Omicron was officially announced on Tuesday as the dominant variant of COVID-19 in the U.S., as the country is entering the third year of the pandemic, with more curing pills ordered from Pfizer while the federal government's policies criticized as murky.

The Japanese government is preparing to declare a quasi-state of emergency in the southern island prefecture of Okinawa due to a spike in the number of coronavirus cases, perhaps as early as this week, The Mainichi said on Wednesday. It would be the first such declaration since September 30.

France reported on Tuesday 271,686 new cases of COVID-19 detected in the last 24 hours, the highest daily record since the outbreak of the pandemic in the country. A total of 20,186 COVID-19 patients are currently hospitalized and 3,665 of them are in intensive care, said the French Public Health Agency.