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Colombia is extending its nationwide lockdown by more than two weeks after reported cases and deaths accelerated in several cities, President Iván Duque has said.

The measure, which was implemented in March, was due to be lifted on 15 July, but has now been pushed back to 1 August.

"Considering we have cities where the rate of cases has accelerated and grown, as well as the mortality rate, we have continued to work on preserving the mandatory preventive isolation as the general concept," Mr Duque said in a televised address on Tuesday.

More than 120,000 cases of Covid-19 and 4,452 deaths have been confirmed in Colombia.

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France's new Prime Minister Jean Castex has warned that a new major coronavirus outbreak in the country could prove irreversibly damaging.

"I have, in the sense of the mission entrusted to me, the will to prepare France for a possible second wave," Mr Castex said in a television interview.

He added, however, that any further measures to control the spread of Covid-19 would have to be balanced against the impact on the economy and what the French people would be able to cope with.

"We must be ready for a second wave, but we would not proceed to a general lockdown like in March... because economically and socially we would not be able to bear another general and absolute lockdown," he said.

The previous French government enforced a strict nationwide lockdown that lasted for about eight weeks, before cautiously lifting it on 11 May. Some restrictions on public gatherings remain in place.

China has criticised US plans to withdraw from the World Health Organization (WHO), saying that the move will have graveimplications for developing countries.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian urged the international community to step up support for the UN agency.

President Trump has repeatedly condemned the WHO's handling of the pandemic, accusing it of being under China's control.

The president accused China of pressurising the WHO to "mislead the world" about the virus, without giving evidence for his allegations.

The US is the global health agency's largest single contributor, providing more than $400m (£324m; €360m) in 2019, around 15% of its total budget.

It was announced on Tuesday that the US will leave the global agency on 6 July 2021. Funding from Washington has already been suspended.

Presidential challenger Joe Biden, who is currently ahead in the polls, has said he will take the United States back into the WHO with immediate effect, if he wins November's election.

James Badcock
Madrid-based journalist

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Normally, June would see the beaches of Majorca, Ibiza and the Spanish archipelago's smaller islands busy with international tourists, who made up the bulk of the more than 16 million visitors to the region last year.

This year only got started with a batch of just over 5,000 Germans, given special permission to stay in the Palma Beach resort on Majorca.

But as Spain scrambles to save its vital tourism industry from the threat of a blank year due to coronavirus, some sense an opportunity to change perceptions about Spanish holidays and start a move upmarket that has been long on the agenda.

Covid-19 looks likely to accelerate a tendency towards less nightlife and more daytime experiences.

"We had already started a process and it is irreversible," says Iago Negueruela, the Balearic minister for the economy, labour and tourism.

"The pubs won't open this year. We are no longer going to receive or tolerate that kind of tourist, who can be a risk for themselves and others."

• Read more from James here

Scientists have warned that doctors may be failing to diagnose a potentially serious string of brain disorders linked to the coronavirus.

Severe neurological complications - including inflammation, psychosis and delirium - were discovered in 43 cases of patients with Covid-19 by researchers at University College London (UCL).

Individuals suffered either temporary brain dysfunction, strokes, nerve damage or other serious brain effects, external, the study says.

"Whether we will see an epidemic on a large scale of brain damage linked to the pandemic - perhaps similar to the encephalitis lethargica outbreak in the 1920s and 1930s after the 1918 influenza pandemic - remains to be seen," Dr Michael Zandi, from UCL's Institute of Neurology, said.

The BBC's medical correspondent, Fergus Walsh, recently reported that it was becoming increasingly clear that coronavirus can trigger a huge range of neurological problems.

Katherine Sellgren
Family & Education reporter

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A campaign group says the assumption that parents will readily resume home-schooling in the event of future lockdowns is "not sustainable".

The group, Sept for Schools, says it has heard from parents reduced to tears as they balance work with educating children at home.

Sept for Schools has written to Education Select Committee chairman Robert Halfon, urging him to "hold the government to account for delivering a clear, comprehensive and workable plan to make sure our children return safely to school in September".

It says any future plans must "ensure that the learning and wellbeing of all children are prioritised, wherever they live and whatever circumstances they live in".

The government says all pupils will be back in school in September in England. Schools in Scotland and Northern Ireland are also aiming for a full return for all pupils when the new term begins.

