this is bbc news with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. in several states in the us protesters demand to go back to work, saying that stay—at—home measures are too harsh. 84 tonnes of personal protective equipment are due to arrive in the uk today from turkey including hundreds of thousands of clinical gowns. fears in haiti, the poorest country in the americas, that an inadequate health care system could soon be overwhelmed. the number of deaths linked to coronavirus in uk care homes may be far higher than official figures currently show. and some of the world's biggest acts take part in an eight hour

star—studded event broadcast around the globe to honour key workers. hello and welcome to audiences in the uk and around the world. we are covering all the latest coronavirus developments in britain and globally. the virus continues to spread rapidly, with more than 2.2 million cases now confirmed in 185 countries. more than 150,000 people have died, but the true figure is likely to be significantly higher. the us has the highest death toll in the world with more than 38,000, one third of those are in the state of new york alone. spain is the second european country after italy where more than 20,000 people have now died.

here in the uk 888 deaths have been recorded in hospital in the last 2a hours, bringing the total to more than 15,000. some good news though from south korea which in february had the highest coronavirus rate in asia outside china, it's now reported just eight new cases in the last day. in the us, demonstrations have continued in several areas against lockdown restrictions imposed by state officials to try and stop the spread of coronavirus. donald trump has criticised state governors by saying they were getting carried away with imposing too many coronavirus restrictions. from new hampshire to minnesota, 0hio from new hampshire to minnesota, ohio to texas, these protesters want lockdown restrictions lifted. angry at how measures to control the spread of coronavirus have impacted

on work and the economy. some have lost theirjobs, their livelihoods and their incomes. and so they would rather risk catching the virus and continue like this. president trump using saturday's white house press briefing to reaffirm that america will again be open for business. texas and vermont will allow certain businesses to open on monday, while still requiring appropriate social distancing precautions. montana will begin lifting restrictions on friday, 0hio, north dakota, and idaho, have advised nonessential businesses to prepare for a phased opening, starting may the 1st. but there is concern that lifting restrictions to early could lead to more people becoming infected and potential for a more people becoming infected and potentialfor a spike in more people becoming infected and potential for a spike in the death rate. in new york, by far the worst affected state, a counter protest by this far smaller crowd who say the

trump administrations measures haven't gone far enough and that the president is responsible for the deaths of thousands of americans. when the virus first hit america, president trump said the cure for the disease should not be worse than the disease should not be worse than the disease should not be worse than the disease itself. america is often referred to as a divided nation whether it's on issues like health ca re whether it's on issues like health care 01’ guns, or whether it's on issues like health care or guns, or the environment, but that division remains. even on an issue like this, with the death toll of more than 38,000 people in the worlds richest nation. amongst fears that the nations wealth is now too in jeopardy. all ahead fears that the nations wealth is now too injeopardy. all ahead of a presidential election due in november. richard preston, bbc news. 84 tonnes of personal protective equipment are due to arrive in the uk today from turkey, including hundreds of thousands of clinical gowns. national health service providers have warned that some hospital trusts could run out of these items due to supply problems. the number of people who have died from covid—19 in the uk

jumped again yesterday, by nearly 900 people. and there are further suggestions that far more people may have died from coronavirus—related conditions in care homes across the uk than has been officially recorded. here's our correspondent john mcmanus. the faces change daily, so to the stories. but the heartbreak is the same. john coker, a detective constable for the british transport police, who's left behind a wife and three children. retired paediatrician judith darmady, awarded an 0be after founding a children's charity. just two of the thousands of victims of the coronavirus in the uk. and the numbers continue to grow. yesterday, it was confirmed another 888 people had died in hospital from the virus, bringing the total to 15,464. but those statistics don't include deaths outside wards. now the national care forum,

