this is bbc news — welcome if you're watching here in the uk, on pbs in america or around the globe. my name's mike embley. our top stories: another momentous number — as the death toll in america rises, 200,000 have now lost their lives. new covid restrictions in the uk. more masks, less socialising and bigger fines for those who don't adhere to the rules. never in our history has our collective destiny and our collective health depended so completely on our individual behaviour. another 200 whales become stranded off tasmania, making it australia's biggest beaching in modern times. and — one giant step for a woman? nasa says it's heading back to the moon and this time the crew

will be male and female. the united states has recorded 200,000 coronavirus deaths. the latest figures, compiled byjohns hopkins university, also show that almost 6,900,000 people in the us are confirmed to have been infected by the virus. this was president trump's reaction to the latest death toll. i think it's a shame. i think if we didn't do it properly and do it right, you'd have 2.5 million deaths — if you take a look at alternatives, you could have 2.5 million deaths, or something there about. you could have a number that would be substantially more. with all of that being said, we shouldn't have had anybody —

and you saw my united nations speech, china should've stopped it at their border. they should've never let this spread all over the world. and it's a terrible thing. but had we not closed our country down and reopened — and now we're doing well in reopening, the stock market's up, all of those things — but i think it's a horrible thing. but if we had not done it right, you could have two million, 2.5 million and three million. the numbers of deaths in the us are high and there is a growing concern that infections will continue to rise during the winter months. they equate to just below 62 deaths per 100,000 people. this is the sixth highest rate of mortality from covid worldwide. that's six times higher than germany — a country lauded for tackling the pandemic well — which has a rate of 11.32 per 100,000. and if we look at china where the virus started, they have a rate of 0.34 deaths per 100,000. as with any country, the rate of death across the us varies widely.

new york has been the hardest hit, with 33,000 deaths and close to half a million cases. here's what nancy pelosi, the democratic speaker of the house of representatives had to say about the handling of the outbreak. but this was preventable — not all of it, but much of it. and what could be lost in the future is preventable, too, if we embrace science. science instead of politics. at the centers for disease control, great scientists are there, demoralised by the political overturning of recommendations to save lives. dr craig spencer is the director of global health in emergency medicine at columbia university medical centre. he gave us his assessment to the us response.

i think what we know is that our response from the beginning in the us has been politicised and fragmented and patchwork in the worst ways, in part because we haven't had the centralised co—ordination, leadership and coherent messaging and support of science that we need when we're responding to epidemics, and particularly massive pandemics like this. your opening package was incredibly powerful. 200,000 deaths isjust a tragedy and every single one a mother, father, a son, a daughter, a sibling that we have to mourn and we have to honour, and i worry that the politicisation of our response has left us inure and somewhat immune to this very, very human and painful toll and the long—term effects of this — we're certainly not out of the pandemic now, but the long—term effects on trauma, on depression, anxiety, on mental health are going to be sewn for years and years to come. a recent survey from the cdc

reported nearly half of people reported increasing substance use, reporting trauma or seriously considering suicide as a result of the pandemic and so, we have to deal with this, we have to recover from this, we have to continue to respond by investing in public health and our president needs to stop downplaying the impact of this and celebrating what has truly been a failed response from his part. you know, of course, people will argue about how we got here, but we are where we are. is the implication of what you're saying that, actually, it's going to get much worse from here on in, not better? well, it certainly has the potential to get worse in the fall and in the winter as viruses like coronaviruses and the flu begin to find a greater footing, and we expect there to be

an increase in cases. and so, what this means is we must finally invest in a sound public health response that includes testing, tracing, support for isolation and economic relief and if we choose to remain in the patchwork response that we have, we will continue to see some states, some areas, do well because their states and local leaders have chosen to invest in public health, which is the only roadmap to returning to normalcy. and you will see some states, much as we have now, not respond effectively, have significant outbreaks and put significant strain on our healthcare resources and, you know, the tragedy will be in more preventable deaths, more preventable suffering that could have been avoided. nancy pelosi is right. much of it was preventable — not all of it, but much of it was — and certainly, our response and the poor quality of it was preventable. dr ashwin vasan.

