In his press conference just now, the French president announced that the European Union would be closing its external borders on Tuesday.

We knew this drastic measure was set to be discussed by the EU's 27 leaders but were not expecting Mr Macron to announce it this evening.

It remains unclear if all states have formally agreed to it.

Earlier, the EU Commission chief Ursula Von der Leyen said she was proposing temporary restriction on "non-essential travel to the EU" for an initial period of 30 days.

She said EU citizens and long-term residents and their family members would be exempt, along with workers who commute across borders, those delivering goods and those involved in the fight against the coronavirus.

The UK government would not be obliged to apply the ban, and UK citizens would not be affected by it, says the BBC's Brussels correspondent Adam Fleming.

The UK has left the EU but is currently in a transition period.

Several EU states including Germany and Spain have already announced border closures with EU neighbours.

Image source, Getty Images

We're watching US President Donald Trump's press conference in the White House. Here are some key points:

• The outbreak in the US is expected to last until "July or August, perhaps longer", Mr Trump says
• US residents are advised to avoid bars, restaurants and public spaces, as well as unnecessary travel
• People should avoid gathering in groups of more than 10
• But Mr Trump said there were no current plans for a nationwide quarantine - suggesting that people in the US are already self-isolating
• White House coronavirus response coordinator Dr Deborah Birx issued an appeal directly to millennials, asking them to limit social contact. "They are the core people that will stop this virus. We really want people to be separated," she said.
• Dr Birx also warned against socialising even if people feel well. "We know that there is a large group of infected people who are asymptomatic, who continue to spread the virus," she said

President Macron is announcing a raft of measures as he puts France on a war-footing to fight the virus.

Here are the key details:

• All non-essential movement to be banned from Tuesday midday for 15 days; residents must stay at home
• Punishments for those flouting the regulations
• Army to be used to help transport the sick to hospital
• Military hospital to be used in Alsace, near German border
• Borders to be closed in agreement with other European Union countries
• Second round of local elections postponed
• No business, regardless of size, will be allowed to fail

Image source, Reuters

France will go into enforced lockdown from Tuesday midday, French President Emmanuel Macron has said in a national address from the Elysee Palace.

All residents have been ordered to stay at home, and can only leave for essential reasons.

Movements will be very severely limited, he said,

"We are at war," the president said numerous times.

The UK health department has released the latest coronavirus numbers for the country.

As of 09:00 GMT on 16 March, 44,105 people have been tested for the virus.

Of that number 1,543 were positive.

The department also says 55 people who tested positive for coronavirus have now died. Earlier this evening Health Secretary Matt Hancock told the House of Commons the number of people to have died with the virus in England had risen to 53. There has been one death in Wales and one in Scotland.

Image source, PA Media

Actor Idris Elba has announced he has tested positive for the coronavirus.

The star of TV series The Wire and Luther tweeted: "I feel ok, I have no symptoms so far but have been isolated since I found out about my possible exposure to the virus.

"Stay home people and be pragmatic. I will keep you updated on how I’m doing. I feel OK. No panic."

Asked what people should do if their jobs do not allow them to work from home, Health Secretary Matt Hancock gives this advice:

"If you are healthy and not being asked to isolate because someone in your household has symptoms then of course you should still go to work.

"It is important that this country keeps moving as much as we possibly can, within the limits of the advice we have been given."

He also tells MPs that measures on shielding will be for those who have "significant health conditions”.They will be contacted by the NHS, he says.

But he adds the measures were not aimed at the "generality of over 70s who are healthy".

He says the guidance for those over 70 is the same as for people of working age, except that the government strongly advises social distancing measures.

A human trial of a vaccine against coronavirus in the US has given a dose to its first participant.

This is the first of a group of 45 healthy volunteers to be given the jab, at the Kaiser Permanente research facility, in Seattle.

Each volunteer will receive an injection over a six-week time frame.

"The first participant received the investigational vaccine today," the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) said in a statement on Monday.

