rachel programs explore asteroids and deep space as well as develop live car iraq all those are included in our plan china's space station is a fraction of the size of the international space station that's the only one currently in orbit china is excluded from using it several western governments are consent to beijing will use its space technology to expand china's military but its leaders say its progress and space exploration will only be used to peaceful needs between e.u. al-jazeera beijing. again i'm fully back to go with the headlines on al-jazeera alexei navalny has appeared in court for the 1st time since ending a 3 week hunger strike a kremlin critic attended a hearing by video link to appeal his conviction for defaming a world war 2 veteran a separate court case has adjourned proceedings on whether to label nirvana's

opposition network extremists bennett smith was at the hearing in moscow prosecutors want to bomb. on to corruption organization they want the court to this declared an extremist organizations violence on these regional political groups as well this would put down to groups an organization on the same level as al qaida meaning people who finance his group or supporters of the group could face very very lengthy jail sentences and very very heavy prison terms. 40 countries have placed to supply india with oxygen as it reports another record spiking coronavirus cases and deaths elections are going ahead in 2 big states despite warnings that one of them could become a new epicenter u.s. president joe biden has presented what he calls his prints to build america he addressed congress on the eve of his 100th day in office biden is promising trillions of dollars in investment in jobs infrastructure and education indonesia's

government says any group found guilty of causing violence in the west proper region will now be considered a terrorist organization it says the move is in line with current counter-terrorism laws and is an effort to increase security in the region has been increasing fighting between the military and separatist groups a top general was killed in violence on sunday as strikes against ethnic armed groups have continued in myanmar 2 days after a military outpost was overrun near the border with china. monitoring groups say the agenda has launched at least 6 air attacks since tuesday and hundreds of people have fled into thailand the strikes came after the qur'an national liberation army captured and brains the army camp were upset with headlines on al-jazeera will have more news for you here right after inside story i hope you do stay with us thanks for watching.

india's code 19 emergency reaches critical levels hospitals are out of beds and oxygen and crematoriums don't have space for the dead what's the fallout for the rest of the world if the crisis isn't contain this is inside story. hello and welcome to the program. patients gasping for air in the street pleas for

oxygen and hospital beds on social media and funeral pyres burning around the clock this is the reality of india's covert 1902nd wave the worst in the world this chart from johns hopkins university shows the number of infections going up more and more rapidly india recorded more than 360000 cases and 3300 deaths on tuesday. experts are blaming political gatherings and religious festivals for the surge the government has ordered twitter facebook and instagram to remove posts criticizing its handling of the crisis overwhelmed hospitals are turning away the critically ill. health workers but if someone dies in my family i won't even be able to say final good byes even those in big leaks the rich and powerful people are not getting to see their loved ones for the last time the hospitals are only showing bodies completely packed in p.p. kits what can they do it has taken $22.00 and a half less money to commute from i believe and come here for this health again so

i can not take the matter without an oxygen till i have to give it to one 0 my god how much time it takes i have to leave really sort of thing of all over india and with over billy. turn to going to go behind how to do our job and all over the nearby cities from 10100 limited but we're getting. all over very well on the tour who are 13 dosia elizabeth purana reports from one of the crematorium set up in new delhi. we are at a makeshift kramatorsk him that's being set up here in new delhi because the actual kemah tour him behind it. all of the bodies which are being brought there every day it is a similar situation and every crime atory i'm here in delhi and many of the other badly affected states these concrete atory i'm has been working from 6 o'clock in the morning until midnight it still had to put up 50 funeral pyres in the park next

to it and it's now putting up another 50 in this open space here the situation is such here and delhi that after going from hospital to hospital to have this sick family members admitted people have to go from crime atory and to crime a tory and to have them cremated in a country where funerals should be taking place do take place as soon as possible because of custom because of the hot temperatures because of a shortage of mortuaries with freezing facilities and all of this is why the international aid that's arriving is seoul south korea is the latest country to say that it's going to be sending oxygen sending everything from medicines to diagnostic tests to protective care that south korea is also arranging flights to bring its citizens back from india because it sees that as poorly funded public health care system cannot deal with the world's biggest surge in cases and there

are no hospital beds or oxygen and many hospitals and and states still elizabeth purana for inside story the world health organization says the situation is beyond heartbreaking the united states the e.u. russia and china are among countries sending oxygen and medical supplies and india the world's biggest vaccine maker is now forced to import jobs the white house is chief medical advisor anthony told an australian newspaper that wealthy nations have failed to prevent a tragedy. all right let's bring in our guests in new delhi saying botty is a medical doctor and national president of the progressive medicos and scientists form in southampton michael head senior research fellow in global health at the university of southampton and in doha patrick tang division chief of microbiology at syndrome medicine a warm welcome to you all let me start with you today we are seeing these horrific

