-- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com hello and welcome to all of you, our viewers joining us here in the united states and all around the world. you're watching "cnn newsroom" and i'm kim brunhuber. the first batch of the covid vaccine has arrived in california and should be delivered just hours from now. we'll look at plans to distribute it. meanwhile, other parts of the world are taking action amid a spike in coronavirus cases. we'll go live to berlin, london, hong kong. and the electoral college is set to seal the end of donald trump's presidency, but he's still not going quietly.

a long-awaited moment, months in the making is now just hours away. the arrival of a covid-19 vaccine across the u.s. today, the first doses of the pfizer-biontech vaccine are set to arrive in all 50 states. it cleared the last hurdle over the weekend after the cdc director accepted an advisory committee's recommendation that the vaccine be administered. ups says its first deliveries are expected in hours from now. the hope is health care workers can immediately begin administering the shots. these developments come one day after the u.s. marked a new record for hospitalizations. more than 109,000. and according to the covid tracking project, this is the 12th straight day where that figure remained above 100,000. the u.s. is now nearing 300,000

covid-19 deaths as statutes brace for more unprecedented numbers of new infections. cnn's pete muntean has more from a vaccine distribution center in michigan. >> reporter: what a moment, especially considering the fact that we only first learned of this virus less than a year ago and now the vaccine is leaving from here. this spot is critical to the vaccine distribution network. this is pfizer's largest facility just outside kalamazoo, michigan. what's so interesting is the trucks carrying the vaccine from ups and fedex left here 8:30 sunday morning. in those trucks, 189 boxes of the pfizer vaccine, 975 viles to a box, five doses per vile. now hundreds of thousands of doses are being delivered throughout the country. the lion's share of the deliveries begin on monday morning. the bulk of them though later on tuesday. they're going to 600 individuals locations according to operation warp speed.

those are places like hospitals and pharmacies, cvs and walgreens. pfizer's head of global supply says this was months in the making. >> i couldn't be more confident in the distribution of the vaccine. we've worked incredibly hard over many months doing test shipments, improving our shippers, making sure they can maintain temperature during their entire journey and we're very happy with the solution. >> this is not just a ground game, also an air operation. trucks left here bound for airports. fligh flights took the vaccine to larger hubs where it could be distributed better throughout the country. we saw some of those flights land today in louisville, kentucky. this is just the start of a massive movement that all begins right here. pete muntean, cnn, port inspector genera, michigan. >> the first vaccines have touched down in california. this was the scene in los angeles international airport after a plane loaded with the

vaccine made its long-awaited arrival. the state has seen three straight days of 30,000 cases. paul vercammen is in l.a. to see how hospitals plan to distribute the vaccine. >> the latest numbers out of los angeles county on the covid-19 outbreak are ghastly. more than 13,000 cases and more than 4,000 hospitalizations. 101 of those hospitalizations for covid-19 right here at the ucla medical center, where they're also bracing for the arrival they say in the next day or two of the vaccine. they say shots will go into the arm of hospital workers. that is on wednesday. but how do you fight a pandemic as well as get your workers vaccinated? we talked to the chief medical officer here at ucla. >> there's years of emergency preparedness behind a lot of these efforts. sot, while we're taking care of our non-covid-19 patients as well as our patients that are

covid-19 as well, we're doing other things we need to do to keep your health care workers safe, including standing up a vaccination program for them. we'll have the staffing to be able to do this and people are pitching in to make sure it works well. >> the priority here at ucla will be to get vaccinations for those health care workers who are constantly around covid-19 patients and close to those patients. now, he will not be one of those who gets the vaccine. that's because he's part of the astrazeneca clinical trial. reporting from ucla, i'm paul vercammen. now back to you. >> the head of operation warp speed says the hope is that 100 million americans can be immunized by the end of march. cnn's jake tapper spoke about that time frame with the commissioner of the food and drug administration. >> we're working very hard to help the manufacturers in the supply chain to get as much supply as possible up and running and of course assessing the quality of manufacturing. i have heard public reports from

