A single Pfizer or AstraZeneca vaccine dose reduces chances of catching coronavirus and going to hospital with it by about 75%, data suggests
UK infections have risen slightly in the last week, with an estimated 119,000 people - up from 110,000 - positive for the virus
First Minister Mark Drakeford confirms a delay to the easing of restrictions in Wales, saying a third wave is under way
Prime Minister Boris Johnson says he's confident restrictions in England can be eased on the new target date of 19 July
He also says he has complete confidence in Health Secretary Matt Hancock
There has been a 79% rise in cases of the Delta variant across the UK in a week
And the number of people in hospital in England with the Delta variant has doubled in a week
The coronavirus R number in England remains unchanged from last week and is between 1.2 and 1.4, latest figures show
Israel is to provide a million Covid vaccines to the Palestinian Authority, the office of Israel's new prime minister says
London's famous Notting Hill Carnival will not go ahead on the streets for the second year running
That's all from us for today - but we'll be back with more updates tomorrow morning.
Today's live page has been brought to you by Jennifer Meierhans, Alexandra Fouché, Jo Couzens, Paul Gribben and James Clarke.
It's been a busy day, but it's time to say goodbye. Here's a summary of what's gone on during the day:
Image source, Getty ImagesAs England opens up first doses of vaccines to everyone aged 18 and older, over-40s and people with underlying health conditions are being contacted to bring their second doses forward.
The initial advice across the whole of the UK was to offer jabs 12 weeks apart in order to give as many people as possible a first dose.
Now those who haven't yet had their second dose in some priority groups can have it after eight weeks.
You can rearrange an appointment yourself, but you must first cancel your original booking online, external, or by calling 119.
Second doses are also being brought forward, external in Scotland to eight weeks and appointments can be rebooked via the NHS Inform website, external.
In Northern Ireland, the interval between doses has been reduced from 10 weeks to six weeks, external for appointments scheduled after 14 June.
In Wales, the government says vaccination clinics "are accelerating second doses", external, and that people will be contacted by their local health board in due course.
Here's everything you need to know about going for your jabs.
Andrew Lloyd Webber has rejected Prime Minister Boris Johnson's offer to add his new musical Cinderella to a pilot scheme for full-capacity live events.
The PM said earlier this week he was in talks with the theatre impresario about including the show in the scheme.
But Lord Lloyd Webber says the theatre industry has been treated as "an afterthought and undervalued" and he would only take part in the scheme if others in the trade were treated equally.
On Monday, the government confirmed it would not lift all Covid restrictions until at least 19 July - delayed from the proposed date of 21 June.
Last week, Lord Lloyd Webber said he was determined to open his show to a full house on 25 June, even if he risked being arrested.
However, after rejecting the option to be one of the official pilot events, he has rowed back on his threat to go to jail and confirmed the show will go ahead with a 50% capacity, the current legal limit.
Image source, Getty ImagesMillions of vaccine doses are needed
Africa is in the middle of a full-blown third Covid wave and there is need for more vaccination, the World Health Organization (WHO) has said.
The total infections have crossed the five million mark and at least seven African countries have run out of vaccines.
Africa remains an area of concern, even though it accounts for only about 5% of new global infections and 2% of deaths, WHO officials say.
New cases in Namibia, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Rwanda have doubled in the past week, WHO emergencies programme head Mike Ryan is quoted by Reuters news agency as saying.
"It's a trajectory that is very, very concerning," he has told reporters at the organisation's headquarters in Geneva.
"The brutal reality is that in an era of multiple variants, with increased transmissibility, we have left vast swathes of the population, the vulnerable population of Africa, unprotected by vaccines."
South Africa, Morocco, Tunisia, Ethiopia and Egypt have recorded the most virus cases in the continent.
Uganda and Namibia are experiencing a deadly third wave, with dozens of fatalities recorded daily.
A total of 136,030 people have succumbed to the virus in different African countries, according to the WHO.
The Delta variant is in 14 African countries while the Beta variant, first detected in South Africa, is in 25 countries.
The WHO says there's no clear timeline on when more vaccines will be available, but there is an urgent need for them.
Image source, Getty ImagesUK music fans are sitting on hundreds of thousands of tickets for postponed concerts rather than returning them.
The latest four-week delay to fully unlocking Covid restrictions has pushed an additional 5,000 gigs into doubt.
Artists such as Rag'n'Bone Man, Olly Murs and Rudimental had scheduled shows between 21 June and 19 July and face a choice of postponing or scrapping gigs.
Industry body Live estimates the events scheduled for the next four weeks are worth £500m to the struggling sector.
It also means fans remain out of pocket to see shows they forked out for many months ago.
