>> brennan: welcome back back to "face the nation." around the world, the numbers of coronavirus infections now more than 58 million, along with deaths, nearly 1.4 million people, are staggering. cbs news senior correspondent liz palmer reports from london. >> reporter: good morning. besides the united states, there are two other countries on earth that have now registered more than six million covid cases, they are brazil and india. and in both those countries, the infection is still growing. funeral parlors in new dehli burn non-stop. two weeks after the main hindu celebration of diwali, with its huge

gatherings, infection rates have surged. that's a lesson for western leaders struggling with plans for a covid-safe christmas. in liverpool, in britain, the military joined a vast trial of tests. if they work well, the idea is to test everyone in england every week. european i.c.u. beds, spearvel iespecially in france d switzerland, are piling up. and the numbers are staggering. >> one person is dying every 70 seconds in the european region from covid-19. >> reporter: sweden is no exception. it started out as an outlier with light restrictions, but the experiment has failed. infections hit a record high this week, and deaths are spiking, too. at the same time, the world's hopes are focused on the vaccine.

here is a shipment of china's arriving in brazil, where it is being tested. the data so far show it is safe but not as effective as the two american/european front-runners. meanwhile, world leaders gathered this week on the mother of all zoom calls in a virtual g-20 meeting. they pledged fair distribution of covid-19 vaccine to poorer countries. but in spite of international goodwill, in countries like this, that will rely on the world health organization for vaccines, 2021 is already shaping up to another lethal year. here in the u.k., the results are in on another front-runner vaccine being developed at oxford university with the drug company astrazeneca. the data shows it does produce a strong immune

result even in old people. >> brennan: liz palmer, thank you. we go to dr. scott gottlieb. who is a board member at pfizer, which has just applied for f.d.a. emergency approval of its vaccine. good morning to you. >> doctor: good morning. >> brennan: let's start on that vaccine. you heard dr. fauci say life probably won't go back to normal in may, but he did seem to agree with the timeline that around that timeframe, that's when the vaccine will be widely available. what do you know about that distribution plan? >> doctor: well, look, the supply is going to be limited in 2020. as we get into 2021, there will be much more supply. and maybe into the third quarter, we'll have a vaccine that will be licensed for general use if everything goes well, and the data continues to support the safety and effectiveness of that vaccine. and we'll be able to vaccinate a good portion

of the public in the fall of 2021. i think 2021 will be a much different year with covid with the combination of the vaccine and the therapeutics. what we really need to get through is the next two or three months. what i would say to the american people is there is light at the end of the tunnel right now. try not to be the person who gets infected in the last two or three months of the acute stage of this pandemic. we have two or three months to go before we have technological solutions that will dramatically lower the risk. we need to get through a very difficult period right now. >> brennan: to clarify your timeline, when you're talking about second or third quarter, you're saying it is really not until april, may, june, maybe later, that your average healthy person can go get a shot in the arm, correct? >> doctor: i think that is probably right. the emergency use authorization will be for a limited population this winter. the companies are likely to file amendments to expand the eligible population as the supply

expands. think of the initial population being the elderly people, and then you expand it to maybe to elderly people living at home, and you start expanding it down to age cohorts. so you basically walk it down to risk benefit continuum. but the point where it will be for the healthy 30-year-old, that is probably second quarter of 2021. but that's okay, because we'll be getting off a dense epidemic this winter, and you want it available in time for the fall covid season. and we don't need to vaccinate 70% of the country. probably 30% of the public will have natural immunity. and ideally some of the people who have had the infection to basically double down on their immunity. >> brennan: do you know if there are adverse reactions to the vaccine?