department of health and human services that the expectation is in the next several months that there will be enough supply of vaccines to vaccinate 100 million americans. >> hhs secretary azar also said however that the u.s., in his view, was on track to have doses ready for 20 million americans by the end of the year. 20 million. that's just 18 days away. you have 2.9 million going out right now. that doesn't seem possible, does it? >> i think it's possible. you know, i certainly heard those discussions and i think that's a reasonable prediction. and i have confidence around that. >> an fda advisory panel slated to meet this thursday recommended to meet emergency use authorization for a different coronavirus vaccine from moderna. do you expect that by the end of this week the u.s. could have two vaccines available in the u.s.? >> jake, i'm not going to prejudge that discussion or our

assessment of the data. what i can tell you is that this week we will publish our assessment of the data in advance of that meeting and we'll have another public discussion just like we did last thursday. my sincerest hope is that we move forward and we'll do so expeditiously but don't want to prejudge that decision. >> dr. matthew is a primary care physician and public care physician. it starts in ernst. shots will be going in arms. as someone who regularly sees covid patients in your office here in georgia where cases have been skyrocketing, seeing those cases of the vaccine rolling on to trucks, what's your reaction? >> kim, thanks for having me on your show. listen, i never thought that if anybody told me that i would be so excited to see trucks with vaccines loaded leaving the

pfizer headquarters, months ago i would have been shocked. but listen, it was such an incredible sense of relief and joy when you talk about so many people that are dying just like you mentioned. we're going to be hitting 300,000 deaths in the u.s., over 3,000 people dying a day, and over 200,000 cases. this pandemic is getting worse. so, this is absolutely light at the end of the tunnel. we just need to be patient. we cannot take that mask off. a lot more people, unfortunately, will die, but there is hope. >> now, there's a lot of debate around whether white house officials should be among the first to get the vaccine ahead of the general public. president trump tweeted people working in the white house should receive the vaccine somewhat later in the program, not specifically necessary. i've asked that this adjustment be made. i'm not scheduled to take the vaccine but look forward to doing so at the appropriate time. so, is it good if they're among the first in the sense that it

sets an example and will give people confidence in the vaccine? or is it bad in the sense that, you know, it could be seen as queue jumping, especially by members of this administration who have sought to down play the severity of the virus in the first place. >> ultimately we're not going to have enough vaccines the first shipment. we'll only get 2.9 million doses. that's just 1% of the u.s. population. but on the other hand, i think that it is important for the white house to set an example and to say, listen, here's my arm. give me the vaccine. this is safe. all americans should get it. you know, there's also a little bit of a bigger issue there in that if you think about a lot of people in the white house have definitely gotten covid-19. we've been hearing about that in the news over and over again with the white house official. the question really as a scientist is if you had covid recently, should you really be first in line to get vaccine because we know that there is

some protection at least two to five months. >> well, here's another question for you then. it's a two-dose vaccine. as you said, there's a debate brewing about whether it's better to give one dose to as many as possible or two doses to a fewer number. where do you stand? >> the way the studies were conducted was pretty straightforward. it was two shots three weeks apart. and if you look at all the parameters, which is exciting, 95% protection, 95 protection, kim, in patients over 65. that's huge because they form, if you will, a bulk of the population with a lot of illnesses and comorbidities. so, in order to get all that protection, you really have to follow the two-dose regimen. so, i fall amongst a group of doctors and physicians that think that we should follow the protocol that was set forth by the vaccine trial, which is two shots. now, one last thing about that, to complete the answer is after the first dose, you do get 50%.

you don't get 95%. and, again, 100% of people are protected from getting severe covid illness if you get both doses. so, i think that everybody should follow the two-dose schedule. >> all right. there are concerns about the federal plan to gather information about vaccine patients. the government wants the data to help track the vaccination efforts to make sure people get both doses and so on. but some worry that will discourage people to get the shot, especially from minority communities and those who would naturally be suspicious of vaccination. why do we need this information and should we worry about how that data will be used? >> no, i think we absolutely need that information. if you really think about it, you're three times as likely to be hospitalized, five times as likely to die from covid if you are in the minority population, specifically the african-american population. so, all of that data is going to be key. the good news is that you look at the pfizer vaccine trial,

