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House hunters are taking advantage of lockdown rules to travel hundreds of miles to view homes, estate agents in England have said.

In-person viewings are allowed in England, but estate agents have raised concerns about their safety and say some buyers are travelling across the country to look at second homes.

Firms have said they are also currently facing increased demand before the stamp duty holiday ends on 31 March.

The government said the housing market is "a key part of our economy" - but that initial viewings should be done virtually "wherever possible".

But firms say many buyers don't want virtual appointments.

Read the full story here.

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Earlier, Education Secretary Gavin Williamson told the BBC that schools in England will be given two weeks' notice before reopening, although he could not give a date.

Schools across the UK remain closed to most pupils, except children of key workers and those considered vulnerable, and are offering remote learning instead.

Plans to return children to the classroom vary across the different nations.

The government's deputy chief medical officer Jenny Harries said schools in England may reopen region by region after the February half-term, depending on local infection rates.

In Scotland, schools will remain closed to the majority of pupils until at least the middle of February - but it is hoped a phased return will be possible from then.

In Wales, the majority of students will continue to learn remotely until at least 29 January, when the next review of national restrictions is due to take place.

And in Northern Ireland, most pupils will not return to school until after the half-term break in mid-February.

You can read our explainer for more on the plans for reopening schools across the UK.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock is making a statement in the Commons on the coronavirus vaccine roll-out.

He says the UK has now given more than five million doses of the vaccine to 4.6 million people.

He describes this as a "huge feat", saying the government is making "good progress" on its target to vaccinate the top four priority groups by mid-February.

It means the UK is working at a rate of giving 200 vaccinations every minute.

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More than 3,000 patients waited longer than an hour to be handed over from ambulance teams to A&E staff at hospitals in England last week - down from more than 5,000 in the previous week.

A total of 3,333 delays of over 60 minutes were recorded across all acute trusts in the seven days to 17 January, according to new figures published by NHS England.

The total for the previous week was 5,513 - the highest weekly figure so far this winter.

University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust reported the highest number for any individual trust among the new figures, with 237 delays of more than 60 minutes, followed by University Hospitals Bristol & Weston NHS Foundation Trust (158) and University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust (156).

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Close to two million people in the UK have received their first dose of a Covid vaccine in the past week, government figures show.

By the end of Tuesday, a total of 4.61 million people had received their initial jab, up from 2.64 million the week before.

The government is aiming to offer a vaccine to all over-70s, the extremely clinical vulnerable and health and and social care workers by mid-February - up to 15 million people.

To achieve this target it needs to deliver more than two million jabs a week.

It comes as 65 new vaccination centres are due to open in England today, including a mosque in Birmingham and a cinema in Aylesbury.

Read more here.

And you can find out more about how the rollout is planned to progress, here.

A housebound 84-year-old woman says she has been told she may have to wait up to two months to have her coronavirus vaccine if she cannot get to her GP surgery.

Stuart Wilson says his mother Julia, from Sketty in Swansea, is immobile and needs two people with a hoist to get her up.

He says her surgery called on Tuesday offering a jab but they were told it would take time to arrange a house visit.

"I'm appalled," says Stuart. "It's completely immoral."

Stuart is one of several relatives of some over-70s who have complained about the waits, while some say the differences in vaccinations between England and Wales is "alarming".

The Welsh government says a mobile service could take a jab to Julia, while Dr Chris Johns, from Sketty Medical Centre, says: "I can give assurances that no housebound patient is being asked to wait this long for their vaccination.

"This is a massive undertaking by GPs and we would ask older patients, if they are mobile, to attend one of our vaccination clinics instead."

Read the full story here.

Image source, Matt Cardy

Unison - the trade union representing many healthcare workers - says it does not object to military medics being brought in to help deal with Covid-19 in Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland's health minister Robin Swann has asked the Ministry of Defence to help out in hospitals - with more than 100 medically-trained military personnel set to help out. The same thing is happening in some parts of England.

But yesterday, Unison in NI said it had questions about the plan and wanted to know whether "other avenues of support" had been explored - such as recruiting staff from private healthcare.

Its statement was criticised by some politicians so now Unison has sought to clarify its position.