which represents adult care providers, says it has evidence that the number of deaths in care homes in one week was double those in the whole of the previous month. that's more than 4,000. the organisation says the care sector needs the same support as the nhs and has called for more personal protective equipment and comprehensive testing. if i have to hear another story about care home staff and support organisations who provide support in the community having to reach out to nail salons and other parts of the community to get hold of vital ppe, or as the bbc reported yesterday, staff having to resort to making their own scrubs out of curtain liners, it's an absolute disgrace, really. you know, we are not the dad's army. the government has been under fire for weeks over the distribution of ppe. after previously insisting that supplies were reaching the nhs, it's now admitted that's not

always the case. so far, serious shortages of equipment have only been seen in england. this consignment of facemasks and virus testing equipment landed in glasgow yesterday morning. but later today, a plane from turkey will arrive with 84 tonnes of ppe for england. including 400,000 gowns. labour says the government must work harder to guarantee continual supplies. meanwhile, downing street says it's giving local councils extra funding to deal with the crisis and it's also told them they must keep cemeteries and parks open. some closed their gates in recent weeks. john mcmanus, bbc news. businesses are urging the government to announce a further extension to the furlough scheme, which allows them to claim government help to pay 80 per cent of the wages of staff temporarily laid off during the lockdown. the job retention scheme, which will accept online applications from tomorrow, is currently due to run

until the end ofjune — a month longer than originally planned. disadvantaged teenagers in england will be able to borrow laptops to help them study at home when schools are closed during the pandemic. it will be up to schools or local authorities to decide who needs help with access to a computer and 4g routers to help families connect to the internet. an online academy offering pupils 180 lessons every week will also be launched to support remote learning. almost all of europe is still in lockdown and while some countries are beginning to ease restrictions, many others have extended the measures introduced to fight the virus. the impact is clearly visible, with empty streets being seen all across the continent, as the bbc‘s tim allman reports. this is madrid, one of the worlds great capital cities looking more

like a ghost town. spain has been one of the hardest—hit countries with more than 20,000 dead. the prime minister says the state of emergency is to be extended for another 15 days. nearly 500 more fatalities in italy, but that figure is down from the day before, the death rate appears to be slowing. applause in france, more positive news, this military field hospital is being partly dismantled as the city in the country improves. heading east, the capital of azerbaijan, where the streets are being sprayed with disinfectant. quarantine will last at least another two weeks. the countries borders remain closed. in lithuania, they have seen a record jump on the number of coronavirus cases, just one day after the health minister insisted the outbreak and reached its peak. the hotspot, this time just outside vilnius, military police stopping anyone getting in or

out. translation: it's been decided to test all adult residents in time. tests will be carried out to not only find active cases of the disease, but also to try to identify residents who already might have immunity. this situation is indeed dangerous. in poland, the presidential election is due to take place next month, but how does a country of 40 million people vote in the middle of a global pandemic? translation: the coronavirus epidemic is the reality for a couple of months coming, and a personal election will be possible in two yea r‘s election will be possible in two year's time at the earliest. if the parties don't agree, the only secure form of conducting a presidential election is postal voting. this is istanbul, where europe meets asia, another place where the streets are

deserted. the two—day curfew is in place, anyone younger than 20 or older than 65 has been told to stay home. the fight against the virus goes on. tim allman, bbc news. 0ur europe reporter bethany bell is in vienna. bethany, we will look at the europe—wide situation in just a moment but first bring us up to date with the situation in austria. well, austria was one of the first countries to impose a very strict lockdown after italy, and because of that, the health minister has said that, the health minister has said that austria has been able to flatten the curve and austria has also been one of the first countries in europe to take steps to ease the restrictions. last monday they opened thousands of small shops and garden centres and hardware shops and people have been going to shop

