different dance studios in the city.

At least 73 new cases were detected on Friday, 50 linked to the dance studio cluster and just 10 considered “imported cases.” Worryingly for officials, at least 8 cases still cannot be traced.?

Meanwhile in Pakistan, all schools have been shuttered as the country battles a second wave of Covid-19.

All education institutions will be closed from Nov. 26 through Jan. 11 as Covid-19 cases mount in the country, according to the education minister Shafqat Mahmood.

Health authorities in Pakistan have recorded at least 2,756 new cases of the virus over the past 24 hours. Pakistan currently has approximately 46,044 active cases of Covid-19 with 7,696 deaths recorded since March.

Luxembourg, one of Europe’s smallest nations, is set to enter lockdown after being hit hard by Covid-19.

The country reported over 1,000 new cases this weekend and still has the worst rate of infections per population in Europe. Six deaths were reported over the weekend.

Local media is reporting that the proposed measures are:

The aim is to get below 500 new cases per day in order for the healthcare system to be in a better position.

Travelers walk in Florida's Miami International Airport on November 22.

Passengers just broke a pandemic air travel record, in spite of the CDC’s warning to not travel for Thanksgiving.?

TSA says 1,047,934 people passed through security at America’s airports on Sunday— the second time since Friday that more than a million people flew.?

The previous pandemic record was set back on Oct.18, the Sunday of the long Columbus Day weekend.

Last week, TSA Administrator David Pekoske said that he expected travel levels to be on par with that record, noting that he expected the Wednesday before Thanksgiving and the Sunday after to be the busiest for air travel.

In spite of the CDC urging people to not travel for Thanksgiving, airlines insist that flying is safe.

On Friday, airline industry groups told reporters that the industry is not encouraging people to travel, but they are not discouraging them either.?

Travelers in the check-in area of Arturo Merino Benítez International Airport in Santiago, Chile, on November 13.

Chile will allow foreign visitors to enter the country through Santiago’s international airport from Monday after an eight-month shutdown, Chilean President Sebastian Pinera announced Sunday.

The reopening is the first phase in a plan to gradually reopen the country and will eventually extend to land and sea entry points, Pinera said.

Visitors must provide three documents in order to enter:

From Monday until December 7, visitors to Chile from countries classified high-risk by the World Health Organization, including the United States, will have to quarantine for 14 days.?After December 7, they will only have to provide the required documents in order to enter.

Chile currently has 540,640 confirmed Covid-19 cases and 15,069 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.

The country has set a daily nationwide curfew from 12 a.m. to 5 a.m.

The fire department in Kansas City, Missouri, lost two employees to Covid-19 in two days, a devastating development its chief called “the worst-case scenario.”

Captain Robert “Bobby” Rocha and Scott Davidson, a communication specialist and paramedic, had been in the hospital “for a while” before succumbing to the virus, Fire Chief Donna Lake said.

Lake joined health experts and officials who?called for the public to follow distancing measures, mask requirements and hand washing practices as the US grapples with the?most intense spread of the virus to date.?

With first responders interacting daily with people who may be infected, following those measures helps protect professionals on the front lines, Lake said.

“When September 11 happened, first responders were on the front line then,” she said. “In this pandemic, we’re on the front line.”

Read the full story here:

Related article 2 Kansas City Fire employees died of Covid-19. It's the 'worst case' for those on the front lines, chief says

A man wearing a Trump shirt and an inflatable Trump inner-tube around his belly who was seen on video deliberately exhaling on two women outside the President’s golf course in Virginia has been charged with simple assault.

Raymond Deskins, 61, of Sterling, Virginia, was charged with misdemeanor simple assault, the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement.

The background: One of the women shot cellphone video of Saturday’s incident outside Donald Trump’s club in Sterling and posted it on social media.

Michele Bowman, public information officer for the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office, confirmed to CNN that Deskins is the man seen in the video.

CNN has been unable to reach Deskins despite multiple attempts.

In the 24-second video, Deskins – who was not wearing a mask – can be seen in a verbal confrontation with the women who were there protesting Trump. It is not apparent what happened before the video began.

