if you're living with hiv . . . . . . keep loving who you are. and ask your doctor if biktarvy is right for you. joining us from around the world. coming up on "cnn newsroom," division in the u.s. demonstrations in washington supporting president trump's baseless claims of election fraud have turned violent. closing out the worst coronavirus case week in the u.s. since the pandemic began. the toll it is taking on hospitals. plus plot to take down a terrorist. how a seemingly straightforward murder in a quiet iranian neighborhood this summer has turned into an international intrigue.

welcome, everyone. joe biden is, of course, the clear winner of the u.s. presidential election. but that's not stopping president donald trump and thousands of his supporters from claiming otherwise. they descended on washington saturday for what were mostly peaceful protests, but after dark, things took a violent turn. officials say one man was stabbed and is in critical condition. the mayor's office says two police officers have also been injured and at least 20 arrests made. we don't yet have a full picture of who was attacked or who might be responsible for the violence, but that doesn't stop the president, of course, from weighing in, tweeting that his supporters, quote, aggressively fought back after he says antifa attacked them. sara sidner gave us an update a short time ago.

>> reporter: really what you're seeing are several different things. you're seeing anti-fascists who were out, who are anti-trump as well. when they see someone from, you know, the trump-supporting side of things who come into the area where they are, we've seen arguments unfold, and then sometimes violent acts unfold as well. we've also seen, conversely, some of those folks who are anti-trump who are walking the streets in large groups, and then we have seen trump supporters, including the proud boys, who he infamously told to stand back and stand by during the very first 2020 presidential debate with joe biden. we have seen them running towards a group of people who were not being aggressive until confronted with a bunch of folks who were coming and screaming curse words at them and then it turned into a bit of a melee.

what we also have been seeing is the police are very heavily involved in trying to stop the two sides from coming together. >> now to be clear, of course, donald trump has no path to victory. that ship has sailed. but it's not stopping him from denying reality by continuing to push false claims. jeremy diamond reports from the white house. >> reporter: one week after joe biden was declared the winner of the presidential election, president trump is still refusing to concede and admit defeat in this 2020 election. instead what we've seen from the president is continuing to falsely claim that he has won, falsely claiming that there has been widespread voter fraud, and that this election was rigged against him. of course, these are the same claims that we saw the president make in the run-up to the election, but he has only continued to make those despite the clear and overwhelming evidence of this election. despite the fact that we have seen election officials, republicans and democrats, in all 50 states, make very clear

that there is no evidence of widespread voter fraud, and that in fact, the 2020 election was one of the most secure to date. during this week, we've also seen the president privately, according to our sources, waver between this pugilistic attitude where he says he wants to continue pursuing these lawsuits and recount challenges in key battleground states, also at other moments beginning to come to grips with reality. we saw a sliver of that on friday as the president spoke in the rose garden, acknowledging the possibility, at least, of a future biden administration. >> this administration will not be going to a lockdown. hopefully the -- the -- whatever happens in the future, who knows which administration it will be, i guess time will tell. but i can tell you, this administration will not go to a lockdown. >> reporter: saturday we saw the president drive through this crowd of supporters who were protesting in washington, parroting his claims of a stolen election. and after that, the president seemed to be buoyed by those supporters, digging in once again on his claims of a rigged election, taking to twitter,

making several tweets that twitter has labeled as misinformation about this election. the president showing no sign that he is prepared to concede this election publicly. jeremy diamond, cnn, the white house. joining me to discuss are scott jennings and dr. abdul al said scott, cnn plitting commentator and former assistant to president george w. bush. dr. said, an epidemiologist and cnn political commentator. good to have you both with us. scott, let's start with you. what do you think the republican party, as opposed to donald trump, is going to gain by supporting what have been futile challenges to results that seem set? >> well, there's really nothing to gain here. joe biden's going to be the next president. what the republican party really needs to do is focus on governing in december, which means passing a funding bill for the government, passing a defense authorization bill, and hopefully passing a covid relief

package. the party then has to turn attention to georgia where there are two senate special elections that it needs to win in order to hold the senate majority. so the real focus of the party at large needs to be on winning in congress, winning in georgia. that's where they have to be in the short-term. >> but right now should they be speaking out right now about what's happening? >> well, republicans -- i mean, republicans speaking out for or against donald trump has never modified his behavior once in four years. so what i'm saying is the party needs to focus on what it needs to do. donald trump needs to get the transition going, let's be honest. joe biden is going to be president so there needs to be a legitimate transition so biden can be successful. >> good point on whether it would have any effect. doctor, what do you see as the impact of the whole trump strategy? in terms of its impact on people's faith in the democratic process, i mean, the country is clearly divided. but doesn't what's coming from the oval office multiply the

