AstraZeneca is recruiting people for trials combining its own vaccine with Oxford University with Russia's Sputnik V
The self-isolation period for travellers and contacts of those with Covid has been cut from 14 days to 10 in the UK
The US drugs agency the FDA says it will approve the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine for use 'within days'
An Australian candidate for a vaccine is abandoned after some trial participants return false HIV positive results
Businesses reopen in Northern Ireland, and also in Glasgow and other parts of western Scotland as rules are eased
EU leaders strike a deal over the bloc's budget and Covid recovery fund
The Royal Shakespeare Company and arts organisations hit by the pandemic share £165m in UK government loans
The response to the pandemic has driven the biggest annual fall in CO2 emissions since WW2, say researchers
Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is giving a press conference as non-essential shops reopen across much of western Scotland - including Glasgow - for the first time in three weeks.
We're also due to hear updates on the latest coronavirus rules in Wales any minute.
We'll bring you the best lines from both nations as we get them.
Image source, PA MediaShoppers returned to the centre of Belfast on Friday following the easing of restrictions imposed in a two-week lockdown
If you're just joining us, here's a round-up of the latest developments from the UK and around the world.
Image source, Getty ImagesThe contacts of people who have tested positive for coronavirus in the UK are to be allowed to isolate for 10, rather than 14, days, from next week, the UK's chief medical officers have announced.
The changes, which already began in Wales this week, will apply to England, Scotland and Northern Ireland from 00:01 GMT next Monday, 14 December.
People instructed to quarantine after returning from high-risk countries will also be able to self-isolate for 10 days.
And it means people who have already been self-isolating for 10 days or more will be able to end their quarantine on Monday.
In a statement the chief medical officers stressed self-isolation was "essential to reducing the spread of Covid as it breaks the chains of transmission".
But they said: "After reviewing the evidence, we are now confident that we can reduce the number of days that contacts self-isolate."
People who test positive for coronavirus are already required to self-isolate for 10 days from onset of symptoms or 10 days from point of taking a positive test if asymptomatic.
Experts say people are most infectious around the time they first develop symptoms and by day 10, only about 2% will still be capable of passing on the virus to others.
Image source, Getty ImagesAs we mentioned earlier, UK and Russian scientists are teaming up to trial a combination of the Oxford-AstraZeneca and Sputnik V vaccines to see if protection against Covid-19 can be improved.
Mixing two similar vaccines could lead to a better immune response in people.
The trials, to be held in Russia, will involve over-18s, although it's not clear how many people will participate.
AstraZeneca said it was exploring combinations of different adenovirus - a virus that usually causes the common cold - vaccines to find out whether mixing them leads to greater protection.
The British-made Oxford vaccine, developed in partnership with AstraZeneca, and the Russian Sputnik vaccine, developed by the Gamaleya Research Institute in Moscow, are similar because they both contain genetic material from the Sars-CoV-2 spike protein.
Early results from late-stage trials of the Sputnik vaccine have shown promising results.
Covid: What is the Oxford vaccine and how does it work?
This week, researchers wrote in The Lancet journal that the Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid vaccine is safe and effective, giving good protection.
The Oxford vaccine is being made in partnership with AstraZeneca - and news about it matters more than other vaccines - particularly to people living in the UK.
Health correspondent Laura Foster explains why this is and how the vaccine works.
Image source, ReutersSouth Korea is deploying hundreds of army and police personnel to help support the tracing effort in Seoul as cases in the capital rise.
The country recorded 689 cases on Friday, 75% of those cases were from the greater Seoul area, external, the Korea Herald reports.
Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said: "We will dispatch 800 personnel of military, police and civil servants to each region of the metropolitan area to support epidemiological investigations."
He warned the country's entire virus response system could break down if efforts in the area end in failure.
Chung has urged people to undergo testing at one of the capital's 150 virus testing centres.
According to local media, hospitals across the country are near full capacity for patients with severe cases of the virus. Of 583 critical care beds, only 52 are available.
South Korea has recorded more than 40,786 cases and 572 deaths since the pandemic began.
Mobile testing units will be deployed in or near secondary schools and colleges in parts of London, Kent and Essex so that staff, students and their families can be checked under a new mass testing scheme, the government has announced.
The areas have become one of the major Covid hotspots in England.