Experts say it will still take many months to know if this vaccine, or others also in research, will work.

Read the full story here: US volunteers to test first vaccine

Meanwhile in Europe, several hospitals in Italy, Spain and France are to test the experimental anti-viral drug Remdesivir on hundreds of patients sick with Covid-19.

The drug, made by California-based Gilead, has already been tested on patients in China’s Hubei province, where the virus originated.

These are clinical trials: Remdesivir has been tested previously on animals, but has not yet been approved by health regulators.

Image source, Getty Images

The Health Secretary Matt Hancock has been updating the House of Commons - including the latest number of people who have now died after being tested positive for the coronavirus.

He says 53 people have now died - an increase of 18 from yesterday.

He also tells MPs he will introduce a Coronavirus Emergency Bill to ensure essential services keep running.

These are "unprecedented measures" he says and he expresses the hope that the government will not have to use many of them.

The press conference with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has ended, and it's fair to say there's quite a lot to take in.

Here are the key points:

• everyone in the UK is now being advised to avoid "non-essential" contact with others and "unnecessary" travel
• people are also being asked to work from home "where they possibly can", and avoid pubs, clubs, theatres and social venues
• people are now being advised to stay at home for 14 days if they, or anyone in their household, has either a high temperature or a "new and continuous cough"
• people in at-risk groups will be asked within days to be "largely shielded from social contact" for 12 weeks
• the UK is to scale up coronavirus testing in the coming weeks
• from tomorrow, mass gatherings will no longer be provided with emergency workers

Mr Johnson said he recognised the government was now "asking a lot of everybody", and the UK had not seen "anything like it in peace time".

But he said "drastic action" was now needed - otherwise cases in the UK could double every five to six days.

What is the situation in Canada?

Canada has approximately 324 confirmed cases of the coronavirus across all 10 provinces. There are an additional 17 presumptive cases. One death has been linked to the disease.

The federal government has urged all Canadians to avoid non-essential travel and to return home where possible.

They have also announced financial stimulus measures for businesses and are promising relief this week for Canadians who are affected financially.

Some provinces and cities have implemented their own measures to prevent contagion and have called on the federal goverment to do more.

Over the weekend, Quebec - where there are about 39 cases - asked establishments like bars, cinemas, arenas, and gyms to close indefinitely.

Restaurants were asked to operate at a 50% capacity.

Some BBC News journalists have been self-isolating so we asked them to give us their updates from life in quarantine.

Dan Lytwyn, BBC News videojournalist, Toronto

My wife and I are in self-isolation after arriving home from a vacation in the US last week.

We will both be working from home for the next two weeks as a precautionary measure.

Neither of us have any symptoms.

We are content with food supplies and for not having to commute an hour in to the office each day.

We’re in constant contact with family via phone calls and WhatsApp group chats.

Everyone is in okay spirits despite how surreal this all feels.

There is an increasing anxiety, though, about what the situation will be like in the coming weeks.

(This probably isn’t helped by the fact we watched the film ‘Contagion’ last night.)

We are closely monitoring news reports and community messages to gauge feelings in our neighbourhood.

Canada has become the latest country to close its borders to foreigners, barring all except its citizens and permanent residents from entering.

Announcing the travel ban on Monday, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said it was "time to take every precaution to keep people safe".

A few exceptions would be made for US citizens, air crew and diplomats, Mr Trudeau said.

“Let me be clear, if you’re abroad, it’s time to come home,” Mr Trudeau said, addressing Canadian citizens.

Starting from Monday, Canada's border agency will have more powers to carry out coronavirus screenings at airports and all other entry points to the country.

Last week Mr Trudeau's wife, Sophie Grégoire Trudeau, tested positive for coronavirus after returning from a trip to London.

Read the full story:Canadian PM Trudeau's wife tests positive for coronavirus

Mr Trudeau is in good health and has no symptoms, according to his office, but will remain in isolation for 14 days.

There are currently approximately more than 300 confirmed cases of the coronavirus in Canada.