apologies, that was the public health professor from columbia medical school. the united kingdom has reached ‘a perilous turning point‘ in its struggle to contain the coronavirus pandemic. that's according to prime minister borisjohnson who has set out a series of new restrictions for england. he stressed that ‘significantly greater restrictions‘ will be brought in if new cases continue to rise sharply. mrjohnson had addressed parliament earlier in the day before explaining his decisions in a televised address to the nation a few hours later. i'm deeply, spiritually reluctant to make any of these impositions or infringe anyone‘s freedom but unless we take action, the risk is that we will have to go for tougher measures later when the deaths have already mounted and we have a huge caseload of infection, such as we had in the spring. so will the latest measures introduced across the uk be enough to suppress the virus? our medical editor fergus walsh

looks at the challenges ahead. how do you strike a balance between bearing down on coronavirus while keeping the economy moving? that's the challenge facing ministers. closing bars and restaurants at 10pm should reduce the amount of alcohol people drink in public, and so perhaps may make behaviour less risky. people will be a little bit more sober when they go home, which means they are less likely to engage in risky behaviours. they're perhaps more likely to remember to put on a face covering on when they get onto the bus and the tube. they may go home with friends, but the chances are it's not going to be in as large a group as they would be in the bar with. the latest reproduction or r numberfor the uk is between 1.1 and 1.4, which means that for every ten infected people, they'll be passing the people on to between 11 and 1a others. and the prime minister made clear that unless r falls below one, then further

restrictions are likely. it's thought that coronavirus cases are doubling roughly every seven days and are increasing among all age groups. hospital admissions are rising, too. yesterday, government scientists said that, left unchecked, we could see 50,000 cases a day by mid—0ctober, and perhaps 200 deaths a day a month later. though they stressed this wasn't a prediction, but that would still be a fifth of the 1,000 daily deaths at the peak in early april. encouraging people to work from home again should mean fewer chances for the virus to spread on public transport and in offices. then there is scotland's decision to ban most people visiting other households indoors, aimed at tackling a key driver of infection. we can expect this to have a significant impact

because we know that this disease is spread from person to person, particularly in indoor environments where there isn't so much ventilation and there may be multiple people close to each other. but on the other hand, there will be impacts on well—being, particularly amongst the most vulnerable, from not being able to see friends and family as much. one thing that has not been tried here is a night—time cu rfew. that was imposed in antwerp, in belgium in latejuly and helped reduce an outbreak there, though cases across belgium are now higher than in the uk. fergus walsh, bbc news. tesla says it's slashing battery costs to speed a global shift to renewable energy. during his battery day presentation and annual general meeting, chief executive elon musk said the company was finding new ways to manufacture batteries with the aim of producing a 25 thousand dollar electric car in 3 years time.

he described the meeting as ‘insane‘, with shareholders parked in tesla cars, honking horns in a car park. perhaps no single industry has been as hard hit by the coronavirus pandemic than airlines. traveller numbers have plummeted, so has revenue. and as countries introduce quarantine measures, the numbers wanting to fly are reduced further. now the body that represents airline companies is calling for all passengers to be tested before flying. the bbc‘s tim allman reports. this has been called the worst year financially in the history of aviation. an entire industry effectively brought to a halt. planes grounded all around the world. quarantine may help combat the virus but it deters passengers. so, could there be an alternative? systematic testing of all passengers at departure would guarantee that you fly people who are not infected by the virus

or with the risk of being infected which is very, very limited — limited by the sensitivity of the test. the scale of the problem is immense. according to the international air transport association, airline revenues for 2020 are predicted to be $419 billion — a 50% drop on previous year. losses for all airlines are estimated to be more than $81; billion. he they're expecting 2.25 billion passengers this year, some airports, like here in rome, have already piloted a scheme where they test all departing passengers. it might make travelling a little more complicated but the airlines are convinced it'll work. it's clear that it will introduce another step in the passenger journey and at the airport but we think first of all it's manageable, we have successfully managed a security check in which we control

every passenger. the first step is agreeing a standard test that is relatively cheap, effective and can be approved by regulators and all destination countries. airlines hoping this will get their industry back on its feet and passengers back in the air. tim allman, bbc news. stay with us on bbc news — still to come: in what's seen as a big step forward in the fight against climate change — china commits to be carbon neutral by 2060. ben johnson, the fastest man on earth, is flying home to canada in disgrace. all the athletes should be

