it brings the country's total to nearly 3,000. more than a third of all coronavirus fatalities now originate from the country. world markets are continuing their downward spiral, with new york stocks plunging off the back of european losses. the european central bank has announced an $820 billion emergency package to try to reduce the impact of the pandemic, as analysts warn the virus could send the world economy into recession. the dow and the hang seng in asia have struggled. america has ramped up its response to the coronavirus. president trump has closed his country's border with canada and invoked a wartime law to increase supplies of vital equipment to fight what he's called the invisible enemy.

you're pretty much up to date on the headlines. now on bbc news, click. this week, keeping our devices coronavirus free. the mobile phone app hoping to help more survive snakebites. and this eagerly anticipated video game is here — but don't expect to see it on an actual screen. in 1998, the release of first person shooter half—life sent a seismic shock across the world

of video games. it featured cinematic storytelling, taut action sequences and some of the creepiest bad guys ever to grace a video game. well, let's just say your hour has come again. i remember when half—life came out, november 1998, a massive moment in pc gaming. before than it had been doom that defined shooter games. half life reset the bar. a sequel followed in 200a. fans patiently awaited new half—life content, but its makers, a company called valve, went very quiet on the half—life front. until now, that is. marks cieslak has been to valve's headquarters in the us, where he's got his hands on the latest addition to the franchise, a game which has surprised many by embracing virtual reality.

bellevue, washington is home to valve software, and award—winning games development company. it has plans to reinvigorate virtual reality with half—life's help. a title which changed games forever. hey, mr freeman, i had a bunch of messages for you... the first half—life i played was probably the second one, before going back to the first one. but both of them start with a train journey going on, and you are being introduced to the world as the train does, as you enter the game, you're seeing everything that's going on in the world. you're slowly being immersed in it. i played the first half—life not long after it came out. pa: current topside temperature is 93 degrees. there's something about having glimpses of set pieces that you never fully get up close to in games, that somehowjust accelerates the world building by 1000%. the knowledge that you may not have even seen it,

i think is brilliant. pa: sector c test labs and control facilities... like, the idea that on a second playthrough, or a third, you can see something you didn't the first time around, and even then, it'sjust by chance, it's going on outside a window, and if you looked to the right you would have seen a different set piece. morning, mr freeman. looks like you're running late. everyone has been fixated on the idea of a new half—life game for years. the a game, the second one, it handed us the gravity gun, we had much more puzzling, much more storytelling. and it has almost become a kind ofjoke over the last 13 years of half—life 3 being announced, because valve has always teased that something would come. there were lots of rumours, everybody wanted something new, but finally being told that we have got something in that universe, it's a whole new full—length story, people are really, really excited. set before the events of half—life

2, the player assumes the role of alyx vance, a resistance fighter struggling to rescue herfather in city 17, the centre of an extra—dimensional invasion of the earth. there has been a lot of hype and high hopes around the rebirth of virtual reality. vr headsets have arrived from a variety of different companies. but in recent years, interest in the technology has waned. virtual reality, it seems, is lacking a killer app. that, however, could be about to change. it's probably fair to say that a new half—life game will be one of the most keenly anticipated titles of the last decade. but is making it a virtual reality only title a way of shifting headsets? i mean, this is a way to sell the headsets. the minute you put a half—life game on vr it's going to make people buy something or potentially look buying something they hadn't had before. but it's notjust available

on valve's headsets, it's available everywhere. so what this all does is potentially reinvigorate and kick—start everybody‘s interest in the vr space. one of our goals here was to hopefully show a bunch of people who looked at vr and thought, that looks interesting, but it hadn't convinced them yet, to say, "oh, there's an experience over there i really want," and hopefully they will see this and say, actually, i'll go check that out. this is the moment that i've been waiting for. it's been 16 years since half—life 2 was released, and 13 years since we've had any new half—life content. right now i'm going to try out the latest game in the series in virtual reality. i'm playing using valve's own vr hardware, called index. the controller features sensors which translate my hand and finger movements. this will allow me to interact with the game world in much the same

way that i would in the real world. here we've got an opportunity to try out some of the gameplay mechanics, so we have the gravity gloves, which should allow me to pull this. and grab it. and throw it towards one of those barnacles. let the barnacle eat it. when you see items you can grab them with the gravity gloves, catch them, store them in your backpack for later. the title has been designed to work with a wide variety of different vr headsets. but the game's demanding technical specifications means it will have to run on a pretty high—end pc. the full index vr set—up like this one isn't cheap either, costing nearly £1,000. can't open these doors, they're jammed. that will open it up for me. here we go. almost everything you interact with in the game works like it does in the real world.