The government says the testing will take place in Barking and Dagenham; Hackney and the City; Havering; Newham; Redbridge; Tower Hamlets and Waltham Forest in the capital, and Southend; Basildon; Canvey Island; Harlow, and Brentwood in Essex. It has not yet specified which areas of Kent will be included.
The scheme will see:
Dominic Hughes
Health correspondent
Image source, Getty ImagesNHS patients in rural areas of England face extra long waits for treatment, according to a study.
The Nuffield Trust think-tank says urban areas benefited most from measures put in place to help the NHS cope with the coronavirus pandemic.
Researchers found rural hospitals now faced an uphill challenge when it came to restoring services to normal.
NHS England says that funding reflects the higher costs of delivering care in rural communities.
The Nuffield Trust report , externalsays while the number of Covid cases in rural areas was lower than in big urban centres, the pandemic's impact on services has been much greater.
Image source, ReutersGreece will cut its quarantine time and reopen churches as part of its Christmas regulations, the government has announced.
Travellers entering the country from 18 December until 7 January will have their mandatory quarantine reduced to three days and will be required to take a rapid antigen test at the airport and produce a negative result, according to local media.
Churches will open on Christmas Day and Epiphany Day, which falls on 6 January.
Up to nine people will be allowed in churches and 25 in cathedrals on Christmas Day and Epiphany, government spokesman Stelios Petsas said.
Greece is set to go under a national curfew from 13 December until 7 January. People will have to remain in their homes from 22:00 until 05:00. They will have to apply for government permission by text in order to leave their house, external.
Despite a slight relaxation of the restrictions, Greece's healthcare system is under pressure.
Petsas said 80% of intensive care beds across the country were occupied.
Greece has recorded more than 121,253 cases and 3,370 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
Image source, Getty ImagesEnsuring Covid cases in the UK do not surge after Christmas will be a "very difficult balancing act", a leading scientist believes.
Prof Sir David Spiegelhalter, chair of the Winton Centre for Risk and Evidence Communication at the University of Cambridge, said there is "bound to be some effect" because of the easing of rules over the festive period will allow more mixing.
Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Today programme, he acknowledged there were regional differences in cases numbers and there may only be a "brief blip". But he said: "It depends crucially on people's behaviour. And, how much they obey the rules and are sensible."
Speaking on the same programme, the Bishop of Manchester, David Walker, said Christmas could be the "fillip" needed "to see us through the hard months until the vaccine is rolled out sufficiently to mean that regulations can relax more generally".
"I think people will by and large be sensible," he added.
Jenny Hill
BBC Berlin correspondent
Image source, Getty ImagesThere are few joyful tidings for Germany this Christmas.
The country that so successfully brought the first wave of the pandemic under control is struggling to contain the second.
Today, Germans woke up to two miserable new records; the authorities registered 29,875 new cases - the highest daily number yet - and 589 deaths were recorded in the same period - again higher than ever before.
A so-called "lockdown light" - which includes the closure of bars, restaurants, leisure and arts facilities, but is implemented to different degrees in different parts of the country - may have flattened the curve, but it's done nothing to reduce the numbers.
The days when Germany's relatively low death toll was the envy of other countries are gone; it’s rising fast and this week exceeded 20,000. So what's gone wrong?
Scientists say Germans are simply not doing enough to reduce their social contacts.
But many also point the finger at regional leaders, who for months have dithered, bickered and resisted Chancellor Angela Merkel's calls for a tougher, countrywide response to the outbreak.
Image source, ReutersIn the early stages of the NHS Test and Trace programme in England, some contact tracers were busy for only 1% of their paid hours, a report by the public spending watchdog has found.
More than £700m was spent on staff who provided minimal services, the National Audit Office (NAO) said.
The NAO added that even in October, after staff cutbacks, some were occupied for fewer than half their shifts.
The NAO says the the average number of tests carried out up until October was only 68% of capacity. And management did not plan for a sharp rise in testing demand in September.
The Department of Health and Social Care points out that more than two million people had been contacted and told to self isolate and that recent performance figures had improved.
You can read the report in full here., external And take a look at our long read on how test and trace struggled to get on track.
Image source, ReutersJapan's Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga has described the situation as tense after the country recorded its highest daily case total yet.
On Thursday, the number of cases hit 2,848, the highest daily tally since the pandemic began.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato has urged people in Japan to have a "quiet year-end and New Year".
There are fears that gatherings to welcome the year 2021 will put people at a greater risk of exposure.
