protecting it with ringback. the number of confirms us coronavirus infections passes 20000000 and the government falls well short of its 1st vaccination targets. other than i am out of my head in and this is al jazeera live from doha also coming up. the usury war good news or 32 thirds of the senators voting. u.s. senators from both sides and donald trump a major defeat in the waning days of his presidency over rising his veto of

a national security bill. but generally smooth start for trade and travel after the u.k. completes its separation from the european union and temporary shelters but still nor certainty for refugees and migrants trapped in freezing weather on the bosnia croatia border. but 1st some more than $20000000.00 reported corona virus cases and the threats of a more infectious strain the united states is entering the new year with a corona virus outbreak that's far from being brought under control the government's also failed to meet its 2020 vaccination goal it wants it to administer 20000000 doses by the end of december but managed fewer than 3000000 around 347000 americans are known to have died since the pandemic began

live reynolds who joins us from los angeles and rob with 20000000 confirmed cases in the u.s. and that death toll over 347000 in this pandemic really isn't under control is it what's the situation like in the u.s. . no. well it was certainly no one's idea of a good way to ring in the new year hall of the particularly here in southern california where hospitals are virtually overwhelmed with patients emergency rooms are crammed people are being treated in conference rooms and gift shops in the hospitals and one a prominent public health epidemiologist said we are in the midst of a viral tsunami and as you mentioned the number of coated cases as reported by johns hopkins university passed 20000000 today in the united states since the

beginning of the pandemic and the death toll of course now approaching 350000 the number of infections in the united states doubled since november the 9th that's less than 2 months ago the u.s. now accounts for one quarter of almost one quarter of all cope with 19 deaths in the world and florida became the 1st state along with colorado and california report confirmed case of that new mutated variant of covert 19 it's believed to be more infectious it was 1st identified in the u.k. in december and given the fact that it is in widely spaced parts of the country many scientists think that it is widespread across the united states although exactly to what extent it's fueling the surge if at all that remains to be seen

that hasn't been really determined yet because gene sequencing is not done as commonly here in the united states as it is in other countries a report by a california firm called helix that does genetic testing said that it's research into the genetic signatures in. the new strain indicates that it may have been circulating here in the united states since october and as of this evening 33 countries every ported the presence of this new variant turkey being the last the most recent one. ok rob reynolds the brain is the picture from the sounds of this robot thank you very much indeed well well let's get more on this night from bruce lee he's a professor of health policy and management at the university of new york's school of public health and joins us now via skype it's good to have you had this here on this era as we head into this new year the one glimmer of hope has been these new

vaccines that are being ruled today but in the united states that rule light really is quite sluggish why is that do you think that thanks for having me tell us so there's been several issues to one if you look at this day to day cope with 1000 bucks in track or only 12400000 doses have been distributed it is today that's well below the actual number that you need to state the target goal you know $20000000.00 people by the end point when you would need twice as many doses $40000000.00 doses cost to be able to cover that many people with with those it's sort of based so much on top of that oh i did you will pardon me i was going to say it is a supply issue then there is a some management issue because donald trump is blaming the states for for ruling this site but if this are in effect seen i mean what can the states rule lights. yeah i think that the problem is there's not enough eckstein m.

plus the whole world oil has not been organized at a national level and it hasn't really been transparent but a lot of states were told get ready for the vaccine and it bans of approval but they weren't told like what are the plans and how are they going to get the resources in case they don't have enough refrigerators or coal based things like that these these have be just the sole responsibly of the states because the virus as well as people cross state lines so you really need to figure out like with states that have the resources where the supply chain needs to be stored up and there were months before the vaccine rollout really get this in order and it really hasn't so so what would you say needs to happen then to reach as many people as possible what should the u.s. government be doing as it moves into 2021. well one is clear transparency and communication so they have to tell all the states you know where

the vaccines are you know like how many being produced and when to expect them to is there needs to be analysis of you know which states and which locations to quote supply chains which states don't know what types of resources that they need where the weak point which places the more brits raters more transport the prices more personnel this has to be organized from a national and a very certain chick orientation and that's not really burning right now but we also see the emergence of this worrying new variance which is 1st discovered in the united kingdom it's of course starting to spread elsewhere in a bid to come back that the u.k. sold surveying its vaccine shadow in a bid to get to the 1st 5 days or doses as many people as possible rather than holding some back to complete the 2 doses that are recommended what do you think of this maven is is this something that kids be attempts it's in other countries like