everything apart from travel. getting around turns out to be one of the more interesting things in virtual reality. it's one of the trickier problems to solve. so many things that are local scale allow you to just use your body in a naturalway, like, i'm going to pick up a bucket to look at what's underneath it. traversing space doesn't quite yet allow you to use your body in that way, so solving that for players is one of reality. we've chosen to provide a variety of methods. there are a couple of different styles of teleportation and then a more traditional movement that we call continuous motion. and some people are more comfortable with one than another. a roomful of headcrabs here. looking for zombies. let's see if there's any extra ammo in here, because i have a feeling i'm going to need it pretty soon. this title is unusual for vr, because that's about 15—16 hours worth of gameplay, much longer than a lot of virtual reality titles. let's get rid of this barricade,

pull it out of the way. this is genuinely extremely tense. 0k, well, i need new underwear. this adds an entirely new dimension to video game combat. one of absolute pant—wetting fear. the big question is, will this can be the one that persuades more people to invest in virtual reality? there is a real chance that half—life: alyx is going to be a killer app for virtual reality in 2020. in part that's because it represents the return of one of the most acclaimed series in gaming, but it's also down to the fact that there are not a lot of developers making this kind of experience with vr with right now. half—life: alyx might not push virtual reality into the mainstream by itself, but it could persuade a lot of developers to start working on similar experiences in vr, and that could be huge. i think the only game that

could potentially sway me and make me want to get vr and play it is a valve game. the only downside is that i have to wander around my living room in fear of my wife walking in on me pretending to smash up some combine offices with a crowbar. i'm with you every step of the way. we'll find out what kind of impact half life: alyx has when it releases on march 23. hello, and welcome to the week in tech. it was a week that the british government ruled that chinese tech giant huawei would still be permitted to develop the country's 56 network after a rebellion from its own mps. finish satellite firm ice eye debuted images made with cutting—edge radar tech which can operate through clouds and at night. and a game—playing robot has been taught to admit its mistakes. i feel bad for letting you all down. yale university scientists said that by expressing vulnerability, the droid helps humans to communicate better. as the coronavirus pandemic continues, one chinese firm says it has created facial recognition that

can identify people while they're wearing protective masks. hanwang technology says it's 95% accurate in this scenario and can even connect to sensors to help china identify civilians suffering from high temperatures. we have seen drones carrying medical cargo before, but now autonomous ports can help load packages too. a drone station like this is opening at a swiss hospital where staff will use smartphones to log samples they can then scan and drop off for delivery to nearby labs. and finally, a digitalfood specialist injapan has been 3d printing sweet treats based on weather data. tokyo's 0pen meals has used algorithms to create flavoured designs, where wind speed alters shape, pressure levels dictate size and temperature determines colour. now, that's cooking up a storm.

we're all being told that the best way to combat the coronavirus is by washing our hands thoroughly with soap and water. but when we can't get to a basin, many of us are also using alcohol—based hand sanitiser. so much so that supplies have been running low. 0ne company we met in taiwan last year hopes to have found the solution. this is the eleclean, a device that is claimed to create your own disinfectant.

hopefully that will do the trick. the company does expect that this protects against the coronavirus. the issue is, they have actually sold out of them. but it's notjust about keeping our hands clean. how about our devices? this week apple issued new advice about how to keep our phones clean, but i would suggest that you don't do anything until you've heard what chris fox has to say. with the growing concern around coronavirus, i thought i would be better safe than sorry and smothered my phone with antiviral gel. but it turns out that sanitisers and actually damage the oil—repelling layer on your phone screen which is supposed to keep off fingerprints. so check this out. if i put my phone next one that has the layer intact, you can see that this one looks

like i've been eating pizza off it. it's covered in fingerprint and oil. this one does have some prints on it still, but not nearly as many, and then if i wipe down this phone with a microfibre cloth, the fingerprints come off super easy. if i try this one, some of the oil comes off but you can see it is still really smeary. and as a final test i popped my fingerprints on there. you can see that this is absolutely gross, and this one not nearly as dirty. so how can you clean your phone without damaging it? well, this week i met with microbiologist doctor lena cilic and she told me how. you don't actually need to use antibacterial or antiseptic products on your phone. you can simply use soap and water. unplug your phone, turn it off and remove the case. dampen a microfibre cloth with water & household soap. gently rub the surfaces of the phone with the damp cloth. take care not to get moisture in any of the openings because even water—resistant phones lose their protection over time. finally, dry your phone with a clean microfibre cloth.