reports out of india hospitals across the country are reporting a shortage of medical oxygen and a shortage of beds crematoriums are running out of space funerals are being held in parking lots bodies are being burned in car parks how dire is the situation and how much worse could it get. the situation is under t.v. let's send the scene have not seen this stable situation evident in my lifetime that people are struggling full speed and i have i have not seen that people who are standing on the old sense showing their oxygen saturation that sea docked at a little casinos educationists old will please provide us back then the hospital a lot of these provide us some help but the u.s. will help less that all to help get infrastructure is all about and all the bad stuff will leo will bite even inside the hospital when i am inside my blog i have to meet life and deaths. in seconds because so many patients saw it on oxygen so we

have to decide whom to put on vent whom to keep on oxygen so it is a very very difficult situation and as we are seeing that now more and more patients are getting infected so i am i am thinking that if not active intervention was done then that the coming days will be very very difficult michael in the past 24 hours there have been more than 360000 new coronavirus cases in india there have been over 3300 deaths in india in the past 24 hours. and the positivity rate is somewhere between 18 to 20 percent as i understand that means that the country is not able to test enough people and that the real number of cases and deaths could be much higher than reported correct. yes that's correct to think we can rather sadly dissipate the the official numbers are probably massively undercounting the

true situational ground so we can expect the number of new cases to be multiple times higher than what we're seeing and if we can expect those discounts to go up on a daily basis for the foreseeable future i think that's going to mention descent we probably will get worse before it gets better so it's a use of a grim situation in india right now patrick i want to talk about the fact that while what's happening in india right now is certainly catastrophic for india but the fact is india is also the world's largest vaccine maker it's considered the pharmacy of the world and many developing countries are counting on india to provide them with kovan $1000.00 vaccines so what's happening in india beyond just being catastrophic for india is also catastrophic for the rest of the world isn't it. yes that's absolutely true this 1st of all is an absolute tragedy for so india it's the kind of situation that all of us want to avoid the

all of the measures that we're trying to do with public health and with vaccination so so i think the devastation that we're seeing in india is going to affect the vaccine supply for the world almost half the world is getting back scenes from india especially to a lot of the lower income and middle income countries including some of the. western countries as well to do so so i think at this stage in the pandemic it's absolutely crucial that we vaccinate our population back need them and fast as we can so that these variants can spread in different parts of the world so so having any reduction in the back seems supply around the world it's going to have very bad effects for the rest of our g. 8 how concerned are you about the effects of the new code variant that was 1st identified in india. yes this this new video is actually causing the c.v.r.

infection and the 2nd thing is that it is it causing see that infection in the younger adults also like those tools or what are having an equal number of illnesses or otherwise healthy individuals but they are getting seated infection previously. in come usually it is infecting only 2 elderly people are who they middle compromise individuals in fairness to reality is more in this little but this time this year this is causing more severe infection and there are those faults also it is definitely mutated away at us and the having much more severe to be michael how much do we know at this stage about how many cases might be attributed to the variant that was identified in india i mean do we know if it's driving infection rates right now because as i understand there's still quite a bit to learn about it right. yeah there is very limited sequencing capacity in

india so we don't know too much about this new variant of interest all we don't have a proper count in terms of the prevalence of the different variants across these coded $1000.00 cases that we're seeing each day from india so there is a lot to learn about it i think it's fair to say that we would speciate a massive increase in cases per date anyway if you have susceptible populations mixing then this is what happens all of the variants of having 19 a pretty good it transmits it that many question really is again as a colleague said as to whether it's more severe than other variants and is causing most of the illness and whether it is more transmissible than other variants but either way in a pretty bad place right now patrick all of this is really putting into stark relief what gaping and growing divide there is between developed and developing countries and their access to medicines and vaccines is it not yes

any anything that stops our efforts that you do control the spread of the virus and the thing that impedes or release you to distribute vaccines and medications through the world is going to hamper our response to the pandemic so this is very devastating not just for india but for the rest of the world hard countries like the u.s. the u.k. and germany have all pledged to send aid to india as i understand it aid has started to arrive but many health experts say that this is really just a drop in the bucket what is happening thus far with the aid and from your perspective do you think it's going to be enough to make an impact and start turning things around. all those countries who are supporting him be and this situation is all basically very good and a lot of even a government also welcomed all the steps done by other countries to support him yet

