In many places, plans for New Year’s Eve celebrations were muted or canceled for the second straight year due to a surge of coronavirus infections, this time driven by the highly contagious omicron variant.

New Year celebrations are approaching and across the world there is an urge to party. But the desire to let loose is being countered by the highly transmissible omicron variant.

The Nov. 29 ban barred nearly all non-U.S. citizens who had recently been in South Africa, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Mozambique and Malawi.

For awhile there, it appeared we might be able to ring in New Year's Eve in major cities across the world with something resembling the big celebrations of yore.

The nation’s second-largest city called off its New Year’s Eve celebration Monday, and its smallest state re-imposed an indoor mask mandate as fears of a potentially devastating winter COVID-19 surge triggered more cancellations and restrictions ahead of the holidays.

Omicron is continuing to spread at an alarming rate across Europe and governments are once again being forced to make tough decisions in order to contain the highly contagious variant.

When Mick Sturla left for vacation to South Africa, he had no idea his eight-day stay at a safari lodge would turn into a mad dash to get back home to the United Kingdom and involve sleeping in a rental car underneath an airport terminal due to new and evolving restrictions tied to the Omicron coronavirus variant.

Governments are trying to buy time with a rash of new travel restrictions as they figure out the potential impact of Omicron.