about 9% of the population studied was black. and it is going to be important for people like me, people of color physicians to roll up the sleeves and get the vaccine so we can really deal with a lot of the issues in minority communities regarding vaccine hesitation and the fear of getting a vaccine that may just be more of an experimental vaccine. >> all right. well, thank you so much for joining us on this exciting day. we appreciate it, dr. matthew. appreciate your time. >> thank you. canada's also preparing to roll out the pfizer biontech vaccine. it's giving hope after recent lockdowns have failed to curve the spread of new infections there. prime minister justin trudeau tweeted a photo of the plane carrying the first doses just after it landed on sunday evening. the vaccines are arriving amid increasing cases despite recent restrictions on movement and major cities, canada's two largest prochss ontario and

quebec logged record setting case numbers over the past week. germany is getting ready to enforce tough new coronavirus restrictions next week. coming up, we'll find out how it's cracking down just ahead on the holiday to stem an uptick in new infections. joiden and kamala harris are about to be one step closer to history. a milestone moment is coming up today. we'll have the details next. stay with us. to fight wrinkles? it's neutrogena®. rapid wrinkle repair® visibly smooths fine lines in 1 week. deep wrinkles in 4. so you can kiss wrinkles goodbye! neutrogena®. every time you touch a surface, bacteria is left behind. now, consider how many times your family touches the surfaces in your home in 24 hours. try microban 24. spray on hard surfaces to kill 99.9% of viruses and bacteria initially, including the virus that causes covid-19. once dry, microban forms a bacteria shield that keeps killing bacteria for 24 hours,

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today marks a major step in finalizing joe biden as president-elect of the united states. in just a few hours, electors from each state will formally vote for president and vice president in the electoral college. biden is expected to speak later in the day. cnn's boris sanchez walks us through what happens next. >> reporter: the electors of the electoral college will gather in their respective states to cast their ballots and certify president-elect joe biden won the 2020 election. now, here's how it's going to work. this is going to be happening all throughout the day. these electors that have been selected since earlier in the summer, in the spring, they're going to gather and record their votes in writing on actual paper

ballots, individually for president and vice president. once they cast their ballots and count them, they're going to sign six copies of a certificate of the vote. those copies are the actual official documents that certify their vote. and they're going to wind up going to their respective secretaries of state, to the u.s. senate, to the national archives, et cetera. but the most consequential certificates are going to be the ones that go to capitol hill because that's where they will be counted on january 6th. notably, an event that vice president pence will be presiding over. and there is a chance in that process for some drama, for republican lawmakers who are supportive of the president, president trump, to raise an objection. ultimately though, to sustain that objection for it to be consequential, they would need both chambers of congress to sustain that objection, to agree to it. and because democrats control the house of representatives, that appears extremely unlikely.

but there still may be moments rife with drama. ultimately the big thing to watch for tomorrow, as the electoral college certifies the results of the election, how many republican lawmakers, how many republican senators will finally come out and acknowledge the reality that joe biden won the election, that there was no widespread electoral fraud. that, of course, is something president trump is not ready to do. >> cnn political commentator and democratic strategist joins me from washington. thanks for being with us. later today the electoral college meets, but sunday president trump said his legal team will keep pursuing challenges. and very few republicans, bar some who have lost their seats or aren't running for re-election, are acknowledging that joe biden won in a fair election. trying to maintain the fiction that biden's presidency isn't

legitimate, is this, just as some people are arguing, the new birtherism. is there anything biden can say in his speech tonight to change that? >> sadly i don't think there's anything that biden can say in his speech tonight to change it, at least to change it immediately because what's going on -- and let's just say that this is and should be completely unacceptable for any elected official to turn their back and to turn away not just from reality, not just from the truth, not just from the facts, but to do something that is in essence doing harm to our democracy, to our democratic institutions and to our electoral process. these republicans understand that what they are saying makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. i don't know if donald trump knows that and he is just playing everybody because you know he's raised millions and

millions of dollars off of this from his own supporters. and i just think he is just cleaning out and taking to the bank, completely taking advantage of them. but to me, it is a pathetic read of where the republican party stands today that they are not able to stand up to this bully after four years, that donald trump still has such an incredible chokehold that he continues to keep the republicans hostage in an attempt to continue to control them. >> well, i want to turn to the transition now. biden has a different problem than president trump had having brought together so many disparate coalitions, claiming a share of his cabinet. what do you make of it so far? who are the winners and losers? >> so, what he's doing with his cabinet is a true reflection not just of his coalition that helped him win the white house