Read the full story here:

Title: Please help. He crossed street to assault 2 senior citizens. Want to identify n case contact tracing becomes necess... https://t.co/aovNccVEeF Duration: Description: Please help. He crossed street to assault 2 senior citizens. Want to identify n case contact tracing becomes necess... https://t.co/aovNccVEeF Upload Date: 202020-11-21 12:00 AM

Related article A man wearing Trump gear who was seen deliberately exhaling on women outside Trump golf club has been charged

A Qantas plane takes off at Sydney's Kingsford Smith Airport in Australia on November 16.

Australia’s national carrier Qantas will require international travelers to prove they have been vaccinated against Covid-19 before flying, Alan Joyce, the airline’s CEO, said Monday.

Speaking to CNN affiliate Channel 9, Joyce said the carrier’s terms and conditions would be updated to advise of the necessity to be vaccinated.?

Joyce said that he expected other airlines to follow suit.?“I think it will be a common theme, talking to my colleagues in other airlines across the world,” he said.

“What we’re looking at is how you can have a vaccination passport, an electronic version of it that certifies what the vaccine is and whether it’s acceptable to the country you’re traveling to.”

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) is planning a “mammoth operation” to deliver coronavirus vaccines to more than 90 low- and middle-income countries as soon as doses are available, it said on Monday.

UNICEF is working with more than 350 logistics partners, including major airlines, shipping lines and freight operators globally “to deliver life-saving vaccines as quickly and safely as possible,” said Etleva Kadilli, director of?the agency’s supply division.

UNICEF, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) and the International Air Transport Association (IATA) last week briefed airlines last week on the expected requirements and how almost 2 billion doses of Covid-19 vaccine?will be transported next year. A further 1 billion syringes will be transported by sea.?

The agency is the biggest single vaccine buyer in the world, obtaining more than 2 billion doses of vaccines annually for routine immunization and outbreak response in almost 100 countries. It said it has vital expertise in supply chain management of temperature-controlled products like the coronavirus vaccines.

It?is leading efforts to procure and deliver vaccines from manufacturers that have agreements with the?COVAX Facility, it said.

UNICEF has worked with logistics operators to transport supplies during the pandemic, delivering more than $190 million worth of supplies such as masks, gowns, oxygen concentrators and diagnostic test kits.

The first patient enrolled in Pfizer's Covid-19 vaccine clinical trial is pictured on May 4 at the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore.

The UK medicine regulator said on Monday that it will make a decision on the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine in the “shortest time possible” now it has received further data.

“It is our job now to rigorously assess these data and the evidence submitted on the vaccine’s safety, quality and effectiveness,” the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) chief executive June Raine said in a statement.

She said that the MHRA “will seek advice from the Government’s independent advisory body, the Commission on Human Medicines. The Commission will critically assess the data too before advising the UK government on the safety, quality and effectiveness of any potential vaccine.”

“The safety of the public will always come first. Our job is to work to the highest standards and safety is our watchword.”

It comes as AstraZeneca/Oxford announced?that another experimental?coronavirus vaccine showed an average efficacy of 70% in large-scale trials and up to a 90% efficacy in one dosing regimen.

The UK government has ordered 100 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine and 40 million doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.

French authorities detected a Covid-19 outbreak on a mink farm in northern France and have subsequently culled all 1,000 animals on the premises, according to a government news release.

The other three mink farms in the country are also being tested, said the release from the French Agricultural Ministry. One mink farm has tested negative already, and two mink farm results are still outstanding.?

“Surveillance and enhanced biosecurity measures are maintained in the other three farms,” said the release.

A health care worker administers a Covid-19 swab test on November 13 in El Paso, Texas.

From surging case numbers to record hospitalizations, the US is grappling with what experts long warned could be the biggest spike in the Covid-19 pandemic – and it still has to get through the Thanksgiving holiday.?

Historically, the week of Thanksgiving is one of the busiest for travel. But with the US reporting its 20th day in a row of more than 100,000 new cases Sunday, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advised against traveling for the holiday this year to decrease risk of spreading infections.?

As new cases spike, hospitalization rates have followed. At least 83,870 Covid-19 patients were hospitalized Sunday – the 13th straight day the US has broken its hospitalization record,?according to the Covid Tracking Project.

