Coronavirus live news: Social gathering banned in LA County as Victoria passes elimination benchmark

US surpasses 13m Covid cases as experts urge caution over Thanksgiving weekend; South Australia records two new cases; and Italy to ease measures in five regions

4.22am GMT

The US president-elect, Joe Biden, has put out a message on Twitter today asking Americans to follow Covid-19 restrictions:

Each of us has a responsibility in our own lives to do what we can to slow the virus.Every decision we make matters. Every decision we make can save a life. pic.twitter.com/Rm0bYqh6eH

4.19am GMT

The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany increased by 21,695 to 1,028,089, data from the Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases showed on Saturday.

The reported death toll rose by 379 to 15,965, the tally showed.

Joe Biden gains votes in Wisconsin county after Trump-ordered recount

Milwaukee recount, which cost Trump campaign $3m, boosts Democratic president-elect days before state must certify result

A recount in Wisconsin’s largest county demanded by President Donald Trump’s election campaign ended on Friday with the president-elect, Joe Biden, gaining votes.

After the recount in Milwaukee county, Biden made a net gain of 132 votes, out of nearly 460,000 cast. Overall, the Democrat gained 257 votes to Trump’s 125.

Oxford, WHO scientists say more data needed on AstraZeneca's Covid vaccine trials

More data is needed from AstraZeneca's Covid vaccine trials beyond what was presented in a press release, experts from the WHO and Oxford University said.

All the presidents' pets: Calvin Coolidge's White House raccoon

President Calvin Coolidge and the first lady were known animal lovers, and received many unusual animals as gifts. One in particular, a raccoon, made its mark as perhaps the last exotic pet to live at the White House. Mo Rocca reports.

Presidential pets: The Roosevelts' menagerie

President Teddy Roosevelt's six children grew up with no fewer than 40 animals, from dogs, ponies and guinea pigs to a one-legged rooster

All the presidents' pets: The Roosevelts' menagerie

President Teddy Roosevelt's six children grew up with no fewer than 40 animals, from dogs, ponies and guinea pigs to a one-legged rooster. Mo Rocca visits historic Sagamore Hill, the Roosevelt family retreat in Long Island, New York, for a look at their collection of animals worthy of an ark.

All the presidents' pets: JFK's canine détente

President John F. Kennedy's family hosted a large number of pets, including dogs, a cat, hamsters and a pony. When Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev presented a gift to the Kennedys – a glamorous dog named Pushinka, whose parents were Soviet space dogs – it set tongues (and tails) wagging. Correspondent Mo Rocca reports.

Coronavirus updates: Los Angeles County issues stay-at-home order; US hits 13 million cases; Ohio State coach tests positive

Los Angeles County announced a new stay-home order Friday. AstraZeneca will conduct an additional vaccine trial. Latest COVID news.
      

Baltimore Ravens star quarterback tests positive for COVID-19

On Friday, four Ravens players and three Steelers players were placed on their teams' respective Reserve/COVID-19 lists, forcing their game to be rescheduled for a second time.

Mobile labs target "testing deserts" where virus spreads undetected

According to research by Johns Hopkins University, communities of color often have less access to COVID-19 testing.

Extremely vulnerable in UK given high priority for coronavirus vaccine

Those with conditions such as blood, bone or lung cancer put in same category on interim guidance list as over-70s

People at very high risk of contracting coronavirus due to health problems, who were made to shield during the pandemic, have been given the same priority as the over-70s to receive a Covid-19 vaccine.

People aged 18 or older deemed “clinically extremely vulnerable” are in the same priority group as those aged 70 and over, according to the provisional vaccine priority list published by Public Health England.

Ravens-Steelers game postponed to Tuesday as Baltimore deals with coronavirus outbreak

NFL moves Ravens-Steelers game to Tuesday, if no additional positive cases force further postponement. Baltimore is dealing with a COVID-19 outbreak.
      

'Voters, Not Lawyers, Choose The President': Trump Team Dealt Another Blow In Court

In a blistering opinion, a federal appeals court has thrown out the Trump campaign's challenge to the certification of votes in Pennsylvania. Trump's lawyers say they will appeal to the Supreme Court.

Ohio State coach Ryan Day tests positive for COVID-19 and will miss next two games

Ohio State coach Ryan Day will not be on the sideline when his team faces Illinois on Saturday after testing positive for COVID-19.
      