the us which is clearly struggling with the the coven i break. well there are several so will problems with that so one is there's not nearly enough vaccine doses to cover enough people in this country and you know the 1st thing that we need to do is really cover the health care professionals because they are the backbone of the health care system and they're more likely to acquire the virus are more likely to transmit it to very many very vulnerable people so if you don't cover them 1st then you leave leave the entire country very very vulnerable they're just not are not enough vaccines to really distribute to everyone so you really have to stick with our dates and names 1st and then also the other problem is if you don't have an organized or station people start wondering like why are certain people getting of vaccines and other people are and are and that raises a lot of questions of you know is it are people getting vaccines because they actually know people or elections or things like that so it could be quite. ok

we'll have to leave it there unfortunately bit bristly great to get your thoughts thank you so much for sharing your expertise with us here on al-jazeera thank you. the u.k.'s reactivating emergency hospitals bill sara lee last year is the more infectious covert 1000 variant drives more hospital admissions the few more than 50 size and new cases on each of the past 4 days and as we mentioned whether a gasp or dish don't says are criticizing a change in the u.k. facts anation strategy the government says it will do lays 2nd doses of the fine as a biotech jobs to prioritize 1st doses to as many people as possible the interval between the 2 doses could be extended to 12 weeks challen says in london and he says there are big questions over a gap that long. pfizer has the data for what happens if you give the 2nd

dose $21.00 days after the 1st dose but if you wait 3 months which is what the government is planning to do then they don't really know what's going to happen is it going to be as effective as it should be the government knows made a decision based on the pragmatics really of public health and the dangerous reality that this new variances has put the country in with so many new infections so many new deaths and so much stress being put on the health system what they have decided is that it's imperative to get as many people vaccinated with the 1st usage of either the pfizer vaccine or the oxford astra zeneca one as quickly as possible because with the 1st dose you do get some degree of immunity with the astra zeneca one it's about 70 percent with the pfizer one it's it's upwards of that so essentially what the government has

said is look let's prioritize 1st dosage to as many people as possible because that's how we get out of this situation and in 3 months time we can give people 2nd doses of these vaccines and hopefully the 1st dose which will have had its effect and the situation will be calmer and better a panel of experts advising india's drug regulator has recommended the use of the u.k.'s oxford astra zeneca vaccine it would be the 1st to be greenlit in a country that's recorded more than 10000000 infections and almost 150000 deaths. and afghan journalist has been shot dead in the central province of core the smell of course on the roads when gunmen fired on his vehicle amok was in charge of a local radio station and was also a human rights activists is the 5th journalist to be killed in afghanistan in the past 2 months. the us senate has delivered

a significant defeat to president donald trump force him to override his veto of a defense policy bill the senate which is controlled by trump's republican party easily achieved the 2 thirds majority needed this reflects a growing rift between some congressional republicans and trump who has 20 days left in the white house that has correspondent kimberly hauck it says trump has unleashed his anger online. the u.s. president reacting on twitter calling this pathetic particularly angry with the republicans in the senate for not standing with him and he feels and tweeting that he believes that they should have done more for americans with respect to the code would relieve raising it from $600.00 to $2000.00 that didn't happen and also the president so i happy with some of the power of the tech companies particularly leverage over the u.s.

election also talking about why more wasn't done for that now in the midst of all of this the house speaker nancy pelosi she reacted as well sending out a statement that this is a resoundingly or buke of the u.s. president and his assault on the american military and national security noting that in the waning days of his presidency she accused him of attempting to sow chaos and undermine security so very strong reactions from the u.s. president but also one of the president's biggest critics in the u.s. congress what we've seen in recent days and weeks is a growing number of republicans distancing themselves from donald trump since his election loss on november 3rd what this really marks is a departure as they sort of look to the president who is outgoing and setting the sights on their own political future so this is certainly notable what is also notable is that many of these republicans are not backing the president's claim

that he won the election that the election was rigged or even that there was widespread voter fraud so how many suffered this very notable loss on capitol hill the u.s. president now setting its sights on the next big date on capitol hill and that is january 6th that is when the electoral college will be tallying or rather when the congress will be tallying the electoral college votes we do expect that there will be. its number of dozens of republicans in the house and at least one republican in the senate that will stand with the president to at least delay that tallying but ultimately it will be unsuccessful the u.s. president will ultimately be joe biden. still to come here on al-jazeera a new era of free trade begins in africa james to one day become a $3.00 trillion dollar economic block and q burbank's on changes to its money as it tries to revive the economy.