Still, more than a million?people passed through airports on Friday alone, according to the Transportation Security?Administration.?

While people board airplanes and load cars to visit family, the US has reported a million infections in under a week. Since the pandemic began,?more than 12.2 million people?have been infected and 256,783 people have died of the virus, according to?data from Johns Hopkins University.

Health experts have long worried that the colder months could drive people indoors, leading to a rise in infection rates. On Friday, the CDC said that 50% of cases are spread by people without symptoms. With just one infected person having the potential to cause an outbreak, experts worry that people traveling and gathering could prove dangerous to the American public that is still in the thick of the pandemic.?

Read the full story here:

Travelers wearing protective face masks walking through Concourse D at the Miami International Airport on Sunday, Nov. 22, 2020, in Miami, Fla. With the coronavirus surging out of control, the nation's top public health agency pleaded with Americans not to travel for Thanksgiving and not to spend the holiday with people from outside their household. (David Santiago/Miami Herald via AP)

Related article Hospitalizations and Covid-19 cases soar as the US enters one of the busiest travel weeks of the year

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock speaks to the media in London on November 23.

As AstraZeneca became the latest drugmaker to release encouraging Covid-19 vaccine trial results on Monday, UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock said that his government hopes to start vaccinating people in December, pending approval.

Other countries are also hoping to start rolling out vaccinations next month.

Moncef Slaoui, the head of the US government’s effort to develop a?vaccine against Covid-19, said the first Americans to receive a vaccine – if all things go according to plan – could be as early as the second week of December.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said last week that she expected a coronavirus vaccine to be approved in Europe in December or “very soon after the turn of the year.”

The Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, said on Friday that a “very substantial” part of the country’s population could be vaccinated in the first half of 2021.?He said Spain would be the first European country, along with Germany, to have a vaccination plan.

Christine Jardine in London in 2019.

Christine Jardine, a Scottish politician who represents Edinburgh in the UK parliament, was not a fan of?universal basic income?before the pandemic hit.

“It was regarded in some quarters as a kind of socialist idea,” said Jardine, a member of the centrist Liberal Democrats party.

But not long after the government shut schools, stores, restaurants and pubs in March?with little warning, she started to reconsider her position.

In her view, the idea – sending cash regularly to all residents, no strings attached – now looks more “pragmatic” than outlandish.

She isn’t the only one to change her mind. As the economic crisis sparked by the coronavirus drags on, support in Europe is growing for progressive policies once seen as pipe dreams of the political left.

In Germany, millions of people applied to join?a study?of universal basic income that will provide participants with €1,200 ($1,423) a month, while in the United Kingdom, more than 100 lawmakers – including Jardine – are?pushing the government?to start similar trials.

Austria has launched a first-of-its-kind?pilot program?that will guarantee paying jobs to residents struggling with sustained unemployment in Marienthal, a long-suffering former industrial town about 40 miles southwest of Vienna.

Read the full story here:

11 November 2020, Berlin: Empty tables and chairs stand in front of a restaurant on the street "Unter den Linden". Federal and state governments have decided on a partial lockdown for the month of November. Photo: Paul Zinken/dpa (Photo by Paul Zinken/picture alliance via Getty Images)

Related article Job guarantees and free money: 'Utopian' ideas tested in Europe as the pandemic gives governments a new role

Shanghai’s biggest international airport momentarily descended into chaos Sunday night, after authorities ordered a mass testing drive in response to a small outbreak of Covid-19 linked to several cargo handlers.

Since the beginning of November, seven cargo workers and their close contacts at the Shanghai Pudong International Airport have been diagnosed as confirmed coronavirus cases, including two reported on Sunday.

In a bid to contain the cluster, authorities ordered all cargo staff at the airport to undergo coronavirus tests overnight and set up a temporary testing site on the second floor of a parking garage, according to a statement from the Shanghai government.

Photos?and?videos?circulating on Chinese social media show hundreds of people packed closely together inside the garage – the opposite of social distancing – with a line of people in hazmat suits trying to hold back crowds pushing forward.

But the chaos appeared to have calmed before midnight, when the airport police?posted photos on Weibo showing workers lining up orderly for the tests.

