, epidemic. against the global epidemic. and sends world stock markets deep into the red. the airline industry is wanting it faces a huge financial hit with more and more businesses sending stuff home. and in the uk guardian, the government could build a tunnel, not a bridge to link northern ireland and scotland. it is supposed to be a cheaper and more whether proof option. finally in the independent, twitter has revealed a new version of tweets named fleets which disappear once they are posted, they cannot be engaged with in public and direct messages was that it comes as users complain that it comes as users complain that tweets are too public and too permanent. hello there, laurence, you have been taking a big look the role of these

stories. let's start off with the lead story on the daily telegraph. patients are being told to stay at home if they get a mild virus. there is increasing worry about the impact on the nhs of this outbreak. absolutely, yeah. and i think concerns have been raised in the uk because obviously they had the first fatality of someone within the country, sort of yesterday. and of course we have the daily telegraph quoting the nhs‘s medical director with this advice which, actually, i don't think it's too far from what the original advice was a couple of weeks ago when it wasn't as much of a concern in the uk. which is essentially ring the nhs helpline when you talk about your symptoms and then someone is as actually it sounds like it is not that serious, so stayed home. clearly, if we see this sort of level of cases that have been seen, i know country such as italy, the stress on the nhs may be quite severe. the problem is of course many

people, particularly older generations who feel they really are at most risk, they of course want to take those precautions as soon as possible. absolutely. and we are told senior citizens and older people with underlying health conditions are potentially at the highest risk. so if you are an older member of the country you would kind of worry about this because it is entirely new, it isa because it is entirely new, it is a virus we don't really know anything about at the moment. i think it's the kind of level of concern that is beginning to sort of spread more deeply into countries. absolutely. you talk about that and the measures as well that some countries are employing. schools, halted for 219 million people worldwide, that was in the japan times. introducing very stringent measures, it is a real headache for working parents in particular. and in japan in particular, by minister abe has been criticised for closing schools and so they won't reopen until the end of march

—— prime minister or early april, and he is saying quite rightly it is better to be safe than sorry but the implications, if you have working parents they can't leave their children at home alone until a certain age. some japanese goods are allowing pa rents to japanese goods are allowing parents tojob children japanese goods are allowing parents to job children into after—school clubs that are still open in some schools —— drop children, but locally there aren't enough places. you have this massive kind of practical issue as societies. we can't all stay at home because we might be passing on the virus if we had it in the first place to our loved ones. and for those teachers who are able to work remotely and all of those online education courses using skype, i mean we have zoom communications, the share price really zoomed right up share price really zoomed right up at this kind of video conferencing software. and i think cases in italy of some private schools running lessons by using one of the microsoft

programmes for its students. so attendance has gone up! with so many people being told to stay at home with limits on travel, inevitably this has had a major impact on business sectors right around the world. really, the stock markets are back into the stock markets are back into the red right across the world, thatis the red right across the world, that is the headline in the times business and we are seeing situations where the interest rate cut, the us federal reserve cut, not seen since the financial crisis. that hasn't quelled markets. it made no difference at all and i thought it was kind of fascinating that they decided to cut so early in this because these sorts of cut in the virus had onlyjust these sorts of cut in the virus had only just begun these sorts of cut in the virus had onlyjust begun to reach the us states. now obviously with more doubts down the line, i suspect we're probably going to see another couple of of extreme volatility on stock markets. unfortunately for save rs markets. unfortunately for savers and investors they will probably be a lot more red on those screens. certainly we

have had those growth projections from the international monetary fund, they are certainly not going to reassure i nvesto rs they are certainly not going to reassure investors any time soon, are they? that is a huge cut to growth forecast. leading investment banks are talking about 0.5%—1% being knocked off global growth was up economists in the uk, where growth is quite low, i wouldn't be surprised if we see a recession in one or two countries, two—quarters of negative growth in the next few months. let's move away from coverage of the coronavirus for the moment and look at this story in the guardian. apparently the scottish secretary has advised borisjohnson to build an irish sea tunnel and not a bridge. this is really interesting, isn't it? this is an idea from borisjohnson initially isn't it? this is an idea from boris johnson initially to build this bridge from the uk mainland over the irish sea. but apparently there is some discussion about really whether thatis discussion about really whether that is visible at all.