clean going into the games. i'm just happy that justice is served. it is a simple fact that this morning, these people were in their homes. tonight, those homes have been burnt down by serbian soldiers and police. all the taliban positions along here have been strengthened, presumably in case the americans invade. it's no use having a secret service which cannot preserve its own secrets against the world and so, the british government has no option but to continue this action even after any adverse judgement in australia. concorde have crossed the atlantic faster than any plane ever before, breaking the record by six minutes. this is bbc news — the latest headlines: in the united states, the death toll reaches 200,000. millions more are confirmed to have been infected. new covid restrictions in the uk — more masks, less socialising

and bigger fines for those who don't adhere to the rules. this week sees the general assembly in new york — well sort of. world leaders are not there in person, delivering their speeches on tape. and the headlines have been made by president xi of china. he's announced plans to make china carbon neutral by 2060. the announcement is being seen as a significant step in the fight against climate change. but the speech gave few details about how china would achieve carbon neutrality. translation: humankind can no longer afford to ignore the repeated warnings of nature and go down the beaten path of extracting resources without investing in conservation, pursuing development at the expense of protection, and exploiting resources without restoration. the paris agreement on climate change charts the course for the world to transition to green and low carbon development. it outlines the minimum steps to be taken to protect the earth, our shared homeland, and all countries must

take decisive steps to honour this agreement. i spoke to kevin rudd, former prime minister of australia and president of the asia society policy institute, about whether china's commitment to carbon neutrality is feasible. i think it is possible, and the reason i say so is because china does have a state planning system and, on top of that, china has concluded, i think, that it is in its own national interests to bring about a radical reduction in carbon over time, so the two big announcements coming out of xijinping at the un general assembly have been, a, the one you've just referred to, which is to achieve carbon neutrality before 2060, and also for china to reach what's called peak greenhouse

gas emissions before 2030. the international community would be pressuring them to bring that forward as much as possible, respectably, we hope, to close to 2050, and we hope close to 2025 as far as peak emissions are concerned, but we'll have to wait and see until china produces its 14th 5—year plan. i guess we can probably assume that president trump wasn't impressed, he's made his position pretty clear on these matters. how do you think other countries will respond or will they just say, "china can do that, we really can't." i think you are right to characterise president trump's reaction as dismissive because ultimately he does not seem to be persuaded at all by the climate change science, and the united states, under his presidency, has been completely missing in action in terms of global work on climate change mitigation activity. but when you look at the other big player on global climate

change action, it's the european union, and i think positively speaking, both the european union, and working as they did through their virtual discussions with the chinese leadership last week, have been encouraging, directly, the chinese to take these sorts of actions. i think the europeans will be pleased by what they have heard. but there is a caveat to this as well. one of the other things the europeans asked is for china not just to make concrete its commitments in terms of peak emissions and carbon neutrality, but also not to offshore china's responsibilities by building a lot of carbon—based or fossil fuel—based power generation plants in the belt and road initiative countries beyond china's borders. that's where we have to see further action by china as well. just briefly if you can, you know there will be people the authorities in australia say a futher two hundred whales have become stranded off tasmania,

taking the total number to four hundred and seventy. the discovery makes it australia's biggest beaching in modern times. 0ur correspondent, shaimaa khalil, told us this sort of event is not unusual. most of the new 200 whales have already died and we already know that some rescue teams are sending a boat to assess the situation to see if any can be saved. they were spotted ten kilometres or six miles from the original part of 270, one third of that group had already died. a0 rescue members have been working for two days now, managing to save 25 and hoping to push more out into the sea but it is challenging because they are facing really strong tides but they are working with really

big animals in a very tight space in a large number and also in shallow waters. the scientists say that this will take days and they simply do not know why this happens. we know that in areas around australia and new zealand that big, big large groups of whales make seasonal migrations of up to 1000 animals per pod actually and the scientists were not able to say what drew the animals to the shore in that manner. in 1969 it was a small step for man, in 2024 will it be a giant step for women? nasa has outlined plans to send the first female astronaut to the moon in the next 4 years. the mission would be the first landing with humans in around fifty years. laura forczyk is the founder of the space analysis and consulting group astralytica. she gave me her reaction to the news.

