Fda issuing an emergency use authorization for it. So this is the fastest that a safe, effective vaccine has ever been developed. But all there is unfolding on the same day the u. S. Surpassed 16 million cases. Its only been four days since we reached 15 million cases. This Global Pandemic just ravaging the u. S. Unlike any other country. For perspective, compare canada and the u. S. , more people died from covid in the last week here in the u. S. Than have died in canada to the entire pandemic. In fact, more people died just yesterday in the u. S. Than in japan and south korea combined, since the pandemic began. The u. S. And south korea reported their first cases on the same day. More than 108,000 americans are in hospitals and friday the deaths of another 3300 americans were reported a single day record. 2,000 more deaths have already been reported today with hours still to go. Officials warned Christmas Travel and gatherings will cause another surge. But back to the muchneeded light at the end of this long tunnel, the Vaccine Distribution process is gearing up. And tomorrow, we should see doses being transported to americas most vulnerable. We are following all the latest developments, cnn correspondent Diane Gallagher is joining us from grand rapids, michigan, tell us how they are gearing up to play a role in the distribution process. Reporter yeah, so, ana, heres the thing, this airport for about a month now has been being prepared, figuring out how theyre going to accommodate Vaccine Distribution. Now, the airport Officials Say they have been in talks with at least four global carriers as far as distributing this vaccine, not just in this country but potentially around the world and say that they are able to eventually hand testimony distribution of up to a billion doses of that Pfizer Vaccine. Now, that is being manufactured just about 45 minutes down the road as pfizers facilities in kalamazoo and the proximity to that pfizer facility makes this board airport ideal for getting that vaccine out to people. Now, we know that fedex and ups are going to be pushing that vaccine to the east coast and west coast of the United States and in all likelihood, a good part will come from this airport. We will see the trucks most likely come in and the planes take off and take it off to the rest of the country. Now, there is big parts they have to Pay Attention to and this complex, logistical process, timing. Theyve got to do this quickly. So both ups and fedex have talked about using these sensors, b blutooth technology to monitor the shipments to make sure everything is adequate and is going on time. If there is weather that causes a delay. If there is traffic thats causing a delay, they will know in real time. The other big important factor is temperature. Weve talked about the fact that these vaccines have to be stored around under negative 100 degrees fahrenheit and that is difficult, requires a lot of precision and it must stay that way so keeping an eye on these packages, making sure theyre tracking them is extremely important. Now, initially my colleague, pete monteen reported that pfizer was expecting to see, fedex, expecting them to see 24 hours after the emergency ruse authorization was granted. Were almost at that point and we still havent seen those shipments roll out. Instead, were expecting that to happen sometime tomorrow. This was the reason that was given. We could deliver it within 24 hours, but the decision was made by the team because there are hundreds of Administration Sites that are going to be receiving these, they thought it best until we wait until monday to deliver them to ensure they are all opened and ready to receive, a weekday, a normal business day seemed like the optimal time to send out those first shipments rather than get them delivered on a sunday when some of these administrative sites might be start staffed or not opened. Reporter and ana, its just to interesting, all of the thought process that has gone into nuances of logistics, everything from weather patterns to traffic patterns to whether or not an airport can handle the width of these cargo planes. Its a part of the reason the airport is being considered for this thats because of this 10,000foot runway that they have. They handle these cargo and freight capacities that they have here. So, ana, this isnt going to be the only airport. The faa told all airports even if they havent been alerted that they need to be prepared to make sure that traffic doesnt hold anything up and be prepared for the potential that they may have to be involved in some way. Its going to be an incredible process and the confidence that we are hearing from official whos are a part of the process. Its encouraging, Diane Gallagher, thank you for that lets bring in dr. Jonathan reiner, a professor and senior al analyst at George Jefferson university. What is your reaction to this historic moment that we have a vaccine that is literally hours, potentially, away from going into americans arms and potentially saving lives . Hi, ana, well, how great to go on offense, finally. You know, for the last ten months, we have been on defense. And we have been talking about how we can limit the damage. Now, we have an offensive tool to finally start to put this pandemic down. So its a thrilling moment to try them for science, its really an international collaboration. This vaccine comes from a German Company if partnership with pfizer. So its a thrilling moment and im glad, finally to go on offense. But this is not the end. It may be the beginning of the end. But its certainly not the end. And it cant come soon enough. We passed another horrible milestone today, 15 million coronavirus cases just here in the United States alone. Tell us when you expect to see the effectiveness of this vaccine reflected in the numbers of case and deaths. Are we talking weeks, months . Longer . Probably months. I think probably two months. I think until we start to get a core group of maybe 50to100 Million People vaccinated, were not going to see the vaccine start to bite away at the pandemic, which is why we need to do what we can do with conventional weapons, particularly