there, although strict social distancing measures are still in place, people are being urged to stay at home as much as possible and i saw yesterday when i was out shopping there are some people in town going carefully into small shops and things like that, but there are still a sense of trepidation here and the government has warned that if the infection rate starts going up again, something they will be able to measure in the next couple of weeks 01’ measure in the next couple of weeks orso, measure in the next couple of weeks or so, they will put the brakes on again. and that's it, it's about public confidence as much as public health? that has a great deal to do with it, of course, but what the government here is saying and other countries as well, like denmark, where they've already begun opening schools, for primary school children in day care centres, that they are doing these measures but keeping a very, very close eye on the rate of infections. germany's chancellor angela merkel has that the situation

is very, very fragile and they have to work incredibly carefully to see how things can progress. but even countries like spain, which of course has had one of the worst outbreaks in europe, they are looking at measures to try and ease restrictions, some workers allowed back this week. the prime minister has said that, although he wants to extend the state of emergency there, until at least may the 9th, he is considering measures to allow children to go out and play because spain has had this very strict confinement rule and children are not even been allowed outside and it looks as though those changes will happen soonerfor them looks as though those changes will happen sooner for them italy, looks as though those changes will happen soonerfor them italy, of course, also considering what measures it can take to try and get things going again, but of course, great trepidation, worries about the economy and worries about public health. bethany, one gets the impression each country has been dealing with this pandemic by

itself. has the eu played any sort of role in helping to determine public policy or helping financially? ministers are talking to each other very carefully but of course the numbers of cases in each country varies quite dramatically and there is now a more concerted effort by the eu to try and do things more in tandem and i think when it comes to questions of eventually opening borders, when travel becomes more of a possibility, that is where the eu will have to try and work together. ok, will have to try and work together. 0k, many thanks. 0ne will have to try and work together. 0k, many thanks. one of the poorest countries in the americas, haiti, is to begin to ease its lockdown allowing test our factories to reopen. it comes as official numbers suggest just three people have died from covid—19 there so far, but the world health organization is warning against complacency. the who is warning against

complacency. as the poorest country in the americas, haiti's healthcare system is already on the brink of collapse, as will grant reports. nowhere in the americas does coronavirus pose a greater threat than in haiti. with 60% of haitians living below the poverty line, the potential for the pandemic to devastate the population is clear. while many nations would struggle to cope with the serious covid—19 infection, haiti might never recover from one. the respiratory therapist in porto—au—prince told me the country is woefully underprepared. to tell you the truth, there was about approximately 40 ventilators in the country, for the whole country and we are 11 million people. and out of that 40, probably 20 are working and for those 20 working we have very, very limited amount of doctors that knows how to run it. with so few ventilators and icu beds available, preventing a major outbreak is the only way to save lives.

grassroots organisations are carrying out some basic, but vital tasks. distributing dozens of hand washing stations to the neediest communities. places like this, a mountainous village outside port—au—prince, where most families scratch a meagre living from the land. clean water is a precious commodity in haiti and the ngo's initiative could be crucial in helping residents combat the spread of the virus. but when it comes to self isolating, many face a stark choice. this man is a motorbike taxi driver and says that staying indoors isn't an option if he is to feed his family. translation: if they don't go out to work, we can't eat. he describes self isolation as impossible. translation: we want to respect the rules, but we can't. this is his wife. translation: i see what governments do in other countries, but here they don't do anything.

meanwhile, the picture in haiti's shantytowns is especially grim. market days have been cut back and demand for basics food supplies is growing desperate. the government has been distributing food parcels to the most vulnerable households, but people are angry at having to jostle and crowd for food. translation: the way they are distributing food is humiliating. people do not respect social distancing. the government should organise it better. i'm very concerned at the sanitary conditions. it is very worrying. a looming health care crisis is a huge threat to haiti, but then that is true of most of latin america. what is especially deadly here is the combination of the pandemic with the crippling economic crisis. one which would deny the continent's most impoverished people the opportunity to even go outside to earn a living. will grant, bbc news. some more positive news