it's time for the perfect gentleman the weather sponsored point qatar airways still snowing still snowing in most of the western side of honshu and they're not will keep going in the slowly weakening window of the next couple of days coming because of this cold air that still exists in the northeast to china temperatures are trying to rise a little bit in places like beijing and so but they're not really coming up too much nearer nor when they were maija things are much warmer down hong kong sunshine 19 degrees taipei's up to about 20 and used to got showers in that northeasterly breeze which is picked up the wet weather in the central philippines and possibly in southern vietnam but the real thrust of the heavy downpours heading down towards the peninsula of malaysia singapore and then eventually into sumatra with a good widespread wet season rainy season elsewhere throughout indonesia and

malaysia i'm also still got right in time when they do and sri lanka we've got an increase interesting brick of sherry stuff somewhere in northern india so interesting is a is at a season and based this sort of thing that improves your air quality has been so poor with long term fog and smoke in the cities in northern india and northern pakistan so the forecast for new delhi is a sherry one that will improve things somewhat equally in the whole the weather's changing quite substantially for the next 3 days. sponsored poll qatar airways. mass protests closing that govern. and santa has but are we seeing the whole try to talk to the pastors we follow journalists on the frontline this is chris jericho progress committed to reporting the facts police officers and pointing guns at journalists to say stop telling the hong kong fact

and fiction the truth is in any way on al-jazeera. my. guess is al jazeera could provide all the headlines for you this hour more than $20000000.00 people in the u.s. have night tested positive for the corona virus that's almost a quarter of all cases worldwide and the government's fallen well short of his 1st vaccination targets. the u.k.'s reactivating emergency hospitals built early last year as the more infectious covert 19 variant strives admissions there be more than $50000.00 new cases in each of the past 4 days and u.s.

senators have voted to override president donald trump's veto of a defense policy bill the senate such as controlled by trunks republican party easily achieved the 2 thirds majority of quiet. egypt's foreign minister has summoned ethiopia's top diplomat in cairo over comments regarding a controversial dam on the river nile egypt's government condemned what it calls ethiopia's aggressive tone it didn't cite specific comments but earlier an ethiopian official said egypt is using tension over the dam to divert attention from its other problems egypt turns you don't fear if the o.p.'s grown renee song stand will take too much of their water supplies. tenser been set up as temporary shelter for rounds of fires and refugees and migrants who are stranded at a burnt out camp in bosnia herzegovina the government faced criticism for failing to

protect them from freezing winter weather kathy lopez who are they on reports. a sign of relief and of new shelter this will be home for hundreds of migrants and refugees stranded in bosnia had to go been asleep a camp near its north was border with croatia back the military set up tents to shield hundreds of migrants from the winter's freezing weather after days of sleeping out in the cold the nation to face mounting criticism for leaving the migrants without proper shelter heat or facilities to do it was ok we don't mind we're going to gesture and we can drink of water that's enough for us but the problem is then problem for us we need to contain this ok. for days there were cries for help earlier this week migrants and refugees once on a hunger strike i am it reports of frostbite and hypothermia they held a protest to bring attention to their poor living conditions when all these nor the

despite the problems caused when these people were abandoned by un organizations and by local authorities we must show solidarity we're here today with the red cross we're trying to help them as much as possible. most of the camp was destroyed in late december when police say occupants deliberately set a fire to protest the schedule closure and lack of alternatives plans to move them to another facility fell through rejected by politicians and people living nearby aid groups have warned of a potential humanitarian crisis is a problem of more humanity just food is not enough all medications bad madness mostly but diseases most of the people here are from south asia and. in the middle east they are among thousands hoping to make it to western europe to start a new life we don't have been like if we don't have jack up you can see this i

don't have shoes the new camp will be run by the international organization for migration it's not a long term solution but it is a way to help people with nothing to survive the winter katia lapus other young al-jazeera. iraq explosives experts are trying to defuse a naval mine found attached to an all time during the gulf on thursday the vessel was refueling another ship in international waters you know the iraqi port of basra iraq's army says it's evacuated the vessel it's not clear who's responsible at this stage iran's government says it's pushing ahead with plans to enrich uranium with up to 20 percent purity is still the un's nuclear watchdog the work will be done in the forward our plants which was built into the side of a mountain there's been a steady trickle of trades and passenger traffic over the english channel after the seismic shift in relations between britain and the e.u.

the u.k.'s completed its separation from the block and in almost half a century of integration with its neighbors paul brennan reports from the english port of dover. the countdown to the new post relationship was projected across the departure gates at the french side of the euro tunnel rail link moments later the 1st lorry was having its documents checked. the trade deal agreed on christmas eve means no tariffs and no quotas but there is significantly more paperwork and most of it needing to be done in advance the euro tunnel operator is get a link the change is already about. for many teams now it's time there is a truck coming here they have to show us that they have done. online before coming here it's a significant change for logistics and haulage firms on both sides of the new trading frontier the u.k.

