Drugmakers Sanofi and GlaxoSmithKline said Friday that their potential COVID-19 vaccine won’t be ready until late next year because they need to improve the shot’s effectiveness in older people. The companies said early trials showed the vaccine produced an “insufficient” immune response in people over 60 because it didn’t contain enough of the material that triggers the production of disease-fighting antibodies. They said they plan to reformulate the vaccine and do more testing, which is likely to delay approval to the fourth quarter of 2021 from the middle of the year. “The results of the study are not as we hoped,” Roger Connor, president of London-based GSK Vaccines, said in a statement.

Italy could soon reclaim a record that nobody wants — the most coronavirus deaths in Europe — after the health care system again failed to protect the elderly and the government delayed imposing new restrictions. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Italy was the first country in the West to be slammed by COVID-19 and, after suffering a huge wave of death in spring, brought infections under control. Italy then had the benefit of time and experience heading into the fall resurgence because it trailed Spain, France and Germany in recording big new clusters of infections. Yet the virus spread fast and wide, and Italy has added 28,000 dead since Sept. 1.

Jewish Americans from a variety of branches of the faith are celebrating Hanukkah with smaller-than-usual gatherings this year, in hopes of keeping the year-end holiday safe but still joyful as coronavirus cases spike across the country. Many Jewish Americans are already accustomed to more intimate celebrations of a holiday focused more on the home than on the synagogue, including Haredim or ultra-Orthodox communities. So the recent successful Supreme Court challenge to New York restrictions on in-person worship by some Orthodox groups won’t mean much as far as their Hanukkah plans.

A U.S. government advisory panel endorsed widespread use of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine Thursday, putting the country just one step away from launching an epic vaccination campaign against the outbreak that has killed close to 300,000 Americans. Shots could begin within days, depending on how quickly the Food and Drug Administration signs off, as expected, on the expert committee’s recommendation. “This is a light at the end of the long tunnel of this pandemic,” declared Dr. Sally Goza, president of the American Academy of Pediatrics. In a 17-4 vote with one abstention, the government advisers concluded that the vaccine from Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech appears safe and effective for emergency use in adults and teenagers 16 and over.

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf said Wednesday he has tested positive for COVID-19 and is isolating at home. The second-term Democrat said a routine test on Tuesday detected the coronavirus. “I have no symptoms and am feeling well,” Wolf said in a statement. “I am following CDC and Department of Health guidelines.” Wolf’s spouse, Frances Wolf, has been tested but has not received the result, Wolf said. She is quarantining with him at their home in Mount Wolf, near York. Wolf is one of several governors who have tested positive for the virus that causes COVID-19, including the governors of Oklahoma, Missouri, Virginia, Nevada and Colorado. President Donald Trump also contracted the virus. Wolf, who is 72, said he continues to work remotely.

The influential sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un lambasted South Korea’s foreign minister for questioning the North’s claim to be coronavirus free, warning Wednesday of potential consequences for the comments. South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha said over the weekend that it’s hard to believe North Korea’s claim that there has been no virus outbreak on its soil. She added that the North has been unresponsive to South Korea’s offer for cooperation to jointly tackle the pandemic. The North Korean leader’s sister, Kim Yo Jong, responded in a statement carried by state media.

Due to the many medical emergencies and tragedies resulting from laxity around candles and kitchen safety on Chanukah, United Hatzalah of Israel issued a number of safety tips for families to implement in order to avoid situations in which family members, especially young children suffer injuries or worse on the holiday. The recommendations of the organization are as follows: Fire safety: Use a special location and apparatus to light the candles. Many times fires occur due to the use of makeshift menorahs. Please use a proper stable menorah and stable table or shelf and avoid proximity to any flammable items, including remaining oil or other candles, as well as drapes, curtains, books, or clothing.

Lawyers for plaintiffs against Eliezer Berland, who is accused of exploitation and fraud, sent a letter to Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit and Jerusalem District Attorney Danny Wittman, demanding that they refuse to accept a plea bargain, which they claim is preposterous. The lawyers, Yaakov Shaklar and Stav Halperin are considering appealing any such plea bargain in the High Court of Justice. It has previously been reported that Berland’s attorneys are attempting to get a plea bargain from the prosecution for Berland to serve less prison time, in spite of the severity of his crimes.

Provincial governments across China are placing orders for experimental, domestically made coronavirus vaccines, though health officials have yet to say how well they work or how they may reach the country’s 1.4 billion people. Developers are speeding up final testing, the Chinese foreign minister said during a U.N. meeting last week, as Britain approved emergency use of Pfizer Inc.’s vaccine candidate and providers scrambled to set up distribution. Even without final approval, more than 1 million health care workers and others in China who are deemed at high risk of infection have received experimental vaccines under emergency use permission. Developers have yet to disclose how effective their vaccines are and possible side effects.

Shipments of the coronavirus vaccine developed by American drugmaker Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech were delivered Sunday in the U.K. in super-cold containers, two days before it goes public in an immunization program that is being closely watched around the world. Around 800,000 doses of the vaccine were expected to be in place for the start of the immunization program on Tuesday, a day that Health Secretary Matt Hancock has reportedly dubbed as “V-Day,” a nod to triumphs in World War II. “To know that they are here, and we are amongst the first in the country to actually receive the vaccine and therefore the first in the world, is just amazing,” said Louise Coughlan, joint chief pharmacist at Croydon Health Services NHS Trust, just south of London.