but of what this country truly reflects as a robust mix of so many incredibly diverse backgrounds. and that is what he is representing in the cabinet. the other really important thing that he's doing in the cabinet is that he is bringing in people that actually know how government works, that actually respect and are committed to public service and that want to do this for the betterment of the american people. >> while i have you here, i want to take advantage of your expertise on this topic. much has been made in the post-election analysis of the president's relatively strong showing among latinos even beyond the cuban american community in florida but also across the country. to be clear, biden still won the overwhelming majority of the latino vote, but looking forward, i mean is this a one off? is this tied to trump or is it a new strength that you think republicans can mobilize in the coming years?

>> look, as a latina, and i've been working on the latino vote and mobilization of the latina and latino vote for four decades here in the united states. and the latino vote should not be considered a base vote. she should be considered a swing vote because they have swung for many presidential candidates. having said that, it is true that a republican president has never won the latino vote. there have been presidents who have gotten more or less percentages of the latino vote, depending who they were. george bush in 2004 got 40 kt approximate of the hispanic vote. donald trump did a little bit better this time around than he did in 2016. to say that he did overwhelmingly well with the latino vote is a complete overexaggeration because there's no question if you look at the

exit polls that the reason -- one of the reasons why joe biden is in the white house today is because of the overwhelming support that he got with latinos in arizona. he would not have won arizona if not for latino vote. in nevada he would not have won nevada if not for latino vote. in colorado, he would not have won colorado if not for the latino vote. and in georgia, michigan, wisconsin and pennsylvania, he got a huge margin of the hispanic vote, which is incredibly important. >> maria, thank you so much for joining us. >> thank you so much. appreciate it. and don't miss our special coverage of the electoral college vote starting at 11:00 a.m. monday in new york, 4:00 p.m. in london right here on cnn. all right. now to a stunning security breach in the u.s. government. the commerce department confirms to cnn that it's been hacked, the victim of a data breach that's believed to be linked to russia. "the washington post" reports wugs government hackers also targeted the treasury

department. now u.s. authorities are racing to investigate. >> reporter: the u.s. government has been hit with a cyberattack which looks like the latest in russia's hacking campaign against the united states. the u.s. commerce department confirmed to cnn that one of its bureaus saw a data breach. "the washington post" is reporting that the treasury department was also targeted. it's unclear what data was accessed. commerce said that the fbi and the department of homeland security cyber arm, which is known as cisa had been asked to assist. cisa said there was recently discovered activity on government networks, as they put it, and that they are offering technical assistance. now the former head of cisa, chris krebs, who was fired by president donald trump after the election, called today's news in a tweet a pretty large scale attack. and he said that it's still early. t"the washington post" reported the russian hacking group, also

known as cozy bear, is behind today's reported attacks, as well as a recent stunning attack on cyber security firm fire eye in which they stole hacking tools. well beyond the u.s. elections, russia is known to be carry out significant broad online attacks against the united states and others, both government and private targets. alex mar kward, cnn quash quash. still ahead, they were hailed for their response to the first wave. now a spike in new cases means tough restrictions in asia's leading economies. we're live in hong kong next. stay with us. today's ways of working may work differently tomorrow.

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and welcome back to all of you, our viewers in the united states, canada and around the world. i'm kim brunhuber and you're watching "cnn newsroom." in the coming hours the first doses of the pfizerer-biontech vaccine are set to arrive in all 50 states. already we've seen shipments make it to several states via fedex, including california where the first batch arrived just hours ago at los angeles international airport. ups says its first deliveries are expected in about 4.5 hours from now. the hope is health care workers can immediately begin administering the shots today. the uk and germany are implementing stricter measures to get the coronavirus under control. germany will go in a hard national lockdown this week, beginning on wednesday, all non-essential shops, services and schools will close until january 10th. and london will begin mass testing school children for covid-19 in some of its worst hit areas. the uk is also set to review its coronavirus tier system on wednesday.

