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Britain is first to approve AstraZeneca/Oxford vaccine
Britain became the first country to approve a coronavirus vaccine developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca as it battles a winter surge driven by a highly contagious variant of the virus.

Britain has already ordered 100 million doses of the vaccine, and the government said it had accepted the recommendation from the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency to grant emergency authorization.

The approval is vindication of a shot seen as essential for mass immunizations in the developing world, as well as in Britain, but one that has been dogged by questions about its trial data that make it unlikely to be approved quickly in the European Union or the United States.

U.S. detects first case of COVID-19 variant
The first known U.S. case of the highly infectious coronavirus variant discovered in Britain was detected in Colorado as President-elect Joe Biden warned it could take years for most U.S. citizens to be vaccinated at current distribution rates.

Biden’s prediction of a grim winter appeared aimed at lowering public expectations that the pandemic would be over soon after he takes office on Jan. 20, while putting Congress on notice that he wants to significantly increase spending to expedite vaccine distribution, expand coronavirus testing and help reopen schools.

Biden said about 2 million people have received the initial dose of one of two newly approved two-dose vaccines, well short of the 20 million that outgoing Republican President Donald Trump had promised by year’s end.

Sinopharm’s vaccine 79% effective
An affiliate of China’s state-owned drug maker Sinopharm said its vaccine showed 79.34% efficacy and it has requested regulatory approval, moving a step closer to becoming China’s first approved vaccine for general public use.

The efficacy rate is lower than the 86% rate for the same vaccine announced by the United Arab Emirates on Dec. 9, based on preliminary data from trials there.

A spokeswoman declined to explain the discrepancy and said detailed results would be released later, without giving a timeline.

Tokyo governor warns of possible explosion in cases
Tokyo’s coronavirus outbreak is severe and could explode, just as Japan begins its New Year’s holiday period, in which millions of people usually move around the country, the city’s governor said on Wednesday.

The capital recorded 944 new cases on Wednesday, just under the record 949 recorded on Saturday, and medical officials said that, unless the outbreak is checked, the city could soon see more than 1,000 new patients a day.

“Please emphasize life over fun,” Governor Yuriko Koike told a news conference.

Philippine president’s guards used ‘smuggled’ vaccines
The Philippine defense minister said that unapproved COVID-19 vaccines given to President Rodrigo Duterte’s military security detail had been smuggled into the country, but called the move justified.

News of the special troop unit being inoculated as early as September has caused a stir among activists, with the Food and Drug Administration yet to approve any vaccine and no set timeline for when health workers would receive one.

Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said members of the Presidential Security Group obtained the vaccine without government authorization and had administered them without his knowledge.

Track the spread with our live interactive graphic here.

Breakingviews - Corona Capital: Spanish banks, British houses. Britain’s housing market continues to defy the country’s dire economic prospects. Also: Spanish banks M&A. Catch up with the latest financial insights.

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Top stories

The U.S. Senate was due to hold a procedural vote that could pave the way for Congress to override President Trump’s veto of a key defense bill, as tension between the outgoing Republican president and party leaders grows. Trump on Tuesday ramped-up pressure on his fellow Republicans to support his decision to veto the bill because it does not repeal certain legal protections for tech giants, and to back $2,000 one-time stimulus checks for struggling Americans.

One of the Louisville police officers who shot Black emergency medical technician Breonna Taylor, and the officer that prepared the warrant for the botched raid during which she was killed, were told that the department aimed to fire them. Taylor’s death when police entered her apartment in Louisville, Kentucky, early on March 13 was one of a string of killings of African Americans that fueled mass demonstrations across the United States in 2020.

Dozens of Cubans protested at the U.S. border in the northern Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez, demanding they be allowed to cross and claim asylum in the United States. U.S. authorities, including police in anti-riot gear, closed off the bridge that leads into El Paso, Texas, with a concrete barrier topped with barbed wire. A recording blared from a loudspeaker warning that any person who crossed could be arrested.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson urged parliament to back his post-Brexit deal with the European Union and open a new relationship as a “friendly neighbor” with the bloc. Britain and the European Union were signing the deal and the British parliament will approve its implementation, ending over four years of negotiation and safeguarding nearly a $1 trillion of annual trade.

A Chinese court sentenced 10 Hong Kong activists to between seven months and three years in jail for illegally crossing the border, in a case that has drawn international attention and concern over the defendants’ treatment. The group had all faced charges in Hong Kong over anti-government protests in the Chinese-ruled city and they have been held virtually incommunicado in a mainland prison since their boat was intercepted on Aug. 23 after leaving Hong Kong, allegedly en route to the democratic island of Taiwan.