As of Monday morning, 17,719 samples had been collected. Of the 11,544 samples that have been tested, all received negative results, officials said at a news conference.

While the initial chaos has drawn criticism on Chinese social media, the swift, drastic response over just a few cases highlights the length the Chinese government is willing to go to in order to stamp out any resurgence of the virus.

Read the full story here:

This photo taken on November 22, 2020 shows health workers in protective suits waiting to conduct COVID-19 coronavirus tests on staff at Pudong Airport in Shanghai. (Photo by STR / CNS / AFP) / China OUT (Photo by STR/CNS/AFP via Getty Images)

Related article Shanghai airport momentarily descends into chaos after workers test positive for Covid-19

Pakistan will close all education institutions from Thursday through January 11 as Covid-19 cases mount in the country, according to education minister Shafqat Mahmood.

Home learning will be instituted between Thursday and December 24, when holidays begin, Mahmood announced Monday.

Health authorities in Pakistan have recorded 2,756 new cases of the virus over the past 24 hours. At the end of October, the country’s health ministry announced that Pakistan was officially in the midst of a “second wave” of the virus.

Pakistan has had 376,929 cases of Covid-19 with 7,696 deaths recorded since March, according to Johns Hopkins University figures.

The chief investigator of the Oxford University/AstraZeneca vaccine trial said the fact that the candidate may be up to 90% effective is exciting news.

Results from clinical trials of this coronavirus vaccine show it has “an average efficacy of 70%,” with one dosing regimen showing an efficacy of 90%, pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca said in a Monday news release.

How AstraZeneca’s statement explains the dosing regimens:

The clinical trials, conducted in the UK and Brazil, showed the vaccine was highly effective in preventing Covid-19 with no hospitalizations or severe cases of the disease reported, the statement said.

Sarah Gilbert, professor of Vaccinology at the University of Oxford, said that announcement the “takes us another step closer to the time when we can use vaccines to bring an end to the devastation caused by SARS-CoV-2.”

“It has been a privilege to be part of this multi-national effort which will reap benefits for the whole world,” she added.

The UK government has already ordered 100 million doses of the vaccine. AstraZeneca told CNN on Friday that the company had delivered four million vials of its coronavirus vaccine candidate to the UK government, with millions more frozen doses ready to be sent.

Read the breaking news story here:

FILE - In this Wednesday, June 24, 2020 file photo, a volunteer receives an injection at the Chris Hani Baragwanath hospital in Soweto, Johannesburg, as part of Africa's first participation in a COVID-19 vaccine trial developed at the University of Oxford in Britain in conjunction with the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca. On Friday, Oct. 23, 2020, AstraZeneca Inc. announced that the Food and Drug Administration is letting it resume testing of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate in the U.S. (Siphiwe Sibeko/Pool via AP)

Related article AstraZeneca's Oxford coronavirus vaccine is 70% effective on average, data shows

A health care worker holds a sign reading "Dancing Group," referring to a dance club cluster of Covid-19, as people stand in line outside a testing center in the Yau Ma Tei district of Hong Kong, on November. 23.

Hong Kong recorded 73 new cases of Covid-19 on Sunday, marking a new spike in infections, according to health authorities on Monday.

This is the highest daily figure since August 16, when Hong Kong experienced a “third wave” of the virus.?

Cases in the city have hovered between zero and a dozen since that wave calmed in September.

Of Sunday’s infections, 10 were imported from abroad, eight were untraceable, and 55 were confirmed as locally transmitted, according to Dr. Chuang Shuk-kwan of Hong Kong’s Centre for Health Protection of the Department of Health.

Fifty of the locally transmitted cases were linked back to a cluster involving 21 different dance studios in the city.

Darell Slater with his wife and daughters.

No one expected him home for the holidays – but after 118 days in the hospital with Covid-19, Darell Slater will spend Thanksgiving with his family.

Slater, 71, was first diagnosed with Covid-19 on July 13 along with his wife, his family said. After two weeks of quarantine, she recovered but he did not.

“About a week later, after putting him on the ventilator, they told us that he was the sickest patient in the hospital … and there was nothing else they could do for him there,” said Slater’s daughter, Kim Cochran.

