this is. money as medicine german lawmakers approved an unprecedented economic plan to save the economy from the pandemic the legislation is aimed at supporting health care and propping up businesses it's also a paradigm shift for germany rolling back historic restrictions on taking out new debt also coming up sick patients packing hospital hallways in madrid spain.

is worsening the country now has more deaths than china and in the capital so many people are dying officials have been forced to use an ice skating rink as a city morgue and in the u.s. the number of keys is skyrocketing but health care workers on the frontlines are facing shortages of protective gear is the troubled it is strange and doing enough to deliver aid to those who need it most now. i'm off it's good to have you with us it is a government lifeline the whites of which modern germany has never seen today the german parliament approved a sweeping rescue package to cushion the economic blow from the coronavirus pandemic is designed to support health care infrastructure and brushes billions of

euros in aid to businesses that are struggling and in an historic move lawmakers voted to scrap rules limiting how much money the country can borrow. our parliament in crisis mode the bundestag has changed its rules to allow decisions to be taken with fewer members present the normal those who were there sat at a safe distance from each other the. parliamentary president volved. called on deputies to show support for the key workers who are helping to keep the country going to try and get. food express thanks in respect to the doctor's care workers and those in the health and security or thora tis who are being tested to their limits every day. did you. think we all agree we should include in our banks those who day after day and in spite of the greater risk of infection they face ensure that people have the supplies they need. in just one day the blue sky because green lighted

government plans to take on more debt this year than ever before the crisis package includes an emergency budget of 156000000000 euros 50000000000 to keep small businesses a bloat and money for hospitals expecting a wave of coronavirus patients finance minister all our short standing in for chancellor merkel is at home insult by selection of knowledge these are judge gannett exams but he said the country can afford it germany's strict rules on government borrowing are suspended for now we're believing that we're facing a crisis unprecedented in our post-war history is this greater than all those we have faced recently it leapt up and it's a challenge to humankind as a whole. for the gunson mentioned there's no script for dealing with the pandemic said child but the government will do everything to reduce its impact on the economy. in this and yes it's on is 1st we have to ensure that there's

a good health care provision for people who are sick from the coronavirus and ensure those treating them are protected by 2nd we must protect the livelihoods of people affected by the crisis thirdly we must stabilize our economy and preserve jobs but it spits out that despite the unparalleled measures when it came to the vote opposition parties rallied behind the government's plan but no one inside the bundestag or elsewhere can get be sure if it will work. well as you just heard german opposition lawmakers are largely on board with this plan but there is criticism earlier we spoke to your control teen a member of germany's opposition green party he says that germany should do more to help the other european union countries that have been hit harder by the pandemic we do not understand as green party for example that the german government is still blocking an initiative supported by

a lot of economists for creating saw cold corona bombs for european union the mass take care also on our european neighbors they're hit very severely like spain and italy and it's not only a question how to deal with the health care in this countries it's also a question that these countries who still suffer from the economic crisis from 2008 will go into a new and much more severe crisis and therefore we need these european karuna bonds . there was your interesting there with the green party here in germany new figures compiled by johns hopkins university show a sharp jump in deaths from the corona virus here in germany 206 people are now known to have died that's a jump of almost 30 percent on the previous days so far germany's mortality rate has been low but medical experts warn the country's outbreak is still at an early

stage. well spain has seen another surge in its death toll from the pandemic with more than 340-1000 deaths spain is 2nd only to italy in the world spain's deputy prime minister has also tested positive for the virus hospitals in the country they are struggling to cope madrid sabet hospital is overwhelmed patients filling the hallways struggling to breathe waiting for the privilege of oxygen. for many here the shortage of ventilators and medical staff could prove to be deadly for a shocking number that already has spain's death toll from cope with 1000 has now surpassed china's. a little bit i don't want to get involved in politics because that's not the time so and i hear on tuesday that there are sufficient let areal

