Keep it small, keep it short and keep it local – that’s the message on Christmas from the UK government’s chief medical officer as Boris Johnson urged people to exercise “extreme caution” about meeting up with relatives or friends.

The easing of strict coronavirus rules will still go ahead over the festive period, after Mr Johnson said banning Christmas altogether would be “inhuman”.

But from England and Scotland there’s strong advice to limit travel and interactions as much as possible. While Wales has changed the law to allow just two households to get together.

The latest UK figures show another 25,161 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours. There have sadly been another 612 deaths, taking the total now to 65,520. The government says 137,897 people have received the vaccine so far.

Boris Johnson calls on UK to have ‘smaller’ Christmas – to reduce Covid spread