alastair jar, the that is visible at all. alastairjar, the minister in concern, said the prime minister was using a bridge is a euphemism, which is an interesting way of looking at it. but anyone who knows about the weather patterns in the north of ireland or across scotla nd north of ireland or across scotland would know that it is quite windy, to put it simply. so the idea of having a large bridge, it would be 22 miles between the two countries, kind of rattling away in the wind and severe weather we have seen in the last couple of months. realising it's probably impractical. so i tunnel, which according to alistairjack is cheaper to build and actually sounds a lot sort of saviour. so this more realistic suggestion, whether we will actually sit in the current parliament remains to be seen. you look at the cost of the channel tunnel and how long that's a. the uk doesn't have a great record on building these kind of infrastructure projects even though it is only 22 miles long. we don't know how long it would take to build. in the meantime, we don't know what

kind of bridge there will be as far as economic ties are concerned in the future with so much still undetermined as far as brexit is concerned. well if this gets the go—ahead we will end up talking about that redline in the sea is between those two countries from an export perspective. there will be interesting if they build it and there is a little redline in the middle of this tunnel or bridge, clearly that says you have gone from one country to the other. this is like the kind of project that actually over the long—term will come to fruition. because about, there has been a focus on infrastructure, hs2 here in the uk, and there is a real willingness to greenlight many other major infrastructure projects. of course there are quite a few others that are higher up the list than this tunnel? the economies in northern ireland and scotland are two areas within the united kingdom that really probably do

need long—term, sustained government support to develop and expand their economies. so this is why something feels like a practical, realistic suggestion and one if it could be achieved, would have a long—term benefit. be achieved, would have a long-term benefit. 0k. let's move on now to another story that we have asked for your views about. this is a change at twitter to introduce so—called fleets to share fleeting thoughts. is this twitter playing catch up with the likes of instagram and snapchat? well it definitely says that when they released the news, they actually did do it via a tweet, surprisingly enough and said this probably feels a little bit like stories and tried to explain why it is not. but it is. you know, the more serious point where in the last few years we have seen everybody kind of going back. somebody goes into the public eye and finds a thing here is she said in a different context that doesn't feel acceptable ——

find they think he or she said. we see a lot of premiership footballers, for example, who have been found it to say inappropriate things when they we re inappropriate things when they were 15 or 16 years old, for example. obviously a number of celebrities again. you can see where the practical aspects of this come from. some people say why can't we edit our tweets, that would make it easier. why can't we edit our tweets, that would make it easierlj was that would make it easier.” was going to say, at the end of the day, don't say anything inappropriate in the first place and it won't matter whether it is there for four hours or forever. and a lot of people shouldn't say these things in the first place. thank you very much for talking through all of the stories from around the world. there is of course still so much more to come here on bbc news. we will be covering all the latest on the coronavirus outbreak. hello, then. there were winners and losers

with the weather on thursday, parts of northern england had close to nine hours of sunshine. look at this beautiful weather watcher picture sent in through the lake district. it was a different story south and east, in fact, the only brightness possibly down through east sussex were the beach huts because there was over 1.5 inches of rain. the rain pretty persistent, it's now moving into the new continent. not many isobars on the charts so light winds and clear skies and that is allowing those temperatures to fall away. it is going to be a chilly start to our friday morning and certainly it is worth bearing in mind as temperatures fall just below freezing in a few spots. the exception, perhaps the south—east, clinging on to cloud and northern ireland. there will also be mist and fog first thing as well. a few showers from the word go out to the west and some of these showers will merge together for long spells of rain as we go through the day. but for many, it is a case of once that mist and fog has lifted away, dry with some sunny spells coming through and certainly a quieter story for many. temperatures ranging from 7—11 degrees. now, as we move out of friday

into the weekend, we start to see another area of low pressure starting to move in from the atlantic. but i really want to emphasise as we move through the weekend, it's not going to be a write off by any means. yes, it's going to turn increasingly windy and there will be some rain at times, but for many of us the rain actually arrives saturday night into sunday morning. so you can see for the bulk of the country on saturday, clouding over from the west, but it will stay largely dry. we will have some rain, some of it heavy and persistent into north—west england, western scotland and northern ireland and by the end of the afternoon and the winds will strengthen as well. temperatures ranging as well between 7—11 degrees. now, because the winds are strengthening, gusts in excess of 50—60 miles an hour without rain, it will push that rain throughout quite a pace overnight saturday into sunday. so, for many of us we will actually see a good deal of dry weather around for the second half of the weekend. the early morning rain clearing in the south—east, a blustery day on sunday with plenty of frequent showers

putting in from the west but as with the nature of showers, some of you may escape them altogether and keep some drier, sunnier moments. again, highs between 7—11 celsius. and it looks as though this theme is set to continue for the early half the new working week. it stays blustery, yes, with plenty of sunny spells and scattered, sharp showers. whatever you're doing this weekend, take care.

good morning, welcome to breakfast with charlie stayt and rachel burden. our headlines today. a woman in her 70s becomes the first person in the uk to die of coronavirus as the government plans what to do next. what the scientists say is you've got a range of things that you can do to arrest or check the spread of a disease but you can't fire your shots too early. we'll be talking to the government's chief scientific advisor at 7.30am. the duchess of sussex joins prince harry on one of their last official engagements before they quit royal life. business leaders say the collapse of flybe