intensity, the division? and give more life to the anger? we are literally seeing on the streets tonight in d.c.? >> yeah, michael, there are a couple of things to say. it's good to hear scott saying what the rest of the party ought to be saying, that donald trump lost the election, lost the election fair and square, that this was an election with extremely high integrity, almost no evidence at all that's justifiable that there's any sort of fraud. and the upshot here is that when you don't see republicans like scott stepping up and calling the president out on the fact that he is making baseless allegations about fraud in the election, it undermines the democratic process itself. my parents emigrated from a country where there is no democracy. i take our democracy extremely seriously. any republican who is standing with donald trump right now is undercutting people's faith in the integrity of our election system, the integrity of our very democracy. and i'll disagree with my friend scott here, because he says that

it doesn't matter what republicans say, that it's not going to influence the president. this isn't about the president, this is about the future of the republican party, whether or not they believe in democracy as it stands or they're more interested in whether or not the election validates their own preconceived notions about the president. the president lost this election. there was no fraud. there were no -- there was no evidence that there was anything untoward about this election. and i think the entire party needs to step up, break the stranglehold that donald trump has on that party, and to tell all of their supporters that this was a free and fair election, joe biden won fair and square. >> speaking of supporters, scott, i guess you've been watching what's been happening in d.c. there's been at least one person stabbed, guns have been recovered, police officers have been injured. there has been palpable anger. and fair to say there's been anger on both sides. but regardless of that, this is not good. and is this thing amplified and

fanned by this sort of vacuum that's been created by donald trump not accepting what happened? >> well, first of all, i think anyone who commits violence against another person is responsible for their own actions. although i think it's fashionable to try to blame donald trump for anything, the fact is there are left-wing protesters committing violence in the streets of washington. and there's -- >> well, on the right too, scott, i've seen them, on the right as well. >> i haven't seen it. i've seen peaceful protesters to date showing their support for donald trump being harassed. i've seen fireworks and incendiary devices shot into open-air restaurants in washington, d.c. tonight. that wasn't being done by trump supporters. >> but the point is this vacuum that's been created by the nonconcession giving oxygen to that sort of demonstration. >> no. absolutely not. the same kind of people who are committing violence tonight were

committing violence over the last several months by burning buildings in portland and kenosha and other places. the same kinds of people committing violence tonight have been doing it, frankly, for the last six months in the united states. so no, this has nothing to do with trump, this has to do with extreme violent left-wing ideological protesters. >> scott, come on, scott. come on. you and i both know that what we're seeing in the streets is being fed and watered by donald trump and republicans who are unwilling to concede the election that he lost fair and square. million maga march is exactly the name of the events in washington, d.c. that you're talking about. and so if you guys want to be the party of law and order, there should be law and order. and what your president loses an election fair and square, you should come out on and say it and tell your supporters to go home. >> dr. sayed, you know as well as i do, the video coming out of washington tonight, those trump

supporters are not committing violence. they are being harassed on the streets. everyone can see it. it's been going on in america for months and months. the same kinds of protesters in d.c. tonight have been in portland and in other places, kenosha, all over the united states. you know who's doing it. i recognize they hate trump -- >> let me ask you this, though. do you think this would be happening if the president wasn't tweeting constantly, we've been robbed -- >> yes. >> you do? >> of course i do. because it's already been happening. and yes, these trump supporters went to washington to support the president. look, like i said, i recognize joe biden's won this election. these people support the president, and because they gathered in support of donald trump, these left-wing protesters came to harass them. it's obvious what's happening. >> that's not what happened. that's not what happened, scott. >> it's not right. >> doctor, last word. >> the sitting president of the united states is failing to concede an election that he lost. his supporters are out in the street because republicans are

unwilling to call the truth what it is. and those supporters, those very same people who claim to be the party of law and order, are now, just like kyle rittenhouse did when he crossed state lines and killed two people, now engaging in violence over an election that they lost. that's the topic right now. >> that is a complete and utter falsehood. >> we've got to leave it there, gentlemen. scott jennings, dr. abdul al sayed, we appreciate you coming on, thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you. for the 12th straight day, the u.s. is counting more than 100,000 new coronavirus cases. more than 160,000 just on saturday, according to johns hopkins university. infections climbing in every single state. hospitalizations shattering records too. for four days the number has climbed. now more than 68,000 people are in hospitals across the u.s.

