this is bbc news — the headlines. the democrats in the house of representatives are inching closer to removing donald trump from office. an impeachment vote is expected later. first — they'll vote on a resolution urging his cabinet to use the twenty—fifth amendment. senior republican — liz cheney — says she will vote to impeach. president trump has dismissed moves to impeach him for inciting the deadly assault on congress as a witch—hunt. speaking on a visit to the mexican border — he also said there was no danger that his own administration would oust him beforejoe biden took over as president next week. the usjustice department and the fbi have opened criminal investigations into more than a—hundred—and—sixty individuals for their part in last week's attack on the capitol building in washington. the charges are likely to include assault and seditious conspiracy. us military commanders have issued a statement condemning the riots. now on bbc news.

welcome to hardtalk, i'm stephen sackur. the coronavirus is a durable and evolving enemy. nowhere is that more evident than in south africa, the hardest—hit nation in africa, now grappling with a highly transmissible new strain of covid—19 that is causing international concern. my guest is virologist barry schoub, chair of the south african government advisory committee on covid—19 vaccines. what does south africa's covid crisis mean for the worldwide effort to end the pandemic?

professor barry schoub injohannesburg, welcome to hardtalk. good afternoon, stephen. thank you. it's good to have you on the show. how bleak is the covid picture in your country, south africa, right now? it is bleak. we are well into our second wave which is really manifesting quite a bit more seriously than our first wave. we are really averaging about 18,000—20,000 new cases per day, as against the highest peak that we had in our first wave of about 14,000, so it gives you some idea that we are on a steep upward trajectory of our second wave, so it is very worrying and we are worrying it's going to move up to our province of gauteng where johannesburg is located and it will expand quite considerably,

so it is a worry. would it be fair to say in the language we use in this pandemic that right now, in south africa, it is out of control? well, you know, we try to control it. at the moment, we don't have a vaccine control but we do have the other infection prevention controls and that could, with human behavioural controls, could, to some extent, to a significant extent, control it. so is it out of control? certainly it's expanding. can it be controlled? it can be ameliorated, yes. how much of this is directly linked to the fact that you in south africa have a new strain of coronavirus, i've seen it described as variant 501, or mutation e484k. i'm no expert, but whatever you call it, it is highly transmissible, not more dangerous to any individual who has got it but much more transmissible.

is this the reason why south africa is in the middle of this crisis? stephen, to answer, it is a combination of factors. i think it's human behavious. because certainly human behaviour triggered the second wave. that started it, that triggered it. but the variant, as you say, which is considerably more infectious, is also contributing to it. i think it's a combination of both. i think one of the big problems is that now in our second wave, people are tired of all these infection prevention measures. in the first wave, people were much more compliant because it was unknown, there was a lot more anxiety but now with the second wave, unfortunately, people are not totally, or not significantly even sticking to what they should be sticking so that, to a large extent, is driving it.

and the variant is also helping it along. president ramaphosa recently said, "we have let our guard down." in late december, he imposed a new set of nationa restrictions which people are calling a de facto lockdown. in some ways, it is an odd one, very draconian, you have a curfew from 9:00 in the evening until 6:00 the following morning, where few countries have had a full—on curfew, but in other ways, it's not draconian and at all because up until early evening, you can still get a meal in a restaurant, you can meet with friends indoors, you can still gathering outside venues. has south africa got this wrong? i don't think so. the problem is really balancing keeping the economy going because, as you know, our economy is not in great shape, to put it mildly, and to kind of impose restrictions that would affect the economy would be very,

very harmful to the country so the government was really faced with a problem... hang on, hang on, let's stop you right there. are you saying it's more important to keep the restaurant industry alive as opposed to keeping thousands of people alive who are going to die of covid—i9 because they are going to catch it in restaurants in the mid—afternoon and early evening? that's a very tricky question, stephen. no, i think we had to do a calculation, really. how many people would get infected in a restaurant? i don't think there'd be a significant number. i think it's the major gatherings and this has been shown scientifically — a very recent publication showed this, it's the gatherings, festival—type gatherings. restaurants have strict rules about wearing a mask coming into the restaurant, taking the mask off while you are eating but avoiding the mixing, the waiters wearing masks, hand sanitisers, etc, so those precautions are in place to try to