so, for more on both these developments, let's start with cnn's fred pleitgen in germany. angela merkel has been talking about this shutdown for a while. how are germans reacting? >> good morning. the run up to the holidays first of all is going to be completely different than most germans thought. one of the things we have to keep in mind is folks in this country and shop owners in this country, until the end of last week thought there was going to be christmas shopping going on until right up towards christmas. but then on sunday, angela merkel and the state governors of this country came together and decided there is going to be this hard lockdown starting on wednesday. and that means that all non-essential shops are going to have to close. that means all the shops where people would have been doing their christmas shopping. so, it is certain will you a tough blow in the run up to christmas and also christmas obviously is going to be a lot

smaller than it would have been at other times. it's only five people who are allowed to be together and it's only from two households. so, there aren't going to be any larger christmas gathering. there obviously aren't going to be any christmas parties either. and the reason for that, as you stated, angela merkel has been passionate saying the light lockdown measures simply aren't enough to stem the tide. i think especially last week really showed that the trajectory for this country was going in the wrong direction wrud a record number of cases on friday. and also a record number of deaths. that really shook people to have 600 deaths in a single day here in germany. that's about the equivalent of 2,400 in a day in the u.s. >> given that, germany obviously really needs a vaccine badly. but it's not approved in europe yet. so, how hard are the germans pressing to speed things up? >> well, you know, it's becoming a problem. i think it's something that really wasn't discussed very

much here in this country when the going was still a little better. but certainly now seems to be a lot more pressing. in fact the health minister of this country came out yesterday on sunday and he tweeted, look, the european medicines agency has all the data from pfizer and biontech. they could make this decision. the u.s. and uk have given this vaccine authorization. he says quite frankly the european medicines agency needs to approve the vaccine or give it some sort of authorization as fast as possible. he said that the credit skpblt the ability of the european union to act in the face of the population here in your opinion, that that was something that was at stake. he said that was something that's extremely pressing. the germans have been putting in place a lot of vaccine centers. they've been building them up. these vaccine centers are ready. they're finished. everyone is standing at the ready. all they need now is approval.

germans saying that should come as fast as possible, kim. >> thank you so much. in london, things seem to be getting worse. what's the latest there? >> absolutely, kim. there's another surge in cases and with the surge comes the controversy about what to do with it. you mentioned the mass testing for school students. that's starting today. mobile testing units were deployed over the weekend to the most affected neighborhood of london as well as the surrounding areas. they'll be testing school age children between 11 to 18. there's always controversy. the major of london says this is not enough. he wants to see school age children testing for coronavirus prioritized over the next couple of days. he wants to see those schools shut down early before the christmas break so the government could maintain control of the virus as the mayor said. but mass testing very much the government strategies to deal with the surge in cases. the other is of course vaccinations. vaccinations started last week

here. they are expanding this week to include local doctor's offices, 100 local doctor's offices will also be vaccinating. again very limited portion of the population. the elderly being given the priority in that case. but the most important thing is that dateline of wednesday because that's when all the restrictions will be reviewed. so, right now england is in a three-tier regional restriction system. so, geographic geography based. each city and town has its own measures and restrictions. on wednesday that will be reviewed. london is expected to go into the highest level restrictions. but here's the catch, kim. even if london goes into tier 3, highest level restriction, unlike in germany where you heard from my colleague fred there, all non-essential shops can remain open. it won't affect any of that. it's also important to remember there's a special christmas time dispen sags, a few days rules are relaxed even more.

all of this has experts worried. how is it going to handle the surge when it has all of these different rules and regulations spread out while they're dealing with a spike in cases. >> very interesting contrast between the two countries there. thank you both. fred pleitgen and selma dell aziz. appreciate it. cities in italy are coming back to life after harsh covid restrictions. risk levels in five regions were downgraded other the weekend. that means most of the country woke up sunday in the yellow zone which is the least restrictive. bars and restaurants can reopen but they have to close by 6:00 p.m. nightly curfew remains in place throughout the country. but none of the regions are now under the red zone. japan and south korea launch tough restrictions this year as the pandemic began sweeping the globe. total case counts are in the ten of thousands versus the millions seen in the u.s. and parts of europe. but they're now seeing some of the worst daily counts yet, and

