As we reported earlier, this week's R number across the UK remains unchanged at 0.6-0.9.

The R number is an estimate that indicates whether the epidemic is growing or shrinking.

An R number of 0.6-0.9 means that, on average, every 10 people infected will infect between six and nine other people.

But how does the R number vary across the UK nations and regions?

As the below graphic shows, the R number is estimated to be lowest in the East of England, London and the South West of England.

Read more about the R number here.

Democrats in the US House of Representatives are expected to try and pass US President Joe Biden's $1.9tn coronavirus stimulus package today.

The American Rescue Plan will help fund medical supplies and send emergency financial aid to households and businesses.

The president's first few weeks in office have been dominated by efforts to try and get his plan through. His party holds a majority in the House but the package is expected to face deeper difficulty getting through the evenly split Senate.

Image source, Getty Images

Kenya will receive its first batch of Covid-19 vaccines next week, the cabinet has said.

Frontline health workers, security officers, teachers and vulnerable groups will be vaccinated first.

The government has not detailed which particular vaccine it is acquiring.

The health ministry previously said the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine had been approved for use in the country.

Kenya has so far confirmed 105,057 cases of coronavirus, according to data from the health ministry.

Read more about the slow start to Africa's vaccine rollout here

Image source, Getty Images

Captain Sir Tom Moore's funeral will be "quite spectacular", external, with soldiers from the Yorkshire Regiment to honour him at the service, his daughter has said.

Sir Tom, who raised more than £32m for the NHS with his sponsored walk of his garden in the first lockdown, served with the Duke of Wellington's Regiment during World War II.

Six soldiers from the Yorkshire Regiment will carry his coffin into the crematorium on Saturday.

A firing party of 14 will each fire three rounds in unison, and a bugler will sound The Last Post at the end of the private service.

The 100-year-old died at Bedford Hospital on 2 February after testing positive for Covid-19.

His funeral will be attended by eight members of his immediate family - his two daughters Hannah Ingram-Moore and Lucy Teixeira, four grandchildren and his sons-in-law.

His daughter Lucy, 52, said: "There's just going to be the eight of us under full Covid restrictions, we will honour him the best way we possibly can."

Sir Tom asked that My Way by Frank Sinatra be played at his funeral and that his epitaph reads "I told you I was old", in reference to comedian Spike Milligan's famous epitaph "I told you I was ill".

Adam Easton
Warsaw Correspondent

Image source, EPA

Poland’s health ministry is raising the upper age limit for people receiving the AstraZeneca vaccine to 69 from 65 due to limited vaccine supplies, a ministry spokesman has said.

Wojciech Andrusiewicz said the decision was taken upon the recommendation of the Polish Medical Council. At the start of February the council recommended senior citizens should not be given the AstraZeneca vaccine in line with many other EU countries. The ministry wants to vaccinate younger senior citizens as a priority and limited vaccine supplies has caused the U-turn.

Mr Andrusiewicz also said that two other Polish provinces are in danger of having tougher restrictions reinstated due to the fast growth of new infections. On Saturday, shopping centres, hotels, cinemas, museums and swimming pools will close in the rural north-eastern province of Warmia-Masuria, which is experiencing more than double the national infection rate. Primary school years 1-3 there will return to online classes from next week.

This week Poland has reported its highest daily coronavirus infections since the start of January.

Image source, PA Media

Travellers released from 10 days in a quarantine hotel after arriving in the UK from a country on the government's "red list" said they were treated like "animals" and "prisoners" during their stay.

Many of the guests who stayed at a hotel near Heathrow Airport complained about the conditions, the costs and being kept away from family members as they left on Friday.

They had been at the hotel since 15 February, the first day the government's new quarantine rules came into force, and had to pay £1,750 for a "package" including transport from the airport, two Covid-19 tests, security and food.

Ruth Conway, 84 and her husband Norman, 72, from Keynsham, near Bristol, stayed in the Radisson Blu Edwardian hotel near Heathrow Airport after returning from a holiday in Portugal.

Leaving the hotel on Friday morning, Ms Conway said although the staff were "very good", she questioned if they were "joking" when asked if she had a positive experience.

She added: "You could come outside as much as you wanted, my husband's a smoker, so it's desperate for him.

