TOP HEADLINES

• The global COVID-19 death toll has passed the grim milestone of two million. On Friday evening it stood at 2,000,905, according to the Johns Hopkins University tracker. 

• Hackers have "manipulated" and leaked the confidential COVID-19 documents stolen from the European Medicines Agency in a move to undermine public trust in the vaccines, the regulator said.

• Pfizer will temporarily reduce its deliveries of its COVID-19 vaccine to Europe while it upgrades its production capacity, the U.S. pharmaceutical company has said. Six EU health ministers signed a letter to the European Commission to express "severe concern" over the delivery delays.

• UK will close all travel corridors from January 18 to protect against risk of as yet unidentified COVID-19 variants and all incoming travellers will require a negative test on arrival, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said.

• France's biggest pharmaceutical company Sanofi could help produce foreign-developed COVID-19 vaccines pending the launch of its own jab, which will not be ready for months, Industry Minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher told Radio Classique.

• Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel will host fresh crisis talks on January 19 on tougher measures to slow the country's infection rate as it crossed two million coronavirus cases. The meeting has been brought forward from January 25.

• Greece will increase fines for violating COVID-19 measures from $360 to $600, said the country's prime minister. Meanwhile, its retail sector may be reopened subject to scientific guidance.

• Norway has revised its advice on who should be given the COVID-19 vaccine after 29 people suffered side effects after receiving the jab, 13 of them fatal, all of whom were care home residents over the age of 80. 

• Train operator Eurostar is in "a very critical" state due to significant drop in passenger numbers during the pandemic, warned a top French rail executive.

• A new nationwide lockdown has started in Portugal, with all non-essential businesses closed and remote working mandatory where possible, however schools remain open. Restrictions will be eased for the presidential election on January 24.

• Brussels has supported the idea of a COVID-19 vaccination certificate, European Commission Chief Ursula von der Leyen said, however the World Health Organization has cautioned against vaccination proof for travel.

• High street pharmacies in England have started administering COVID-19 vaccines, as the government seeks to speed up what is already Europe's largest vaccination program. 

• France will not accept antigen, or lateral flow, tests that can deliver results within minutes, from those arriving from non-EU countries with effect from January 18. It will only accept PCR tests, the standard diagnostic method of testing for COVID-19, which can take 72 hours to give a result.

ACROSS EUROPE

Stefan de Vries in Amsterdam

On Friday, the Dutch government was focusing on an even more pressing matter than the pandemic: Prime Minister Rutte resigned after a scandal in which the tax office wrongly pursued thousands of families for fraud.

On Thursday, the Netherlands recorded 6,575 new cases, slightly below the weekly average of 6,940. The number of patients in hospitals and those being treated for COVID-19, decreased by 12 to 2,502. 

In 2020, 15,000 more people died in the Netherlands than expected, mainly due to the pandemic. Last week, the number of deaths was again higher than usual, according to data from CBS, the country's statistics office.

Despite the advice to stay at home as much as possible and only fly if absolutely necessary, an average of 35,000 travellers still travel to and from Amsterdam's Schiphol airport every day. 

That's significantly lower than the 200,000 a day in 2019 – but the airport was Europe's busiest in 2020. Some political parties now want to ban flights as part of the lockdown, but the government says a ban is legally impossible.

Toni Waterman in Brussels 

Belgium has tightened travel restrictions as the number of new COVID-19 infections continue to increase. 

Any traveler entering the country by bus or train is now required to complete a passenger locator form, regardless of how long they have been abroad or intend to stay in Belgium. They also need to present a negative COVID-19 test if they are coming from a red zone outside the EU and the Schengen zone. 

The stiffer measures come as the country tries to contain a resurgence in new cases. The average number of daily infections is up by 24 percent in the past week. 

There are growing concerns that the new, more transmissible COVID-19 variants are in wider circulation than the numbers indicate. One of the country's leading virolgists, Marc Van Ranst, told the VRT radio program on Friday that around 100 cases of the new variants have been detected.

"This is of course a sample, which must probably be multiplied by 100," he added. 

Ryan Thompson in Frankfurt

Chancellor Angela Merkel told top officials on Thursday that she wants "very fast action" to counter the spread of the new COVID-19 variants. 

A meeting with 16 state premiers to review pandemic restrictions will be brought forward after Germany recorded a record number of deaths from the virus. German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel reported that the new measures could include border checks, mandatory requirement to wear medical-quality FFP2 masks and shutting down factories which remain open. 

German health officials have voiced increasing concern about new virus strains that were recently identified in Britain. They are considered to be more contagious, and Merkel worries they could hamper Germany's exit from a lockdown that has been in place since November.

Mia Alberti in Budapest

Hungary could be the first European country to approve China's Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine. 

Following the announcement that the government has reached a deal with Sinopharm, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban told public radio on Friday that the approval process is already underway and he expects the Hungarian regulators to approve the vaccine in the next few days.

The move represents yet another breakaway from Brussels as Hungarian officials have criticized the EU's vaccination plan for being too slow. 

Although Hungary is not in breach of any EU agreement in procuring the vaccine, it remains unclear if the jab would be recognized by the planned vaccination certificates which could be used around the bloc for various purposes including travel.

Iolo ap Dafydd in London

The UK has reported 1,248 COVID-19 deaths in the past 24 hours, taking its total to 86,015 dead. However, the number of new cases are slowing down and 3.36 million have been vaccinated against the virus.

There has been sobering economic news too as the UK economy shrank by 2.6 percent in November. The UK's Office for National Statistics said gross domestic product was 8.5 percent below its pre-pandemic peak in Britain.  As a second lockdown was imposed, pubs, hairdressers and non-essential shops were closed. The services sector has contracted by a tenth since before the pandemic.

As the UK variant continues to spread, the UK government has banned travellers from South America after fears of a new more contagious variant found in Brazil. The travel ban includes Portugal because of its strong links to Brazil, as well as Cape Verde islands and Panama in Central America.

British and Irish citizens and foreign nationals with residence rights are still allowed to return but must isolate for 10 days. According to the government, the ban is said to be precautionary, and there is no end date to the travel ban.

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COVER IMAGE: Siese Veenstra /ANP/AFP