and experts warn those facilities will soon be at capacity. >> we're headed to more and more cases and an intolerable number of deaths. and what we're going to see in places where the rates of cases are continuing to rise is we'll see hospital icus fill. you can make more icu beds, but what you can't make are more icu nurses. we will run out of the capacity in many of these hospitals to care for the critically ill. >> now the midwestern u.s. in particular is seeing big jumps in coronavirus cases lately. let's take a look at just one state, iowa, which now has more than 181,000 cases and more than 1,900 deaths. and they're seeing record high hospitalizations, according to the covid tracking project. dr. gregory schmidt is a critical care specialist affiliated with university of iowa hospitals and clinics.

doctor, thanks so much for being with us. i saw you quoted as saying, people in leadership are starting to say things in meetings like, i have a sense of impending doom. it's chilling to hear that. explain. >> well, these are unprecedented times for us. and we see the numbers. we see the trends. and we know that roughly two weeks after infections, patients will be in the icu. and so we can see our future before us, and we're doing everything that we possibly can to get ready. but we know that this is an unprecedented surge, and we're going to really have stressed systems. >> you are truly frontline. give us a sense, because i don't think most people have a clue, give us a sense of what it is like in the e.r. as beds fill up. and you're looking patients in the eye, it all seems to be anonymous to most people, i think. >> well, this is a profound

illness. patients become desperately sick, critically ill, unable to breathe. often requiring artificial machines to breathe. sometimes even artificial lungs to replace their failing lungs. so they're desperately ill. and they are separated from their usual support systems. and that's one of the things that's particularly unusual about this disease is that because we're in a pandemic, families are not there. which means these patients are on their own. and that's hard on them, and it's hard on us. >> well, exactly. i was going to get to that in a moment. you are dealing with sick and dying covid patients. and then you and the people you work with perhaps leave and see bars that are packed, people in restaurants, people partying, watching football or whatever. what goes through your minds and the minds of your colleagues when you walk outside the e.r.

and see that behavior? >> well, michael, frankly, we're concerned. some of my colleagues are angry. they're scared about what's going to happen. and maybe the best word would be frustrated. frustrated because the devastation that is in front of us now and worsening in the next few weeks is preventible. at least to a substantial degree it's preventible. if we took the proper steps. and so it's seeing those people at bars, that's not the proper steps. that's not going to ameliorate this pandemic. >> you touched on this, and i do want to revisit it. you speak about the toll on staff. it has been nonstop, months on end. that cannot go on forever. what sort of mental toll is it taking on medical staff? >> well, you know, michael, on the one hand we're professionals. and we are doing our job.

and we will do our job. but when every day you are up to your elbows in critical illness that keeps coming, you know, that one of the challenges about this is we're kind of mopping up the damage of a virus. and we can do that, but somehow the spigot has got to be turned off. and this illness needs to be controlled. and those are things that are beyond the power of any one hospital or any one specialty group. this is something that is going to require national action on the part of our leaders and on the part of our population. we need them to join with us in this fight. >> i was just about to ask you about that. what is your message to those showing covid admittatimitigati fatigue? a brand-new member of congress tweeted yesterday, masks are

oppressive, my body, my choice. what do you say to people who continue to push back on coronavirus restrictions, the whole freedom argument? >> well, i think freedom is not really the right term. there are many things that we're not free to do because we live in a civilized society. we can't drive down the wrong side of the street. we can't go downtown with our pants off. these are things that in a ci l civilized world you don't do. but i think -- i actually want to defend the citizens in a sense, because they've gotten conflicted messages. and i think one of the things that the coming administration needs to do is to be more on point with messaging, a consistent message to the population about what is going to be required help, but it's going to be awhile before a vaccine is going to have its effect. and hundreds of thousands of americans are going to die before that happens.