Image source, Reuters

Asked how long the new advice on avoiding social contact will last for, UK chief medical adviser Prof Chris Whitty says it will be a "minimum of weeks to months".

"Depending how it goes it, it may be longer," he adds.

He says it is important that people realise the measures will need to be in place for the "long haul" if the National Health Service is to be protected.

"We've got to see this as a long game," he adds.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has announced a series of sweeping self-distancing measures in an attempt to slow the spread of coronavirus in the country.

While in the UK, people are being urged not to go to pubs and restaurants and other places of social contact, they are not being forcibly closed.

Germany, like France and other western European countries, is going about things differently.

Speaking at a news conference, Mrs Merkel said said most shops would be closed along with other public venues such as bars, clubs, theatres and swimming pools.

Restaurant opening hours will be limited, with rules setting out a minimum distance between tables enforced, she said.

On the question of travel, Mrs Merkel has said that people in Germany should not undertake personal trips either in or out of the country.

It is not yet clear whether this amounts to a total ban on travel.

Mrs Merkel said the government would attempt to minimise the economic impact of these measures. She said the G7 - the world's seven largest economies - had agreed to cooperate on this front.

Image source, Getty Images

UK chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance says the latest figures show the UK is three weeks behind Italy rather than four as previously thought.

He's re-iterated that people need to reduce social contact.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson is asked whether the government is considering criminal sanctions to enforce its new measures on self-isolation.

He replies that the government has "tremendous powers" in this area but the UK is a "mature and grown up democracy" and people "understand the advice that is being given to them".

The prime minister began this press conference by urging people to avoid non-essential contact with others, including going to pubs, clubs and theatres.

Asked by a reporter whether pubs and restaurants will be closed down, Boris Johnson says the government has the powers to do this "if necessary" but doesn't believe they will need to be used.

There's also a question about virus testing, following strong advice from the World Health Organization earlier today for “every suspected case” to be tested.

In the UK, tests are primarily being given to hospital patients with respiratory problems, and to people in residential or care facilities experiencing outbreaks.

The many people with mild symptoms who are self-isolating at home are no longer being offered tests.

In reply, Prof Chris Whitty says UK testing has been “substantial" but will be "scaled up" over the next weeks, “moving out into the wider community”.

The UK has tested more than 44,000 people.

Here's what the WHO director said earlier:

As the UK government ramps up measures to tackle the virus, Italy has just released an update on the impact there.

There has been a jump in deaths of 349 in less than 24 hours, taking the total number of fatalities in the country to more than 2,100. It now has nearly 28,000 confirmed cases of the virus, an increase of 3,233 since Sunday.

Chief medical adviser Prof Chris Whitty says the UK's overall and single aim is to reduce deaths from the spread of the coronavirus. Overall, the chances of dying from the virus are very low, he says.

But as well as "direct deaths" from the virus, there will also be a "significant number" of other deaths as a result of hospitals being "overwhelmed".

The government is working to reduce this "overall effect" on the NHS, he says.

Measures taken against the spread of the virus can also cause "negative impacts" on people's health.

However new measures have the ability to "very significantly" pull down the peak of the virus.

UK chief scientific adviser Sir Patrick Vallance echoes the PM, saying he recognises the social distancing measures laid out "are not easy".

However they are designed to delay transmission and keep people safe, he says. "They will have the effect if we all do it."

He says it "may be necessary" to think about school closures but only "at the right stage" of the outbreak.

The UK has faced criticism for so far imposing less stringent measures than other countries in Europe, including our closest neighbours.

But Sir Patrick defended the government's policies, saying the UK was implementing stricter measures at an earlier stage than "some" other countries based on where we are in terms of the virus's spread.

London is a few weeks ahead in terms of the virus curve than other places - meaning transmission is happening more rapidly, the PM says.

For this reason, he says, those in the capital need to be especially cautious.

The government, he continues, recognises that the "very draconian" measures he has outlined will be “asking a lot" from the everyone.