Nicola Sturgeon says well over 100,000 people have now received their first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine.

The first people in Scotland are receiving the AstraZenica jab today, she says.

In the period to the end of January, the Scottish government expects to have 900,000 doses of the vaccine and "we hope that number will increase" she says.

That number will be split roughly equally between the AstraZenica and the Pfizer vaccines.

More than 2.5 million people, the First Minister said, will receive either the AstraZeneca or Pfizer vaccine by the end of the spring.

The current expectation is by early May everyone aged over 50 and people under 50 with specific underlying health conditions will have received at least one dose of the vaccine, she says.

Schools will stay shut to most pupils until February, as part of efforts to curb the spread of coronavirus, Sturgeon says.

It means there will be an additional two weeks of home learning for most pupils.

The Scottish Government had already announced the festive break was being extended to January 11, with ministers having originally planned for remote learning until January 18.

However, schools will still be open for the children of key workers who cannot work from home, and for vulnerable youngsters.

Nicola Sturgeon says the Scottish government didn’t take the decision to take more action “lightly”, she is “acutely aware” of the impact it will have on people but it is “essential”.

She says additional restrictions will apply to all those currently in level four – which is all of mainland Scotland.

The “fundamental advice for everyone is to stay at home” and it will become law, she says, like it was during the lockdown in March. People will only be allowed to leave for essential reasons.

She says from tomorrow, a maximum of two people from two households will be allowed to meet outdoors - although that will exclude those who are 11 and under.

Places of worship will also have to close, she says.

Updating the Scottish Parliament, Nicola Sturgeon says there are "two significant game changers in our fight against this virus".

The first is the approval of vaccines which "offer the way out of this pandemic".

The second is the new faster spreading variant - which she describes as "a massive blow".

Sturgeon compares the challenges of tackling Covid-19 to a race.

"In one lane we have vaccines," she said. "Our job is to make sure they can run as fast as possible and that's why the government will be doing everything we can to vaccinate people as quickly as possible.

"But in the other lane we have the virus which as a result of this new variant has just learned to run much faster."

She says in order to win the race, the government must speed up vaccination but must also slow the virus down by bringing in tougher restrictions.

Scotland First Minister Nicola Sturgeon says the NHS is coping at the moment but she says there is a “real risk of the NHS being overwhelmed” if the rate of increase in Covid cases continues at the current pace.

She says modelling suggests that without further intervention, "we could breach inpatient Covid capacity within three or four weeks".

She says that would also mean more people getting ill and dying which is why they needed to act “decisively”.

A further 1,905 people have tested positive for Covid-19, 15% of the 13,810 new tests carried out yesterday.

That's a drop in the total number of new cases but positivity rates remain very high.

The Scottish government will provide updated information on the number of deaths that have been reported during the Christmas holiday period tomorrow.

The Scottish government has decided to introduce from tonight “a legal requirement to stay at home except for essential reasons”, First Minister Nicola Sturgeon says.

Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has begun her urgent statement to the Scottish Parliament on the developing coronavirus situation.

The chamber has been recalled to hear the update.

Scotland First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is due to make a statement shortly to the Scottish Parliament about coronavirus measures.

BBC political correspondent Nick Eardley says "a strict stay at home message is about to be announced". She will be speaking at around 14:00 GMT.

Image source, Reuters

The number of Covid vaccine doses will amount to “tens of millions by the end of March” Boris Johnson says.

The supply will "ramp up in the weeks ahead", the PM says during a visit to Chase Farm Hospital in north London where people have been receiving the Oxford-AstraZeneca Vaccine.

Johnson says it is “completely untrue” the NHS doesn’t have immediate capacity to administer two million doses a week, but that the issue is “getting them (the batches of vaccines) properly tested”, and “each batch needs to be properly approved and quality controlled”.

Asked when the government would hit giving two million doses a week, he says he will release more details in the next few days, “as soon as we have better numbers to give”.

Johnson met chemotherapy nurse Christiana Omodara who said she has been worried about passing Covid to her cancer patients.

The Prime Minister also watched junior sister Susan Cole get her jab, an experience she described as a "really surreal surprise".

"He asked how I felt about having the vaccine and we talked a little bit about how important it was not just for the person but to protect other people," she said.

As the UK rolls out the Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine and France's programme is accused of going far too slowly, how are other countries in Europe doing?

• The Netherlands is the only EU country yet to start its vaccination campaign - the launch is set for 8 January
• In Germany, about 240,000 people had been vaccinated by Sunday morning
• Vaccinations started in Italy on 27 December and more than 70,000 doses had been administered by Sunday
• Portugal has started to vaccinate people in nursing homes after health workers were first to receive it
• There is frustration in Spain over the perceived slow roll out in some regions. Spain is to set up a register of people who refuse to be vaccinated.

Image source, PA Media

It's been a busy day so far, with coronavirus vaccines leading the headlines. Here is a reminder of what's been happening:

• In the UK the first doses of the vaccine developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca are given to patients in what Health Secretary Matt Hancock calls a "pivotal moment"
• Meanwhile, the country's prime minister, Boris Johnson, says there are "no questions" that tighter restrictions will be needed

• The row over whether primary schools in England should be closed has rumbled on with head teachers warning of a confused picture over which areas are open
• The Welsh Health Minister Vaughan Gething warns the new "highly-infectious" variant of coronavirus is spreading rapidly throughout Wales but hails the rollout of the new jab.
• The French government is vowing to speed up the rollout of the Pfizer/BioNTech jabafter only 516 vaccinations were reported in the first week
• In India, there are concerns over the "rushed" approval of its Covaxin vaccine, withthe health watchdog saying there is a lack of transparency

Image source, PA Media/House of Commons

Former health secretary Jeremy Hunt is calling for schools and borders to close "right away" as he warns the pressures facing hospitals are "off-the -scale worse" than previous winter crises.