Donor to pro-Trump group sues to get his money back after dropped election lawsuits

Fred Eshelman, who gave $2.5 million to the group True the Vote to back President Trump's challenges to the election, is suing for his money back.
      

Opinion: Gonzaga makes a bad call, playing despite positive COVID tests: 'I hope nobody gets infected'

Gonzaga had a player and staffer test positive for COVID-19, but that didn't stop team from putting Auburn and Kansas at risk by continuing to play.
      

Trump will campaign for Georgia GOP Senate candidates, urges supporters not to boycott runoff elections

President Trump on Friday urged his supporters not to boycott two Georgia runoff elections that will determine which party controls the Senate.

'Calling an election unfair does not make it so': Appeals court denies Trump campaign's effort to overturn Biden's win in Pennsylvania

In rejecting Trump's appeal, a judge wrote, "calling an election unfair does not make it so," and said Trump offered no evidence of wrongdoing.
      

Financially troubled Hertz announces plans to sell Donlen fleet leasing business

In a news release, Hertz Global's president and CEO Paul Stone said the sale will be "another significant accomplishment" in its road to recovery.      

Kamala Harris called a nurse on Thanksgiving to thank her for fighting on Covid frontlines

A friendly phone call is all too normal during Thanksgiving -- that is unless it's coming from the vice president-elect, herself.

Trump campaign loses appeal in Pennsylvania

The Trump campaign has so far been largely unsuccessful in court.

Macron ‘shocked’ by video of French police beating black man

President condemns ‘shameful aggression’ amid growing anger over apparently unprovoked assault

The French government is scrambling to dampen rising anger over footage showing police beating a black music producer in Paris, the latest in a series of acts of alleged police violence to rock the country.

Emmanuel Macron said a video of officers beating Michel Zecler in his studio was “shameful” and said that government would have to find a way to restore public confidence in the police force.

Trump loses appeal of Pennsylvania election case

The appellate opinion marks the latest court loss for Trump, who has refused to concede to President-elect Biden and is falsely asserting that he won the race.

Kylie Moore-Gilbert faces long road back to normality, says fellow former hostage

Ana Diamond, who was held for more than six months, says the Australian academic was subject to a ‘sophisticated’ hostage-taking operation

Back on Australian soil, and safe in the enforced quiet of Covid quarantine, Kylie Moore-Gilbert faces a long road to recovery, according to another victim of Iran’s practice of seizing foreign nationals as hostages.

Ana Diamond was just 19 when she was seized by the country’s Revolutionary Guards in 2016, held for 200 days in solitary confinement and forced to endure a mock execution over baseless allegations she was a foreign spy.

Trump's baseless claims of Georgia voter fraud spark fears among Republicans

As Trump suffers another post-election court defeat, some Republicans worry he could depress turnout in crucial Georgia runoffs

Despite giving his strongest hints yet that he is coming to accept his loss of the White House to challenger Joe Biden, Donald Trump’s continuing reluctance to leave office and baseless claims about electoral fraud are increasingly worrying his own party.

In particular, Republicans are concerned that the chaos caused by Trump’s stance and his false comments on the conduct of the election in the key swing state of Georgia, which Biden won for the Democrats, could hinder his party’s efforts to retain control of the Senate.

Iranian scientist's death only the latest in long line of attacks blamed on Israel

The Middle East is on edge as the Trump administration enters its final weeks

Mohsen Fakhrizadeh may be the most senior Iranian nuclear scientist to have been assassinated but he is certainly not the first, joining at least four others during the past decade.

In killings Iran said were aimed at sabotaging its nuclear energy ambitions – it does not acknowledge using the technology for weapons – the country has consistently pointed the finger at Israel, its regional arch-foe.

President Trump and President-elect Biden to throw their weight behind Georgia Senate candidates

After his Thanksgiving conference call with members of the military, President Trump confirmed he plans to travel to Georgia to help incumbent Republican Senators Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue win reelection. President-elect Biden also plans to visit the Peach State to support Democratic challengers Reverend Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff. Georgia Public Broadcasting Reporter Stephen Fowler breaks down the impact these visits could have on the runoff races and gives us the latest in Georgia politics.