limit the spread. 0n the other hand, the problems, of course, in our country is that if you have too draconian lockdown measures, for example, it affects other health issues because if there is a shutdown, people stay at home, for example, and it's been shown quite clearly in numbers that other health things, maintenance of hiv and tb therapy, antenatal, those things do suffer, so you have to kind of balance the cost of the restrictions, economic and health costs, versus what we are saving from a public health point of view in terms of covid spread. i think thatjuggling act is a fine act. it is based on science. very often it does sound, to some extent, contradictory, and maybe to some extent has been lampooned, but i think that it has been really more or less worked out. keep the economy 0k, keep the other health sectors, maintenance therapy 0k. at the same time wait up

to what are going to prevent in terms of covid so the curfew, for example, is a very limited damage to the economy but it does limit, for example, alcohol drinking. there is alcohol ban as well. trauma, which can overload the hospital system, etc, etc. but in brief, president cyril ramaphosa is clearly on the cusp of extending the lockdown or restrictions, at least another month, but there is a big question mark about whether he is going to make them tougher. as your country's leading virologist, do you think they should be tougher right now? i think we really are in quite a precarious position with covid, which is expanding rapidly, as i mentioned earlier, and i think certain restrictions do need to be tightened. some need to be prolonged. i don't think personally, as a virologist, we need to go into hard lockdown,

what we call lockdown five, it is going to be too damaging to the other things, the economy and other health issues. explain something that really puzzles me. why is it that across the continent of africa, most countries are giving us readouts, official stats on coronavirus, which suggests they have been hit much less hard than, for example, the united states and most of western europe, and yet the most prosperous country in the entire continent, the country with the best healthcare infrastructure and the most modern economy, the most sophisticated economy in africa, is the country where coronavirus has impacted hardest. in many ways, it's counterintuitive. what has led south africa to a european—style experience with coronavirus when the rest of africa, thank god, appears to have escaped more lightly? i think it is a combination of factors, like everything

else is a combination of factors. it is a highly urbanised country, an industrialised country and i think that goes with the spread of coronavirus because it facilitates people coming together in congregate environments and that facilitates the spread of the virus and that is why it spread in europe much more so than in south africa, particularly in your country, the united kingdom, much more so than in south africa, because that kind of industrialised environment does promote the spread of the virus. south africa is a much more industrialised country than many of our neighbouring countries. that is one factor. the second factor is urbanisation. many of these countries are largely rural and we know that rural environments where people are more spread out in an outdoor environment probably decreases the spread of the virus. many of the countries of course are tropical countries,

a lot of sunlight, a lot of outdoors, that probably also decreases the spread of the virus and probably also to a very significant extent is the degree of reporting. i think there is a significant amount of underreporting of cases, underreporting of mortality in the countries to the north of us. we have a pretty good reporting system, not ideal, i agree, but pretty good and certainly much better than our neighbouring countries. you also have these deep inequalities in south africa. i read one extraordinary statistic in one of the cities hit hardest by covid, port elizabeth, there were 59 ventilators, 59 people on ventilators in hospital, 57 of those were in expensive private hospitals, only two in public hospitals. if you are poor in south africa today and you get covid, your chances of getting hit badly and dying are way higher, are they not? you are right, you are right,

that is one of the problems, one of the things we do have to improve on. i think the eastern cape as you mention, port elizabeth, is a particularly deprived part of the country. i don't think that ratio would apply injohannesburg or cape town or durban. you might have it, but i don't think the ratio, you unfortunately picked the worst example, but you are absolutely correct, there is that equality, that needs to be addressed as quickly as possible. does south africa need to be isolated from the rest during the government how to advise its vaccine strategy. there are many critics who think that the government is

already messed this up. you already messed this up. you already have i already messed this up. you already havei million already messed this up. you already have i million vials of vaccine that are due to be in south africa through the course of this month and an extra half a million coming in february. free country with a population of 60 million plus, this is disastrous.— disastrous. that1 million cominu disastrous. that1 million coming in _ disastrous. that1 million coming in and _ disastrous. that1 million l coming in and half-million coming in and half—million coming in and half—million coming at the end of next month, orthe coming at the end of next month, or the highest priority for the health care workers, there is extensive negotiations going on with various manufacturers to have a vaccine roll—out in the department or the minister of health is confident that we will be able to immunise the entire two thirds of the population, which is what we need to get to for getting herd immunity. that is

around 30 million of the adult population. and he is confident that we are going to get to that we are going to get to that stage. hang on, professor schoub. you are talking about immunising a0 million people to get some sort of collective immunity. that is 80 million doses of vaccine, because everybody needs two doses. you are currently telling me you've only got on order 1.5 million doses and you are telling me this isn't disastrous? sounds terrible and it's not just me, ijust noticed a few days ago a group of nine of south africa's most eminent scientists slammed the vaccine situation saying, "it beggars belief that south africa, against all reasonable expectation, finds itself in the group of poorest, most vulnerable countries dependent on the international covax programme for access to vaccine yet we in south africa are not a poor country." that is an unfortunate...

