Vienna residents line up for COVID-19 vaccination on November 10, 2021. (Photo: Xinhua/VNA)

Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) Director Carissa Etienne says half the population in the Americas are fully vaccinated against the coronavirus, a milestone in the fight against the pandemic.         

US President Joe Biden is planning to invest billions of USD in mass-producing COVID-19 vaccines to increase the supply to the developing world.

On Wednesday, Indonesia’s Coordinating Minister for Human Development and Culture Muhadjir Effendy announced that the government will impose public mobility restriction Level 3 in all regions during the 2021 Christmas and 2022 New Year holidays.

The Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency (KDCA) said it will issue a five-level COVID-19 risk assessment on a weekly basis to decide whether to continue with relaxed social distancing or to impose new restrictions.

255.7 million people worldwide had been infected with coronavirus as of Thursday, and 5.1 million of them had died, according to worldometers.info. The US leads the world in the number of infections (48.2 million) and fatalities (788,000).