By August 6, he was put on ECMO, or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation, a therapy that adds oxygen to the blood and pumps it through the body.

On September 18, Slater finally tested negative for Covid-19, and he started to be slowly removed from all of the machines. He was moved to a medical rehab facility, where he would remain for the next seven weeks. Slater was wheeled out of the hospital on Friday, where his waiting family was waiting for him.

The family said they are thankful to all of the hospital staff that helped take care of their dad.

“We just want to tell the story because we don’t want anyone to give up,” Cochran said. “You just can’t give up.”

Read the full story:

Slater being hugged by his family when he finally left the hospital.

Related article After 118 days in the hospital with Covid-19, one man is finally home just in time for the holidays

A medical worker takes a venous blood sample from a patient for Covid-19 antibody testing at a Gemotest lab in Simferopol, Crimea, Russia, on November 20.

Russia reported 25,173 new Covid-19 infections on Monday – the highest number of cases it has reported in a single day, according to the country’s coronavirus response center.?

The country has now officially reported more than 2.1 million confirmed cases, and 36,540 virus-related deaths.

However, a CNN investigation previously found that Russia’s official death figures may grossly understate the real toll by excluding people who are presumed to have Covid-19 post mortem, and even those with pre-existing conditions that proved fatal due to the infection.

Read our investigation:

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

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson tweeted on Monday that the results from AstraZeneca’s experimental vaccine trials were “incredibly exciting.”

UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock also said on Monday that he was “really really pleased with this news.”

“Of course, we have 100 million doses of this vaccine on order. And we’ve been working very closely with AstraZeneca as they’re increasing the manufacturing of the vaccine,” he said on BBC Breakfast.

“For our two top vaccine candidates that are the earliest in development, both to have come through with an effectiveness that high is really good news for everyone.”

Trial results: The AstraZeneca/University of Oxford vaccine showed 90% efficacy in one dosing regimen, and 62% efficacy in a second regimen, giving it an average of 70% efficacy.

AstraZeneca said on Monday that it would immediately prepare to submit the trial data to authorities in countries that allow conditional or early approval.

Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during a news conference in Sacramento, California, on April 14.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a?tweet that he and his entire family tested negative for Covid-19 on Sunday, after three of his children were exposed to an officer from the California Highway Patrol who tested positive.

According to the tweet, Newsom and his wife Jen learned of their children’s exposure late Friday evening. Newsom said he and his wife did not have any direct interaction with the infected officer, and wished the officer a speedy recovery.

Although they tested negative, the whole family will be quarantining for 14 days “consistent with local guidance,” said the tweet.

Remember: You can test negative and still be infected and contagious. The virus’ incubation period goes up to 14 days – so even if you have already contracted Covid-19, it can take days to show up on a test.

Justin Lessler,?associate professor of epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, said the virus takes time to replicate inside the body – so getting tested before the third day after exposure “is not of much use,” he said.

That’s why experts urge people to still quarantine after they’ve been exposed, even if they tested negative.

South Korea has declared an “emergency period” in the capital city of Seoul until the end of the year as cases continue to spike, Seoul’s acting mayor Seo Jung-hyup said on Monday.?

Under the new restrictions, public transportation is reduced by 20% after 10 p.m. and gatherings are capped at 10 people.

The city will also conduct regular Covid-19 tests on some 40,000 workers and users of nursing hospitals and daycare centers, Seo added. Stricter virus control measures will also be introduced to facilities such as religious centers and call centers.?

Seo urged people to refrain from holding end-of-year gatherings, and for religious groups to turn to online services.?

The Seoul metropolitan area will also be placed under Level 2 social distancing measures for two weeks, starting November 24.

Under Level 2 restrictions:

On Monday, South Korea reported 271 Covid-19 cases from Sunday, including 112 cases in Seoul, according to the Seoul government.

In this June 24 file photo, a volunteer receives an injection at the Chris Hani Baragwanath hospital in Soweto, Johannesburg, as part of Africa's first participation in a COVID-19 vaccine trial developed at the University of Oxford in Britain in conjunction with the pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.