and then my colleagues this morning complain that there is not sufficient material i can't believe it when the government's crisis committee comes out to say we have everything it's not sure that it is his study. so many have died this week at madrid's morgues are also overwhelmed this ice skating rink will take in the overflow keeping bodies out of the sun as the country prays for a reprieve. other provisional facilities are popping up around spain and barcelona the military has erected a temporary homeless shelter where up to a 1000 homeless people will be able to isolate unhygenic conditions. struggling to cope the government will extend the state of emergency until mid april. police are tightening controls to enforce the countrywide lock down. anyone without a permit to be out will be fine police say they've handed out over $80000.00 fine

since the rule went into effect 10 days ago. many spaniards welcome the strict control on movement. people are not respecting confinement measure is irresponsible a lot of us have to go to work this is the 2nd control of pasta and i think it's great. with over 400000000 euros of medical equipment on order from china spain is looking to see if its efforts will start to stifle the spread of the virus. well here are more of the latest developments in the corona virus pandemic prince charles the heir to the british throne has tested positive for the virus buckingham palace says that he has mild symptoms turkey's president says his country will overcome the outbreak in 2 to 3 weeks through timely action. saying quote we have preparations for every scenario

and the governor of the u.s. state of minnesota has ordered all residents there to stay at home for 2 weeks other midwestern states including michigan illinois and wisconsin have similar orders now in place. u.s. lawmakers have agreed to the biggest stimulus package in the nation's history to cushion the blow from the pandemic the legislation would provide 2 trillion dollars in funds to help stabilize businesses and households that have been hit hard by the outbreak the relief comes as cases of the infection continue to soar many health care workers say they do not have the supplies that they need. a long line of drivers all waiting to be tested for the corona virus this is florida but the cues are getting longer right across america. the number of confirmed infections is gathering pace along with the number of those known to have died from the virus as the scale of the outbreak becomes increasingly clear doctors are worried about

their own safety in a timely. care to come to walk by being cared we are trained to do you know i am and we're committed to doing mad doc to say hospitals nationwide are overwhelmed and there's not enough protective gear there are people that literally are wearing bandanas because they have nothing better to protect themselves from the respiratory droplets of patients who are and who would not and i think the national shame of us president donald trump downplayed the dangers of a pandemic for weeks before changing his tone but he has criticized the shutdown's advocated by infectious disease experts to bring the outbreak under control for not going to let the cure every worse than the problem. at the end of the 15 day period will make a decision as to which way we want to go where we want to go the timing and essentially we're referring to the timing of the opening of the century the opening

of our country this was a medical problem we're not going to let it turn into a long lasting financial problem an increasing number of states have closed down non-essential businesses heating i mean as hard this restaurant is trying to keep going by serving takeaways but i own a young mint owns 2 other eateries and pays $12000.00 a month just in rent. he's had to lay off most of his 25 stone off. this just taking it all us surprise and also off our feet we are. i don't know how to deal with this every day is a new challenge for us is very challenging and for the most wise very terrible. we will get through this is the message from one bar owner in california people who have lost their jobs can get a free meal here. a small team does the cooking.

are you scared oh no tom stop it is struggling to make sense of what's happening here in hollywood he has to pay rent of a $1000.00 a day. i'm concerned. all we can do is help each of them help each other and hope for help from washington. a $1000.00 a day or countries across asia are taking steps to curb the spread of the corona virus india has become the latest and largest country to impose a nationwide walked out we asked 4 of our correspondents to report on what the pandemic is doing to their parts of the world. well the last 2 weeks or so that have been focused on the number of pieces have been driving steadily from 32000 on wednesday prime minister in rome on has been reluctant to improve but it hasn't prevented from governments to go ahead but the army has been deployed and be