"But it would have been nice to walk around a garden or something.

"That's what I can't wait for, to walk around my garden at home and to be able to get out of one room without having to be escorted everywhere."

Image source, PA Media

A father-of-three has said he was made to feel like an "animal" while quarantining in a hotel.

Theo Paulse, 39, who lives in Torquay, Devon, stayed at the Radisson Blu Edwardian hotel near Heathrow after flying in from South Africa after a family visit.

After leaving on Friday, he told the PA news agency: "For the amount of money they charge, I felt more like a prisoner than actually a guest here.

"I had loads of altercations in the end with staff just not knowing how to treat people because the power went to their head.

"They didn't realise they were dealing with guests, they just kind of felt like they've got to treat you like some kind of animal and keep you in these rooms."

Image source, Reuters

Thanks for joining us this lunchtime. If you'd like a catch-up of what's been happening today, here are some of the main headlines.

• The next priority group for Covid vaccinations across the UK will be people in their 40s, who will receive their first dose once the current phase of vaccinations has been completed
• Prioritising by jobs rather than age would be "more complex" and could slow things down, the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation said - but there's been some criticism for this approach, including from teaching and police bodies
• Levels of coronavirus have continued to fall across the UK, according to Office for National Statistics data. The figures show that in the week to 19 February there were about 421,300 in the community who had the virus - it's a similar infection rate to how things were last October
• The R number in the UK remains unchanged at between 0.6 and 0.9, according to latest figures
• The Queen has urged the public to "think about other people" when they are offered a Covid-19 vaccination and take up the offer. She had her first dose of the vaccine in January and said it was "very quick"
• This year's Pride in London event is due to take place in September, organisers have said. Last year's Pride was cancelled due to the pandemic
• A British man has been sentenced to two weeks in prison for breaking Singapore's quarantine rules by leaving his hotel room to see his fiancee

Image source, Welsh Government

Wales' chief medical officer says there isn't enough evidence to support prioritising people from specific occupations in the next phase of the vaccine roll-out.

It comes after there has been some criticism for the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation's latest advice, which is to prioritise people in their 40s next, regardless of their job.

Dr Frank Atherton said there had been "many calls for people from specific occupations to be prioritised for the next phase of the vaccine roll-out".

"The JCVI did consider this," he said. "However, it found there wasn’t sufficient evidence to set specific occupations apart from the general population.

"It also advised that the complexity of delivering this approach would slow down the pace of the vaccination rollout".

The coronavirus R number in the UK remains unchanged at 0.6-0.9, according to the latest figures.

The UK daily growth rate is estimated at -6% to -2%, up from -6% to -3% previously.

R represents the average number of people each Covid-19 positive person goes on to infect.

Image source, PA Media

The percentage of people testing positive for coronavirus has decreased in all regions in England except Yorkshire and the Humber, the ONS has said.

It said that in the week ending 19 February the trend in Yorkshire and the Humber was "uncertain" but caution should be taken in over-interpreting "small movements in the latest trend".

Around one in 120 people in private households in the region were estimated to have had Covid-19 in the week ending 19 February while the highest proportion was in the North West at one in 110.

For London the estimate was one in 125 and for the West Midlands it was one in 140.

The other estimates are one in 145 for north-east England, one in 150 people for the East Midlands, one in 175 in south-east England, one in 210 people for eastern England, and one in 240 in south-west England.

Helen Catt
Political correspondent

It is right for the government to accept the advice of the Joint Committee on Vaccination on the next phase of the vaccine rollout, the prime minister's official spokesman has said.

Doing so "will protect the most people" and "have the most impact" on pressures on the health service, he said.

The spokesman said the committee had been clear "that giving priority to certain professions would not be as effective" and that "even in the under-50s age remains the biggest factor determining mortality and hospitalisation".

More than a million vaccinations will have been given in Wales by Saturday, Wales' chief medical officer says.

Dr Frank Atherton told the Welsh Government press briefing this was a "truly phenomenal performance and a success story that is bringing everyone hope and a path out of this crisis".

He added: "We are working hard to reach everyone in groups 1-9 by mid-April and all adults by the end of July, subject to vaccine supply matching our ambition."