Drugmaker AstraZeneca announced on Monday that its experimental coronavirus vaccine has shown an average efficacy of 70% in its large scale trials – the latest of several vaccine trials worldwide to post their results this month.

The vaccine, developed with the University of Oxford, showed 90% efficacy in one dosing regimen, and 62% efficacy in a second regimen. That averages to a 70% efficacy, AstraZeneca said.?

The interim analysis included a total of 131 Covid-19 cases, according to the release.

Other vaccines in the works: This comes after Moderna announced earlier this month that its vaccine was 94.5% effective against coronavirus, and Pfizer announced its vaccine was 95% effective.

The Chief Minister of India's Maharashtra state, Uddhav Thackeray, speaks during a news conference in New Delhi, India, on December 8, 2016.

The Chief Minister of India’s Maharashtra state, Uddhav Thackeray, has warned the public to practice Covid-appropriate behavior to avoid a “tsunami” of infections after the festival season.

“The second and third wave of coronavirus that some states are experiencing, if you compare it with previous waves, it’s not a wave but a tsunami,” Thackeray said in an address on Sunday, referring to rising infections in Delhi and other states.?

He added that Maharashtra has gained some control of the situation – but cautioned citizens to wear masks and avoid crowds.

Maharashtra, India’s second most populous state, has reported more than 1.78 million Covid-19 cases. The state’s death toll stands at 46,623, according to the Indian Ministry of Health.

People are seen at Melbourne airport checking in for flights to New South Wales on November 23.

Australia reopened travel between New South Wales state and the former virus hotspot of Victoria on Monday, after four months of closed interstate borders.?

Flights between Sydney and Melbourne, once the busiest flight route in the country and second busiest in the world, also resumed on Monday. Qantas and Jetstar will operate 17 flights between Sydney and Melbourne on Monday alone according to Qantas.

Why the border shut: The border between NSW and Victoria was closed on July 8, when Victoria saw a large spike in coronavirus cases. The country’s largest outbreak so far peaked in July and August, and cases have slowly fallen back to single and double digits per day.

Both New South Wales and Victoria recorded no new locally transmitted coronavirus cases on Sunday.

The reopening of the border comes after Victoria further relaxed restrictions, including allowing the number of people attending outdoor gatherings in public places to 50 people. Cinemas, galleries and museums will be allowed to host up to 150 people indoors.

Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak speaks during a news conference on the state's response to the coronavirus outbreak at the Grant Sawyer State Office Building in Las Vegas, on March 17.

Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak has ordered a statewide “pause,” saying Covid-19 cases are growing at a “wildfire level.”

The new restrictions, which go into effect on Tuesday, will last for three weeks, Sisolak said at a news conference.

Here’s what the restrictions mean:

The state’s positivity rate is at a record 16.5%, and 10% of all cases ever reported in Nevada have been in the past seven days, the governor said.

The United States reported?142,732?new coronavirus cases and?921?virus-related deaths on Sunday, according to Johns Hopkins University.

At least?12,246,849?Covid-19 cases and?256,782?deaths have now been reported in the US, according to the university’s tally.

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 cases:

Shanghai’s Pudong International Airport tested all personnel working in the cargo areas of the airport on Sunday following the discovery of several coronavirus cases.

On Sunday, another two airport workers tested positive for virus, bringing the total number of reported infections linked to the outbreak to five.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis speaks during a campaign rally for President Donald Trump at Pensacola International Airport in Pensacola, Florida, on October 23.

The number of new Covid-19 cases per week has tripled in Florida since Gov. Ron DeSantis reopened the state in one swoop in late September.

That means three times more Floridians per week are testing positive for Covid-19 now, than the week the state was reopened.

In an effort to curb the spread of the virus, a bipartisan group of mayors from across the state asked DeSantis last week to issue a mask mandate, bolster contact tracing, increase funding for Covid-19 testing, and give mayors more local control.?

DeSantis issued a video message last week sharing “promising news” about therapeutics and vaccines – but he didn’t address the rise in cases.

The Chinese city of Tianjin has launched a mass testing program that will test 2.6 million residents in just a few days after five locally transmitted cases were reported on Friday.

