Day after day the u. S. Continues to set new daily records for coronavirus cases. Yesterday nearly a quarter Million People were diagnosed with covid19. Just yesterday. More help is on the way with this second vaccine. The moderna drug could reach Health Care Workers as early as monday. Between pfizer and moderna, nearly 8 million doses will be distributed nationwide this week. This morning operation warp speeds chief operating officer general gus perna said hes confident that 20 million vaccines will be allocated this year. So whats the difference between the two drugs . Well, both the pfizer and the Moderna Vaccines are proven to be more than 94 effective regardless of race or gender or Underlying Health conditions. Both have shown only mild and temporary side effects. The big differences are storage and timeline. Modernas vaccine can be kept in a conventional freezer at minus 4 degrees. Pfizers needs a special freezer set at minus 94 degrees. Both vaccines require a second dose, but modernas come four weeks apart. Pfizers come three weeks apart. We will look at the production of these vaccines and see who could get the first doses. Meanwhile, the uk has already started vaccinations, but thats not canceling other precautions. Millions of people in london and most of englands southeast are being forced to cancel their christmas plans. Today Prime MinisterBoris Johnson announced these regions will be placed under the strictest lockdown rules, what they call tier 4. Those restrictions effectively ban holiday gatherings beyond individual households. This decision came after the emergence of a fastspreading variant of the virus. A mutation that is up to 70 more transmissible than previous versions. Hundreds of antilockdown demonstrators gathered outside parliament to protest these new restrictions. It is worth noting this coronavirus has already mutated. A lot. And yet the vaccines are still considered extremely effective. Speaking of vaccines, lets start there. Today a Cdc Advisory Committee voted to recommend the Moderna Vaccine for emergency use authorization on americans ages 18 and up. The vote was 110 with three recusals. Nbcs Shaquille Brewster starts us off tonight from olive branch, mississippi that is southeast of memphis, tennessee. Give us the timeline for distributing the Moderna Vaccine. Reporter joshua, the cdc said the work to distribute this vaccine came as soon as the authorization came on friday night. Mckesson is the distributor moderna is relying on. And work began to essentially break down that stockpile of Moderna Vaccine into individual shipments based on the cdcs recommendations. And that is the work that has been going on since then. What we heard this morning from the chief operating officer of operation warp speed is that we can expect to see trucks leave this facility and another one in louisville tomorrow morning at some point. And make their way out across the country. We know that the first shipments of this vaccine can come as early as monday. Remember, moderna is promising to deliver 20 million of these vaccines by the end of the month. You mentioned the key differences between the Pfizer Vaccine that we saw last week and the Moderna Vaccine that will be rolled out this time around. Its that storage capacity. What that means in implication is this vaccine will be able to go to more places more quickly than pfizers vaccines. Were talking about places like pharmacies, doctors offices, nursing homes, especially in those hardhit rural communities. This was expected to have a major impact once it leaves the facility. Joshua . There are some states who say their vaccine allocations for next week were sharply reduced. There was some controversy in terms of the administration saying that pfizers having trouble producing the vaccine. Pfizers been saying theyre not having any trouble producing the vaccine they just need to know where it needs to go and then they can meet the need. Whats actually going on . Whos right . Reporter it essentially boils down to a giant miscommunication. We heard from the general, general perna of operation warp speed, and he said and explained that essentially when he was laying out that initial forecast for states misallocated or underestimated the amount of vaccine that was going to be available for each individual state so that was the number that was conveyed to the governor. But you know, listen to what he told us this morning because youll hear from the tone of the general when explaining his mistake, its a tone that you dont hear too often coming out of washington. Listen here. I am the one that approved the forecast sheets. I am the one that approved the allocations. There is no problem with the process. There is no problem with the Pfizer Vaccine. There is no problem with the Moderna Vaccine. So to the governors, to the governors staffs, please accept my personal apology if this was disruptive in your decisionmaking and in your conversations with the people of your great state. I will work hard to correct this. Reporter he says that problem has now been solved and it wont affect his estimation that when you combine the vaccines from moderna and pfizer from last week and the ones that will be going out next week, that they believe theyll be able to hit that 20 million dosage target by the end of the vaccine or within the very first few days of january. Joshua . Thank you, shaq. Thats nbcs Shaquille Brewster joining us from olive branch, mississippi. There have been problems with National Distribution of the covid vaccine, as you heard. And