come under the spotlight. and president biden is in kentucky meeting some of those affected by what the governor says are the worst tornadoes ever seen there. we start in the uk which has recorded its highest number of daily covid infections since the start of the pandemic. here s prime minister borisjohnson. if omicron continues to building across the whole of our united kingdom with over covid 19 cases today, the highest ever daily number of reported. and the doubling rate of omicron in some regions is now down to less than two days and i m afraid we re also seeing the inevitable increase in hospitalisations, up by 10% nationally week on week and up by almost a third in london. so more than 78 and a half thousand new cases in the past 2a hours recorded in the uk. that s 10 thousand more than the previous record injanuary. but while cases are at a record high (ani)the number of deaths the number of deaths 165 in the past 2a hours is significantly lower than during th
dedicated to women from afghanistan. it s seven in the morning in singapore, and 6 in the evening in washington dc where the white house says us government officials won t attend next year s winter olympics in beijing because of china s human rights record. however, us athletes will be able to take part in the games and the white house said they had its support. well, china s embassy in washington reacted to the u.s. decision calling it a pretentious act and political manipulation . in a statement they said that it s a grave distortion of the spirit of the olympic charter but it would have no impact whatsoever on the successful holding of the games. there have been numerous calls for a partial boycott of the games, most of them over the treatment of the uighur minority. here s the white house press secretaryjen psaki explaining whyjoe biden felt the move was necessary: the biden administration will not send any diplomatic or official representation to the beijing 2022 wi
boycott of the 2022 winter olympics because of china s record on human rights. the former elected leader of myanmar, aung san suu kyi, is found guilty of inciting dissent and given a prison sentence. and we talk to the hollywood legend mel brooks, who at 95 is looking back at his eventful life. and coming up in the sport, on the bbc news channel. all eyes on goodison park as everton host arsenal, desperate for an improved performance in the premier league. good evening. a ten year strategy for dealing with drug abuse in england and wales has been announced by borisjohnson. he said the focus would be on supporting the rehabiliation of drug addicts, doing more to discourage the recreational use of drugs and punishing those involved in drug gangs. the biggest share £780 million will be spent on improving treatment services. all local authorities in england will receive new money. £300 million will be spent in england and wales on breaking up supply lines, including thousan
there s no conceivable way we will stop the spread of the new variant omicron. it is already in 45 countries, it is present in 17 states in america. over 300 people now have it in the uk. on top of that the figures worldwide are widely skewed, some countries much better at genomic sequencing than others. the suspicion will be that its starting to fuel a fourth wave. in the us the number of daily covid 19 is back at 120,000 the first time it s been there since early october. however there is promising news on the vaccine front, the concerns over the spread of the omicron variant, has led to an increased take up of the vaccinate in the last week. these are figures are for the us. but there is a similar trend worldwide. the threat of a fourth wave is testing the patience of political leaders. there are tighter mandates coming in austria and germany, and today the mayor of new york bill de blasio announced that everyone in his city will need to be vaccinated if they want to go to
this kind of language, this kind of hate cannot be condoned. i m phil mattingly in for pamela brown. you re in the cnn newsroom. travelers coming to the united states about to run into a list of tighter restrictions and that takes effect in just a few hours at the stroke of midnight. it s an effort to limit the spread of the omicron variant. all in bound travelers must test negative for covid-19 and for the past day before they are allowed to enter the u.s. including vaccinated and american citizens. nadya has more. these stricter travel rules come as u.s. covid-19 cases are absolutely on the rise again now averaging more than 100,000 cases per day, the highest in two months. what does this mean for the landscape? this is what the biden administration was trying to prevent, the winter surge. we hit a pandemic record of thanksgiving travelers going through airports according to tsa. we have a new variant omicron that s showing up here in the u.s. and dozens of other coun