now from south korea , which has reported only eight new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours. it's the first time in two months that the country has seen only a single digit increase in infections. shortly afterwards, the authorities in seoul announced that it would ease restrictions on social gatherings. let's get more on this from our correspondent in seoul laura bicker. laura, this will give other countries a lot of hope that south korea has had a very strict policy, hasn't it, of testing and chasing? right from the word go, so right from the very first case, january the 20th, the same day as of the united states announced its first case of coronavirus, but the difference here was that within 17 days this country had created a test and 100 laboratories ready to process those tests, and right from the outset, they decided to go after this virus aggressively and way back at the end of february, when it was the worst hit area, there were around 100 ambulances outside the

hospital and i said to officials, are you ever going to get this under control and they said to me at the time, yes, we are determined and now, just eight weeks later, here we are and they have now announced eight new cases. the last six days has all been under 20 daily new cases and it's worth mentioning that five of those eight new cases today come from overseas arrivals where they are testing every at the airport and also demanding everyone arriving has 14 days quarantine. what was it in south korea that gave them this efficiency and determination pressured mug had it been previous experience because south korea had been experienced in sars? it has middle east respiratory syndrome in 2015, south korea had the worst outbreak outside of the middle east, and at that time they realised they couldn't trace where patient zero had come from and where he had travelled to. at that point,

they recreated laws to try to track and trace those with the infection, so and trace those with the infection, so it means right now, the government, if i had coronavirus, the government would track me using my phone and i would also be required to fill in details on how i was feeling each day, the minute i went outside my quarantine area, the phone would ring, so that's the kind of chatting and chasing measures they are using. also at the time, i was told the day the first patient was told the day the first patient was diagnosed they realised how contagious this virus was, so they realised they needed a test quickly and told four laboratories they needed a test and they had this partnership between private and public health which allowed one laboratory to come up with a test within a week and four others come up within a week and four others come up with other tests, so that's how they did it quite quickly. experience. and also this public—private partnership which has

allowed infectious disease specialists to come to the forefront. thank you so much. thank you, laura. let's speak to hugh pennington, emeritus professor of bacteriology at the university of aberdeen. he has also co—chaired inquiries into e—coli outbreaks in scotland and wales. professor, thank you so much for joining us here on bbc news. i don't know if you caught what correspondence was talking about in south korea, the number of cases now down to single digits, due to very efficient and strict testing and tracing, but how would you compare the uk's response to something like that? well, we gave up doing that a very early in the outbreak here. we started doing that when people are coming back from skiing in italy and from china, essentially locked up those people and tested and did

contact tracing and then we gave up and felt the outbreak of gone too far, it wasn't possible to do it. i suspect the reason was we didn't have a testing capacity to do it, to test the hundreds of thousands of people necessary to follow up. when you co nta ct people necessary to follow up. when you contact tracing, you identify number one, and then you identify their contacts and sometimes you go on to identify their contacts and the only way you can do that with this virus is by testing. the symptoms are so common in many people, they don't have any symptoms, and in many the symptoms are so symptoms, and in many the symptoms are so mild it's not a very good guide. so i think we lost the plot on the testing, let's put it like that. should we have been planning if we didn't have the test, much earlier to acquire them? absolutely. 0ur criticism of the government is, yes, obviously there's a problem with getting it going, it wasn't the test itself, because the chinese published information on which you could design a test within about 24

hours on the 12th of january, so we had plenty of time in that sense, but the problem is getting the laboratories basically to do the test and public health england had some but it wasn't enough, and many other laboratories have this technology but don't do testing for microbes, but use the same technology and could design their same technology and could design their sa m e test technology and could design their same test again, within 24 hours, and it was rather late in the day it was realised they were all these facilities at the and you would offer the francis crick institute, not a macroalgae pace, but a place which could give a test, and that could have happened even earlier than that, lots of people up and down the country very well qualified, there was the argument about testing worse than no test—bed for this test that's not applicable. this is the antibody test. if we