there are more local issues as well. Yesterday protests broke out at Stanford UniversityMedical Center hospital in california. Frontline workers staged a walkout shouting first in the room, back of the line. Demonstrators accused the Medical Center of prioritizing vaccinations for senior doctors and medical workers who are not directly caring for covid patients. Stanford has since apologized for its Distribution Plan and says its working to develop a revised version. Californias icu bed capacity has dropped to 2 statewide and that is a crisis at facilities like Hazel Hawkins hospital in hollister, inland from monterey bay. That is where we find nbcs scott cohn joining us now with more on the Vaccine Distribution and the challenges hospitals are facing. Scott, how are hospital workers doing where you are, particularly with cases going up and bed capacity going down to almost nothing . Reporter yeah, its really rough, joshua. As you know, hollister, as you said, its inland and sort of on the edge of the central valley. So they get a crosssection here of people commuting to Silicon Valley about 40, 50 miles away and agricultural workers. This hospital, Hazel Hawkins in hollister, is the only hospital in the county and it is now operating at 130 of capacity. Not just the icus but the whole hospital. Theyve had to double up patients in what were single rooms. They have patients that are staying in the emergency room. And of course a lot of it owing to that surge of covid patients. And people here wonder if theres any sign of it letting up. Its like a war zone inside there. We are kind of treating this as a mass casualty event. The hospital has come together as a team and were treating the sickest patients and were treating every patient that comes through the door, were getting them in, giving them treatment and were seeing everybody that shows up. Reporter now, the hospital staff here is getting vaccinated. Thats the good news. They got about a little more than 200 doses of the Pfizer Vaccine last week. Theyve done half of it up till now. Theyll do the rest next week. And theyll get about 300 doses of the Moderna Vaccine next week. So theyll be able to vaccinate not just the frontline staff but also eventually some support staff as well. But of course that doesnt do anything about the surge in the community. And they also know here that theyve only had the first dose of the vaccine, so they wont be fully protected until they get the second dose, which they expect in january. Its a tough time here, joshua. Scott, there are so many different kinds of Medical Centers in california. You know, stanford is different in that it deals with a different kind of clientele in palo alto, in Silicon Valley, where you are its kind of in san bonito county, kind of inland from monterey bay, just south of the bay area as we think of it. Away from interstate 5, which runs right through the central valley. Its kind of squished between all of these different population centers. What kinds of hospitals are the hardest hit right now . Is it just the ones in the big dense areas like l. A. , san diego, San Francisco . Is it the ones that are kind of squeezed between areas . Whos struggling the most . In a lot of ways its sort of equal opportunity. The state divides things up by region, and theyre rook looking at icu bed capacity. In Southern California the most populous part of the state theyre tapped out of icu beds. Los angeles, san diego, santa barbara. Zero icu capacity. Also here, this is considered part of the central valley, the san joaquin valley, also no icu capacity. In the bay area, the greater bay area, were talking about 12 . The cutoff for the state, for the expanded stay at home orders is 15 . The bay areas below that. And sacramento now sitting right at 15 . The only area where its a little bit less severe is in the northern part of the state. Theyre operating with about 25 of icu bed capacity left. But even that is pretty striking. So its in a lot of ways, its equal opportunity. Its a tough time, as i said. Thank you, scott. Thats nbcs scott cohn reporting for us from hollister, california. Covid was not the only virus that made news this week. Computer viruses did too. Yesterday the white house was prepared to release a statement that would formally blame a Hacking Campaign against the federal government on russia. But they were told to stand down. Its unclear who gave that order. This was first reported by the a. P. And confirmed by nbc news. Today President Trump downplayed the hack and tweeted that china might be at fault. He cited no evidence for this, just said it might be so. Two officials with knowledge of the situation say these tweets caught white house officials off guard. The tweets also directly contradict yesterdays statement from secretary of state mike pompeo. He said it was in his words pretty clear that russia was the culprit. Joining us is democratic congressman ted lieu of california. He serves on subcommittees that focus on the internet and Homeland Security and his district includes malibu and santa monica. Congressman lieu, good evening. Thank you, joshua. Honored to be on your show. I wonder what you make of the president s comments about this hack . Is there any evidence that china might have had anything to do with this . We do know that china is very technologically sophisticated and this is not beyond their capability. But do we know that this was china . The answer is no. What we do know is that in 2016 russia engaged in a sweeping and systematic attack of our elections