they're both considering new countermeasures. for more on this, let's bring in kristie lu stout who's live in hong kong. let's start with south korea. i take it's much wanted test and trace system isn't working as it was early in the pandemic. is it that they're just overwhelmed with too many cases? >> well, it's too many cases and too many clusters. in the case of south korea, it's too many clusters in the seoul metropolitan area. in the case of japan, it's too many clusters across the nation. and it's big cities from tokyo, also including nagoya and hokkaido. as a result over the weekend, both countries, south korea and japan, set a new record of the highest coronavirus daily count since the beginning of the pandemic. over the weekend, japan surpassed 3,000 new daily coronavirus cases for the first time since the beginning of this punishing pandemic. we know that around 6:00 p.m. local time today the japanese government will be holding a task force meeting to go over

and propose new countermeasures to fight this new outbreak, including possibly excluding tokyo and nagoya from a domestic travel scheme. meanwhile, south korea over the weekend reported 1,030 new cases of the coronavirus, a new record for south korea. on saturday, the south korean president moon jae-in mobilized the military, the police as well as medical workers to control the outbreak. and on sunday, he described it as a, quote, emergency situation and said that if his nation does not bring this outbreak under control, it will have to issue its very first level three alert. take a listen to what moon jae-in said on sunday. >> translator: it is a very serious and emergency situation. there is nowhere to back down. it is a desperate time to devote all efforts to stop the spread of corona by focusing all quarantine capabilities and administrative power. unless the outbreak can be

contained now, it has come to a critical point to consider escalating the social distancing measures to the third level. >> in the event of a level three alert, that would mean a ban on all social gatherings of more than ten people and only essential workers would be allowed in the office but ahead of a level three. authorities in south korea have already made a move. today they announced that schools in seoul and in neighboring areas will be closed. all the students will transition to remote learning. kim. >> a huge move there. so, before you go, i want to ask you about the newest travel bubble announced today. australia and new zealand. what can you tell us about that? >> a little bit of good covid news with the announcement of the travel bubble between australia and new zealand. it was the prime minister who made the announcement earlier today. the bubble will be kicking in sometime during the first quarter of 2021. but there are conditions. one of the most important conditions is that there must be no community of the transmission

of the virus in either place for 28 days. it's achievable, but it is a tall order. as we saw last month in hong kong we had the widely anticipated travel bubble between hong kong and singapore. it never had a chance to float because of multiple days of community transmission of the virus. >> thank you so much. appreciate it. up next on "cnn newsroom." >> i'm afraid we're still very far apart on some key things. >> boris johnson says a no deal brexit is likely but he and his european counterparts are holding out hope. i'll tell you why next. stay with us. what if i sleep hot? ...or cold?

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♪ i'm afraid we're still very far apart on key things. where there's light, there's hope. we're going to keep talking to see what we can do. the uk certainly won't be

walking away from the talks. i think people will except us to go the extra mile. >> that was boris johnson there managing expectation. he and the european commissioner have agreed to extend trade negotiations again. but both parties are warning there will likely be no deal agreed when the brexit transition period ends at midnight on december 31st. that means the uk and its closest neighbors would wake up to world trade organizations terms with its tariffs and checks. nic robertson joins me live from london. nic, the fact that they're extending the deadline, is that a sign that they're close to a deal or just that each side just doesn't want to be the one to be seen to be walking away because there's so much at stake? >> the art of any negotiation is that neither side wants to be carrying the can for the blade. we've gone into the weekend in an atmosphere of gloom. you had the phone call yesterday

between the european commission president and boris johnson. i think we're in a phase now, perhaps you can call it invigorated gloom but it's still gloom because we don't know what's actually happening in these talks, why they feel that they can actually bend some ground by continuing to talk, obviously a lot of pressure because of the cost of a failure to get a deal. a lot of pressure continue talking but we don't know on the basis of what. and this time there's no deadline put in place here. i think when you talk about the boris johnson managing expectations, you know, saying that this may come out to be no deal and trading on wto terms, i think we can say, well, who's expectations is he managing here? certainly he's managing expectations in the uk. but that's part of a negotiation, isn't it? so, he's managing expectations on the other side that the uk is ready to walk away. and we've heard that from a bad deal and we've heard that from