but the thing is that the main active support or the act of intervention can only be done by indian government if more and more health care infrastructure is dead loved in a short period of time if oxygen supply is out adequately for a way to bat so that all the industrial use of oxygen can be halted for some time and all will be used for medical or clock c.n.n. and isolation centers many more n one vaccination send us can be developed in a short period of time so all these things that like they need a very strong commitment from the bolasie makers and if this can be done at government level then any support from other countries middle of your sleeve will be helpful and this i want to say that any support by anyone milby lifesaving in india michael countries like india and south africa made a proposal some months ago to the w t o asking that intellectual property rights of pharmaceutical companies be waived

and that would allow developing countries to produce covert $1000.00 vaccines of course the u.s. and other countries blocked negotiations at the w t o of that proposal it seems that perhaps that stance might be softening right now as a result of what's going on in india are you seeing indications that that stance might change because there is supposed to be a meeting about this issue later this month at the w t o. here for sure there will be more scuffles or not it has been a little bit disheartening i think we should be sharing knowledge as much as we possibly can during this pandemic but it's not just about the sharing of intellectual property rights. manufacturing that seems easy tricky process so scaling up new sites quickly he's very hot can be done we said he can and should increase capacity across the world to do that right now and intellectual property rights is part of that but i think certainly if we can do that right now the good but also that's an important question full in between kind of explore the next kind

of it is to work out where we can scale up manufacturing build new sites have them ready for the next public health emergency whenever that be patrick you heard michael there talk about the fact that you know country need to be scaling up and preparing before the next public health crisis but our country is learning the lesson from this right now i mean are countries being more transparent about the challenges they face with health care do you think that this is going to change said that by the time there is another huge public health emergency or pandemic the world will respond in a much more rapid fashion then be able to help other countries more quickly. that's a very good question and it's a tough one to answer. i think we all hope that the lessons from this and demick are is that all countries are going to be better prepared next time and that we strengthen our public health system and we have

a system in place to produce vaccines and do research for medications and. that that's what we all hope will come out of this and on it but that remains to be seen so so i think it's important that as pandemic winds down over the next year or so of that that we maintain this pressure on the governments that everyone in health care and public health maintain pressure so that we don't forget all of the things that we've learned and all of the suffering that we've gone through during this and. you spoke a little while ago about just how imaginable all this was what's going on in india i want to ask you a bit of a more personal question how difficult is it for you and other members of the medical profession in india that hospitals are having to turn away patients and the fact that people are dying who could otherwise be saved. you know very difficult

and like then it is very difficult to console them google for it out of that hospital lot of stuff somewhere else and of even model really that they have something for a hospital bed sort of they have it something folksy and and they are many thing that patients at home and then even i am supervising were treating many of the patients what i call i end causal calls for them and manage them at home and tell them what to do and not to do so all these things we are doing as a health get what it got and it is very exhaustive and from actually causal to men in all these things that this moment of dying because men that are on duty ought to be out of do a b.b.s. can be mostly voting for the patients we have been mostly i that attending call us already in wards we had attending patients so it is very exhaustive and it will become very difficult when we have put on some patients and then tell them don't please find out someone of that another place to get to have been documented

michael if there is uncontrolled spread of the virus in parts of the world doesn't that mean that at some point there's a greater chance that new mutations and that new variants will develop that might escape the protection of the vaccines that have already been developed. so you said in the more cave in 19 you have obviously great ability of disease but also you are more likely to have new variants of interest and variants of concern emerging and that might have an impact upon vaccine effectiveness i think it is very likely that we will in the relatively near future the next year if you need to develop booster doses. to count new variants that is fairly likely i think so the battle against 98 is going to be a long one even here in the u.k. where our current vaccine roll is fairly advanced the cases are relatively low we do still need to be cautious about kobe 19 and plan and prepare ahead of any possible new outbreaks so yeah it's a long battle ahead yet patrick what do you say are boosters going to be needed and

are they already being developed. well researchers are being developed and there's a lot of talk of. new versions of the vaccines but i think you know the evidence is not out that that's absolutely required and if you've looked at you know where we've had a lot of. different variants develop and we look at the most successful strains that have spread around the world they have shown some degree of convergent evolution where where they share many of the common most successful mutations so so we're seeing that in many different places where these variants arise and they share the most successful regions so so it looks like the virus is running out of successful mutations to develop so so i mean what the other thing that's very reassuring is that in countries that are starting to look at that africa's use of the vaccines in the real not in the lab looking at where the antibodies binder not

that they're seeing that there is protection from the vaccines against these new variants against severe disease against out they might not protected gates mild infections 100 percent but but that's going to be ok if enough people get x. need it so so i think i'm reassured that you know the virus is running out of mutations and that the vaccines are very good and we shouldn't be casting doubt on africa's use of the vaccines if we get enough people vaccinated we can eventually reach that post pandemic days hard it was just last month that india's health minister said that the country was in the endgame of the coven $1000.00 fandom a coming there was a sense that in india the government believe that had really gotten past the worst part of the pandemic now it's a situation where everything is in short supply and there's just a staggering amount of new cases every day why wasn't the government stockpiling