>> absolutely. our pleasure to speak with you, dr. gregory schmidt, we appreciate your expertise, we appreciate what you and your colleagues are doing every single day that people by and large aren't getting at the moment, and it's important. thank you. >> my pleasure, michael. thank you. we're going to take a quick break. when we come back on "cnn newsroom," more people than ever are catching coronavirus in the u.s. but thend why there's still a lot further to go. ♪ ♪ still the one and i can't get enough ♪ ♪ we're still having fun, and you're still the one. ♪ applebee's 2 for $20. it's date night in the neighborhood. or psoriatic arthritis, little things can become your big moment. that's why there's otezla. otezla is not an injection or a cream. it's a pill that treats differently.

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it's made for him a veteran who honorably served and it's made for her she's serving now we also made usaa for military spouses and their kids become a member. get an insurance quote today. since the first diagnosed u.s. coronavirus case back in january, death rate has dropped dramatically. treatments have improved. the outcome for many patients but as case numbers continue to skyrocket, it is clear this is a fight that is far from over. cnn's dr. sanjay gupta with more. >> new york city. the epicenter of the pandemic this spring. >> code 99, code 99. >> code 99 could mean someone that still has a pulse, a blood

pressure, but is struggling to breathe. >> dr. robert feranji was in the thick of it in march with very few tools at that time to manage a new respiratory disease. >> imagine trying to treat severe bacterial pneumonia without antibiotics. we're basically relying on a machine and the patient's own immune system to recover. >> other area hospitals also overwhelmed, like morristown medical in new jersey where dr. lewis rubinson works. >> our numbers went up pretty dramatically, pretty quickly. we had 20 units with covid patients. our maximum was over 300 patients concurrently. >> reporter: one study of a new york city health system found that in march, 25.6% of hospitalized covid-19 patients would end up dying. imagine that. 1 in 4. >> this is a terrible, very terrible virus. and it's killing our people.

>> by june, that mortality rate had dropped by more than two-thirds to 7.6%. >> the number of deaths has not been increasing markedly. >> and it's not just new york. in england, the fatality rate was around 6% in june, and by mid-august, it was 1.5%. one thing has become clear. if someone is infected with the novel coronavirus now, they are more likely to survive than back in the spring. but why? after all, the virus itself hasn't changed. but it turns out we have. for starters, about 75% of the people hospitalized were over the age of 50 back in march. almost 40% had at least one underlying condition. >> we were seeing, as many centers were seeing, more mature patients being impacted and having severe disease. >> today, more than half of all newly infected people are under

the age of 50. and they are significantly less likely to get sick. but even if patients do end up in the hospital, their care is now very different. we have an expanded toolkit. drugs like remdesivir and monoclonal antibodies to stop the virus from replicating. the steroid detection sa meth zone. we're using blood thinners to help reduce clotting associated with covid-19. >> you know, there was a lot of discussion about ventilators, doctor, in the beginning. and patients who went on ventilators, at one point the mortality rate for them was approaching 50%. what was going on there? >> well, for someone whose breathing is so bad that we can't get enough oxygen in them or carbon dioxide out, the ventilator helps. but it comes at potential costs. the pressures and the strategies that we use in medical ventilation worsens some lung disease. >> take a look here. with covid-19, the lungs can

quickly fill up with mucous, making it difficult to take in oxygen. also, damaged lung tissue can sit next to healthy tissue. if too much oxygen is forced onto the healthy tissue, it can cause leaks and swelling and other damage. it's why doctors started to wait longer to move patients to ventilators, utilizing strategies like having patients breathe on their stomachs, known as proning. and just monitoring patients with low oxygen levels with as few interventions as possible. >> we're driving on the road that we're paving at the same time with covid. >> evolving standards of care to match our evolving understanding of this disease. so there's no question that we've become better at being able to take care of patients once they've contracted covid, and even if they become seriously ill. all the techniques, the medications, things that we've been talking about. the issue now is that there's just so many patients who are contracting covid, that's going to increase the percentage of

people who need to be hospitalized, we're already seeing that. the projections are close to 200,000 more people may die within the next 100 and so days. so the numbers are still pretty awful. what we have to do in order to bring those numbers down, in addition to the better medical care, is reduce the amount of virus out there. the same basic things we've been saying for months. masks, physical distancing, no large public gatherings, stay away from clustered indoor settings. if you do these things, we can, in addition to the good medical care, we can really start to bring this curve down. >> sanjay gupe tax our thanks. right now millions of votes are being counted by hand right here in georgia when where we're broadcasting from. the statewide order that the presidential race is on a tight deadline. we'll have more after the break. also, we will trace the complex road that lies ahead in the nine weeks before inauguration day. this year, our driveways have brought us

