Deep in the lush valleys of northern Iran, where the Alborz Mountains crumble toward the sea, Ali Rahimi takes up his grisly work. Day in and day out, Rahimi, a 53-year-old volunteer cleric in the city of Ghaemshahr, puts on his hazmat suit and receives the deceased; disinfecting, washing and shrouding the dead bodies in white cloth. The northern province of Mazandaran, with its forests and farmland, is a four-hour drive from Tehran, the capital, where half of the country’s coronavirus deaths are concentrated. Hospitals in the city of 10 million are coming under strain and the capital’s vast cemetery is struggling to keep pace with the dead.

France relaxed its coronavirus-related ban on trucks from Britain on Tuesday after a two-day standoff that had stranded thousands of drivers and raised fears of Christmastime food shortages in the U.K. French authorities, who had imposed the ban to try to protect the continent from a new variant of the virus that is circulating in London and southeast England, said delivery drivers could enter by ferry or tunnel provided they showed proof of a negative test for the virus. Select passengers will be allowed back on the continent, too.

Coronavirus cases spiking nationwide. A chill, existential and literal, setting in once more. And now: a winter likely to be streaked by a soundtrack of sirens instead of silver bells. It was winter when the pandemic began, and it will be winter long before it’s over. Weary and traumatized from months of death and confinement, Americans are being handed mixed messages, from governments to their own internal clocks running haywire on flattened time. Shouldn’t it be over by now? After all, vaccines are arriving. But before the average person will get inoculated, winter will exact its toll. The holidays are wreathed in danger for those who travel and may spread the virus — and those who don’t and may suffer from isolation.

The Belzer Rebbe added his signature to the Rabbanim and Dayanim of the Machzikei Das of the chassidus on Tuesday, calling for his chassidim to be vaccinated against the coronavirus, the first Chassidic Rebbe on the Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah to do so. The dayanim issued instructions following an in-depth discussion of the Rabbanim on the Beis Din with Health Ministry representatives, headed by Health Ministry Deputy Director-General Prof. Itamar Grotto, according to a B’Chadrei Chareidim report. A conference of Dayanim was held at the Belz Mercaz Olami in Jerusalem earlier this week in order to present the benefits of the vaccine to the Rabbanim of Machzikei HaDas.

German pharmaceutical company BioNTech is confident that its coronavirus vaccine works against the new UK variant, but further studies are needed to be completely sure, its chief executive said Tuesday. The variant, detected mainly in London and the southeast of England in recent weeks, has sparked concern worldwide because of signs that it may spread more easily. While there is no indication it causes more serious illness, numerous countries in Europe and beyond have restricted travel from the UK as a result. “We don’t know at the moment if our vaccine is also able to provide protection against this new variant,” CEO Ugur Sahin told a news conference the day after the vaccine was approved for use in the European Union.

The U.N. epidemiologist who denounced the World Health Organization’s withdrawal of a report on Italy’s coronavirus response says he is suffering retaliation for having spoken out and is calling for the agency to live up to its obligations to protect whistleblowers. Dr. Francesco Zambon said he filed an internal ethics complaint with the WHO in May after he said he was pressured by a senior WHO official to falsify data to obscure that Italy hadn’t updated its influenza pandemic preparedness plan since 2006. In an interview with The Associated Press, Zambon said he never wanted to enter into a fight with the WHO but now feels he is being isolated professionally for having followed WHO regulations to report alleged misconduct. “I couldn’t be silent,” he said.

As Turkey faces a dramatic rise in COVID-19 infections during the pandemic’s second wave, hospitals that were quickly built in the early days of the outbreak are dealing with some of the country’s most serious cases. Two prefabricated infirmaries in Istanbul, constructed in less than 45 days and opened in May, are offering state-of-the-art intensive care facilities dedicated to COVID-19 patients. Named after renowned Turkish physicians who died from the disease, the hospitals are located near airfields to give ease of access to sufferers from across Turkey and are built to similar specifications, each with 1,008 beds, 16 operating theaters, dialysis units and wards for infected pregnant women and babies. The Associated Press visited the Dr.

California has recorded a half-million coronavirus cases in the last two weeks and in a month could be facing a once-unthinkable caseload of nearly 100,000 hospitalizations, Gov. Gavin Newsom and the state’s top health official said Monday. Gov. Gavin Newsom, himself quarantined for the second time in two months, acknowledged that a state projection model shows hospitalizations in that range and said he’s likely to extend his stay-at-home order for much of the state next week. Dr. Mark Ghaly, California’s secretary of Health and Human Services.

Reports from Britain and South Africa of new coronavirus strains that seem to spread more easily are causing alarm, but virus experts say it’s unclear if that’s the case or whether they pose any concern for vaccines or cause more severe disease. Viruses naturally evolve as they move through the population, some more than others. It’s one reason we need a fresh flu shot each year. New variants, or strains, of the virus that causes COVID-19 have been seen almost since it was first detected in China nearly a year ago. On Saturday, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced new restrictions because of the new strain. Several European Union countries and Canada were banning or limiting some flights from the U.K. to try to limit any spread. Here’s what is known about the situation.

A growing list of European Union nations and Canada barred travel from the U.K. on Sunday and others were considering similar action, in a bid to block a new strain of coronavirus sweeping across southern England from spreading to the continent. France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Ireland and Bulgaria all announced restrictions on U.K. travel, hours after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced that Christmas shopping and gatherings in southern England must be canceled because of rapidly spreading infections blamed on the new coronavirus variant. Johnson immediately placed those regions under a strict new Tier 4 restriction level, upending Christmas plans for millions. France banned all travel from the U.K.