Hospitals in England told to prepare for Covid vaccine rollout in 10 days' time

Exclusive: NHS could receive first deliveries of Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine as soon as 7 December

Hospitals have been told to prepare for the rollout of a coronavirus vaccine in as little as 10 days’ time, with NHS workers expected to be at the front of the queue, the Guardian has learned.

NHS bosses said hospitals in England could expect to receive their first deliveries of a vaccine produced by Pfizer/BioNTech as soon as Monday 7 December, with regulatory approval anticipated within days.

Denmark could dig up and cremate mink killed in Covid cull

Fears nitrogen and phosphorus could be released in large quantities into soil at grave sites

Denmark’s government is considering exhuming and cremating the remains of millions of culled mink after decaying carcasses started to emerge from a hastily dug grave.

After a mutated version of Covid-19 was found in the animals, the prime minister, Mette Frederiksen, announced a cull in early November of the estimated 15-17 million mink in Denmark, the world’s biggest exporter of mink fur.

What exit polls say about state of Georgia's Senate runoffs

The pair of January runoff elections will determine whether Republicans or Democrats control the Senate.

'Don't talk to me that way': Trump lashes out at White House reporter over election question

Trump angrily admonished Reuters reporter Jeff Mason after he asked if he would concede the election after the Electoral College voted for Biden.
      

Analysis: The President who dared to tangle with Thanksgiving

American norms and traditions have been trampled over the past four years. But even President Donald Trump never dared to mess with Thanksgiving -- unlike his predecessor Franklin Roosevelt, who bit off more than he could chew when he tangled with Turkey Day, 81 years ago.

As Americans fix their 2016 error, we in the UK are doubling down on ours: Brexit | Jonathan Freedland

It is a kind of madness that a thin deal or no deal is government policy. Labour has a choice to make, and fast

Envy is an unworthy emotion, and yet I feel it. It first struck on Monday, as Joe Biden announced his top tier of cabinet appointments, naming a team of calm, competent, deeply experienced lieutenants that will contrast sharply with Britain’s cabinet of all the talentless. The green-eyed demon struck again on Thursday as I watched Biden issue a series of Thanksgiving messages with a warmth and humanity alien to the man he will succeed. It’s clearer every day that in electing Biden and rejecting Donald Trump, Americans are moving to undo the great error they made in 2016. I envy that – because we are still stuck with ours.

Of course Trumpism will live on in some form, but in January 2021 Americans will formally conclude the chapter that opened with Trump’s victory four years ago. In the same month, we will start our Brexit story in earnest, leaving the European Union not just in name but in practice. As America’s encounter with the reality of 2016-vintage populist nationalism ends, so ours will begin.

Trump's furniture fail: that's not a desk, Donald – it's a table for TV dinners

The Resolute desk at the White House is made of timbers taken from a Royal Navy ship. It projects pure power. Is that why the defeated US president has switched to an occasional table?

Has Donald Trump conceded the presidency by design? Is his choice of furniture betraying a subconscious admission of defeat? When the outgoing US president gave a speech this week saying he would depart if the electoral college voted for Joe Biden, his words came as less of a shock than the desk he chose to sit at. It was tiny. It sent out a clear signal. And that signal was “loser”.

Jokes about the shrunken size of Trump’s desk – one photograph, taken from low down, captures his legs barely fitting beneath it – are easy. So let’s not. You want to see a real ruler’s desk? The Resolute desk in the Oval Office is the definition of one: a massive fortress of a working space, like an aircraft carrier with legs, sporting the US eagle at the heart of its heavy Victorian carvings. Its timbers are British in origin: they come from a Royal Navy sailing ship, HMS Resolute, that once braved the icy waters of the north pole. And in a final addition of defensive machismo, Franklin D Roosevelt had the front bulwarked so no one could see his leg braces and discover he was disabled.

Democrats deride 'dark' money, but a new analysis shows it helped boost Joe Biden

Democrats have denounced anonymous money in politics for years, but 2020 brought a tidal wave of it into the election to benefit their party.

Pentagon sees uptick in coronavirus cases in military as major holidays approach

The Pentagon also recorded more than 1,300 new confirmed cases of Covid-19 among the sister service branches, a new record for the military in a 24-hour period.

Trump won't concede but says he'll leave White House if Electoral College votes for Biden

President Trump committed to leaving the White House in January if the Electoral College votes for Joe Biden, but says he'll continue to contest the election results and still refuses to concede. Ben Tracy reports from the White House.