and once you get it, will you have to get it every year? >> doctor: we don't know yet. and initially it will be given in a general schedule, and until we know more about how much it cuts down on the transmission of the virus -- does it just prevent you from getting covid symptoms or does it prevent you from getting the infection and spreading the infection, and how long the immunity is. there is some data that suggests the immunity might last longer than a year, and we're not going to know it until we learn more. the safety profile has been good in the clinical trials. most information related to the vaccines happens in the first two months of vaccinations. and that's what the f.d.a. is taking a prudent approach and they're not going to generally license this vaccine until they have six or eight months of followup on the

patients vaccinated in trials, as well as those who get vaccinated over the course of the next several months. >> brennan: key point for people who hear it may be available next month, it won't be widely available for quite sometime. i want to play something for you that president trump said on friday. >> president trump: you won't have a vaccine, if it weren't for me, for another four years. f.d.a. would not have been able to do what they did, what i forced them to do. >> brennan: is that true? >> doctor: well, i think the f.d.a. moved with a lot of speed, and they worked very closely with the manufacturers. i have no indication that the white house forced them to do that. i think it was the agency and recognizing the urgency. i know they engaged with the manufacturers, including pfizer, which i'm on the board. i don't think anybody was forced to do anything. i think everyone worked together very hard in

collaboration. this was an unprecedented collaboration between the government and private industry because everyone recognized the urgency. >> brennan: what dr. fauci was saying carefully, he was clearly issuing a warning of what we need to prepare for over the next few weeks. we talked a lot about progress that has been made in medical research, in therapeutics and vaccines. at what point does that progress get overwhelmed by the infection rate? do we wipe out that progress because it is so widespread? >> doctor: well, the problem is that the progress wouldn't be widely accessible when we're going through the worst phases of this pandemic. what is going to happen over the next four or six weeks is largely baked in. the federal government is not going to be able to back-stop local regions who are going to be facing very unprecedented situations. there will be therapeutics

available probably to help on the tail end of what we're going to have to go through. but we're going to have to go through this the old-fashioned way, wear masks, hunker down. right now the prevalence is 1.5%. if you're in a restaurant with 50 people, there is a 50% chance that someone has covid. in north dakota, if you're in a group of 10 people, someone in that group of 10 people has covid. and that's what we're facing right now, and it is only going to get worse. >> brennan: you're saying hospitals are going to get overwhelmed? >> doctor: hospitals have a lot ability to create new beds. where they're going to get overwhelmed and stretched is on personnel. what we were able to do during the spring wave, and, again, the wave in the summer, we surge health care personnel into those regions. so the hospitals can create new beds, but they just won't have the people

to staff them. >> brennan: dr. gottlieb, thank you for your analysis. we'll be right back. whoo-hoo! and nutrients to support immune health. and nutrients to is now a good time enough, crohn's. for adults with moderate to severe crohn's or ulcerative colitis, stelara® can provide relief, and is the only approved medication to reduce inflammation on and below the surface of the intestine in uc. you, getting on that flight? back off, uc. stelara® may increase your risk of infections, some serious, and cancer. before treatment, get tested for tb. tell your doctor if you have an infection, flu-like symptoms, sores, new skin growths, have had cancer, or if you need a vaccine. rpls, a rare, potentially fatal brain condition, may be possible. some serious allergic reactions and lung inflammation can occur. lasting remission can start with stelara®. if you've been financially impacted by covid-19,

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>> brennan: c.v.s. pharmacy is one of the locations where americans will eventually be able to get a covid vaccine when it becomes available. the c.e.o. larry merlo joins us this morning. >> good morning, margaret, thanks for having me. >> brennan: i'd love to get your insight for the american people on what they can expect. we hear from the u.s. government, from "operation warped speed" command general perna, that a vaccine can be distributed within 24 hours of approval to all 50 states. we know the elderly are likely to be among the first to receive it. i know your company has contracts to give those shots in the arms inside long-term care facilities. what is the timeframe, when you receive it from