with masking and social distancing and targeted closures. Until the vaccine, vaccines come online and we can get enough of people inoculated in this country. But probably towards the beginning of spring. But then, as we start to get the vaccine into large numbers of people in this country, not just the First Responders or the most vulnerable. We start to get them into young people. Then we really start to see the numbers of new infection drop dramatically, hopefully into the spring and early summer. There is sa way to go. But the skies like bright on the horizon. I am curious to the medical adviser, when do you think president elect biden get the vaccine and should it be public . It should absolutely be public. I would vaccinate the incoming president on monday. Thats what i would do. And incoming Vice President as well. Lets think about this. It takes about a month for the full effect of this vaccine to take hold. Until you are truly immune. About a week after the second dose. The second dose the at three weeks. So, a week after that would be a month. We are now what about 39 days out from the inauguration. I want the incoming president immune to this virus when he takes office and its going to take almost all the time to do that. This is a key part of president ial protection. This is no different than his secret service or his armored car or the physical protections around the white house. This is biological protection. I would vaccinate him on monday and i love the fact of doing this in public. Maybe even have some First Responders getting their vaccines also. But this would go a long way to show the public that this is a safe vaccine. Thats really the concern. Thats where the reluctance s. People who are reluctant to take the vaccine are worried, is it safe . If the incoming president is taking it. That will go a long way to assuage any concerns. It happened so quickly. So that has i think some people wondering. Shall we take it . The fda says the vaccine volunteers will have a choice to know whether they received a placebo. That doesnt necessarily mean the people who received the placebo automatically get the vaccine now, does it . Well, it depends on the trial. I think that the, well, moderna i think will do something interesting. They will try to maintain the blind in their trial and give everyone in their trial either placebo or a vaccine going forward. So that everyone can get the vaccine but not know whether theyve had the vaccine. Im unsure what pfizer is going to do in their trial. There the a lot of value in getting the data blinded out to two years understanding safety of this vaccine, as well as efficacy. So anything that the trials can do to preserve the blind i think is great. But i completely support giving the folks in these trials who receive placebo vaccine the patients who enrolled or the citizens who enrolled in these Clinical Trials are heroes. They agreed to take an unproven vaccine one known safety for the good of all and i absolutely will put them at the front of the line to get a vaccine if they got, if they received a place placebo. Can you explain the difference between the emergency use authorization versus fullon approval . Because i am assuming timing has to do you with that. So there is this idea the trial must continue. The research must continue. And, you know, if the people in the Placebo Group were to opt out, that would i would think be a setback. You know. It would be a setback. So an emergency use authorization is issued by the fda in circumstances where no effective therapeutic or vaccine is available. And when a new agent with an existing suggests that it may be effective with the confluence of data suggests it may be effective. Thats what we have now. Full approval comes with longerterm studies with larger bodies of evidence where the data set is much stronger and i think were going to need to continue to accrue data from all these vaccines, not just to understand the southeast in this initial group of patients but also to see how this vaccine works in children and other atrisk groups. Pregnant women. People with immune deficiencies. So there is a lot of work yet to be done. Another doctor told our colleague here each dose needs to be put in the freezer within 90 seconds from the time its taken from the box. That sounds like there is not a lot of room for mistakes. Yeah, that might be a little bit over dramatic. So, actually, i think the Pfizer Vaccine, even though it has these very stringent ultracold chain requirements has some flexible storage fridge options. It comes in a storage transport container that sites can actually use to store the vaccine for up to a month if they change out the dry ice every five days. The vaccine can be stored in an ultracold freezer that many hospitals have at minus 94 degrees fahrenheit for six months. And once the vaccine is thawed, it can be stored in a standard refrigerator for up to five days. So there are all kind of options. Were going to learn as we go forward. This is a new day. Another quick question for you, in the u. S. , you know, states have their own vaccine rollout plans, which is different than in the uk, for example, which has the National Health service in charge of coordinating all of that what challenges does a decentralized system like in the u. S. Pose to a vaccine rollout . Yeah. Every state, every region is reinventing the wheel. You know, it would be great if we had more coordination from the beginning. States have had to figure out testing on their own. States literally have had to figure out opening on their own, had to source ventilators and testing equipment like swabs on their own and 95 masks. So we faced this from the beginning. I think as we, there will be a time for us to understand where the major mistakes are made during this pandemic. I think one of them is so decentralizing everything weve done. Going forward, i think we need much more a coordinating federal approach to this. Dr. Reiner, we always learn so much from you. Thank you. They the people are seeing the tragic toll of the coronavirus first hand day in, day out. Ill speak to two icu nurses next. We are live in the cnn