i don't want to use too strong a term, i am not sure i would use the term eminent scientists, i don't think their science is that eminent, and i don't think that... i think they are sparing with the truth as well. forgive me, but what is wrong with their analysis when they say south africa is very much a middle income country, it has got massive resources, and yet it is as vulnerable, right now, to the lack of supply of vaccine, as some of the poorest countries on earth? i can explain if you would let me explain. i think the 1.5 million is what is on its way, there is vaccine is, and unfortunately there are nondisclosure agreements which i have signed, which i can't reveal on air, which will assure the country a vaccine for the entire year. that is negotiation which is taking place. the minister has in

fact mentioned that. but unfortunately our eminent colleagues ignore that, and they might have another agenda, which causes them to kind of go on a rampage, literally a rampage, you know, it is interesting, if you look at the covid epidemic, it has three consequences. conspiracy theories, miracle drugs, such as chloroquine, and the vaccine and also the blame game. and the blame game unfortunately is taken up by the scientists, which is very unfortunate and i will tell you why it is unfortunate. it is undermining trust. it is undermining trust in the government, and authorities, to get out of the non—palatable infection control procedures like wearing masks, physical distancing, socially isolating, and if the public is undermining the trust of these precautions which are going out, i mentioned that in the article... i know. you know what, i read your article with great care.

and when you say people are playing the blame game it seems to me you are playing the blame game too. first of all, you are blaming people who ran certain trials in your country, trials of vaccines, because you say those people should have made sure when they agreed to do the trial work that they got guaranteed suppliers of the vaccines after the trial. so you are blaming other people, not yourself, for that. you're also blaming the rich countries of the world. you say they have been indulging in what you call a "vaccine grab", hoovering up most of the available vaccines coming out of the world's pharmaceutical companies. so on both counts, you are the blame gamer. no commitment i tell you i am blaming? i am blending the system. i am blaming the system. i am blaming the system, because i think vaccines should be treated not as other commodities. vaccines need to be taken out of the market economy, because vaccines are different to other commodities. and i think that is the crux of the problem. because when profit drives the purchase of vaccines, this is the unfortunate,

this is the casualties. it is unfortunate because it is not only a social responsibility, it is a responsibility when you are in a pandemic that the entire world, low income countries, middle income countries, high income countries, get equitable access to vaccines. what has happened, and you can't deny it, is that 13% of the world's population pre—bought 51% of the production of vaccines. you mean 13% of the world's... the richest nations of the world, have hoovered up a lot of the vaccine that is available? that is what you are saying? exactly that. it is not only social responsibilities, it is actually sensibility. because pandemics don't recognise borders. pandemics spread across borders. and if you have a country or a region where a virus is circulating, even if your country is protected by vaccines it can never be protected 100%, that virus

will will find itself into the high income countries. that is one problem. the second problem is a virological problem. if the virus is circulating in one point of the world, that is when it is going to pick up these mutations, which is going to threaten the rest of the world. listen, i totally understand the point you are making, the interconnectedness of it all, and the equitable nature of the system you want to see, but i come back to this one point. you are the guy who was the chief adviser to your government on vaccines. yours is not a poor government. was it not your national duty as a south african to tell the government that they should be buying up substantial amounts of vaccine? months and months ago, when the uk government was doing it, the us government was doing it. you in south africa could have afforded to do it as well, but you chose not to, and that is why these eminent or not scientists and others have accused you of being asleep at the wheel.

no, but stephen, the reason for that, the reason for that is, let me correct you. we are not a wealthy country. we are a middle income country which has got severe economic woes. we were faced, and it is very easy to go now and retrospectively look at other factors, but we were faced at the time with putting down 2.4 billion rand, south african rand, which is a substantial amount of money, on deposit, non—refundable deposit, during vaccine trials, for vaccines which at that stage we didn't know whether they were going to work or not. the high income countries could afford to do that. because if the vaccine didn't pan out, or weren't suitable for their registration authorities, those deposits would not affect their economies in the same way. look, i don't answer for the department of health. 0ur advisory did recommend, and this is published on our website, to negotiate through bilateral negotiations, for whatever reason, the treasury or the department

of the government could not afford 2.4 billion rand deposit at risk. right, 0k, very clear, it was about money. and i get that message loud and clear. the united kingdom, which as you have pointed out, has a bigger covid crisis in south africa right now, the uk has decided that to ensure the maximum collective safety of the community, they are going to roll out the vaccine by prioritising first doses and not giving the second dose after three weeks, but using more of the available doses for first dose use, and extending the period until the second dose, as long as 12 weeks. will south africa do that as well to offer protection to as many people as possible, as quickly as possible? we may do that. it has got pros and it has got cons.