the u.s. government, how long before there is a shot in the arm? >> yeah, margaret. that's a great question. we've been working closely with "operation warped speed" and the c.d.c. for several months now. our first involvement in terms of administering the vaccine will be in long-term care facilities. that is not anything that is new for us. our pharmacists, our nursing professionals, have gone to skilled nursing facilities, assisted living facilities, for several years conducting seasonal flu clinics. so we have the systems. we have the processes. we have built the logistics directly for the covid vaccine. we just received information in the last few days that more than 25,000 long-term care facilities have selected c.v.s. to be their covid vaccine provider. so wir wire in the final steps of our logistics plan. "operation warped speed" said 24 hours after

approval the vaccines will be on the road. and 48 hours after we receive those vaccines, we'll be in those facilities providing that vaccine into the arms of the elderly and most vulnerable population. >> brennan: for someone who has a loved one inside a nursing home right now, when they hear the f.d.a. approval, can they expect within three days their loved one will get a shot in the arm? >> we will be starting that process. we will go to each of the facilities that have selected c.v.s. we'll berforming three clinics over a three to six-week period. but we'll be starting that process, as i mentioned, within 48 hours. >> brennan: you're hiring thousands of people to do all of this work. who is actually administering the shots? pharmacists? interns? who are they? >> they will be pharmacists, along with pharmacy interns and licensed pharmacy technicians who collectively -- those will be the professionals that

will be administering the vaccines all across the country. >> brennan: and will c.v.s. employees who are giving the vaccine also be among the first to receive it themselves? >> well, we will weigh guidance from the c.d.c., in terms of the various protocols, in terms of who is available for those phases. we will certainly be involved when it is our turn. >> brennan: have you briefed the incoming biden administration on the plans you know so far? i know you are waiting for a lot of the information yourself, but what kind of contact have you had? >> we have reached out to the biden covid task task force. we talked about the role we've been playing in fighting the virus. the role that we played in testing all across the country. the fact that we have now tested more than seven million americans for covid. the plans that we have are to play an important role

in administering the vaccine. we have 10,000 pharmacies, about 70% of the u.s. population lives within a few miles of a c.v.s. pharmacy. equally as important, we have built mobile kiosks. we have gone into historically underserved communities to bring access to covid testing. we'll do the same thing with the vaccine -- >> brennan: what does that mean, temporary facilities? >> think of a mobile trailer that we can put on wheels and take it to a particular location to provide testing availability, and we'll be doing the same thing to administer vaccines at the appropriate time, when the vaccine becomes available. and we've also talked to the biden team about our commitment to work with them in terms of ensuring that we work together to make health care more accessible and more affordable. >> brennan: okay. because when the

president-elect said that he doesn't fully endorse the plan to use commercial retailers, grocery stores and pharmacies to distribute because he thinks underserved communities will be overlooked. do you think there is a blind spot there? >> margaret, for us, there is not. 70% of the population lives within a few miles of a c.v.s. pharmacy. we have worked with state officials, in terms of bringing testing to underserved communities where we may not have a c.v.s. pharmacy today. >> brennan: how stretched are you when it comes to testing demand now? i know if i'm asymptomatic, i can't get a test. >> yeah, margaret, we have come a long way from that first testing site in massachusetts. we now have 4300 testing sites up, most at c.v.s. pharmacy drive through locations. we have even the demand for testing increase

substantially over the last 10 days, and we're continuing to roll out additional testing sites. we'll have more than 5,000 within the next two or three weeks, including about a thousand point of care testing sites, where we'll use the antigen test that will provide realtime results in about 30 minutes. costumers can go to c cvs.com and find the testing site near them. >> brennan: but if you haven't had contact with someone who is sick and you're not sick yourself, can i still get a test? >> you can. we've created a seamless experience for costumers to fill out a simple questionnaire. that will determine their eligibility to schedule an appointment for a covid test. >> brennan: thank you very much. we'll be back in a moment with former national security advisor h.r. mcmaster.