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program. i'm michael holmes. you're watching "cnn newsroom." appreciate your company. here in the state of georgia, the head of elections seth the state has recounted roughly 20% of the ballots in the first full day of an audit of the presidential race. cnn projects joe biden will become the first democrat in nearly 30 years to flip the state from red defeat donald tre state's republican party are not ready to help yet. right now nearly 5 million ballots are being counted by

hand as part of a statewide order. joe biden's lead prior to the order stood at more than 14,000 votes over mr. trump. cnn's a.m. mra walker is at one the recount sites. >> reporter: fulton county, the hand recount moving along swiftly and efficiently. i spoke with the elections director, richard baron. he says the goal is to finish by monday, a couple days earlier than the deadline. he says judging by the even ear. statewide, according to the secretary of state, things are also moving at a smooth pace. but overall, the state is up against a pretty tight deadline to recount 5 million ballots that were cast in the presidential election. wednesday, 11:59 p.m., the deadline to finish this hand audit. friday, the deadline for the secretary of state to certify the final results. transparency in this entire

process has really been the priority for state election officials, especially as president trump and his campaign have been repeatedly trying to undermine the election process, claiming, falsely claiming, that there has been widespread voter fraud. in fact, just a few days ago, trump's campaign alleged that four dead georgians voted on november 3rd. one of those individuals, it turns out, is alive and well. >> the president of the united states was accusing you of voter fraud. essentially. >> oh, i know it. and i knew it wasn't fraud. >> who did you vote for? you don't have to share that. >> i voted for the democrats. for biden. >> i see. >> i guess i voted against the other one, really. >> reporter: the trump campaign had claimed in a tweet that mr. james blalock of covington, georgia, had voted even though he died in 2006. he never voted, according to

election officials. in fact, his wife, mrs. james blalock, she's been voting under that name for many years, according to election officials. i do also want to mention that on the floor here and in other counties, the carter center has sent out monitors, and that is a very unusual move by the carter center. this is the first time they've actually sent observers to observe an american election. typically what they do is send out monitors to countries where they feel like democracy is under threat. so again, transparency, boosting confidence in this election system in the u.s., has really been the priority. i'm amara walker, back to you. >> amara, thank you. in 66 days, president-elect joe biden will be sworn in as president. what happens in those days leading up to the inauguration? and who does what? tom foreman takes a look at the complicated process that lays ahead.

>> reporter: from now until the second week of december, states should settle their vote counts and certify the results. they all have their own particular deadlines, so it won't happen all at once. and of course, if there are local rules or a legal challenge requiring recount that could produce delays. but they're all headed for the same goal, saying within a few weeks, we've settled all disputes and this is our final tally for each candidate. they must have that complete by december 14th, because that is when the electors must vote. who are they? they are 538 people from all different states chosen by the parties and mirror the number of representatives in each state, plus the district of columbia, which gets 3. this is the electoral college. typically they gather at their local statehouses and award their electoral votes, in most

cases, to whoever gathered the most popular votes in their state. although occasionally some break from that and cast rogue votes, becoming what we call faithless electors. although the supreme court rules just this year they can be punish punished or removed if they take that action. in any event, the results must be sent to washington no later than december 23rd. and then on january 6th, those electoral votes are counted during a joint session of congress under the watchful eye of the president of the senate, meaning, vice president mike pence. and when that count is done, he will be the first person to officially announce the names of the next president and vice president. and then on wednesday, january 20th, at noon, as prescribed by the constitution, the big finish. the president and vice president will be sworn in at the u.s. capitol and begin four years of leading the country, or at least trying to, amid these challenges times. tom foreman, cnn, washington.