the disadvantage, of course, is that you have a 12 week period of vulnerability, a 12 or ten week period of vulnerability. so we need to evaluate how the vaccine is going to roll out. is that feasible? it would be very advantageous, as you mentioned, because it is being rolled out in the united kingdom. so we may well do that. but i think we need to look at the population, how the vaccine is reaching out to particular parts of the population, and make that evaluation at a later stage. a final question which people around the world will really want a clear answer to. in your view, is the south african mutation, the variant of the covid—19 vaccine, going to be more resistant to the vaccines that we currently have, or not? in basic terms, should we be deeply worried about the south african variation? i was waiting for that question. stephen, the answer is that this is intense research done in south africa and worldwide, looking at our variant, at the brazilian variant, in other words, the variance

with additional mutations to the united kingdom variant. at this stage it is looking good, but i must say it is preliminary. preliminary evidence seems to point to the vaccine being effective, but it is still being intensively researched. hopefully it still will be effective. so truly, you don't know? you are being optimistic with me, but you don't know yet whether your variant of covid—19 might do much more resistant to the international vaccines? we have got indications that it will not be resistant. but the jury is still out, because the research has not been completed. barry schoub, we have to leave it there, but i thank you so very much for joining me on hardtalk. thank you very much, stephen. thank you for having me. i hope my answers were all right.

hello there. the weather really can't make up its mind this week. one day it's going to be cold and bright, next day, cloudier and milder with outbreaks of rain. wednesday and thursday both pretty wet, some pretty heavy rain around over the high ground. will start to see a battle of air masses. rain slowly pushing up the cold air across the easter and the country through wednesday means we could start off with an ice risk for a time on wednesday morning. a bright and cold start across northern and in areas. here's the rain. starts to slowly push its way. some heavy rain moving northern ireland, stretching down into central and eastern

parts of england. northwest england for a time on wednesday morning. a bright and cold start across northern and eastern areas, but soon the clouds will build in here as the rain out west starts very slowly pushing its way eastward, some snow developing over the pennines and the higher ground of scotland. some heavy rain for northern, that rain stretching down towards central and eastern parts of england. further south and west though, it's going to be pretty mild. double figure values here, much colder further north and east and it will feel quite grim with a mixture of rain, sleet and snow. wednesday night looks very wet, some heavy rain around, a risk of localised flooding in place. further snow over the higher ground of northern england and into scotland. it's here where it's going to be cold once again. further south and west, though, less cold — those values no lower than around seven to nine degrees. as we head into thursday, we've still got those weather fronts with us,

almost stalled across the country, and very slowly move their way southeastwards. this ridge of high pressure will build into the west. that'll start to drive things out across western areas on thursday. so, a drier picture from northern ireland, some sunshine, one or two showers. much of britain is going to be a cloudy and very wet day. again, heavy rain around, snow on the penines and on the higher ground of scotland, turning a little bit drier across western areas as that ridge of high pressure moves in. again, the temperature contrast, cold in the north and east verses milder in the south and west. and through thursday night, eventually the rain begins to fizzle out and the hill snow turns a bit dry, leaving a legacy of some cloud. some mist and fog around as the winds fall lighter under of this ridge of high pressure, which will bring a fine and settled day on friday, but then rain will push in to the northwest of the country later on friday. and for the weekend, low pressure takes control, so it will be turning wetter and windier. largely dry and cool for many of us on friday, rain pushing into northern ireland in scotland, then it's unsettled into the weekend with wet and windier weather moving in.

this is a bbc news special — as the pressure in congress mounts on president trump after the storming of capitol hill — and three house republicans say they'll vote to impeach him. i'm laura trevelyan in washington. and i'm mike embley in london. us officials say hundreds will be charged for their roles in the violence — for everything from trespass to murder. democrats push their case for removing the president from office — this is the scene live in the house of representatives. president trump flies to the us—mexico border wall — denying any responsibility for the violence. they have analysed my speech and my words and my final paragraph, my finalsentence

paragraph, my final sentence and