First Black American Cardinal hopes to begin on "positive" note with Biden

Gregory called it "baffling" and "reprehensible" when President Trump visited the St John Paul II National Shrine in Washington, a day after protesters were forced away for his photo op.

We are all Johnson's exes now, led on by false hope and dishonesty

You’d be forgiven for thinking we would exit lockdown into something better, but the prime minister’s harsh tier system was our destiny

“Now is not the time,” gibbered the prime minister, “to take our foot off the throat of the beast.” Its throat? A lot of people feel like they’ve been living in the beast’s colon for most of the year. Still, see you guys in tier 4 in January.

Incredibly, the above was not even the worst line of Boris Johnson’s Thursday evening press conference. Johnson is unaccountably celebrated as a brilliant prose stylist but frequently spouts the sort of sub-inspirational shit you might see slapped on a photo of a crossroads on Instagram. This outing was a case in point, as the prime minister intoned: “Your tier is not your destiny – every area has the means of escape.” Wow. I want to say “#makesuthink”, but I’m going to go with: “Then tell us what the means of escape is! Why does everything have to be a bleeding ring quest?”

Trump says he'll "certainly" leave if election results formalized

The president said it would be a "mistake" for the Electoral College to uphold what he claims, without proof, was an election marred by "massive fraud."

Live political updates: Trump says he would 'certainly' leave White House once Electoral College votes for Biden

President Donald Trump's annual Thanksgiving proclamation calls for Americans to "gather" for the holiday.
      

Biden COVID-19 advisory board member Dr. Celine Gounder on plans to combat pandemic

Millions of Americans traveled for the Thanksgiving holiday, despite warnings from health officials. Dr. Celine Gounder, a member of President-elect Joe Biden's COVID-19 advisory board, joined "CBS This Morning" to discuss the impact of all that travel, and what steps the Biden administration is prepared to take to stop the pandemic's surge.

Shopping on Black Friday? Remember the stranded seafarers who make it possible | Nusrat Ghani and Guy Platten

With nearly 400,000 crew members trapped at sea by Covid restrictions, it’s time for retailers like Amazon to help press for key worker status

This weekend is one of the planet’s busiest shopping sprees, with an estimated £66bn to be spent in the UK alone over Black Friday and Cyber Monday, much of it online. Yet as shoppers click and wait to collect, there is a crisis at sea among the people whose work brings us these goods.

It is no exaggeration to say that without shipping the global marketplace would collapse. It is responsible for the movement of 90% of all global trade. Even in normal circumstances, more than a million seafarers labour daily on the vessels that make up the world cargo fleet, their work barely noticed by consumers. As Covid-19 has ravaged the world, they have helped keep the global economy functioning, unseen.

Coronavirus World Map: Tracking The Spread Of The Outbreak

A map of confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths around the world. The respiratory disease has spread rapidly across six continents and has killed at least 1 million globally.

Coronavirus Is Surging: How Severe Is Your State's Outbreak?

View NPR's maps and graphics to see where COVID-19 is hitting hardest in the U.S., which state outbreaks are growing and which are leveling off.

Covid tests and a hungry bird: Friday's best photos

The Guardian’s picture editors select photo highlights from around the world

A COVID-19 Vaccine For Children May Still Be Many Months Away

The first COVID-19 vaccines to hit the market will not be approved for use in children. Researchers must figure out if the vaccines are safe and effective in kids.

A Garden Is The Frontline In The Fight Against Racial Inequality And Disease

North Minneapolis's mostly minority community lost its only grocery store this summer. It's a neighborhood grappling with heart disease, obesity and COVID-19. A Garden may help.

Will everyone in the world have access to a Covid vaccine? – video explainer

The hunt for a coronavirus vaccine is showing promise but it is premature to say the end of the pandemic is nigh. Several rich countries have signed a 'frenzy of deals' that could prevent many poor nations from getting access to immunisation until at least 2024. Also, many drug firms are potentially refusing to waive patents and other intellectual property rights in order to secure exclusive rights to any cure.

Michael Safi, the Guardian's international correspondent, explains why 'vaccine nationalisation' could scupper global efforts to kill the virus and examines what is being done to tackle the issue

'A precarious point': Covid cases surge in Canada's Prairies after relaxed approach

Infections rising in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, exposing failures in strategy and accusations that officials squandered valuable planning opportunities

When an elderly couple with Covid-19 were admitted to her hospital’s intensive care unit, Laura Marie and her team made sure they were put in the same room.