Read BBC business reporter Rebecca Wearn's full report here.
And a guide to the rules for gigs and festivals is here.
Image source, Getty ImagesMost existing Covid restrictions in the UK are staying in place for the moment, because of concerns over the Delta variant.
The government had hoped to "remove all legal limits on social contact" , externalin England from 21 June.
It's now been put back until 19 July.
Wales announced earlier it is pausing its programme of lockdown-easing for four weeks.
In Northern Ireland, a planned easing of restrictions has been pushed back to at least 5 July.
And in Scotland, the current rules are expected to be extended until mid-July.
Find a full guide to the restrictions here, while an explanation of the latest rules for weddings is here.
Image source, EPAWembley hosted 22,500 fans - 25% of its capacity - for England's Group D fixture against Croatia
Uefa says it is "confident" the semi-finals and final of Euro 2020 will be held at Wembley as planned - but has a contingency plan amid concerns around England's coronavirus restrictions.
The Times reported the games could be moved from London to Budapest if VIPs are not given an exemption to England's strict quarantine rules.
The UK government has postponed lifting all restrictions until 19 July - the final of the tournament is due to take place on 11 July.
Most countries in Euro 2020 are on the UK government's amber or red list.
Wembley's capacity is reduced to 22,500 for group fixtures at Euro 2020, but that is set to be expanded to 45,000 - about 50% of full capacity - for games in the knockout stages.
The matches are being treated as fan pilot events and so are exempt from strict capacity limits.
Read more on this story here.
Robert Cuffe
BBC head of statistics
Cases are rising in every region and nation of the UK.
The numbers of people going into hospital are rising in Scotland and every region of England.
The epidemic is without a doubt growing, and so we should expect to see ever higher numbers of cases and people going into hospital for a while.
But the case numbers are not growing as quickly as they have been in recent weeks.
Today’s figure of just over 10,000 is nearly 30% higher than last Friday’s which was, in turn about 30% higher than the week before.
But the two weeks before that saw numbers rising by nearly 50% each week.
Slower rises are still rises, and we’ll have to wait and see how this plays through into hospitalisations.
But any potential slowdown is a hopeful sign – before reversing, you need to hit the brakes.
BBC Newsbeat
Image source, Getty ImagesLike many others, Enter Shikari frontman Rou Reynolds says the past 18 months have been strange.
Last year, Covid-19 wiped out the UK's summer festival season, and this year only a handful are still taking place.
This weekend, the band will be back on stage at Download Festival in Donnington Park, Leicestershire.
"Can you believe it? We've been spending the last three weeks trying to work out how to be a live band again," he tells Radio 1 Newsbeat.
"I remember saying halfway through the pandemic, it sort of feels like we're experiencing what the death of a band would be like, by just not being able to play."
Read the full story here.
Vitaliy Shevchenko
BBC Monitoring
Image source, EPAThe recent surge in Covid numbers in Russia may be an example of how careless talk costs lives.
For months, Russians had been told by officials and Kremlin-controlled media how successful their country had been at battling the coronavirus, while the West was described as failing miserably.
People in Europe, for instance, were said to be confused and angry because of endless lockdowns. There were reports on Russian TV of violence, rioting and vaccine shortages in the West.
Time and again, Russian TV described Western vaccines as part of the problem, and claimed that they were causing more deaths. No evidence was offered to back up these claims.
Meanwhile in Russia, state TV would say, things were getting better: restrictions were being lifted, shopping centres and museums were reopening, students were going back to universities, and vaccination was proceeding apace. Only little mention was made of how many Russians exactly had been vaccinated, or how many had died because of the virus - it had been all but defeated, supposedly.
Now the rhetoric has changed. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on Friday blamed a record number of daily Covid infections in the capital, Moscow, on "nihilism", and state TV is alarmed and broadcasting pro-vaccination appeals.
But given the past behaviour by both officials and the media, it should perhaps come as no surprise if many in Russia are complacent and distrustful of vaccines.
Nearly 470,000 UK adults received either the first or second dose of a Covid vaccine yesterday.
The latest government data shows 243,978 first doses were given, taking the total number of people to have received their initial jab to 42,460,632.
A total of 223,260 people were given a second vaccination, meaning 30,898,467, or 58.7% of adults, have now had both jabs.
There have been a further 10,476 cases of Covid in the UK, the latest government figures, external show.
Another 11 deaths within 28 days of a positive test have also been announced.
Last Friday there were 8,125 cases and 17 deaths reported.
Yolande Knell
BBC Middle East correspondent, Jerusalem
Image source, ReutersAs we reported earlier, Israel has said it is to send at least a million doses of Covid vaccine to the Palestinian Authority in return for receiving a similar amount back later in the year.
