World Coronavirus Dispatch: The pandemic forced countries to look inward

Treatment gets delayed for cancer patients in Italy, Facebook bans Australian celebrity chef over conspiracy theories, and other pandemic-related news from around the globe

How UK scientists tracked down the new virus variant

Starting late September, the southern part of England was seeing an unsually rapid rise in infections even as the remaining regions were beginning to see a dip. Puzzled by it, scientists sought to find if there was any super-spreader event that leading the trend, but only to discover later that was not the case. A new variant, 70 per cent more transmissible, was detected in early December. The new variant links back to an outbreak in September after scientists turned to an expert team that was monitoring genomic sequencing in the country.