supplies why weren't they doing more to prepare for this eventuality. because the 1st thing they have and they're taught there because they have been of the vaccine and all vaccine was promoted as after the event rather than being a preventive measure and and 2nd thing that the patient inaudible is old for because he is that something like in the somebody and then woody mission order was also decreased will be a top that means you know what a way to us and all weekend and continue with their daily lives and even patients that we have been the people who have relaxed the better bit and stood up over it after opiate behavior at our best talk to beating their mosques they have started a mosque gatherings so everything was gone so long that we've been few months. and came to this situation so does that's why i just want to also add i am now seeing people who have suffered had acquired infection lost yet also have fooled or says the vaccine but still got infected by this white house sold the thing is we have to

keep in mind that this white house is mutating very fast it is fine let me knew him knew what he is doing didn't please you once in human system and causing infection so we all should follow who lead afrobeat behavior as much as possible and i wired must get things this must be a lemming lesson to all of all of the wanted michael the serum institute of india is a major contributor to the kovacs initiative which is providing vaccines to low and middle income countries it has said it will not be able to meet its international commitments to deliver vaccines due to domestic shortages what's the knock on effect of this. something that shows that it is tricky to rely on just one manufacturer to supply vaccines for us thank you for the world right now so india will retain much of the vaccine supply coming out of the servants to cheat and who can blame them but always who will have a knock on effect full kovacs other lower middle income settings and also high

income countries like the u.k. who get about seems from astra zeneca from the start is to as well so that mean that there codex rollout is slow so there will be a great bit of disease and more unprotected people in those populations so again there will be consequences in terms of a lack of supplies from the few manufacturers sites we have around the world of which a key one is in india patrick if the kovacs rollout is now slower because of what's going on in india what does that mean for the overall situation and from your perspective are there other countries that are going to be able to pick up the slack. this is a difficult one because india a lot of countries do depend on india for their axioms so. when there's a slowdown in the distribution of vaccines around the world it's going to allow more cases of this these to develop then and this is and as i said before this is the end game this is where we need to vaccinate as many people as possible as fast

as possible so that we can reduce the number of people that died from and that reduce the number of people that get severe disease from covert so it's it's absolutely crucial and i don't know it's very complicated to set up vaccine manufacturing because it requires a global supply chain it was a lot of quality assurance so it's not easy to be able to cut the slack from from the manufacturing in india. from your point of view the fact that the serum institute is not able to meet its commitments when it comes to the kovacs initiative the fact that so many developing countries are counting on these vaccines from india how concerned are you about you know what the situation is in india and how that will affect the rest of the world. ready much concerned as i help get a little because i want everyone should be vaccinated as at me as possible because if even if infection a few get infected after vaccination by section is very mild and it has it has

a protection so that everyone should know that senator that i am much more concerned about fluster and foremost well they'd be and people that everyone in india should get vaccinated as empty as possible and after that the whole made the whole world line or that everyone is dependent as you already said that it is a pharmacy of the world so everyone should get vaccinated and because every life i have seen people dying on the roads and it is very difficult to see them die because of this infection so they all must get vaccinated this is a must yes all right we have run out of time so we're going to have to leave the conversation there thank you so much to all of our guests saying botty michael head and patrick tang and thank you too for watching you can see this and all of our previous programs again any time by visiting our website al-jazeera dot com and for further discussion go to our facebook page that's facebook dot com forward slash a.j. inside story you can also join the conversation on twitter our handle is at a.j.

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change to the way the police in the united states. well if we cannot have palestina my government was suddenly not allowed britain to control french polish time would be an outrage but then we need to find another solution before we come to blows 100 years ago britain and france made a secret deal that would influence the shape of the middle east 1st century to come and so. now we can draw on the. psychs to become lines in the sand on al-jazeera. from the al-jazeera london broadcast center to special guests in conversation when societies divide when women are divided from the only thing that benefits from this contract itself unprompted uninterrupted since the 1st one school girls are those world who don't work for him or in fact. it would like to think that their nationalism is not as ugly

as someone else's nationalism in part to be unscripted understand the differences and similarities of cultures across the wound so no matter when you call. the news and current affairs that matter to you. you want your deservedly so rob and horrible out of our top stories alexina valley has appeared in court for the 1st time since ending a 3 week hunger strike the kremlin critic attended a hearing by video link to appeal against his conviction in february for defaming a world war 2 veteran in a separate court case proceedings on whether to label the valleys opposition network extremists have been adjourned it's a move that could ban the group and lead activists facing long prison sentences ben smith was at the hearing in moscow.