British citizens returning home from roughly 30 countries deemed at "high risk" from new coronavirus variants could soon have to quarantine in hotels, reports said on Wednesday.

The announcement that the coronavirus strain sweeping Britain could be more deadly as well as more transmissible has raised fresh concerns about the variant that has spread to dozens of countries.   

More than 100 million Covid-19 cases have now been recorded worldwide, according to an AFP tally on Tuesday, as newly-inaugurated President Joe Biden pledged to ramp up the United States's struggling vaccine program.

Germany's health ministry on Tuesday joined AstraZeneca in rubbishing reports quoting unnamed government sources that claimed the British-Swedish company's Covid-19 vaccine showed little efficacy for people above 65.

Mexico's coronavirus death toll has surpassed 150,000, the government said Monday, a day after President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador announced he had Covid-19.

New Zealand's borders are likely to remain closed for much of the year as health officials assess global vaccine rollouts, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern warned Tuesday.

Dubai restaurants have begun offering discounts to customers who have been inoculated against coronavirus, amid a vaccination drive as the emirate seeks to fight the pandemic without closing its doors.

Australia's medical regulator has formally approved the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine, with the first doses expected to be administered in late February, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Monday.

The Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) granted provisional approval for the Pfizer product, making it the first Covid-19 vaccine to get the green light in Australia.

Border restrictions were being tightened around the world Monday in the face of an unrelenting coronavirus threat, after a weekend in which anger at social distancing rules bubbled over into fiery clashes in the Netherlands.

Egypt began its Covid-19 immunization program Sunday, becoming one of the first countries in Africa to vaccinate its citizens, with a doctor and a nurse receiving the Chinese-made Sinopharm jab.