a big thing to see the impact of the both tone and the. reported figures. the prime minister to. minimize the impact. on. the. stimulus package all this exposure to the coronavirus situation number one the sun is getting worse by the day currently there are these 74 people suffering from the illness and as much as the government's trying to address them and they say they're facing many challenges along the way for one millions of people in the nation rely on daily wage just to get by which makes shutting down major cities nearly impossible secondly the government is saying that people aren't doing enough to socially distance themselves from one another and most importantly i want to share is a large land border with iran one of the most heavily affected nations in the world in terms of the coronavirus the philippines has recorded

a relatively no number of 19 cases so far but this number is expected to increase in the coming days as more testing is scheduled on the signs that you see here out on the streets is in direct contrast to the uproar that is now on social media netizens are pounding their keyboards demanding the last testing after they found out through the airport that legislators had been mine and had gotten tested ahead of everybody in this fight the limited number of testing kids in the country malays are stepping up coronavirus testing the country can currently do about 7000 tests per day but the ministry of health says by the middle. next week that number will climb to more than 16000 but health officials warn that if there is a major surge in cases there will not be enough ventilators the army and police have set up checkpoints to enforce the nationwide restrictions on movement people are only allowed to go outside for necessities and only one person for how far are supposed to go pharmacies are taking customers temperature's before letting them

inside even spraying their hands with sanitizer the majority of coronavirus cases in malaysia have been linked to religious gathering that was held last month. our correspondent reporting on the pandemic from around the world you're watching news from berlin. for all of us here brillant thanks for the company we'll see you tomorrow stay safe everybody and stay healthy. combating the pandemic. where does research stand. what are scientists learning. background information and news. our daily corona update. 19 special and next on d w. how does

a virus spread. why do we panic and when will all this. trying to just through the text and weekly radio show is called spectrum if you would like to me information on the krona laroche or any other science topic you should really check out our podcast you can get it wherever you get your podcasts you can also find us at. science. this is the w.'s covert $900.00 special from berlin. after originating in asia reaching europe and northern america cold at 19 is now quickly spreading across the african continent over the weekend the number craddick republic of congo registered its 1st death from the virus now the country has closed its borders and declared

a state of emergency president felix says the country is at war with an invisible adversary public life has been suspended and the country has gone into lockdown closing bars and restaurants and now most flights to and from kinshasa are bound and this 1900 special we're looking at how african countries are preparing for the upcoming challenge on their already vulnerable health care systems. i'm john thanks for joining us corona virus is sweeping across africa but the true number of cases is unknown as mass testing has not yet been rolled out here's some of the latest information we have for you the number of confirmed cases in africa shot past the 2000 mark on wednesday now the majority of the continent's 54 countries have registered infections ivory coast and senegal have both declared states of emergency and south africa will begin a lockdown starting thursday joining us from abroad in the republic of

congo is michel yeah he's the program manager for emergency response at the world health organization in africa also here is edwards he's a professor and immunologists at reading university welcome to you both michelle i'll start with you what sort of advisory has the w h o given africa if any. the advisory in fact he went through different steps their 1st step is for iran the containment face is. to prevent local transmission on as much as possible so this helps to detect they initiate cases now that we have a serious inc a local transmission on it we have it in more than 15 countries in africa now the nest is

a how to scale up quickly to be able to contain the. situation and also to start preparing for of a mitigation phase gets on phase is something equivalent to a wide community spread that con is a layer of ice trash they had to have this is like what we are seeing now in your european countries now they are all the jets are also predicting that african countries fell experience their peak number of infections this summer now how prepared would you say the continent is you spoke of upscaling the capacity is the shelf. we set out the 1st step culture respect from quite well by detecting they put out the cases that's where important in africa but 5 a nest is where we need to mobilize maw and we need more at fault we need

more support in most of the african countries because it is a step that they will have to deal with and out of people needing intensive have in their system in many african and for fossett it is you don't have such capacity so they need to think about how to scale up with for temporary treatment such as how to get assessed or are suggesting provide also rescued out to the mice in how to get access to a protective equipment so at this level countries are less prepared because they are locking the ressources most of them have them for up at preparedness and response plan but the supplies and for example is one of the major challenge to fulfill the spot that is utterly gente because we are moving to are they wide contamination in many countries already now michelle spoke at there of the white