>> brennan: we go now to president trump's former national security advisor, h.r. mcmaster. he has a new book out.

good morning to you. >> good morning, margaret, great to be with you. >> brennan: joe biden is the president-elect, and the president has now viable legal pathway to 270 electoral results, but he continues to raise doubts. how corrosive is that to our national security? >> well, it's very corrosive, margaret. what concerns me is that the president is playing into the hands of our adversaries. what i write about in "battlegrounds" is russia doesn't care who wins our elections, as long as a large number of americans doubt the legitimacy of the result. what all of us need to do at this point is to demand better from our political leaders, especially the president, that they don't play into our adversaries' hands, and reduce our confidence in our democratic principles. >> brennan: the

president fired cri kris crebs. creb called that press conference the most dangerous hour and 45 minutes in american history and possibly the craziest. is he overstating it? >> i think he is overstating it. we should be confident. i think it was a travesty to fire him because really what the administration should have done was take credit for the vast improvements that the trump administration made in our election security since 2016. cris crebbs was a big part of it. it is thanksgiving week, and we should be thankful for the framers of our constitution because they designed our form of government based on what they say as worst-case scenarios, based on the bloody wars in england in the 20th century.

we have in place a transition that will occur without really the say of the executive branch. the president doesn't get a say in the transition itself. >> brennan: afghanistan, i know you feel strongly about the conflict there and our troops who continue to serve. this week president trump halfed the number down to 2500, even though violence is spiking, and even though the taliban has not cut ties with al-qaeda. is the president handing the taliban a victory on the way out the door? >> yes, margaret. what i think president trump has done is doubled down on all of the flaws of the obama administration approach to afghanistan by conjuring up the enemy we would prefer instead of the actual enemy we are facing in afghanistan, and a an enemy who, if they win, gives safe haven and

support basis to terrorist organizations who want to commit mass murder against us on the scale of 9/11, and we will be far less safe and vulnerable to these groups. i think what happened is the prioritization of withdrawal over our interests led to us empowering the taliban. if we were going to leave, just leave. but don't force the afghan government to release 5,000 of the most heinous people on earth. don't make the assumption there is this bold line between the terrorists and the other organizations. we saw today with the rocket attacks in kabul, and the images of hundreds of young girls fleeing these rocket attacks. we saw it with an attack on a maternity hospital, where they gunned down pregnant mothers and killed infants. we saw it in the attack on the american university in afghanistan. does it mean there are

mass executions in the soccer stadium every other saturday? i think it is abhorrent what we're doing. i hope that a biden administration will reassess, based again, on what is it and for us. we know what happened on 9/11. >> brennan: quickly, the conflict to come with china, you architected the trump strategy. is joe biden inevitably headed for conflict with china? >> what the trump administration has done is set us up to be competitive with china. we know the previous policy was flawed. that china would play by the rules, and as it prospered, it would liberalize its economy, and the exact opposite is happening. it is important to compete as a way to avoid a confrontation with china.

>> brennan: h.r. mcmaster, it is good to get your insights. we'll be right back. lactaid is 100% real milk, just without the lactose. so you can enjoy it even if you're sensitive. yet some say it isn't real milk. i guess those cows must actually be big dogs. sit! i said sit! wthe natural light is amazing. hardwood floors. there is a bit of a clogging problem. (clog dancing) at least geico makes it easy to bundle our renters and car insurance. yeah, helping us save us even more... for bundling made easy, go to geico.com

>> brennan: that's it for us. thank you for watching. and today is a sad day here at "face the nation," but senior producer catherine reynolds' last broadcast. we wish her all the luck in the future. i will miss you, cat. we all will miss you. for the rest of you, have a safe thanksgiving. for "face the nation," i'm margaret brennan.

♪ defying and denial. -- >> people want to be with their families. >> protests against new restrictions, why the week ahead could be america's most dangerous yet. >> we are in a very, very difficult situation. >> also, president trump digs in. despite new pressure to concede. >> the conduct of the president's legal team has been a national embarrassment. >> president elect biden pushes ahead, roadblocks and all. teachers feel the strain. caught on camera, a florida man wrestles an alligatoro save his dog. the remarkable rescue ahead. >> they are like