The chairman of the Commons Health and Social Care Committee says, while in previous years, elective care has been cancelled in January to protect emergency care that too is now under severe pressure, with "record trolley waits for the very sickest patients".

"Even more worryingly, fewer heart attack patients appear to be presenting in ICUs, perhaps because they are not dialling 999 when they need to," the Conservative MP said on Twitter, external.

"[The number one] lesson is countries that act early & decisively save lives & get their economies back to normal faster.

"We therefore cannot afford to wait: all schools should be closed, international travel stopped, household mixing limited and the tier system reviewed so that the highest tier really does bring down infection levels (as with the first lockdown)," Hunt concluded.

Vicki Young
Deputy Political Editor

Image source, PA Media

The old tier system is no longer enough… the figures are only heading in one direction.

Those are the words of the health secretary and a health minister.

Boris Johnson says stricter measures are coming, which immediately sparks the questions “When?” and “What are you waiting for?”

Downing Street wants to push a tougher message on adherence to the current rules while it assesses the latest Christmas data, but it is coming under growing pressure to act sooner.

With Nicola Sturgeon about to go further and the Labour leader calling for an immediate national lockdown it’s difficult to see how the prime minister can wait much longer.

Boris Johnson says there is "no question that we are going to have to take tougher measures" to reduce the spread of a new variant of coronavirus, which he said was requiring "extra special vigilance".

He said there were "tough, tough weeks to come" and reminded people it was vital to maintain social distancing measures and wash their hands.

Image source, Getty Images

Students at University College London (UCL) are being told to not return to campus until at least the end of February.

It goes against government advice for students to return to university at the end of January.

In a statement, UCL said it wanted to be "honest and transparent" about its decision-making, external.

It said: "Our current and most realistic assessment is that it is unlikely that case rates will have reduced sufficiently to allow students to return to campus before at least mid-February, and quite possibly the end of March.

It said there would be no in-person teaching until 22 February "at the earliest", adding: "We are aware that this is later than the government is advising but we believe this is the most responsible course of action in this complex situation."

The National Union of Students has previously called for refunds for students if the ''quality of learning is severely impacted'' by online teaching, as well as more government money to support students who will be paying for properties "they are being told not to live in for months"., external

Sean Coughlan
BBC News, education correspondent

Image source, PA Media

It’s been a cold, dark and confusing start to the new school term for many families in England.

Primary schools - apart from those already closed to most pupils because of high coronavirus levels - were meant to reopen this week.

But it’s been an uncertain first day - with some schools staying closed, amid worries about safety when coronavirus levels are rising.

This in turn will have caused last-minute childcare problems for parents trying to get back to work.

There are no official figures yet about how many schools have not fully opened - in what seems to be a patchwork of local closures.

But the biggest teachers’ union, the National Education Union, is advising teachers it is not safe to teach classes in school and wants a two-week switch to online learning.

Local authorities are also querying why some schools in tier four areas are open, while others have been closed.

But the government is emphasising the importance of keeping schools open whenever possible.

Health Secretary Matt Hancock says there might be “mixed emotions” but school is the “right place” for children.

Read more here

Covid-19 jabs are being rolled out across the UK today but it is not the first time mass inoculation has been used to fight a deadly virus.

In 1950, fears over the potential scale of a smallpox outbreak in Glasgow sparked a major response from public health officials.

This archive footage shows how special clinics were set up to inoculate hundreds of people every hour.

As with the current coronavirus pandemic, public health officials tried to trace people who had come into contact with those carrying the virus.

But the key to fighting the outbreak was the vaccine.

Read more on how Glasgow tackled its smallpox crisis here.

Maddy Savage
BBC News, Stockholm

British citizens travelling to Sweden from the UK are being refused entry, amidst a lack of clarity over new Covid-19 testing requirements.

Since 1 January, UK nationals who are resident in Sweden have been exempt from a general entry ban from the UK to Sweden - introduced due to the new coronavirus variant in the UK - as long as they can provide a negative Covid-19 test certificate.

However, some Britons have been turned away at the Swedish border despite proof of negative test results.

The UK’s Ambassador to Sweden Judith Gough has called for “greater clarity and consistency” over what type of test is needed.

Sweden has not previously required negative Covid-19 tests for inbound travellers from any destinations, and Swedish citizens are still allowed to travel home without being tested in advance.

Image source, Getty Images

France is starting to vaccinate healthcare workers over 50, but President Emmanuel Macron has voiced his anger at the slow progress of the rollout in one of the world's most vaccine-sceptical countries.

France launched its vaccination programme last Monday using the Pfizer jab. But after the first few days of the campaign, only several hundred had received the first dose.

President Macron is reportedly furious, criticising the pace as like a "family stroll".

So far the strategy has focused on administering vaccines in care homes, which face logistical problems in storing the Pfizer jab, and time-consuming processes of consent.

Vaccine scepticism runs high in France, with one poll suggesting only 40% of people planned to get a coronavirus jab.

More than 65,000 people with the virus have lost their lives in the country.

Read more here