Six In The Morning Friday 4 December 2020

 

US breaks daily coronavirus records as Fauci warns January will be 'terrible'

• New daily highs for cases, hospitalizations and deaths
• Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings could fuel surge

Adam Gabbatt and Vivian Ho

Fri 4 Dec 2020 14.20 GMT

The US set three grim coronavirus records on Thursday, as it recorded the highest daily number of coronavirus deaths, the highest number of new cases, and the number of people admitted to hospital with Covid exceeded 100,000 for the second day in a row.

Some 2,879 people died from coronavirus, according to Johns Hopkins University, while there were 217,664 new cases, as the top infectious disease official, Dr Anthony Fauci, warned “January is going to be terrible”.

Numerous states have warned that they are running out of intensive care beds, with 100,667 people currently in hospital with Covid,

Detained former Saudi crown prince at risk after social media attack, say lawyers

Exclusive: YouTube asked to remove video claiming Mohammed bin Nayef plotted to bring down current regime

Patrick Wintour Diplomatic editor

Fri 4 Dec 2020 13.17 GMT

Mohammed bin Nayef – the detained former Saudi crown prince and interior minister – has been the victim of a sustained and coordinated attack from inside Saudi Arabia on social media that risks endangering his personal safety, lawyers acting for him have warned.

The lawyers have written to YouTube demanding it take down a video, saying the content claiming he had been plotting to bring down Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman runs the risk of inviting serious retribution and harm to him. YouTube has not yet acted on the complaint.

Bangladesh moves ahead with Rohingya refugee relocation

Officials say none of them are being moved against their will, and that it would ease overcrowding in camps that are home to more than 1 million Rohingya who have fled neighbouring Myanmar.

Authorities in Bangladesh on Friday started sending a first group of more than 1,500 Rohingya refugees to an isolated island despite calls by human rights groups for a halt to the process.

The south Asian nation says it is only moving refugees who are willing to go and that this will ease chronic overcrowding in camps that are home to more than 1 million Rohingya, members of a Muslim minority who have fled neighbouring Myanmar.

Demands for more Covid-19 vaccine transparency grow as studies ‘were problematically gender-blind’

As countries around the world prepare for approving and rolling out Covid-19 vaccines, a group of experts is raising concerns that many governments are not publishing important data about Covid-19 and gender. Evidence is emerging of differences between women and men in terms of testing, hospitalizations and deaths. “The three leading vaccines haven’t recorded their results according to gender, which is problematic”, says Professor Kent Buse, co-founder of Global Health 50/50.

New U.S. Citizenship Test Is Longer and More Difficult

Simon Romero and Miriam Jordan

The Trump administration is rolling out sweeping changes to the test immigrants must take to become U.S. citizens, injecting hints of conservative philosophy and making the test harder for many learners of the English language.

The new citizenship test that went into effect Tuesday is longer than before, with applicants now required to answer 12 out of 20 questions correctly instead of six out of 10. It is also more complex, eliminating simple geography and adding dozens of possible questions, some nuanced and involving complex phrasing, that could trip up applicants who do not consider them carefully.

How UK protesters are taking the spark of Black Lives Matter back to their hometowns

By Aaliyah Harris and Shama Nasinde, CNN
Illustrations by Kenneth Fowler and Gabrielle Smith, CNN
Video by Sofia Couceiro and Agne Jurkenaite, CNN

Updated 1351 GMT (2151 HKT) December 4, 2020

George Floyd's death at the hands of a Minneapolis police officer in May sparked a mass global movement against structural racism and police brutality.

The outcry began in Minnesota, but campaigners spread the spark of the movement to towns around the world. In the UK, even as the coronavirus pandemic gripped the country, tens of thousands of demonstrators marched in the streets of its major cities.

In June, large crowds protested outside Parliament Square and the US Embassy in London, in Manchester's Piccadilly Gardens and in central