european leaders z as well. i don't think we have a clear understanding of what's happening in that negotiating room. the eu negotiator is briefing eu diplomats this morning. perhaps some light shed on it. but the reality of where we stand right now i think is one that, yes, all sides want to get this deal. they're sticking at it. and that's about all we know, kim. >> do you know what the biggest issue is that's holding up the talks? >> yeah, again, i think it just depends on sort of which tiny little leak you listen to. the fisheries issue has been so important for the uk. it's their sort of take back control. it's their being able to show that where every previous british prime minister who's never got a good deal were uk fishermen, that boris johnson can deliver something better. the gdp is miniscule for

fisheries in the uk but it's a big issue. so, i think that's there's a lot riding on that for boris johnson. perhaps indications are that that's something that can be resolved in timelines and where you put the borders. the uk 12 miles out to 200 miles out. you know, how much eu fisher meb can access that, what the terms and conditions would be and overwhat time frame the changes would be made. there's room for fudging in there. but i think the biggest thing seems to be this gap is over what's called a level playing field. quite simply how closely the uk should track changes in eu regulations if the uk wants to continue access with zero tariffs, zero quote or no quotas applied into the european union's single market. that, i think, is the thorniest one, but again, that can be

managed by words. there's a possibility to find language where it doesn't seem that britain is being demanded to immediately follow eu rules and regulations. but there will be an expectation with outcomes if they didn't. >> all right. thank you so much for your analysis, nic robertson. really appreciate it. well, best spelling spy novelist john le carre has died. some books were turned into blockbuster movies. he also served in british intelligence during the cold war. his family says he died from pneumonia. his literary agent describes him as an undisputed agent of lit clur. he was 89 years old. night pain.

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♪ south africa has some of the most beautiful beaches in the world, but it is also ranked as one of the planet's worst

plastic marine polluters, creating an environmental crisis on its shoreline. >> our oceans are integral to our health. it's important that we care for it so that we can breathe oxygen, so that we can eat fish, so that we can have healthy water to feed our crops. >> she's a surfer and conservationist in cape town. in 2015 she founded the volunteer based beach co-op to clean beaches every new moon. she wants to have a long term impact. by identifying the types of rubbish and weighing its mass according to a method. >> uts a methodology we use on sandy beaches and here at the rocky shore to document what we're finding. >> during 100 clean ups, the

beach co-op has pucked up over 30,000 sweet wrappers, nearly 33,000 cool drink lids and over 25,000 straws. the dirty dozen methodology was designed by professor peter ryan, a cape town ordinary reason tholgs and leading researcher on marine plastic waste. >> we looked at litter coming out of an urban river in cape town and almost all of it washed up within 5,500 meters of the mouth of the river. >> peter advises the beach co-op. today they are confronted by a spill of microplastics, tiny plastic pelts called nurdales, which are the raw materials used by industry to make larger items. hundreds of thousands have washed up on cape beaches. >> we're wanting to document where they have found them and the date and we're hoping to collect all of that and weigh it and take it to a plant to be

used to make bricks with the plastic. >> mining plastic pollution for data. the surface and ters and scient south africa are fighting for more than just a pristine coastline. >> it really gives the citizens an opportunity to engage in what they're finding and change their behavior so they bring less plastic into their own homes and eventually place pressure on manufacturers of plastic to change the plastic they produce. >> cleveland's major league baseball team will no longer be called the cleveland indians. "the new york times" and other outlets say the team is dropping its long otomb moniker. the franchise has declined to comment. cleveland was already scaling back use of its controversial mascot, replacing it with a red

c on uniforms. washington football team's old name was seen as offensive by native american groups. a special hanukkah treat in jerusalem is inspired by israel's new relations with the uae. a bakery has created a delicacy called the abu dhabi doughnut, made from dates and nougat and topped with gold leaf. can y . that wraps this hour of "cnn newsroom." i'm kim brunhuber. i'll be back in just a moment with more news. stay with us. today's ways of working may work differently tomorrow.

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we're just so excited. i mean, we're watching on the news and we jumped in the car, and said we're going to get down here right now. >> all coming from west michigan. >> excitement builds over a historic moment. coronavirus vaccines are on their way, expected to be delivered across the united states in the next few hours. making official, the electoral college meets to affirm the results of the u.s. election and seal donald trump's defeat. the outgoing president is still in denial. the u.s. commerce department says it's