Four of the five new cases were reported in the same residential compound in Binhai New Area district, located in the eastern part of the city, the city’s health commission said in a statement.

The mass testing, which started on Saturday, will cover all residents living in the district, it added. The testing was expected to be completed in three days.?

As of Sunday evening, Tianjin had received more than 2.25 million test samples, of which over 1 million have come back negative, the health commission said.?

Tianjin, a major port on China’s northeastern coast, is home to more than 13 million people.

Dr. Len Schleifer, president and CEO of Regeneron, speaks during a hearing in Albany, New York, on October 20, 2015.

Dr. Len Schleifer, the president and CEO of drugmaker Regeneron, explained the company’s decision to let President Donald Trump use their antibody cocktail.

When Trump contracted Covid-19 in early October, Regeneron granted him compassionate use for their treatment, REGEN-COV2.

It was still an experimental treatment; human clinical trails began in June, and the first encouraging data from patients came just three days before Trump announced he had Covid-19.

While they knew it would bring unprecedented scrutiny on the company, Schleifer said, “Frankly, that’s not the kind of calculation we do in these moments. Rather we considered if it was the right thing to do for the patient and if it adhered to our policies and ethical standards. In this case, it was, and it did.”

REGEN-COV2 was granted an emergency use authorization by the US Food and Drug Administration on Saturday.

Japan recorded 2,162 new coronavirus cases and seven new deaths on Sunday, according to the Health Ministry – the fifth day in a row that the country has recorded more than 2,000 new infections.

The spike brings the nationwide total of cases to 133,070 and the death toll to 1,994.

Osaka cases surge: The major port city set a new daily infection record with 490 new cases recorded on Sunday. Osaka raised its alert level on Friday and requested residents refrain from dining out with a group of five or more people for periods longer than two hours. The prefectural government also asked elderly residents to avoid non-essential outings.

Cases are also rising in Tokyo: Japan’s capital city recorded 391 cases on Sunday, marking the fifth day in a row of more than 300 daily cases. The total number of infections reported in Tokyo now stands at 37,708.

Customers dine in the Hollywood Riviera area of Redondo Beach, California, on November 15.

Outdoor dining in Los Angeles County will be shut down as the five-day average of new Covid-19 infections has passed 4,000 daily cases, according to a news release from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health.

The order, which will go into effect on Wednesday November 25 at 10 p.m., also includes dining at breweries, wineries, and bars.

The five-day average of new cases is at 4,097. If the five-day average number reaches 4,500 or hospitalizations reach 2,000 a Targeted Stay at Home Order will be issued for three weeks, according to the release.

There are currently 1,401 people hospitalized with the disease in the county, with 26% of those in the ICU, the release said.

Britain's Prime Minister Boris Johnson leaves number 10, Downing Street as he heads to the weekly Cabinet meeting at the Foreign Office on November 10, 2020 in London, England.

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson on Monday is expected to announce an “extensive community testing” program for regions living under the “very high alert” top tier of Covid restrictions, as well as offering testing support from the National Health Service (NHS) and the armed forces.

The government’s Covid Winter Plan will employ repeated testing of contacts so that they can avoid the need to isolate after having contact with a positive individual, according to a Downing Street news release.

The release said the program of “repeated testing of contacts instead of isolation” will be trialed in Liverpool starting next week and then expanded across the NHS and care homes in December before being rolled out to the general population in January.

The expanded availability of testing under the Covid Winter Plan will allow care home residents to see two visitors twice a week, the release said.

Johnson will announce that testing will be expanded to catch asymptomatic individuals who can still spread the virus and that weekly testing will be available for employees in food manufacturing, prison staff, and workers delivering and administering Covid vaccines.?

Vehicles line up as a health care workers help to check in people being tested at the Covid-19 drive-thru testing center at Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida, on November 22.

November isn’t even over, and the US has already seen more new Covid-19 cases than any other month of this entire pandemic.

More than 3 million new cases were reported between November 1 and 22, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. That’s about a quarter of all US cases since the beginning of this pandemic.

Yes, testing has increased. But it hasn’t kept pace with the rate of new infections.

As of late last week, the number of daily new cases increased 25% compared to the previous week, according to Johns Hopkins data.