However, despite the rising infection rate and fears of gatherings around New Year, the government says it will continue with its tourism promotion programme, which provides subsidies to increase domestic tourism in the country, over the festive period.
Suga said he is not considering a halt to the campaign despite claims from the country's media that a pause was being considered.
Last month, the promotion was suspended for inbound and outbound trips from Sapporo and Osaka to stop hospitals from being overwhelmed with virus patients. That suspension is set to last until mid-December, external, the Japan Times reports.
A head teacher has urged pupils to take a Covid test as part of a mass testing scheme for secondary school children in parts of London, Kent and Essex.
Ges Smith, head teacher at Jo Richardson Community School in east London, said extra tests for schools in the worst-affected areas of the three counties had been "a long time coming".
East London and the parts of Kent and Essex that border it have become one of the major Covid hotspots in England.
Mr Smith said tests were not mandatory.
"As far as I know we have got no mandate on forcing students to take that test," he told BBC Breakfast.
However, he added that he would be writing to students at his school in Dagenham to inform them of the testing process and "strongly encourage them to take that test".
Sarah Rainsford
BBC Moscow Correspondent
Image source, EPAAstraZeneca has announced that will begin recruiting people aged 18 and over for trials combining the AstraZeneca and Oxford University vaccine with Russia's Sputnik V, produced by the Gamaleya Institute research facility in Moscow.
The aim is to see if this helps to boost people's immune response and improve protection from the virus.
The company told the BBC that the trials would be held in Russia, but it's not clear when they would start or how many people would be involved.
In a press release, AstraZeneca said: "Scientific collaboration with Gamaleya Research Institute is important to explore the potential of vaccine combinations unlocking synergies in protection and accessibility through a portfolio approach."
China's aviation regulator has recommended cabin crew wear disposable nappies and avoid using the toilet to cut the risk of Covid-19 infection.
The advice on nappies is in a section on personal protective equipment (PPE) in new guidelines for airlines.
Setting out its advice in a new 49-page set of guidelines for airlines, the regulator said the recommendation applied to charter flights to high-risk Covid-19 destinations.
It comes on top of the advice for cabin crew to wear medical masks, disposable gloves, caps, goggles, disposable protective clothing and shoe coverings.
Globally, airlines and airports have been making big changes to how they operate to get passengers flying again.
Coronavirus: What it's like to fly in the 'new normal'
Image source, PA MediaThe global response to the pandemic has driven the biggest annual fall in CO2 emissions since World War Two, researchers say.
According to the Global Carbon Project, external team, carbon emissions have declined by about 7% this year - or by 2.4 billion tonnes.
A large number of countries around the world enforced lockdowns in a bid to curb the spread of coronavirus.
France and the UK saw the greatest falls, mainly due to a second run of shutdowns in response to a rise in the number of infections.
France saw a fall of 15% and the UK went down by 13%, according to one analysis.
China, by contrast, has seen a large rebound from coronavirus that overall emissions may grow this year.
Sean Coughlan
BBC News, education correspondent
The mass Covid testing of students before Christmas has so far found 0.2% testing positive at one of the universities taking part.
The University of Portsmouth is reporting "very low numbers" of positive cases from its Covid testing.
"We are seeing fewer than two per day on average at present," said vice-chancellor Graham Galbraith.
He criticised a "blame culture" in which students had been accused of spreading infections.
"Prevalence in students is now very low indeed," said Prof Galbraith.
Image source, ReutersTaiwan's early response has kept the virus well in check
Authorities in Taiwan have warned that even as vaccinations begin, the world should remain extremely vigilant against the virus.
Health Minister Chen Shih-chung said scientific data on the vaccines' lasting effect was still insufficient.
"During the first vaccination periods, people should continue with the safety measures," he told the BBC.
Taiwan has been one of the most successful places in the world in dealing with Covid-19. So far, it has had only 724 confirmed cases and seven deaths and has never had to go into lockdown.
The health minister does not question the vaccines' safety or whether they provide immunity, but rather stresses that it was not clear to which extent and how long they would protect people.
Coronavirus: Your vaccine questions answered by expert
The UK began a mass Covid-19 vaccination programme this week, starting with the elderly, health workers, and carers. The country was the first to approve use of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.
But is the vaccine safe for people with chronic illnesses? And what demographics was the vaccine tested on?
Dr Penny Ward, a professor of pharmaceutical medicine, answers members of the public's questions about the Covid-19 vaccine.