The deal means Israel will not waste doses that are about to expire, while the Palestinians can accelerate their vaccination programme.
This appears to be a win-win arrangement for Israelis and Palestinians.
The first batches have already been received by the Palestinian health ministry. It says they will be used in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip and that vaccination centres will now open seven days a week with extended hours.
Israel, which has led the world with its rapid rollout of Covid vaccines, has faced criticism for not doing more to ensure Palestinians have access.
It denies having responsibility under international law - but Israeli health officials say there’s a benefit to helping Palestinians get immunised because of mixing of the populations.
Image source, PA MediaHarry Potter publisher Bloomsbury has said vaccines will be compulsory for its staff returning to the office when it reopens.
Many firms are having to weigh up the necessity of workforce vaccinations.
The government has announced care home workers in England will be required to have a vaccination or risk losing their jobs.
Bloomsbury told The Bookseller , externalmagazine, which first reported the company's decision, that it had taken both "medical and scientific advice".
"The simple fact is that this virus is still extremely dangerous."
The publisher is due to reopen on 19 July and made employees aware of the policy in an email ahead of the second May Bank Holiday weekend.
Read more on this story here.
Katie Prescott
Today business presenter
Image source, Getty ImagesSome passengers due to set sail with cruise company MSC are having their trips cancelled because the delay to easing Covid restrictions means the ships have been overbooked.
Cruise ships are allowed to hold up to 1,000 guests under the current guidelines.
But MSC oversold tickets for cruises after 21 June, saying it "had fully expected that most restrictions would be removed".
Customers who had their trips cancelled yesterday are complaining on social media about the lack of information and about being out of pocket for things such as parking, travel to the ports and hotels.
One woman told me she paid £1,4000 for her elderly mother to go into respite care for the week.
Andy Hunt from Essex was due to set sail from Southampton. He says: "Now they've had my money, we had the suitcases out of the garage, got the week booked off, my wife has the week booked off, the dogs are booked into kennels. I'm really, really frustrated it could have been handled so much better."
MSC says the first 1,000 passengers who booked get priority boarding and those left will be able to rebook or get a refund. You can read more passenger reaction here.
Image source, ReutersItaly has brought in a five-day quarantine requirement along with a mandatory Covid test for all arrivals from the UK, amid growing concerns about the spread of the Delta variant.
Italy is on the amber list for UK travel and had, until today, not required quarantine on arrival as long as visitors presented a negative Covid test result, external taken in the previous 48 hours.
Italy reported 37 coronavirus-related deaths yesterday against 52 on Wednesday, while the daily number of new infections fell to 1,325 from 1,400, the health ministry says.
In contrast, the UK reported 11,007 new cases yesterday.
Euro 2020 sees Wales due to play Italy in Rome on Sunday so some fans from the UK may already be in the country.
For others who have bought tickets quarantining on arrival could mean they'd miss the match.
The travel rules and no official fan zones mean most of the "Red Wall" will follow Euro 2020 at home or in the pub. Meet the Wales fans who will be swapping the stadium for the sofa this year.
Robert Cuffe
BBC head of statistics
Rates of coronavirus infection in England are highest in the North West, the Office for National Statistics estimates.
About 0.55% of people are testing positive there, with the next closest Yorkshire & the Humber at 0.25%.
No other English region has rates above 0.2%.
There are possible signs of a decrease in the percentage of children testing positive in school years 7 to 11.
The highest rates are in the group between school year 12 (16-year-olds) and those aged 24, which sees 0.5% testing positive, and among 25 to 34-year-olds - at 0.4%.
About 0.2% of younger children would test positive and about 0.1% of older adults would test positive, the ONS says.
Smaller cities around the US are offering incentives, sometimes up to $15,000 (£10,800), for young talent to move there.
And with remote work on the rise during the pandemic, people are freer to relocate.
Nearly one in four Americans is expected to be a fully remote worker in a few years.
Image source, Getty ImagesVaccinating children is routine and widely accepted - measles, mumps, polio, diphtheria, rotavirus, multiple strains of meningitis, whooping cough… the list goes on. All this starts from just a few weeks old.
So, what about Covid-19?
Some countries are cracking on. The US is immunising children between 12 and 15. It expects to have enough safety data to go even younger next year.
But in the UK - the BBC has been told - a decision to vaccinate all 12 to 17-year-olds is unlikely to be recommended by UK experts any time soon.
There is a scientific question - will vaccinating children save lives? - which is complex as the answer may vary from country to country.
There is also a moral and ethical dimension if doses destined for children would save more lives if they were given to health workers and vulnerable adults in other countries.
Read BBC health and science correspondent James Gallagher's full report here.