“They were so sweet,” said the nurse, who works in the Canadian province of Alberta. “But they were so scared.”

The only thing most of us will be wearing this party season is slightly smarter pyjamas | Grace Dent

‘I’ve given up trying to control anything now,’ I announced last Tuesday while breakfasting on a packet of jelly babies

Food has lost much of its meaning for me. Well, its meanings, to be more accurate. A typical late autumn of eating has its rhythms: shortly after decorative gourd season and past toffee apple weekend (both cancelled due to lurgy), many of us move seamlessly into pre-Christmas hoarding and restraint mode. The hoarding begins with a casually snaffled box of stollen slices or a little bag of Lindt chocolate Christmas tree decorations, chucked into the shopping basket “just to get things started”. Then a shufti around Marks & Spencer’s food hall, where the displays of shortbread in commemorative tin boxes (those nice ones your mother used for her sewing kit) always bring a sense of minor panic that holidays are comin’ and I am unprepared. Begin the lists, open the iCal, commence the slightly terse intra-family emails. Panic!

I do not have a yuletide shopping delivery slot. That dodgy shelf in my chiller will not survive a fortnight of festive season fridge Jenga, and a better woman than me would have made her own figgy pudding by now. But, as I say, the hoarding won’t happen this year. The big Dent jamboree is cancelled. And the restraint – which runs in parallel from about now to late December – is off, too. About now, I generally have in the diary at least two festive gatherings where I envision myself slinking in wearing some frock that will require me to be a bit hungry for at least 22 days and say things like, “No, I love running five miles pre-dawn dodging flashers – it centres me”, and, “Toast is too filling and carby. I’m so happy with this bircher muesli.” The only thing most of us will be wearing this party season is slightly smarter pyjamas.Life is quite bizarre now that the usual run-up to New Year has been steam-rollered. How empty does late November feel without a low, bubbling, passive-aggressive email chain between siblings about how much room a nut roast takes up in an oven? I feel oddly bereft without any invites to a mock-Bavarian Christmas market where I can drink £8 glasses of glühwein and eat a reheated wurst on the waltzer while listening to David Guetta. This week I noticed the first of the “What to do with Christmas day leftovers” tips and tricks in the papers. The notion of having so many visitors that you might be caught with a glut of food already seems oddly archaic.Buying, planning and hoping for things to run like clockwork is a mug’s game. The rules are that there are no rules. “I’ve given up trying to control anything now,” I announced last Tuesday while breakfasting on a packet of jelly babies. I think it was Tuesday. It may have been Thursday. The Gregorian calendar feels so meaningless these days. Anyway, each baby was so chunkily delicious, and their pudgy little lightly frosted bellies slid so soothingly down my throat, that they felt momentarily like love and order. This one lemon, yum yum. This one raspberry, schlurp. I rarely ate sweets before the pandemic, but now, in the blur of news about possible vaccines, permanent restaurant closures and the millions of wonderful hospitality workers who will no doubt need to retrain in cyber, they’re the only thing that piques my attention some days.

A vaccine is joyful news – but am I really ready to go back to the world? | Emma Brockes

This year has been horrible in so many ways, but adjusting to normal life again may not be as straightforward as we think

Most of us can, at any one time, hold conflicting thoughts in our heads; it’s the basic condition of getting anything done. Faced with even the most trivial task, my first response is almost always I don’t want to do it, followed by I do very much want it to be done. To move from one state to the other requires the kind of internal workout – think how good it will feel to be on the other side of this bump; imagine what will happen if I simply stopped doing things; what kind of person can’t deal with the dishes etc – that kicked in particularly viciously last week, with news of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine. Three oppositional thoughts flew to mind: the end of the pandemic is finally in sight; infection rates will, between now and then, continue to rise and many people will die; and, most confoundingly, I’m not sure I’m ready to go back to the world.

There is, almost certainly, a compound word in German for the anticipation of future nostalgia. One feels it keenly with children. I look at mine, now, hitting first milestones, and experience a spasm of what feels like loss: the certainty that, at some unspecified time in the future, this period will occupy enormous parts of my hard drive. I will feel sad for what has come and gone. The intensity of this period, so much of which flies by in the scramble just to hang on without falling, will, I know, look different at 10 or 20 years’ distance.

