By Helen Regan, Adam Renton, Zamira Rahim and Ed Upright, CNN
From CNN's Kristina Sgueglia
New York state surpassed 1 million Covid-19 infections over the weekend, according to state and Johns Hopkins University data, becoming the fourth state to do so.
Saturday the state hit the grim milestone, and as of Sunday, it reported 1,017,153 total infections to date since the pandemic began.
From CNN's Madeline Holcombe and Paul Vercammen
Most New Year's Days, Rosa Cerna would be celebrating the birthdays of her dad and uncle -- brothers born exactly one year apart. This year, she mourned them both at a cemetery in Simi Valley, California.
Visiting the graves of the brothers who died of Covid-19, Cerna said she is angry that her 73-year-old father had so much more life to live and that the death of two important men in her life could have been prevented if more people had taken it seriously, she told CNN.
"Every day I live knowing that my dad passed from Covid, that my uncle passed from Covid. And some people, I don't think, understand that it could impact them the same way," she said.
"They live so carelessly ... but whatever you do could affect somebody else, just like they did to them."
As Cerna grieved this weekend, President Donald Trump questioned the number of cases and deaths in the US in a tweet, using the term "Fake News."
"It's an insult," Cerna said. "If it was fake, then my dad would be alive. My uncle ... all the rest of the people that have died would be alive."
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From CNN's Pierre Bairin and Gaelle Fournier in Paris
The head of France’s “Great East” region has described the perceived slow rate of the Covid-19 vaccinations in the country as "a state scandal."
Speaking to TV channel France 2 on Monday, Jean Rottner underlined the “big suffering” in his area, and said he wanted regions to “take over” the rollout from the national government.
According to the latest data made available by the French health agency on January 1, 516 people have been vaccinated in the country. The first shot was administered in France on December 27.
At the beginning of December, French Prime Minister Jean Castex said that 1 million people would able vaccinated by the end of January.
The “Great East” region has been particularly hard hit by France's second wave of Covid-19. It is one of the 15 administrative areas in France where the government has imposed a 6 p.m. curfew in an effort to curb cases.
We are making fun of ourselves because today, being vaccinated has become more complicated than buying a car,” Rottner said.
Regarding the speed of the rollout, Rottner added that this was “bulls**t."
“We need to accelerate, we are at war ... Today, we need to vaccinate everywhere we can, with the means that are at our disposal," he said.
The controversy over the vaccine rollout has prompted French government officials to try and improve the process.
In Emmanuel Macron's New Year’s Eve address the French President said he “would not let, for wrong reasons, an unjustified slowness settle." Health minister Olivier Véran has also announced an accelerated timetable for vaccinations.
From CNN's Faith Karimi
Our global coronavirus nightmare is entering its second year, and we're hanging on the best we can.
Our lives have been turned upside down, the economy is sputtering and more than 1.8 million people have died -- 350,000 of them in the US, more than any other country in the world.
As a nation, the US is exhausted. American hospitals and health care workers are overwhelmed. The grief and trauma are piling up. The vaccine rollout is behind schedule, a new strain of the virus has emerged and experts fear a post-holiday explosion of new cases and hospitalizations.
The next few months will likely be dark and painful. But there's a promise of light on the horizon. With two vaccines approved in the US and more on the way, there's hope for a gradual return to normalcy -- whatever that looks like in a post-pandemic world.
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From CNN's Niamh Kennedy in Dublin
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Monday that there was "no question" that his government will need to take tougher measures to tackle a surge in coronavirus cases.
With the British government facing increasing pressure to impose a national lockdown, Johnson told Sky News that "there's no question that we're going to have to take tougher measures."
Johnson called on British citizens to "do their bit now" during the "tough, tough weeks" that are to come.
The British leader acknowledged that people are "understandably becoming frustrated, impatient," and are failing to following the guidance "in the way that they should."
Johnson said that "the basic things: hands, face, space, really matter now particularly with this new variant."
Earlier on Monday, UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock told BBC Radio 4 that the UK's tier system is "no longer strong enough" to suppress the spread of the new coronavirus variant.
Hancock defended the UK government's delay in imposing further measures saying they "had shown [previously] we are prepared to move incredibly quickly, within 24 hours if we think that is necessary."
With three quarters of England's population currently under the strictest Tier 4 measures, Johnson said what the government had "been waiting for is to see the impact of the Tier 4 measures on the virus."