The union's regional secretary Patricia McKeown says the first statement has been "misunderstood". Speaking to Good Morning Ulster earlier, she said: "To be absolutely clear, Unison has not objected to assistance from military personnel."

There's more here.

People forced to evacuate their homes amid widespread flooding across England and Wales are being told they won't be breaking Covid restrictions to do so.

About 2,000 homes in the Didsbury and Northenden areas of Manchester, and in Ruthin and Bangor-on-Dee, North Wales, and Maghull, Merseyside, are affected.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson says the government is "totally prepared" for the dual crises of flooding and the pandemic and that Covid-secure facilities will be available for any people forced to leave their homes as a result of the weather.

One resident in Didsbury, Fari Iravani, tells BBC news the pandemic is making it more difficult to find somewhere to stay.

"During corona where do you evacuate to? You don't want to impose yourself on other people," he says.

"We are trying to hold on as long as we can, and hopefully it will pass... If there is a continuation of the rain and the storm, that's going to be a problem."

Meanwhile, pumps and sandbags have had to be brought in to protect supplies of the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine being held in a warehouse in Wrexham, north-east Wales, which was threatened by floods.

A statement from Wockhardt, which runs the warehouse, says there is no disruption to manufacturing and the site is now operating as normal.

Pallab Ghosh
Science correspondent, BBC News

The findings of Imperial College's React study are seemingly at odds with recent figures from NHS Test and Trace, which has been reporting recent decreases in daily infections and has prompted some experts to suggest that we might be beginning our journey out of the woods.

The study's initial findings suggest infections between 6-15 January were up by 50% on early December, with one in 63 people infected.

The researchers behind the study say the test and trace figures may be reflecting an initial drop in infections just after Christmas, which is only now being registered on the official figures. It takes time for infection to turn into symptoms, for test results to be turned around and then put into the system.

The study's more up to date findings indicate that infection levels did not continue to fall in the first two weeks of January and may even have gone up. So why has this happened?

Data on people's movements has shown that there's been increased activity which the scientists involved say has kept transmission of the virus at a high level. The Department of Health says that the study does not yet reflect the impact of the lockdown in England.

But if this trend continues, say the scientists, the numbers admitted to hospital with severe Covid illness will not fall in the short term, as some had hoped.

This is one set of figures over a short number of days so there might be a more optimistic picture when the study reports its full set of results in a week's time. But there is no getting away from the fact that ministers will be disappointed not to have seen a fall at this stage.

Unless things change, even tougher measures will have to be considered.

We heard earlier from Education Secretary Gavin Williamson and he has also been speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme where he has given a bit more detail on the possible timetable for schools returning.

Asked whether there is any realistic prospect of schools fully reopening before Easter, he says: "I would certainly hope that that would be certainly before Easter."

He is also asked about concerns proposals for "mini exams", to help teachers grade pupils after formal exams were cancelled, could disadvantage pupils who had faced more disruption to teaching this year.

Williamson says this will only be "one element" of how teachers will grade pupils, with teachers asked to make a judgement "across a whole set of evidence", including course work, essays and other tests completed throughout the year.

Anne Soy
BBC News, Nairobi

Image source, Reuters

UK Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has called on high-income countries to support global access to Covid-19 vaccines.

Speaking in Kenya's capital, Nairobi, at the start of his visit to East Africa, Raab said the UK had provided £500m ($684m) to aid the distribution of vaccines across the world through an initiative dubbed Covax.

The African Union has secured 270 million vaccine doses from manufacturers for member states, but that is still not enough to meet demand for the more than one billion people on the continent.

Western countries have been accused of buying almost all doses of the leading vaccines, leaving poorer nations uncertain of when they will get the shots.

The World Health Organization said it could become a "catastrophic moral failure" that would cost lives and livelihoods.

Mr Raab on Wednesday toured the Kenyan research centre taking part in the Oxford vaccine research.

Even though doses are now being administered in the UK, none have been made available in Kenya.

Mr Raab said it was in the UK's national interest and its moral duty to get the vaccine there as soon as physically and logistically possible.

But it’s not just Kenya. Middle and lower income countries have struggled to find vaccines.

Wealthy countries have signed deals to buy as much as five times the quantities they need.