Loving the crew: Prints for Music – in pictures

Music production teams have lost more than three-quarters of their regular work during the pandemic, leaving many in financial hardship. In an initiative set up by the photographer Ed Robinson, more than 100 prints have been donated for sale by celebrated artists, with the proceeds going to the Stagehand Covid-19 Crew Relief fund

Biden to face test over access to sensitive info as he inherits Trump's secret server

• Trump administration removes experts from Defense Policy Board

Trump administration removes experts from Defense Policy Board

Several high profile members of the Defense Policy Board were removed on Wednesday by the Trump administration, in yet another purge of longstanding foreign policy experts and national security establishment figures in the final days of the Trump era, according to three defense officials.

Biden says 'America is back' at the head of the table – but is that a good thing?

After four years of Trump, many diplomats are hopeful – but US critics say the idea of a return to a ‘golden age’ is a delusion

For most of the world’s diplomats, Joe Biden’s foreign policy slogan “America is Back” is no metaphor.

On global issues from climate change, to non-proliferation and human rights, the US under the Trump administration had literally gathered up its papers and pens and left the meeting room. Biden’s election victory and choice of committed internationalists to lead the foreign policy team, means that there will actually be someone sitting in what has been an empty chair.

'She called me!!!!!': Vice President-elect Kamala Harris phones California teen to thank him for painting her portrait

Tyler Gordon said he painted Kamala Harris' portrait because he was inspired by the barriers she broke to be elected as vice president.
      

How the Covid-19 pandemic has increased Amazon's dominance – podcast

As high street rivals were forced to close this year, Amazon has gone from strength to strength. But reports of conditions in some of its huge warehouses have brought a new level of scrutiny, as John Harris explains

Before the pandemic struck, high street retailers were already struggling to stay competitive with online companies that offered low prices and rapid deliveries. When Covid-19 forced shops to close and consumers to stay at home, online retailers, particularly Amazon, were ideally placed to capitalise.

The Guardian columnist John Harris tells Anushka Asthana that having spoken to several Amazon workers in recent weeks and months, it is clear that rising demand is placing a huge strain on the workforce. While Amazon temporarily raised its wage rates, workers allege that only in April did masks become mandatory and warehouses over the summer were often uncomfortably hot.

Trump pardons Michael Flynn, former national security advisor who admitted lying to FBI

President Donald Trump's first national security advisor, Michael Flynn, has tried to undo his guilty plea for more than a year.

Boston Market small group orders surge triple digits as CDC urges Thanksgiving gathering limits

With group dinner orders up 172% headed into Thanksgiving, Boston Market President Randy Miller said it's a sign Americans are heeding officials' advice.

Trump rants about overturning the election even as administration begins transition to Biden

Trump spoke at a GOP-led hearing on the election while Biden, his successor, delivered a formal Thanksgiving address from Delaware.

DOJ appeals ruling that kept Trump as defendant in E. Jean Carroll rape claim case

E. Jean Carroll says President Trump defamed her by saying she was lying and motivated by money when she claimed he raped her in a dressing room in the 1990s.

Trump lawyer details far-fetched strategy to reverse Pennsylvania win for Biden

President Donald Trump is scrambling for a way to undo the projected win for President-elect Biden. He faces virtually impossible odds.

With Yellen in line to lead Treasury, here are other economic posts Biden transition team could name next week

With Janet Yellen in line for Treasury secretary, Biden must now round out a team tasked with nursing the U.S. economy back to health.

Watch live: President-elect Biden delivers Thanksgiving address

President-elect Joe Biden delivers a Thanksgiving address Wednesday afternoon from Wilmington, Delaware.

New York Gov. Cuomo says 'states are broke' and need federal funding to distribute Covid vaccine

Cuomo said distributing a vaccine is going to be much harder than anticipated, citing the early difficulties states had in administering Covid tests.

President pranked as comedians snap up Trump 2024 domain

Jason Selvig and Davram Stiefler buy DonaldJTrump2024.comTrump yet to formally concede despite losing to Joe Biden

Donald Trump’s bid to retake the presidency in 2024 has been launched – by two comedians.

“We got the domain DonaldJTrump2024.com,” comics Jason Selvig and Davram Stiefler, AKA The Good Liars, wrote on Twitter.