oh, it's fantastic, this a long time coming. we've been wanting to get back to the moon for decades now and, in a way, it's a perfect time because we're not only going as the united states of america, we're going as an international collaboration, and we're going with a more representation of the human body so it will be men and women this time. laura, why has it taken so long to get back? a lot of politics, a lot of deciding which priorities to spend our money on, so in previous presidential administrations, there have been plans to go back to go back to the moon, however they've all been cancelled, they've been too expensive or congress has decided it wasn't worth the money and so this time around, there is a new initiative, and it's going with international collaboration and with commercial partners which hopefully makes it more sustainable for the future. so it's not like apollo, where we planted a flag and we left. this time, it's going to be a sustained lunar base that we can learn from so that we can go on to mars and the rest of the solar system. what are your thoughts

on the plan to do it by 2024, is that realistic? it's a very optimistic plan. i think it will depend on how much funding congress allocates to nasa's plan and it is technically feasible however money—wise, politically, it's probably going to slip a little bit, we'lljust have to see. presumably, or at least there may well be a political angle to the choice of date, mightn‘t there? yes, that's the speculation is that 2024 was chosen as the date because that would be the end of a second trump administration if he is elected. the original date that was planned prior to the announcement of 2024 was 2028, landing humans on the moon by 2028, and i wouldn't be surprised, ifjoe biden is elected, there is a biden administration, that we would see a slip in the day, maybe 2028 or some other date in between. what do you think is the possible significance of there being women on board, and possibly the first woman landing on the moon? what does it mean in a wider sense?

in sri lanka, tea is picked by women who live and work on isolated plantations, often in poor conditions. their children are given limited access to higher education. but in a remote hillside plantation in central sri lanka, a group of girls has become the first in the estate to go to university.

and maybe become astronauts, why not? and you can get in touch with me and most of the team on twitter. also, the bbc news website.

thank you for watching. hello there. tuesday marked the autumn equinox, and also the last of these very warm and sunny days. we saw 26 degrees in santon downham in suffolk on tuesday afternoon. by friday, it looks like temperatures in suffolk will only manage to make around 12 or 13 degrees. so, noticeably colder as we end the week. and the change comes behind this cold front, which is slowly spreading its way southwards and eastwards early on wednesday. ahead of it, there will be a lot of cloud around. some showers too, longer spells of rain, some of which could be on the heavy, maybe thundery side. but for scotland and northern ireland, skies will be clearing behind the weather front. so we start wednesday off on a chilly note here. but again, for england and wales, where we have the weather fronts, the cloud and rain, it's going to be quite mild, 12—15 degrees

to begin the day. but a lot more cloud on wednesday for england and wales. outbreaks of rain tending to become more persistent as it pushes eastwards. some heavier bursts again across the south—east, and winds will pick up as well probably the best of the sunshine through the day will be scotland and northern ireland, but it will be chillier here, low teens celsius, 14 to maybe 19 across the south—east. but it looks like it could be quite went across the south—east of england into the evening. persistent rain here, winds also picking up across the north sea coast, across the south—east and across the south coast as well. that's because area of low pressure will eventually push off towards scandinavia, and a new area of pressure will arrive just in time for thursday. now, this one's going to bring some windy weather too. showers or longer spells of rain, some of which could be quite heavy. there will be some sunshine around, probably the best of it across the northern part of scotland, but the winds will become a feature across south wales and south—west england, 40, 50mph. and it's going to be cool, 11—14 celsius

across the country. as we move out of thursday into friday, that area of low pressure continues to push over towards the north sea and the near continent. then we're in the run of pretty cool, brisk northerly winds. looks like most showers will be packing into northern and eastern areas closer to that area of low pressure. the further south nd west you are, the better chance of seeing some sunshine, actually. not feeling too bad in the sunshine, but in some shade in that northerly wind, it will feel cool. things look like they'll settle down a little bit thanks to a ridge of high pressure into the weekend but it's still going to remain on the cool side, both by day and by night.

this is bbc news.

the headlines: president trump has said it's horrible that the number of deaths from coronavirus in the united states has exceeded 200,000, but mr trump said his intervention had helped reduce the toll. democratic critics have highlighted what they say is mr trump's ineffectual response to the pandemic. the british prime minister borisjohnson has used a national television address to call for a "spirit of togetherness", urging people to observe the new rules he's bringing in to combat the rapid rise in coronavirus infections. he said the country faced an unquestionably difficult winter ahead. the authorities in australia say a further 200 whales have become stranded off tasmania, taking the total number of whales to 470. the discovery makes it australia's biggest beaching in modern times and draws more attention to a natural phenomenon which scientists say has no known cause. now on bbc news, hardtalk.