Ministers in Wales have said blended learning is likely to continue for some time to come.

Read more here.

Simon Atkinson
BBC News, Albury, New South Wales

Sometimes you find things when you least expect them.

We are in Albury, on the New South Wales side of the border with Victoria. The border closed on Wednesday in response to rising cases in Victoria.

And after taking a wrong turn, we stumbled across a back lane with two police officers flying drones.

They weren’t too keen to be filmed. But they are a more covert part of the operation to monitor this extremely long border.

There are 55 official crossing points between the two states. At least 30 of them have staffed police checkpoints, we’re told.

Add to that boats, surveillance planes, and the drones, and you get an idea how keen authorities are to make sure nobody is crossing the border who shouldn't be.

Image source, Getty Images

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Protests raged in Belgrade as authorities reimposed a curfew in the Serbian capital amid a rise in cases. Here’s the rest of the news from Europe:

• In her first trip abroad since the pandemic began, German Chancellor Angela Merkel is heading to Brussels to discuss how the EU can best respond to the crisis. While the EU has proposed a €750 billion rescue package for the bloc, a number of European nations – notably the Netherlands – oppose the plan
• France’s director general of health Jérôme Salomon has told Le Figaro newspaper that the country must prepare for a second wave. “Each and every one of us must continue to respect barrier measures, hygiene measures, physical distancing and wearing a mask,” he said
• Catalonia is expected to make face-mask use compulsory, even outdoors, on Wednesday as officials deal with a fresh outbreak in Lleida province. “We are seeing some relaxed attitudes,” said Catalan government spokesperson Meritxell Budó. “By making it mandatory, we will ensure that those attitudes do not exist”
• Gatherings of up to 100 people are now allowed in Denmark as the country further eases its restrictions. The Nordic country was one of the first to go into lockdown in March and one of the first to lift measures, allowing hairdressers to reopen as early as April

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Mumbai, one of India's biggest coronavirus hotspots, has become the country's first city to open up testing to everyone.

Until now, complex rules have meant that testing was mostly restricted to those who have symptoms or are high-risk, and required a doctor's prescription.

But Mumbai - which has some 86,500 confirmed cases - has done away with that. It's also allowing all labs, including private ones, to do the test. The government has already fixed prices.

The move comes as India ramps up testing - case numbers have already surged in recent weeks as a result.

It now has more than 740,000 confirmed cases, the world's third largest tally.

Today Programme
BBC Radio 4

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Dr David Nabarro, the World Health Organization's special envoy on Covid-19, has described President Trump's decision to take the US out of the global agency as "really sad".

"The world is facing a massive health crisis, it's been extremely bad for the last six months and I fear it's going to get much worse in the next six months.

"We've still got a lot to find out about this virus, and how to deal with it - and it just seems really unfortunate that the most important country, in terms of size of the WHO budget, has decided to pull out," he told the Today programme.

He added that he was sure the majority of American people "wanted to be part of the global response and will be a bit confused about why this has happened".

"All world leaders, all world nations must work together to deal with this virus. To have the US pulling out is not what the world's people need."

He said suggestions that the WHO chose to ignore warnings about coronavirus issued by Taiwan at the beginning of the year were false.

"Communications with the people of Taiwan and the institutions in Taiwan by the WHO are in no way affected. There has been regular correspondence between them."

"The people inside the WHO do not sit and have favourite countries - they deal with the issues as they come up, and as best they can".

Asked about the possibility of airborne spread of coronavirus, Dr Nabarro acknowledged that it was "part of the puzzle" but said it was "not the major means of transmission".

Cases of coronavirus are on the rise across Africa. Yet in some countries, people don’t believe the pandemic is real.

The hospitals of Nigeria’s biggest city, Lagos, tell a different story, as the BBC's Yemisi Adegoke reports.

The country recorded the second-highest increase in deaths from Covid-19 after South Africa in the WHO report for 1 July. Nigeria has the third-highest number of confirmed infections after South Africa and Egypt.

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The coronavirus pandemic pushed the French economy into a deep slump in the first half of the year, but the country looks set to recover quickly, according to France's national statistics agency.

The French National Institute of Statistics and Economic Study (Insee) estimates that the economy will contract by 9% over the year. While this still represents a significant recession, it's not as bad as the 11% slump forecast in the government's revised 2020 budget.