Image source, georg-nuesslein.de

A German conservative MP, Georg Nüsslein, is being investigated on suspicion of large-scale bribe-taking linked to the supply of Covid face masks. He has called the allegations “baseless”.

He is in the Bavarian CSU – a party allied to Chancellor Angela Merkel, but has now lost his parliamentary immunity. Investigators searched his Bundestag office and 12 properties in Germany and Liechtenstein linked to him.

Prosecutors suspect that he received large sums after lobbying the government on behalf of a supplier of medical masks. The money was not declared to the tax authorities, it is alleged.

We're hearing there will be a Downing Street press conference at 17:00 GMT led by Health Secretary Matt Hancock.

He will be joined by England's deputy chief medical officer, Prof Jonathan Van-Tam, and Dr Susan Hopkins, senior medical adviser at Public Health England.

We'll bring you updates from it here.

Image source, Reuters

Indonesia has authorised one of the world's first private vaccination schemes to run alongside its national one.

Business leaders pushed for the initiative in order to help open up the economy. The government says more than 6,600 companies have signed up for the scheme, which will allow them to buy state-procured vaccines for their staff.

Some fear privatised immunisation could deepen inequality - but a senior health official said at a news conference on Friday that the scheme will not disturb the separate national roll-out, Reuters reports.

State-owned pharmaceutical company Bio Farma has said it is in talks to secure Sinopharm and Moderna jabs for the initiative.

Image source, Getty Images

The decision not to prioritise police officers in the next phase of the coronavirus vaccination programme is a "deep and damaging betrayal" which "will not be forgotten", says the national chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales.

John Apter says: "There's real palpable anger from all levels within policing about how we have been completely disregarded and ignored in this phase.

"What is expected of policing does put them at risk, it does put them at risk of transmitting this virus.

"They're being spat at, coughed at, rolling around on the ground with people, working in hospital environments, going into people's homes, they can't mitigate the risk of the virus.

"All of that means absolutely nothing."

The chair of the Metropolitan Police Federation Ken Marsh called the decision "absurd".

He told the BBC he was "absolutely shocked" by the JCVI's announcement today, adding: "We have been told over and over again that there would be much heralded top cover for our brave colleagues out there.

"This is not about pitting us against others. This is about being very clear and understanding that we do a job that no one else does in this country."

Image source, PA Media

A head teachers' union said it is "disappointed" the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) has decided against prioritising education staff for the next phase of the vaccine rollout.

Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: "The government needs to make a policy decision on this matter having insisted that education is a national priority and having announced a 'big bang' return to the classroom in England.

"It must now back that up by providing a clear direction that education staff will be prioritised in the next phase of the programme."

He said it would be important not only in reassuring staff expected to work in busy and crowded environments, but also in terms of minimising disruption to education caused by staff absence as a result of Covid.

Read more about schools re-opening here.

Infections have "continued to decrease" across the UK in the week to 19 February, the latest figures from the ONS infection survey suggest.

In England one in 145 people are estimated to be testing positive for coronavirus compared with one in 115 last week.

In Wales it is one in 205 compared with one in 125 last week, in Northern Ireland one in 195 vs one in 105 last week, while in Scotland it's one in 225 vs one in 180 the week before.

Estimates from the ONS survey suggest that about 420,000 people in the UK would test positive for coronavirus.

That is 0.65% of the population, or one in155 people, down from one in 115 last week.

Read more here

Image source, Reuters

South Korea started its Covid-19 vaccination rollout on Friday, with the first doses going to nursing home workers and some patients.

Officials hope to vaccinate hundreds of thousands of people over the next month using jabs produced by AstraZeneca and Pfizer-BioNTech.

Earlier this week, South Korea’s prime minister told the BBC that he was confident the country would achieve herd immunity from Covid-19 by the autumn despite a later start to its vaccination programme.

Image source, Science Photo Library

We just heard a few moments ago that phase two of the UK's vaccination programme is to continue moving down age groups rather than be based on occupation.

People in their 40s will be next in line, followed by those aged 30-39 and then those aged 18-29.

In phase one, nine priority groups were set out based on age and underlying health conditions - the biggest factors in raising someone's risk.

But who has already been immunised and when might you be offered the vaccine?

You can read our piece on this and other aspects of the vaccination programme here.