COVID-19: What you need to know about the coronavirus pandemic on 10 December

Confirmed cases of COVID-19 have passed 268.6 million globally, according to Johns Hopkins University. The number of confirmed deaths has now passed 5.28 million. More than 8.35 billion vaccination doses have been administered globally, according to Our World in Data.

US regulators have expanded eligibility for COVID-19 vaccine booster shots to 16- and 17-year-olds due to concerns about the new Omicron variant of the virus. The US Food and Drug Administration said it amended its emergency use vaccines authorizations to allow youths aged 16-17 to receive a third shot.

South Africa is preparing to offer people booster doses of the Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccines, a senior health official said today.

German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach defended restrictions on the unvaccinated and mandatory COVID-19 jabs for medical and nursing staff due to be passed by parliament today. Germany, in the grip of a fourth wave of infections, has a relatively low rate of vaccination compared with the rest of Europe.

Dozens of US Navy medics have deployed to New Mexico to treat a Delta variant-fueled surge in COVID-19 patients as part of a military operation to treat virus hotspots. New Mexico is suffering one of the highest levels of new coronavirus infections in the country, its hospitals reaching record capacity levels.

London's Heathrow Airport said it was seeing high levels of business travellers cancelling over concerns they could be trapped overseas by travel restrictions triggered by the new Omicron variant of coronavirus. The airport said demand in November was down 60% on pre-pandemic levels.

AstraZeneca said on Friday it will supply Singapore with its COVID-19 antibody cocktail, Evusheld, by the end of the year. Evusheld can act as another layer of protection, alongside vaccines, for people who are at high risk of COVID-19 infection.

Japan has found eight new cases of the Omicron variant of coronavirus, a government spokesperson said on Friday, bringing its total to 12. All the cases have been found during testing of arrivals at airports. Two of the new cases were close contacts of the first case, a diplomat from Namibia.

The World Health Organization has warned wealthy countries against hoarding COVID-19 vaccines for booster shots as they try to fight off the new Omicron variant, threatening supplies to poorer countries where inoculation rates are low.

Many Western nations have been rolling out boosters, targeting the elderly and people with underlying health issues, but worries about the fast-spreading Omicron have prompted some to expand their programmes.

The jury is still out on how effective current vaccines are against Omicron. They have so far proved hugely successful in slowing the spread of the coronavirus and the severity of illness, but low rates of inoculation pose the risk of more dangerous and more vaccine-resistant variants emerging.

"As we head into whatever the Omicron situation is going to be, there is risk that the global supply is again going to revert to high-income countries hoarding vaccine," the WHO's vaccine director, Kate O'Brien, told a briefing on Thursday.

Omicron was first detected in southern Africa and Hong Kong and Africa accounts for 46% of reported cases globally, Richard Mihigo, coordinator of the WHO's Immunisation and Vaccine Development Programme for Africa, told an online briefing.

Just 7.5% of more than one billion people in Africa have had primary vaccine shots.

Japanese researchers have developed masks that use ostrich antibodies to detect COVID-19 by glowing under ultraviolet light.

Scientists at Prefectural University in western Japan started by creating a mask filter coated with ostrich antibodies targeting the novel coronavirus, based on previous research showing the birds have strong resistance to disease.

In a small study, test subjects wore the masks, and after eight hours, the filters were removed and sprayed with a chemical that glows under ultraviolet light if the virus is present. The filters worn by people infected with COVID-19 glowed around the nose and mouth areas.

The team hopes to further develop the masks so that they will glow automatically, without special lighting, if the virus is detected.