contamination do you alice see the crisis in africa reaching a similar level to what we're seeing here in europe how would that look like. i think i think you know that's that's what we've you know i've been thinking about exactly that since way back you know when we were hearing about the outbreak 1st of all and we han in china i think one positive is i think the much work has gone on to try and expand for example diagnostic testing services across africa and we've learned a great deal from programs to tackle big infection has such as hiv and malaria so for example simple rapid testing technology is now relatively quick and appropriate to draw all out so we have these sorts of tests here which can be done without in the burra 3 they're not perfect but they're very easy to scale out what

i'm hoping is that what we've learnt from those kinds of activities those kinds of public health activities will help to deal with early identification and early containment in these states but it is a huge problem given that we can't contain outbreaks very effectively in europe i think will be the same in any other country across the world now testing of course 8 important part of the response to the corona virus michel would you say that people are taking the gravity of the situation they are in africa seriously. i think most of the. national party to is taking it seriously if we look at all the states often meant tennessee declare is on that we will start to recall in many african countries that up taking in serious you nest is really for they hold population on and i'm not sure about they have. this level of

it wellness as well as. taking it seriously in most of the african communities there is a lot of room us going to run including men's fault for treats men so there is they work to be done and from what we learn from a born out it is that when it does need to be fully on board and for that they need to have the appropriate information to increase awareness but they need to be fully engaged for them to play iran if we have a community wide transformation is the community behavior that we in part on they way they desist will spread fast within this community and i think learning from hero is time now to take some of the. public of measures we for food and gauge went off the community to listen lord on this spread and objective is to flatten the. big that's we'll. take control we've they think

up our cities thank you very much michel yeah he's the program manager for emergency response at the world health organization and africa also here is al edwards he is a professor and immunologist at reading university thank you both. now around the world celebrities have inundated us with their song and dance numbers often from home and with mixed reception but ugandan musician turned politician bobby wine has seen his own take widely shared it's a music video reminding everyone about how to purge the spread of the coronavirus wash your hands and keep your distance have a listen. thank. you very much. everybody.

there but we're now joined by our correspondent joy during beer out she's standing by for us in nairobi kenya joy we just listened to bobby winds our rap slash public service message there for us what sort of a role do pop culture and social media have in getting the word out. a lot actually because when you look at the african demographics at the moment big population happen to fall between the ages of 35 going down and this is major

concern for a lot of people right now are focusing or making sure that the young people get the message because the older generation at the moment does not have access to technology on a large scale and they are or happen to be the most vulnerable demographic when it comes to the spread of the coronavirus or covered 19 so social media and pop culture is playing a humongous role in spreading the message to last of the young people on the african continent and in kenya and uganda as well particularly so young people acting as multipliers of the message there now that message itself a team is quite simple wash your hands stay home but neither of those things are easy for everyone. indeed access to water is not readily available to millions of people around the african continent and that in itself is

a challenge especially in the informal settlements in a lot of areas the rural parts of africa say in kenya today what the government is trying to do is ask the water supplies to be a little bit and weave their customers not shop their bills and also and do not switch off there was a connections in a bid to help people flatten the curve of the coronavirus spread that water will be readily available to the people and that even though they might be having a rear is this still going to be able to wash their hands and maybe take care of that problem at a later date and also the government has tried as much as possible to go to areas where there's not enough access to water to see. them and also provide water when necessary thank you very much our correspondent a joy there for us in nairobi. and

that was our d.w. covert 19 special on africa thank you for watching and will that bobby wine play us out for more check out our social media channels i'm genoud malone stay healthy everyone. but that. guy over. there never forgot. the murder that yellow blood came along and done it again. so. much. the result of the markets. the momentum of the working world.

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