There are probably still about four or five weeks of "incredibly intense pressure" on hospitals ahead, the boss of NHS Providers says.

Chris Hopson, who is chief executive of the organisation, which represents hospitals and other NHS trusts in England, explains there is a time lag between when the number of cases starts to drop off and hospital admissions and deaths do.

He tells BBC Breakfast there are currently more than 39,000 people in UK hospitals with coronavirus - 80% higher than during the first wave last spring.

Hopson also says there is "a real nervousness" that because of the increased transmissibility of the new variant of the virus, it will take longer for the peak in cases to come down than during the first wave.

"In that sense I suspect that the pressure on hospitals will last longer than it did in the first wave," he adds.

EU leaders meet via video late this afternoon for a summit focusing on the vaccine rollout and how to contain the spread of new variants of Covid-19. German Chancellor Angela Merkel is warning that border controls could be introduced if tighter common measures aren’t agreed. Greece, meanwhile, is keen for an EU vaccination certificate to help cross-border travel.

Image source, Reuters

There's bad news for the French ski industry – as expected ski lifts will remain closed at the start of next month and the tourism minister says it’s highly unlikely they can reopen later on in February. At least a quarter of a million French jobs rely on the ski season and the government is working on economic support measures.

German health officials are seeing a lower trend in infections since Christmas. Although over 20,000 new infections have been reported in the past 24 hours, the Robert Koch institute says weekly incidence rates are now down to 119 infections per 100,000, the lowest since the start of November.

The mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin, is lifting some Covid restrictions from tomorrow, with city colleges and sport schools allowed to reopen and capacity at theatres and cinemas raised from a quarter to a half. Schools reopened last week and the mayor says more than 220,000 people in the capital have been vaccinated.

Swedish PM Stefan Lofven has extended a ban on alcohol sales in restaurants after 20:00 until 7 February and told bosses the most important thing they can do is to let staff work from home. Sweden has reported a slight fall in the number of Covid patients in intensive care to 327.

Image source, Getty Images

Education Secretary Gavin Williamson says he hopes to be able to restart daily testing in schools, after plans were paused on the advice of Public Health England.

He says trials before Christmas of daily testing of close contacts of positive cases “worked really well” but Public Health England wants to look in more detail at how this will work with the new more transmissible variant.

“We very much hope… that we’re able to restart that programme that worked so well on the old variant,” he tells BBC Breakfast.

Williamson also says he wants to see all teachers and support staff vaccinated “at the very earliest moment” but that it is right to prioritise those most at risk of being admitted to hospital with Covid-19 in the first wave of the rollout.

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The government is not in a position to say the exact date schools in England will reopen but it is hoping to give two weeks’ notice, the education secretary says.

Gavin Williamson tells BBC Breakfast he wants to give teachers, children and parents enough notice to allow them to prepare for a return to the classroom.

Asked what factors will determine when schools will reopen, he says the “key reason” schools had to close to most pupils was because of pressure on the NHS.

“It will be when the pressure is starting to lift, that puts us in the best possible position to be able to welcome all children back into schools,” he says.

Read more.

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Scientists tracking the spread of coronavirus in England say infection levels in the community may have risen at the start of the latest lockdown.

Infections in the period 6-15 January were up by 50% on early December, with one-in-63 people infected, Imperial College London's initial findings suggest.

Swab tests from 143,000 people indicate 1.58% had the virus during early January - up from 0.91% in December.

Ministers say the report does not yet reflect the impact of the lockdown.

But Imperial College London's Prof Paul Elliott warns if the high prevalence continues "more lives will be lost".

Read more.

Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the coronavirus pandemic. Here’s a quick summary of the main headlines in the UK this morning:

• Scientists tracking the spread of coronavirus in England say infection levels in the community may have risen at the start of the latest lockdown
• Another 60 NHS vaccination centres in England, including a mosque in Birmingham and a cinema in Aylesbury, will welcome their first patients today
• People have been told Covid restrictions allow them to leave their homes in an emergency, as hundreds are evacuated amid widespread flooding across England and Wales
• Anyone going on a Saga holiday or cruise in 2021 must be fully vaccinated against Covid-19, the tour operator has said
• House hunters are taking advantage of lockdown rules to travel hundreds of miles to view homes, estate agents say