mobilise all these other labs, cancer research labs and so on, it would only be for a period while we had the outbreak rolling towards its peak, but the people in those labs are highly trained, it would have been a good test, i'm sure the funding of those labs, charities and medical research council, would only be too happy to play their part as would the staff. not really a big problem. thank you very much for joining us on bbc news. thank you very much. some of the world's biggest music stars have taken part in a two—hour concert intended to thank healthcare workers and others in the fight against coronavirus, all from the comfort of their homes. participants ranged from rock veterans the rolling stones to newcomer billie eilish. the event was organised by a non—profit group global citizen and the world health organization to encourage everyone to stay at home and reduce transmission of the virus. bill hayton reports. # you can't always get what you want#

the rolling stones played separately, but together, although charlie watts appeared to have forgotten his drum kit and they were just some of the supporters who sang and played in this global effort against covid—19. 0thers included stevie wonder, taylor swift, paul mccartney, eltonjohn, and lizzo. through webcams and wi—fi, viewers were granted brief access to the music rooms of the rich and famous. health professionals spoke about their struggles and the heads of the united nations and the world health 0rganization encouraged everyone to work together. the whole event was broadcast on multiple television channels and streamed online. not so much to raise money, but to pass on messages of hope to everyone working on the front line or stuck at home. that was what billie eilish and her brother, fineas, intended with their chosen song, sunny. and the event closed with perhaps the biggest crossover number as classical pianist lang lang accompanied celine dion, lady gaga, john legend and andrea bocelli. it seemed that lady gaga had

achieved her aim in helping to organise the event, giving everyone permission to smile. bill hayton, bbc news. hello there, a subtle sundae pretty much right across the country with a little bit of cloud across england and wales this morning. after a murky start. some of the cloud could be stubborn throughout the day. in devon, it was a different story further north in scotland, coal start here, but absolutely beautiful, not a cloud in the sky. we are seeing scotland at its best at the moment. it does look as though that area of high pressure influencing the story sitting to the north—east of scotland circulating around that high, and easterly feed, so the wind coming in off a cool north sea, never a great source, really, and it just north sea, never a great source, really, and itjust means along the east coast it could be disappointing. further west, some of that cloud will linger through much

of the day across south—west england and also into northern ireland but elsewhere, it's dry, settled, sunny, and, asa elsewhere, it's dry, settled, sunny, and, as a result, temperatures a degree or so up and, as a result, temperatures a degree or so up on and, as a result, temperatures a degree or so up on where they were yesterday. highest values of 18. as we go through the evening and overnight, just need to point out down through the peninsular is, we could see a few showers moving towards the channel islands and the isles of scilly, and we keep the cloud in the extreme west but elsewhere a relatively quiet night. light frost in sheltered scotland and in the city centres, around 4—8. so monday will be another quiet day, the high pressure still sitting up to the north—east but a few more isobars perhaps to the south of the high, which means the wind could strengthen further, certainly monday and tuesday they will be more noticeable. again, we could run the risk of a few isolated showers down to the south—west and a little more cloud here, but it's a dry, subtle

story throughout but the winds are really going to be a future. in fa ct, really going to be a future. in fact, as we go into the afternoon, we could see gusts of wind in excess of 30 miles an hour, may be stronger, and that could take the edge off the weather. but temperatures on your thermometer will register around 12—13 on the east coast, highest values of 19 further west. as we move out of monday, into tuesday, a similar story but by wednesday, lighter winds, so there's the potential for temperatures to climb up into the low 20s. it stays dry, settled on sunday pretty much for all. take care.

this is bbc news. the headlines: in several states in the us protesters demand to go back to work, saying that stay—at—home measures are too harsh. 84 tonnes of personal protective equipment is due to arrive in the uk today from turkey, including hundreds of thousands of clinical gowns. fears in haiti, the poorest country in the americas, that an inadequate healthcare system could soon be overwhelmed. the number of deaths linked to coronavirus in uk care homes may be far higher than official figures currently show. and some of the world's biggest acts take part in an eight hour star—studded event broadcast around the globe to honour key workers.