When you're not working you don't feel like a man | Modern Masculinity - video

Iman Amrani is back with Modern Masculinity, looking at the issues affecting men which relate to mental health in the shadow of Covid-19. In this episode, she returns to Leeds to speak to Neil, a barber who she met in series one, to find out how his business is coping with lockdown, what pressures his employees are facing and how they feel about the future 

A vaccine revolution | podcast

Results from clinical trials have shown that the world has three apparently highly effective vaccines for Covid-19. With the race now on for regulatory approval, production and distribution, is the end of the pandemic within reach?

After a gruelling year of successive waves of Covid-19 infections and national lockdowns there has been a burst of good news this month, with three separate vaccine candidates performing extremely well in clinical trials.

First, Pfizer and Moderna announced that their vaccines were testing at an efficacy of around 95%. Then came the news that the AstraZeneca vaccine (the one pre-ordered in bulk by the UK government) was hitting 90%. It marks not just a new phase in the Covid-19 pandemic but potentially a revolution in vaccine technology itself.

Rescuers recover migrants' wedding rings lost at sea

Algerian couple were survivors of a shipwreck in October off the coast of Lampedusa, Italy

On 9 November, a migrant rescue boat came across a red backpack floating in the Mediterranean alongside other remains from a shipwreck that took place weeks before. The rucksack, covered with sea snails and reeking of petrol, contained two wedding rings, inscribed with the names Ahmed and Doudou.

“We thought it was proof of yet another love story that ended up at the bottom of the sea,” said Riccardo Gatti, the president of the NGO Open Arms in Italy, who recovered the personal items. “Unfortunately we find many of these. Most of the time suitcases and bags, floating in the sea, are nothing more than symbols of yet another journey that began in Libya and ended in tragedy.”

November gallery

Editorial cartoons
      

Donald Trump motorcade drives by supporters protesting US election results – video

Donald Trump's motorcade drove past supporters protesting the US election results on Saturday.

Trump was on his way to a nearby golf course in northern Virginia when he reportedly intentionally chose the route. He passed his supporters in Washington DC demonstrating against the results of the presidential election, which Joe Biden won.

Pro-Trump demonstrations are scheduled to take place across the US on 14 November, with counter protests also planned

Is the new Covid vaccine our way back to normality? - video explainer

The news this week that the Pfizer/BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine was effective on more than 90% of trial recipients is of huge importance. The efficacy is significantly higher than hoped for and so far there appear to be no safety concerns.

The Guardian's health editor, Sarah Boseley, explains that, while this is a major breakthrough, there are still several hurdles to overcome, and restrictions, such as wearing masks, social distancing and remote working, must remain in place for the time being

Can Joe Biden and Kamala Harris unite America after Trump? – video explainer

When Joe Biden formally takes over the presidency in January he will face some of the greatest crises to hit the US in recent history: a pandemic that has killed more than 200,000 Americans, a devastated economy, a rapidly overheating climate and a deeply fractured nation.

The Guardian's Lauren Gambino looks at how Biden and the vice-president-elect, Kamala Harris, plan to 'heal' the country after four years of Trumpism – and the challenges they will face with the prospect of having to navigate these times without a majority in the Senate

Countdown to Inauguration Day

Inauguration Day is Jan. 20, 2021. Here's what needs to happen before President-elect Joe Biden can officially take office.
      

‘Stop the vote’ and ‘count the votes’, say protesting Trump supporters – video

Count the votes or stop the count? Two conflicting Republican protests have emerged across the US, with some Trump voters demanding that election officials stop counting ballots in states such as Pennsylvania, where Trump holds a narrow lead, and previously Michigan, where Biden was out in front, but keep counting them in Arizona, where the current president is behind. So far, Trump has helped fuel both sides of the protests, filing lawsuits in some states to stop the vote count, and lawsuits in others that cast doubt on whether all votes have been properly counted

Help us document the US healthcare workers who die fighting coronavirus

We’d like your help identifying the US frontline healthcare workers who die after treating or helping patients with coronavirus

Lost on the frontline is a project by the Guardian and Kaiser Health News that aims to document the life of every healthcare worker in the US who dies from Covid-19 during the pandemic. From doctors to hospital cleaners, and from nursing home aides to paramedics, this project will capture the diverse range of frontline health workers risking their lives to help others in this fight. You can read more about the project here .