>> for more let's bring in michael genevese. good to see you. we were talking about the violence and protests in washington saturday. how mu how mu how much damage is done to public faith in the electoral system by the president's refusal to accept the results of the election? >> let's be clear, this is unprecedented. a president who is intentionally starting the embers of conflict by attacking our electoral system and democracy by a false narrative that the election was stolen, that it's all unfair, it's fraud. he's inflaming the passions of his followers when he should be calming things down. he's egging them on. so the proud boys and the tinfoil hat-wearing followers, there are some of them who are very susceptible to the

president's words, see him throwing gas on this fire, and this cannot end in anything that's good. >> i'm interested. what direction do you think the gop will head in as the party -- once this is all over? this is essentially been the trump party for four years. does the party have to regroup in a post-trump world? or do you see it as the party has changed forever? >> well, donald trump won't go away. he is probably going to announce running in 2024. and in the post-loss election autopsy, the republicans are going to have to do some soul searching, and they'll do a lot of finger pointing, and there will be some recriminations. they have to figure out if they, going forward, are the party of trump, because he still has the base and they're still loyal, or if they're going to purge themselves of the influence of donald trump and try and move beyond trump. whether they're going to try to be more moderate and try to attract newer voters, more women, more young folks.

maybe hispanics. whether they're going to be the -- sort of the old party of white males. so there's going to be a lot of soul searching, there's going to be a lot of argumentation. but it all hinges on the future and donald trump, whether he is in or out of the republican tent. >> i guess, you know -- that is a reality. joe biden convincingly, overwhelmingly, won the popular vote. however, the democrats did not do well down ballot. they didn't flip the senate. they lost seats in the house. the president did grow the vote, and he grew the vote among minorities and so on. why is that? >> well, i think there are a variety of reasons. sometimes it's individual candidates, in individual states. but i think what it is, we still as a country have not agreed on a consensus as to who we are and where we want to go. and we are so divided and so polarized that we were not talking to one another, we're talking and yelling at one another. no one has captured the romance

of the time or the logic of the time, so no one has the narrative that they can describe that this is where we are, this is how we got here, this is where we're going, this is how to get there. this is no consensus or agreement on that. so we remain a fragmented and fractured society. in that kind of society, there's no real direction in which we go, we've just lurched from one side to another, almost mindlessly. >> great analysis, michael genevese, thanks so much, good to see you. >> thank you, michael. europe is one of the biggest coronavirus hot spots right now. and each country is going about it quite differently. but the wave of infections does seem like it could peak soon. we'll break it down for you. mystery swirls around a killing in iran. did israeli agents on motorcycles assassinate al qaeda's number two leader in an audacious shooting on the streets of tehran? mily event! with 25 to 50% off everything!

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welcome back. a senior al qaeda leader reportedly gunned down on the streets of tehran by israeli operatives at iranians say it never happened, israel and the u.s. are not saying much of anything about it. as oren lieberman reports, the killing happened exactly 22 years after the al qaeda operative helped plan a devastating terror attack. >> reporter: on the streets of iran's capital city, the drive-by shooting took seconds. a middle-aged man and his daughter shot and killed in their car on august 7th. semi-official news agencies i.d.'d the man as a lebanese academic with ties to hezbollah. and then the story vanished. the man, it seemed, didn't lebanon, no academic by his name in iran. months later, mid-october, on

obscure social media accounts, the story resurfaced but not about doud. the accounts said the man was really abdullah ahmed abdullah, better known as al masri, the number two man in al qaeda. "the new york times" said it was indeed al masri. a cnn counterterrorism official told cnn, al masri was probably dead. he was on the fbi's most wanted list, $10 million award for information leading to his capture. he was one of the primary planners of the twin bombings of the u.s. embassies in tanzania and kenya on august 7th, 1998, 22 years to the day before he himself was killed. according to the "times," the drive-by shooting was carried out by israeli agents at the behest of the united states. if true, it would be similar in nature to israel's reported killings of iranian nuclear scientists in the past. the israeli and american governments declined to comment, and al qaeda has made no comment

about losing one of its leaders. iran's foreign ministry denied the report, accusing the u.s. and israel of spreading lies that iran associates with terrorists. some analysts saw abu mohammad al masri as next in line to lead al qaeda, the man who would take over for al zawahiri, the terrorist group's leader for a decade, also on the fbi's most wanted list. what about the woman in the car with al masri who was killed? it was his daughter miriam, the widow of hamza bin laden, the deceased son of osama bin laden. oren lieberman, cnn, jerusalem. police in frankfurt, germany, dispersing lockdown protesters and counter protesters on saturday. police say they used water cannon after some of the lockdown protesters demonstrated without following mask and social distancing rules. germany has been under partial

lockdown since november 2nd, and there is little expectation that restrictions will be eased for now. let's take a closer look now at europe's devastating second coronavirus wave. first, austria. it is soon going to have its second nationwide lockdown, and that is because covid-19 cases are growing ten times faster than expected. the chancellor, sebastian kurz, is urging people not to go out and meet anyone, admitting that authorities were no longer able to trace 77% of new infections. the new lockdown will start on tuesday and will last at least 2 1/2 weeks. poland reporting a record high in daily coronavirus deaths, and the country has the biggest total in all of eastern europe. and greece will be closing all primary schools and nurseries on monday for two weeks. officials say it's a precaution because of a surge in cases there.