including a massive cyber hack and we know that russia continued to attack the United States in these last four years including this very recent hack of solarwinds that secretary pompeo said was essentially done by russia. I did not understand why donald trump still has yet to condemn Vladimir Putin for any of his attacks on the United States. I dont understand why when it comes to putin donald trump bends the knee. Something is really wrong with our president when it comes to russia. How do you think this hack happened . Do you think this is more about russias technological sophistication here or is this the kind of thing where you had enough federal employees who just refused to update windows on time and it exploited a vulnerability that could have hit anybody . We do know from public reporting that on the dark web they were selling access to solarwinds, which is the company that was hacked, and this company had at least over 18,000 customers that may have been affected including numerous federal agencies. The reporting also says that one of their passwords was literally solarwinds123. If thats true, then solarwinds should be firing its employees right now who were responsible for that. At the same time we know that the Trump Administration also eliminated multiple positions in cybersecurity including a National SecurityCouncil Position in cybersecurity and in 2019 a number of Cybersecurity Administration officials left. So its no surprise that our cybersecurity has been weakened and foreign powers took advantage of it. Solarwinds 123 . Really . Seriously . Please tell me you just made that up, congressman. That is the dumbest thing i ever heard. It may have been solarwinds 1234 now that i think about. For those of you who have a password like, that do yourself a favor, go google password generator right now and make up an honest to god not stupid password because that is a very bad password. What are we doing about these attacks . Is this the kind of thing we have the capacity to push back on or should we just kind of get used to this being the nature of how the world is going to work for the future . So im one of four recovering Computer Science majors in congress. Its going to be one of three next year because a persons retiring. And its clear that one of our weaknesses are thirdparty vendors. The opm hack during the obama administration, which was a massive hack where millions of security clearance records were taken by a foreign power, that was also done through a thirdparty vendor. So we have to do a lot more testing and surveillance of thirdparty vendors that provide software to the federal government. Im working on legislation to do that right now. But thats a weakness in our cybersecurity. President elect biden has tapped Alejandro Mayorkas to tap the department of Homeland Security. That is his nominee. What do you make of him in terms of his ability to deal with threats like these . I am so happy that Alejandro Mayorkas was nominated by president elect biden. I knew him when he was a u. S. Attorney, the Central District in california. He is an amazing, smart, passionate, hardworking person. And he was also deputy secretary at a department of Homeland Security working on cybersecurity issues. So he gets it. And hes going to make sure that we get back on track in cybersecurity. At the same time we have to streamline cybersecurity in the federal government because right now you have the department of Homeland Security, you have the office of national budget, and then previously you had a cybersecurity czar. Its all over the place. I think we need a Central Point of contact. Hopefully the Biden Administration will fix that in the next couple years. And briefly, sir, before i have to let you go, whats your sense of how much can actually be done about this . I mean, china and russia have the at least military advantage of making these kinds of hacks in a very centralized way. North korea as well. The United States as you mentioned does a whole lot of contracting. Although a lot of our cybersecurity operations are governmental. This feels like were fighting a very asymmetrical war with countries who just dont play by the same rules as the United States plays by. Are you more optimistic about the future or more pessimistic about the future . I am optimistic because we do have the Bidenharris Administration coming in that will take cybersecurity much more seriously. They also believe in facts and in science. So thats good. In addition, we know that we have not enough cybersecurity professionals, not only in the private sector but also the public sector. So i have legislation which is a new collar jobs act that will provide a tax act for companies to send their employees to get trained in cybersecurity because we just need more cybersecurity professionals at all levels of Government Plus in the private sector. Conversation for another night. Id love to talk to you about the future of recruiting cybersecurity professionals because youre right, theres been an effort for years to try to get more people to if theyre looking for a career shift to consider this as a future career. Conversation for another night, though. Would love to talk to you more about that. Democratic congressman ted lieu of california. Congressman, thanks very much. Thank you, joshua. Theres plenty more to come tonight. Later on, lawrence odonnell, the host of the last word, will join us live. Also coming up, congress is working through the weekend. Lawmakers have until midnight sunday to reach a deal on a Government Spending