The European Commission recently forecast that among the eurozone economies, France, Italy and Spain would struggle the most in the wake of Covid-19.

France has reported more than 206,000 cases of coronavirus, with 29,936 confirmed deaths linked to Covid-19, according to Johns Hopkins University.

Scott Morrison says the government will consider limiting the number of people allowed to return to Australia in the coming weeks, as a second wave spreads across Melbourne.

Since March, more than 350,000 Australians have returned home - with a majority of these travellers undergoing mandatory quarantine in hotels in Sydney and Melbourne.

However, the system is currently "under pressure", said the PM, who suggested future arrivals may have to pay for their own quarantine.

At the weekend, Sydney Airport capped the number of international arrivals to 450 a day.

Yesterday New Zealand announced a pause on citizens booking flights home, as they are also nearing capacity in their quarantine system.

If you're just joining us, here's a quick look at what's been going on around the UK.

• Chancellor Rishi Sunak is set to announce a £2bn "kickstart scheme" to create more jobs for young people and "help Britain bounce back from coronavirus"
• Supplies of personal protective equipment (PPE) must be guaranteed ahead of winter when the UK could face a second wave of coronavirus, say MPs
• Childminders in Scotland have called on the government for "clarity" amid fears current restrictions could see 80% of businesses in the sector collapse within a year
• Care homes in Wales have been "badly let down" during the coronavirus pandemic and the government has been too slow to respond, a report has said
• Northern Ireland education minister Peter Weir has told school principals there is no extra money to help schools reopen after the summer break

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Melbourne residents have flocked to supermarkets to stock up on supplies as they brace for a new six weeks of lockdown.

The restrictions follow a surge in coronavirus cases - and there have been reports of long queues, panic buying, and empty shelves - just like in the early days of the pandemic.

Coles and Woolworths, two major chains, have responded by reintroducing purchase limits on some products.

Coles chief executive Steven Cain said: "Our thoughts are with the many Victorians who will now be required to isolate at home, and we will continue to work with the state government to provide whatever assistance they need."

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Cricket's first Test match in four months begins today, when England take on West Indies in Southampton.

The last Test anywhere was in early March in New Zealand. England's last Test was in January, and West Indies' was in November.

The five-day game beginning today will have no fans, English umpires (instead of overseas umpires being flown in) and players are banned from using saliva on the ball.

Both teams have been in "bio-secure" environments for two weeks before the match.

"I know there is not going to be anybody in the crowd to hear or get energy from, but we can't use the lack of crowd as an excuse not to get up for this game," said England's Ben Stokes.

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Thousands of protesters have clashed with riot police in the Serbian capital, Belgrade, after the government announced a weekend curfew in the city in response to a rise in coronavirus infections.

Image source, Reuters

They demanded the resignation of the president, accusing him of mishandling the crisis.

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The government lifted restrictions ahead of an election in June which was won by the president's party amid a boycott by an opposition alliance. Serbia recorded 13 virus-related deaths on Tuesday, its highest number so far.

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More then 3 million coronavirus infections have been recorded across the US since the beginning of the pandemic, according to both the New York Times and NBC.

NBC reports that more than 46,500 new cases were added to the tally on Tuesday.

The US has by far the highest number of confirmed infections in the world.

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Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has said he wasn't surprised he tested positive for coronavirus.

He compared the virus to the rain and said everyone would eventually get wet. He also pointed out his symptoms were mild and said he was now feeling fine.

Bolsonaro has repeatedly dismissed the severity of Covid-19, which has been linked to the deaths of 67,000 Brazilians while nearly 1.7m infections have been recorded.

On Sunday the president was pictured without a face mask at an Independence Day celebration at the US embassy.

Several cabinet ministers are now self-isolating while they wait for the results of their tests.

As California and Texas report record numbers of infections, where else in the US is the infection rate rising? And where is it falling?

According to New York Times data, external, the seven-day average of new infections has increased in the past two weeks in 37 states, including California, Texas, Florida, Nevada, Alaska, and Hawaii.

New infections are flat in 12 states, including New York, New Jersey, and Maryland.

And they are falling in just one state - New Hampshire - as well as Washington DC.

It's worth pointing out that in some places - such as New York, New Jersey, and other north-eastern states - even though the infection rate is not falling, it is way down on the peak earlier in the year.

Image source, Reuters