PARIS: Here are the latest developments in the coronavirus crisis:
Thousands demonstrate against restrictive measures designed to slow the spread of Covid in several European countries.
Austrian police report that 27,000 people turned out in Vienna to protest plans to make vaccination compulsory.
Thousands also marched in cities across France against tighter restrictions on people not vaccinated, while thousands protested in the Italian capital Rome.
A newspaper report that UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson witnessed weekly drinking sessions by his staff throughout the coronavirus pandemic has stoked fresh calls from his own party for him to quit.
An Omicron case has been detected in Beijing, officials in the Chinese capital say, as the country battles multiple outbreaks of the highly transmissible coronavirus variant ahead of the Winter Olympics next month.
Australia returns Serbian tennis star Novak Djokovic to detention, saying his opposition to vaccination against Covid could cause "civil unrest", but a new court appeal is scheduled for Sunday.
The coronavirus has killed at least 5,528,972 people since the outbreak emerged in China in December 2019, according to an AFP tally compiled from official sources Saturday.
The United States has recorded the most Covid deaths with 849,259, followed by Brazil with 620,796, India on 485,752 and Russia 320,634.
Taking into account excess mortality linked to Covid-19, the WHO estimates the overall death toll could be two to three times higher.
S African scientists who first identified Omicron are pointing to two other Omicron sub-variants, BA 4 and BA 5, "as...
Nearly a quarter of adults are now obese in Europe, higher than in any other region except the Americas, WHO says
Very young children are the only group that are yet to be eligible for COVID-19 vaccine in the US and in most countries
China is facing its worst outbreak since the peak of the first wave in early 2020, with eastern Shanghai recording...
Under its zero-COVID policy, China has used lockdowns, mass testing, and travel restrictions to stamp out infections
China's health commission says a four-year-old boy tested positive for the strain after being hospitalised earlier...