But the number of new tests increased only 14.55%, according to the Covid Tracking Project.

And?in 44 states, the percentage of positive tests is?higher than the recommended 5% threshold.

And every surge in new cases leads to more hospitalizations and deaths in the following weeks.

Read the full story:

CHICAGO, ILLINOIS - OCTOBER 19: Passengers enter a Transportation Security Administration (TSA) checkpoint at O'Hare International Airport on October 19, 2020 in Chicago, Illinois. Yesterday the TSA reported that it had screened over 1 million passengers, representing the highest number of passengers screened at TSA checkpoints since March 17, 2020. During the week ending October 18, TSA screened 6.1 million passengers nationwide, the highest total since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. (Photo by Scott Olson/Getty Images)

Related article Nearly a quarter of all the coronavirus cases in the US were reported in November

President Donald Trump listens as Moncef Slaoui, the head of the US government's effort to develop a?vaccine against Covid-19, speaks about coronavirus vaccine development in the Rose Garden of the White House, in Washington, DC on May 15.

Moncef Slaoui, the head of the US government’s effort to develop a?vaccine against Covid-19, said the first Americans to receive a vaccine – if all things go according to plan – could be as early as the second week of December.

On Friday, Pfizer submitted an application to the US Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization for its Covid-19 vaccine candidate, and an FDA vaccine advisory committee is slated to meet December 10.

Slaoui said that means, if authorized, the vaccine could be rolled out the next day.

Slaoui also said that based on plans, the amount of the population who need to be vaccinated for life to return to normal is likely to happen in May.

How to achieve herd immunity: Slaoui told Tapper that with the level of efficacy that has been shown in both Pfizer and Moderna’s vaccines, “70% or so of the population being immunized would allow for true herd immunity to take place, that is likely to happen somewhere in the month of May, or something like that based on our plans.”

Following Slaoui’s comments on Sunday, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, told CBS’ Margaret Brennan on “Face The Nation,” that while he “totally agree(s)” with Slaoui that there could be herd immunity by May, it would require that a majority of the country be vaccinated.

A new Gallup poll?found that 58% of Americans?said they would get vaccinated against the coronavirus if there was an FDA-approved vaccine available right now at no cost.

Read the full story:

Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine vials.

Related article White House vaccine chief says first Americans could be vaccinated next month

A traveler approaches the AirTrain to JKF International Airport in New York, on November 20.

Thanksgiving travel is surging as new coronavirus cases approach 200,000 a day in the United States.

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued guidance on Thursday?urging Americans not to travel for Thanksgiving. But millions of people are still planning to travel over the holiday week.

On Friday, the number of travelers screened at US airport security checkpoints topped 1 million for only the second time since March, according to?Transportation Security Administration figures. That’s still just 40% of the volume screened on the Friday before Thanksgiving a year ago.

Many weary Americans eager to join family and friends for Thanksgiving face another risk calculation as they weigh scrapping travel plans at the last minute or going ahead as Covid-19 cases surge.

Gail Duilio, a retired public health nurse in Portland, Oregon, has canceled her flight to Minnesota for the holiday and her mother’s 93rd birthday.

Travel organization AAA has said that it expects at least a 10% drop in travel this Thanksgiving because of spiking coronavirus cases, shifting travel restrictions and calls by health and government officials for people to stay home.

AAA forecasts nearly 48?million travelers will drive to their?destinations?– representing a 4.3% drop from last year in the number of people traveling by car over the holiday period, which AAA defines as Wednesday to Sunday.

Air travel is expected to see its largest one-year decrease on record for Thanksgiving, a nearly 48% drop, with just 2.4 million travelers expected to fly, according to the organization.

Read the full story:

Travelers walk through Newark International Airport on November 21, 2020 in Newark, New Jersey. - Current US numbers -- more than a quarter of a million deaths have been reported -- have alarmed authorities enough to advise that people stay home for the November 26 Thanksgiving holiday, when Americans usually travel to be with their families. (Photo by Kena Betancur / AFP) (Photo by KENA BETANCUR/AFP via Getty Images)

Related article Millions traveling for Thanksgiving despite surging Covid-19 cases