but there are also some good signs. france reporting a new decrease in covid-19 patients in intensive care units. it is the first time since october that that has happened. and the uk reporting its lowest number of daily new cases since wednesday. it's a start. that's what we're able to tell from government data from saturday. there is more welcome news. the head of the german vaccine maker biontech says he's confident their vaccine could get fda approval very soon. >> i'm fred pleitgen in der lin. as german company biontech and u.s. company pfizer seem on the cusp of being able to apply for an emergency use authorization for their vaccine candidate with the fda. now the ceo of biontech in a phone call this week said he believes that could come as early as the third week of november. he also thinks that the vaccine

he also thinks the vaccine which showed efficacy rates of more than 90% in late stage trials will not be the only vaccine that will be successful. all this comes as the coronavirus infections in germany continue to soar, and also more and more patients are ending up in intensive care units. the german health minister saying if the trajectory continues the way it is now, the german health care system could be overwhelmed within a matter of weeks. >> our thanks there to fred pleitgen reporting. we're going take a quick break. when we come back on cnn newsroom, it is moving day at the masters golf tournament. after the break, we'll look at who pulled away i from the field, and what to expect for the final round. we'll be right back. ♪ ah honey honey ♪ ♪ you are my candy girl ♪ and you've got me wanting you ♪ applebee's 2 for $20. it's date night in the neighborhood.

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problems urinating, vision changes, or eye pain occur. take a stand and start a new day with trelegy. ask your doctor about once-daily trelegy. and save at trelegy.com. president trump waving at the news cameras there as he played yet another round of golf saturday at his trump national club near washington. all in all, he has spent, get this, 412 days of his presidency at one of his properties. and this was his 301st day at one of his golf resorts. that's more than a year of his presidency. golf's best players,

meanwhile, are getting set for the final round of the masters later today. cnn sports andy scholes with more on that. >> reporter: wow, this masters tournament is now dustin johnson's to lose. the world's number one player taking control of this tournament in saturday's third round. dj with an eagle and five birdies to end the day at 16 under par. that ties jordan spieth's 54-hole record. dj looking for his first evergreen jacket after finishing tied for second last year. no world number one has won the masters since tiger did it back in 2002. dj doesn't have a great track record when leading after three rounds in majors. he is 0 for 4 in converting those leads to wins, but hopes this time will be different. >> if i can play like i did today, i think it will break that streak. i put myself in the situation a lot of times. i know what it takes. i know how i respond in the situation. so i'm very comfortable, you

know, with having the lead. it would mean a lot. it's what a great event. i mean, it's the masters. it's a major. i grew up right down the road. so this one would be very special to me. >> tiger woods meanwhile not able to vault himself towards the top of that leaderboard on saturday. tiger had to finish eight holes from his second round in the morning before starting his third round. and tiger is not able to get anything going. had some opportunities, but finished his third round at 5 under for the tournament. barring a miracle, he will not be repeating as masters champ. will he be putting the green jacket on dustin johnson for the first time? dj has a four-shot lead heading into sunday's final round. one thing to keep in mind, while dj has not won the masters before, he might not feel that normal pressure of trying to close out a masters tournament because there is no fans here. so he's not going to have to hear those big roars from the crowds around the course and wonder if other players are

catching up. >> andy scholes reporting there. i'm michael holmes. i appreciate your company the last hour, and i'll be back with more "cnn newsroom" after a quick break. more to come. it's open! hey. think you're managing your moderate to severe ulcerative colitis or crohn's disease?

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after thousands of supporters of president donald trump rally in washington, the situation turns violent after dark as the divide over the election grows deeper. these lines of people waiting to take coronavirus tests in los angeles as the u.s. faces sweeping escalation in infections, setting new records every day. and police clash with antilockdown protesters in germany, firing water cannon when the