newsroom. For drug free relief that works fast. Vicks sinex. Instantly clear everyday congestion. On all the food that makes you boogie. [narrator] grubhub perks give you deals upbeat music get the food you love with perks from [crowd] grubhub. Grub what you love. Im happy to give you the tour, i lohey jay. It. Jay . Charlotte oh hi. He helped me set up my watch lists. Oh, hes terrific. Excellent tennis player. Byebye. I recognize that voice. Annie . Yeah she helped me find the right bonds for my income strategy. Youre very popular around here. Theres a birthday going on. Karl he took care of my 401k rollover. Wow, you call a lot. Yeah, well its my money were talking about here. Joining us for karaoke later . Ah, id love to, but people get really emotional when i sing. Help from a team that will exceed your expectations. If you have type 2 diabetes and risks for heart disease, you could land in the hospital with heart failure. For people like you, farxiga does more than lower a1c. Farxiga also helps prevent hospitalization for heart failure. Do not take if allergic to farxiga. Symptoms of a serious allergic reaction include rash, swelling, difficulty breathing or swallowing. Stop taking and seek medical help right away. Tell your doctor right away if you have red color in urine, or pain while you urinate, or a genital area infection, since a rare but serious genital infection may be lifethreatening. Do not take farxiga if you have severe kidney problems or are on dialysis. Other serious side effects include dehydration, genital yeast and bacterial infections in women and men, urinary tract infections, low blood sugar, and sudden kidney problems. Stop taking farxiga and call your doctor right away if you have symptoms of ketoacidosis, which is serious and may lead to death. Answer the alert. Ask your doctor if farxiga could do more for you. If you cant afford your medication, astrazeneca may be able to help. After all the things that the coronavirus does is keep infected patients away from loved ones. Far too often they pass away with nobody holding their hand or provide comfort or give that one last hug or kiss. No inperson goodbyes. That role, that unimaginably heavy act of compassion falls on medical staff who are watching their hospitals and intensive care units filled to absolute capacity with record numbers of new cases, new patients coming in. I want to get two women in here who are literally on the front lines of this battle and have been for nearly a year. The covid unit icu nurse in boise, idaho joins us and katie kerry began in jackson, mississippi. Thank you both for being with us. Thank you both so much for all you do. Corey, nobody outside of your profession can honestly imagine what it must be like to witness the weeks and months of this pandemic and to care for the feel who are gravely ill. Tell us how do you do it . And help us understand what you have been going through. You know, i was one that always knew i wanted to help people and i think the hardest part of this pandemic and this virus is that feeling of isolation. Like you spoke, just like these patients of isolation. We isolate them from their families. We have to gown and glove and mask and double mask. We lose that personal touch, which is why most of us got into healthcare is to have that personal touch and its very depersonalized now, like you said, we have to start visitation policies. And there arent visitors in our covid19 unit unless its end of life and unfortunately, sometimes we dont have the time to get families there. That emotional burden on healthcare is what is going to stick with all of us forever. I think thats whats the most difficult for me personally to deal through all of this. Katie, what about you . You work in an icu caring for Covid Patients in the worst condition. Tell us what you see there on a daily basis and are cases rising or falling where you are . So, my perspective is a little bit different. I feel like the most because when the boycotted firpandemic, we still had patients coming in. Your trauma patients, your patient whos are having heart astacks, stroke patients. They didnt stop coming in because a pandemic is here. Now were in a situation where the er is overwhelmed and we are holding 22 icu patients in the hallway and now transferred to icu, now we are caring for these overwhelming amount of critically ill patients who die in such a short amount of time and the rapid progression and the complexity of this virus is really unlike anything of us in healthcare have seen. We have watched patients go from completely is thatible to dieing in a matter of a 12hour chicago i was recently caring for a patient who was dying from covid and her husband told me, he said, you know, we recently separated our 49th wedding anniversary. We wont make it to 50 because covid has taken her away from me. You know, we feel like were in this neverending fight against this invisible enemy. We need people to mask up and to fight with us. Yes. And corey, when you talked about earlier the people hospital sized with covid cannot physically be with their loved ones, they cant have people come and visit. I know you are trying to make sure that isnt all lost. Can you speak to the human power of the connection, even if it is a video chat or phone call, is there a therapeutic quality to that connection . Absolutely. You think thats whats hard to get families to understand because i had a patient a couple weeks ago who was on a ventilator sitting paralyzed which his wife couldnt really wrap her mind around what that looks like or that fit in. We had to explain, i dont want to do it. I dont know what to say. And after explaining to her that even as nurses, these patients are paralyzed, theyre zatd. We still talk theyre sedate. We still talk to them. It was an awkward conversation to try to get her to be able to talk to her husband. Its a different dynamic. We encourage the patients and family to keep that connection. You know, that personal connection with their family is key to their success in recovery. We think its so important for our viewers to hear that, because so many of us feel powerless or unable to help, especiall