is expecting $220000000.00 additional customs declarations every year at a cost to business of some $9500000000.00 the ferry crossing between the english port of dover and cali and france handle some $2500000.00 freight vehicles every year but less than a 1000 lorries were said tool to make the crossing on new year's day it's a gentle start for the new regime many haulage companies said they were holding off until the new systems have bedded in my hope is that given the opening couple of weeks in january are generally pretty late for us and with the pre-breakfast star bill that we saw going on that that should enable those people that are trading during the time to do train themselves and get used to working in this new way in fact at the gates of the 4th the biggest sticking point on this 1st day isn't rex it related at all. we had a plan all works out already to hold freights to manage the freight but now we've had to initiate testing as well it's

a number of locations so that's the biggest problem that we've got because that was never expected never planned for the key to keeping the ports open and running smoothly who. with the speed with which the logistics companies get to grips with the new electronic and paperwork requirements the early log jams are likely to be not here at the ports but back at the factory gates or were harassed with cargo delayed because the correct paperwork hasn't been filled in these 1st quiet days of january an opportunity for companies to familiarize themselves with the new practicalities the real test will come when trade volume ramps up again around the 10th or 11th of the month paul brennan al-jazeera over. a free trade blog has launched in africa $54.00 of the continent's $55.00 countries have signed up for no it's being implemented in the $33.00 countries ratified it but some economists say purse states will still be at

a disadvantage. reports from the capital niamey. workers at this garment factory rushed to deliver thousands of fees masks the owner says more than 2 and a half 1000000 were made here to help control the spread of corporate 90. but as the africa free trade agreement comes into effect he foresees trouble ahead for the continent's poor countries. and one of the small and poor economies will always be at a disadvantage hopefully as time goes on we can get special considerations otherwise it will be difficult to compete. businesses in poor countries may have their concerns but overall experts say the agreement will eventually benefit them they believe the cheap cost of labor in these countries will attract more industries and that yet they did. in 2 african trade industrial development the level and pace of industrialization among african countries very some will have an advantage over

others but african countries need to buy and sell roll and finished products among themselves. currently imports most of its needs from bottled water to food and machinery from big retail to local markets and here is flooded with imported products because of its weekly infrastructure and the country will continue to depend on him making it difficult for local industries to grow. experts say it's hard to see european and asian multinational companies giving up the trade advantage they've held in africa for century. products from europe asia and africa's larger economies line the shelves at the emmys biggest retail monopoly consumers prefer these brands traders say they won't be many local goods on store shelves unless government steps in. we should be given support the government should facilitate easy acquisition of land and loans from banks. but it's hard to

see how governments on the continent can do that without breaching the protectionism rules of africa trade agreement and the world trade organization. agrees al-jazeera. now the once popular software adobe flash player is no more the company has stopped supporting it's and updating it as of january the 1st and is urging people to an install the software before it blocks all flash content on the 12th 1st release in 1906 flash content creators to make and share animations and games online but security issues have plagued it for years. but cuba is overhauling its money the peso will be kept but devalued it's more the so-called convertible peso will be eliminated latin america gets to the cia near an reports. that he stole medicare

owns one of her banners most successful private restaurants a must even for the most high profile visitors until now his customers paid in cook's r c u c a state invented substitute for the u.s. dollar with $25.00 times more than the cuban bissau but now the cook is being scrapped with an unsustainable dual currency an exchange rate system there is only me that it just means the elimination of a currency that was circulating for a long time and reactivate in our national currency. if only it were that simple one of the most common phrases in cuba is nice classy or it's not easy. and that's the perfect way to describe the risk elimination of cuba's 2nd currency while it's considered to be hard currency it's in fact worthless outside of cuba hindering exports and desperately needed investments one the 1st that got us almost

there was then when the creek was put into circulation it was pigs' of the dollar but in time it was value its elimination in general terms is positive but there will be collateral damage. first and foremost a devaluation of the peso against the us dollar and a steep increase in prices which means purchasing power will drop despite the much higher promised salaries. i don't see the point they raise your salary but they triple or quadruple the price of the dollar which we need to buy all the basics. and that's the other big problem if you want to buy anything from food to clothes or even hygiene products you need to go to one of the more than $120.00 stores and that's why all these people are lining up in front of the bank to exchange hard currency for an electronic debit card in m l c the cuban name for the u.s. greenback cash transactions aren't allowed. not that iran has

who can send money if you don't work with tourists you don't have access to hard currency this change has been very bad. it will be a difficult process for a country that is already suffering from a deep recession scarcity and harsh new u.s. economic sanctions but then as they say getting cuba's finances in order won't be easy. to see in human al-jazeera. this is al-jazeera and these are the headlines women 20000000 people in the u.s. of no tested positive for the coronavirus that's almost a quarter of the world's cases the government's phone well short of its targets with minister 20000000 vaccine doses by the end of december brandel says more from the sanchez here in southern california were hospital.