we haven't used any anti—bacterial or antiviral gel on these phones so how do we know they are clean? we can use these swabs and this device which tells us the level of microbial activity on the phone in relative light units, or rlus. so the higher number we get, the higher number of germs. the results are pretty good. so we would want a surgical surface to have a rating of 50 or less and all of the phones have readings of less than this, so that's pretty good. so they're significantly cleaner with just soap and water? yep, they are. how is that possible without using antiviral gel? what's going on here? the main ingredient in soap is a detergent, which is basically lifting off the grease and grime and the germs from the surface of the phone, which is then rinsed off with water, and that's what makes it clean. there are a few other ways you can clean your phone safely. this week, apple changed its guidance and that is if you have an iphone, you can safely wipe it with a 70% isopropyl alcohol wipe — the kind you can get from a computer shop or online, if they haven't sold out. there are also devices that can

sterilise your phone using ultraviolet uvc radiation. this one is called phonesoap. it costs about £80, although there are cheaper ones available, and what you do is pop your phone inside and let it cook for about ten minutes. the manufacturer says that shouldn't harm your device but some phones or cases could be discoloured over time. finally, what can you do if, like me, you have stripped the oil—repelling coating off your phone's screen? there are some ways to fix it. first of all, you can get a screen replacement, although that is not going to be the cheapest option. or you could stick on one of those glass screen protectors, which is a quick and easy way to fix the screen. or you can try this. it's called liquidnano and this wipe puts a silica dioxide coating over the display, which says it will restore the oleophobic properties for 12 months. it cost between 20 and £30 and you have to let it set on the phone for at least half an hour. so i tried it out on the phone i ruined and i have to say it seems to have done a pretty good job! so that's one solution to what could have been an expensive mistake. just remember that if you do clean your phone, as soon as you touch it, you are putting

germs back on it again and the most important advice remains to wash your hands thoroughly and frequently. that was chris. now, later this month, a number of globes here at the british library, some of them over 400 years old, are going be made available online in full, 360 interactive form. this isn'tjust a way of immortalising these fragile objects but also making them available to the masses. the digital globes project will eventually see 30 of them brought to virtual life without the risk of any grubby mitts damaging the originals. anthony, here we have the capturing process, quite a few dslrs. can you talk me through the set—up? it's not actually capturing the whole globe, it's actually capturing elements, and the process is called photogrammetry. so once all the images go through to the computer, the software we'll be using will render all the images together to make one complete globe. once they are all knitted together, you have to make sure that the colour‘s right, is that what that colour chart‘s for? that is correct. for example, we can do a 3d print from the items. so if you can do a 3d print, you need to have it exactly the right colour. so people can recreate their own — not that these globes are entirely accurate. california seems to be an island. and it wasn't due to ignorance in the 1700s, as some earlier maps had it right.

that is correct. for example, we can do a 3d print from the items. so if you can do a 3d print, you need to have it exactly the right colour. so people can recreate their own — not that these globes are entirely accurate. california seems to be an island. and it wasn't due to ignorance in the 1700s, as some earlier maps had it right. inaccuracies were purposefully placed in maps for all sorts of reasons. such as, putting continental rivals, for example, down a wrong route or sending them the wrong direction.

as well as being available on the british library's website, there is also an augmented reality version which is within an app called sketchfab. this is accessible on any ar—compatible device. so here is the map and to turn it into ar, i tap on this and it is going to appear in front of me and then, i can travel around the world. it's an interesting contrast. while this looks so ancient to us, it was technology in its time and now we're mixing that in with a bit of augmented reality — technology of our time. so whilst there may have been a little polishing in the virtual versions, these globes still provide the history lesson of how the world was seen — notjust geographically, but politically — in each of their eras. so earlier, we were talking about the coronavirus. but now, to a very different sort of health risk — the snake bite. around 5 million people every year are bitten by snakes and,

of course, we know how dangerous their venom is. it can cause crippling injuries and be fatal. india is one of the parts of the world that has the highest death toll, falling into the tens of thousands every year. so could something as simple as a mobile phone app actually bring those numbers down? david reed has been gujarat in the west of india to find out. these guys are off to catch one of the world's most dangerous animals. the cobra. highly venomous. they're using a new life—saving app. it has told them a snake has been spotted in a local gujarati workshop. to bag it and get it back in the wild, they first have to find it in a pile of stuff

where every second thing looks like a scary snake. this is going to take time, so let's check back with them later. first, we're heading to a local hospital to see why this app is so important. this conservationist is going to guide us there with his indian snakes app. so we are here and have to go here which is about 25 kilometres away. it gives vital details to those bitten by snakes of nearby hospitals stocking the antivenom that could keep them alive. we actually are going to meet this doctor who is a specialist in snake bites. so this is the hospital. the hospital is there, the name is there, the phone number is there. we get there in snake bite rush hour. we've been here only a very, very short time. and in the matter of the last five minutes, three new patients have come in, complaining of snake bites.