Adding that this impact was "still unclear," Johnson said that based on recent numbers further measures would likely be taken.
The UK case numbers have surpassed 50,000 for six straight days over the course of the past week, with 54,990 new cases recorded Sunday.
From CNN's Kristen Rogers
There seems to be a light at the end of the long, harrowing pandemic tunnel as Covid-19 vaccines are approved.
As the physical risks are better managed with vaccines, however, what will likely still remain is the indelible impact of the pandemic weighing on the collective psyche.
"The physical aspects of the pandemic are really visible," said Lisa Carlson, the immediate past president of the American Public Health Association and an executive administrator at the Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta.
"We have supply shortages and economic stress, fear of illness, all of our disrupted routines, but there's a real grief in all of that."
"We don't have a vaccine for our mental health like we do for our physical health," Carlson added. "So, it will take longer to come out of those challenges."
Based on the mental struggles endured by so many this year, burnout, trouble with sleep and eating disorders are just some of the issues that mental health professionals anticipate coming to the fore in 2021.
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From CNN's Schams Elwazer
British teachers’ unions are calling for a “pause” in the reopening of schools as some reopened in England this morning.
Students in the UK were due to return from the Christmas break on Monday. But less than a week ago, the government announced the return to class would be delayed by two weeks for almost all high schoolers and some primary (elementary) school children. Learning will move online instead.
In some areas primary schools remain open, a decision which has prompted union criticism.
“The government’s chaotic handling of the opening of schools has caused confusion for teachers, school staff and parents alike,” the education unions’ joint statement said Monday.
“Bringing all pupils back into classrooms while the rate of infection is so high is exposing education sector workers to serious risk of ill-health and could fuel the pandemic,” the statement added.
The unions also called for school staff who continue to work to be given priority access to vaccination.
There has been an ongoing debate around reopening schools as the UK battles a deadly new wave of the coronavirus, with new daily infection numbers topping 50,000 for six days straight.
On Sunday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson conceded schools may need to close indefinitely.
From CNN's Elizabeth Cohen
A new variant of coronavirus first discovered in the UK, also known as B.1.1.7, is present in at least 37 countries as well as Hong Kong and Taiwan, according to CNN's count.
Experts say that while the variant appears to be more transmissible than other Covid-19 strains, there is no evidence it is deadlier or causes more severe disease.
Test results are expected this week from labs that are studying whether the variant might pose a challenge to coronavirus vaccines, according to a World Health Organization official.
The UK variant is separate from another one first identified in South Africa.
The 37 countries are: United Kingdom, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Chile, China, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Lebanon, Malta, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Portugal, United Arab Emirates, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey, United States (including cases in Florida, California and Colorado) and Vietnam.
From CNN's Nadine Schmidt in Berlin
German police struggled to keep day-trippers off ski slopes in several regions over the weekend, despite a nationwide lockdown to curb the spread of coronavirus.
Authorities in the Winterberg resort near Düsseldorf said thousands of people traveled to the winter resort despite closed ski slopes and police efforts to blockade roads.
Over the weekend German police registered 182 violations of a law requiring face masks be worn, 99 violations of social distancing rules and one breach of the ban on alcohol consumption in public places, according to a police statement.
Authorities in the Eifel region also announced the closure of slopes to avoid breaches of Covid-19 regulations. Police in the Harz region asked people via Twitter on Sunday to avoid traveling there.
Despite the lockdown, December was Germany's deadliest month in the coronavirus pandemic -- with a nearly threefold increase in the number of deaths since November, according to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), the country's disease and control center.
Between December 2, 2020 and January 1, 2021 16,718 people died from Covid-19, compared to November when 6,155 deaths were recorded, according to the RKI.
Germany's health care system has come under strain and hospitals in some areas are increasingly coming close to their limits.
On Tuesday, German chancellor Angela Merkel will meet with the 16 heads of the country's federal states to discuss whether the current lockdown in place until January 10 should be extended.
Some regional leaders, including Bavaria's state premier Markus Söder, have already come forward calling for an extended lockdown until at least the end of January.
On Sunday, Söder warned that infection numbers are still too high.
'We’re not yet able to assess how the situation has developed over Christmas, New Year and especially through the large numbers of travelers returning home," he said.
"That’s why it would be irresponsible to relax the lockdown now. Stopping too early would be highly damaging.''
