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(Deletes extraneous "refuse to" in 2nd paragraph)
WASHINGTON, Dec 1 (Reuters) - The United States entered the
final month of the year hoping that promising vaccine candidates
will soon be approved to halt the rapidly spreading novel
coronavirus after 4.2 million new cases were reported in
November.
The new COVID-19 cases were more than double the previous
monthly record set in October, as large numbers of Americans
still refuse to wear masks and continue to gather in holiday
crowds, against the recommendation of experts.
With outgoing President Donald Trump's coronavirus strategy
relying heavily on a vaccine, a Food and Drug Administration
panel of outside advisers will meet on Dec. 10 to discuss
whether to recommend the FDA authorize emergency use of a
vaccine developed by Pfizer Inc.
A second candidate from Moderna Inc could follow a
week later, officials have said, raising hopes that Americans
could start receiving inoculations before the end of the year,
although widespread vaccinations could take months.
Other global pharmaceuticals including AstraZeneca PLC
and Johnson & Johnson also have vaccines in the
works, leading a member of the Trump administration's "Operation
Warp Speed" program to predict the country could be vaccinated
by June.
"One hundred percent of the Americans that want the vaccine
will have the vaccine by (June). We will have over 300 million
doses available to the American public well before then," Paul
Ostrowski, the vaccine program's director of supply, production
and distribution, told MSNBC television on Monday.
In the meantime, leading health officials are pleading with
Americans to follow their recommendations and help arrest a
pandemic that killed more than 36,000 people in November,
pushing hospitalizations to a record high of nearly 93,000 on
Sunday, according to a Reuters tally.
The widespread impact of the pandemic has led
Merriam-Webster to choose "pandemic" as the Word of the Year
after it racked up the most online dictionary lookups of any
word.
"Sometimes a single word defines an era, and it's fitting
that in this exceptional - and exceptionally difficult - year, a
single word came immediately to the fore," the dictionary
publisher said.
With more than 10,000 people dying and 1.1 million
contracting the novel coronavirus in the week ended Sunday,
Trump has remained focused on overturning the results of the
Nov. 3 election won by President-elect Joe Biden, denying Trump
a second term.
Biden has pledged to make combating the coronavirus his top
priority upon taking office on Jan. 20, saying he will rely on
the best scientific evidence.
In the absence of a federal blueprint to curb the spread of
the virus, states are issuing new or revamped restrictions on
businesses and social life.
California's governor said he may renew a stay-at-home order
in the coming days, warning that ICU admissions are on track to
exceed statewide capacity by mid-December unless public health
policies and social behavior change.
"The red flags are flying," Governor Gavin Newsom told
reporters in an online briefing. "If these trends continue,
we're going to have to take much more dramatic, arguably
drastic, action."
(Reporting by Reuters staff; Writing by Daniel Trotta; Editing
by Bernadette Baum)