to help identify the snake, patients often kill the animal that bit them. this is a highly venomous russell's viper. but administering antivenom carries its own health risks. doctors hold off using it and instead do a battery of tests until they know it is not a dry bite and the patient is showing the effects of venom. he will be under observation for 48 hours. if any venomous symptoms we see, then we will start the antivenom injection. often, there is no time for wait and see. a number of bite victims waste precious time visiting faith healers over hospitals — it's one of the reason so many die from bites each year in india — estimates say as many as 50 to 60,000 people. the indian snakes app aims to get people to hospital fast.

the first moments, the first minutes, first hour of a snake bite, is very, very important. the major problem that we face is people don't go to the hospital first, they go to the local, traditional healer who they trust. and then, when is not possible for him, he will send the patient to the hospital. the first warning on the dos and don'ts list is don't go to a faith healer. the second, don't suck out the venom, whatever you've seen in the movies. there's also a field guide to id venomous snakes. you want to see the snake in detail, so you can click on the picture, you zoom in... you can also report a snake in your house and call a rescuer. click on this. this is your current location, you'll find your nearest rescuer. all you need to do is contact the rescuer. remember these guys? let's see how they're getting on. actually, pretty well. they distinguish the snake from yards of cabling. it then instinctively made a dash straight into their black bag. and with a little coaxing, popped safely inside.

the indian snakes app is notjust about saving lives and helping snake rescuers, but also conserving and learning about snakes, especially in their conflicts with people. we get a lot of data from out of the country about the demographics, and epidemiology of snake bites. so it's kind of getting knowledge and giving knowledge app. do you think snakes are kind of understood? completely, they are one of the most misunderstood group of animals. so this app's main purpose is to sensitise people of india to start working on snake bites and snake conservation, and lead the coexistence of the snake's life in the future. better education about how to avoid and treat snake bites could well transform our attitudes to one of the most feared and demonised animals on the planet. dave reed there in india.

that is it for this week's show. you can keep track of the team throughout the week on instagram, facebook, youtube and twitter at @bbcclick. thanks for watching. hello, there. yesterday it was scotland that had the best of the day's bright weather, with some spells of sunshine coming through, for example in this weather watch picture from the aviemore area. it was not like that everywhere though. for england and wales, we've had a slow—moving weather front with us for a couple of days now, and that's been bringing some murky weather and outbreaks of light rain and drizzle. that front is this stripe of cloud you can see here. and it is this weather front that separates the mild but rather murky weather to the south, to the clearer, sunnier conditions, but colder conditions that we have

across the north of the uk. now, over the next few hours, that weather front is still with us, bringing cloud and rain, murky as well across parts of the midlands, wales and southern counties of england, with some hill fog patches. but it is the cloud that stops it from getting too cold, so it's actually quite mild. temperatures for some at around eight celsius over the next few hours. whereas, further north, with those clearer skies in place, yes, it i cold enough for a few bits of frost, although quite windy for the northern isles, and that will keep temperature from dropping too far. it will though bring a few showers into shetland and 0rkney as we start the day. there will be a few more showers coming and going into the north—west of scotland later on as well. but the winds will be getting lighter all the time. further south, we've got our weather front, that's not really moving very far through the day. if you start off with outbreaks of rain, chances are they will still probably be there, even into the latter part of the afternoon. temperatures for most around 8—10 degrees. but on the northern edge of this front, it could be quite chilly

for one or two areas, with temperatures around 5 degrees in one or two spots. for friday, well, ourfront is a still there but it is moving a little bit further southwards so the cloud still thick enough for an odd patch of rain. we'll have these cold winds, gusty winds, particularly around the headlands of south—west england, the hills and coasts of south wales and the wind will make you feel quite chilly even though there will be a little bit more of that sunshine to go around. looking at the weather charts into the weekend — this area of high pressure really is setting up for quite a prolonged dry spell of weather for the uk, but the amount of cloud that we see is likely to vary from place to place. now, on saturday, we could see some areas of cloud come across the north sea. that may well affect some of our eastern coast. but the best of any bright or sunny weather, well, probably west of scotland, north—west england, western wales, the favourite areas for seeing some lengthy spells of sunshine. that cool wind though will knock the edge off those temperatures around these eastern coasts. temperatures just 6 in aberdeen — that's not particularly warm for that time of year. the second half of the weekend also looks like it will stay dry with occasional bright or sunny spells and the fine weather looks set to last for many of us

into the first part of next week as well.

this is bbc news, welcome if you're watching here in the uk, on pbs in america or around the globe. i'm mike embley. our top stories: italy registers the biggest daily increase in deaths from the coronavirus anywhere in the world, 475 in the past day. the us closes its border with canada and invokes a wartime law to increase supplies of vital equipment. we're going to defeat the invisible enemy, i think we're going to do it even faster than we thought, and it will be a complete victory, it will be a total victory. world markets still plunging, as the european central bank says it will launch a multi—billion dollar emergency package to ease the impact of the pandemic. and the rise of the virtual gig — artists across the world come together to beat