tonight in agreement here in germany the country is about to take the biggest steps yet to reopen its economy and lift the walked out. that all stores and restaurants will soon be allowed to reopen but if the coronavirus makes a comeback she says the walk to restrictions will return to also coming out bringing back the bundesliga the pandemic forced germany's top football league to suspended season later this month. on the pitch but the fans will have to watch

from home plus flip flop the u.s. president walks back to his country's coronavirus task force just a day after signaling that the task forces days were numbered also on the show on the frontlines of the pandemic and discrimination doctors and nurses in the colombian capital are already risking their lives to save. they're facing a new challenge of abuse and discrimination. plus more than 5 years after a german wings pilot killed 150 people by crashing his plane in the alps the victims' families are now heading to court they say move. is to blank. our viewers on p.b.s. and. united states and all around the world welcome back in business with the

option to shut down again today german chancellor angela merkel in else that germany will ease some of its coronavirus measures in the coming weeks but she warned that the steps must be taking gradually and with caution let's take a closer look now at some of the challenges that are confronting germany states as they try to manage a reopening of their economies. this is what the new normal in germany could look like all the shops open more people out on the streets wearing face masks. restaurants and beer gardens are to reopen as well but there will be regional variations due to germany's federal division of path. we have seen good progress as far as the number of new infections is concerned that means we can now take 5 the steps. that mean but we have to be

careful to keep control. and the emergency response mechanism we have to fight it means i can feel quite confident. him off his newfound friends peacefully home that means the state premie aides have agreed to adjust their measures on the grounds of the number of new infections if they rise above a certain number tougher restrictions must be reintroduced. you do see the big decisions we made today don't just concern the question of how can we ease the restrictions but also how can we continue to ensure public security we know it's difficult finding a balance between public safety and civil liberties. it's being left to the 16 state governments to decide for themselves how and when to reopen day care facilities restaurants and hotels social distancing rules are to be extended for another month but members of 2 separate households will now be allowed to meet large events like concerts and festivals remain banned until the end of the summer

but football fans can look forward to the bonus league season being allowed to resume in late may with restrictions. or relief from many parents children will gradually start getting back to schools and kindergarten so it is an almost complete return to normal and the chancellor said that it is up to german themselves to make sure their regained freedom works are this fall in our chief political correspondent linda crean she's covering this force here in berlin good evening to you melinda i mean these are significant steps that have been agreed to what do they tell us about how the government health state governments how they view the state of the pandemic here in germany. well they tell us that the federal government a sense that at most germany has come out of the very 1st phase of the pandemic the words caution and careful were mentioned frequently by the chancellor of the

seedling and in the past she has said that it would be a crying shame if germany were to squander the good results that it had it she in the 1st things that dealing with the pandemic but what we can also see from this meeting and it's reported that there were some heated exchanges during the course of the meeting is that they had the federal states the minister presidents are very eager to get their economies up and running once again and for obvious reasons the crisis here as elsewhere has taken a very very grave economic toll so those are the 2 sides that are being balanced here with these measures and what we can say for certain is that it's going to be trial and error this will be a test and depending on the results then they we may see germany return to a stricter lockdown you know we know that there is an emergency brake built into the agreement that was reached today wondering how much risk are we talking about

in the strategy that the governments are following right now. no question that there is a risk there's a risk to reopening schools and to kindergartens it isn't still not quite clear to what degree children can spread the virus but certainly there is a potential risk there there will once again be the possibility for people to visit their relatives in old age homes there will be a relaxation of contact restrictions meaning that now members of the family in 2 different households can get together all of those definitely heighten the possibility of seeing the virus transmitted from one person to another now germany had managed to greatly suppress the so-called reproduction the rate the the refs hit it easy with which the virus doubles so germany is on pretty good crowd at the moment but that number could go up and in fact the head of the robert

costa institute which is essentially this country center for disease control says that he is definitely expecting that there could be a 2nd or even a 3rd wave of the virus in future and we know that these decisions made today represent some of the boldest steps yet of and moving towards normality again here in europe and it's because germany has fared as you say so well compared to its european partners when it comes to this pandemic why has germany done so well. well there are a couple of different reasons for that 1st of all germany got a little bit of advance warning if the virus began peaking later here than it did for example in italy and germany watched what was happening in italy and then moved into action pretty quickly to put into place serious restrictions but it was last minute nonetheless secondly the people who were initially infected many of them

were young they were coming back from ski vacation in austria or possibly also in italy and those young people had a better chance of recovering from the virus than older people would have so the fatality rate critically in that 1st wave was pretty low 2nd certainly because of that advance warning that germany got it was able to keep the health systems from being severely overburdened meaning that people got high quality health control and the doctors were forced to essentially engage in tree arch between different patients so all of that plus the fact that germany did very extensive testing more extensive than almost anywhere else certainly in europe and the us means that the rate of deaths to overall infections that we currently know looks very low so a number of different factors working their butts up and stays that way our chief political correspondent linda crane linda thank you. fans of germany's bundesliga

soccer got the news they wanted today games will resume on may 15th the league suspended all matches in mid march because of the pandemic today's decision makes the bundesliga europe's 1st major football league to resume play it will be a kickoff watched by the entire world of sports i tennis at wimbledon cancell 1st time since world war 2. the tokyo olympics postponed until 2021 if it even takes place the. same goes for the cancelled european football championship the list of postpone major sporting events is law top class sport worldwide has come to a standstill. but the german football league is now allowed to start again the chancellor announced on wednesday. and then the female among other things the

topic of shops which cannot open without restriction but of course with the heightened concepts will be covered to pine mass and delicious bullets this one is 5 the 1st and 2nd german football league which will be allowed to run the can see again from the 2nd toughest may on woods under the approved and also tested rules for human that of the league had their own response. today's decision is good news for the blinis league and the 2nd one is legal the clubs and their employees now have a great responsibility to implement the medical and organizational guidelines in a disciplined manner that. the d.f.l. belo organization of the german football league is breaking new ground with the resumption of play a central component of its concept close mess testing of everyone involved there are to be $20000.00 tests in the next few weeks the 1st wave of testing resulted in

10 positive cases out of more than $700.00 tests there will be strict hygiene in distance rules and of course games without spectators these so-called ghost games are to be played in the 1st and 2nd division in till the end of the season the d.f.l. decided the restart date for german football will be may 15th or businesses are grappling with the economic fallout from the coronavirus lockdowns in germany the all important manufacturing sector is among those hardest hit industrial order in march fell by more than 15 percent that's the what was well in 3 decades this has demand both at home and abroad as a result of the pandemic and things well they look even worse for the rest of the european union on wednesday the e.u. released its economic forecast for the rest of 2020 it makes for grim reading. after more than 2 months of lockdown romans are slowly getting used to spending

a little money in their neighborhoods again citizens and many other e.u. countries are taking similarly tentative steps towards normality but the economic damage already done across the 27 country block by covert 19 has been severe. economic. if there's no. demand. and the result of all that the e.u. forecasts that its economy will fall by a massive 7.4 percent in 2020 the worst fall since the e.u. was founded in 1950 s.

unemployment in the e.u. is forecast to rise by nearly 2 percent up to 9 percent for 2020. while the impact will be felt across the continent some countries will be hit harder than others italy and spain 2 of the worst hit countries are forecast to suffer contractions of around 9.5 percent each more than france and germany the used 2 biggest economies it's not all bad news at least e.u. officials said they expect the economy to slowly recover in the 2nd half of 2020 before a sharp bounce back in 2021. but for those gradually emerging from lock downs that probably still feels a long way off. well here are some of the other stories now that are making headlines around the world. spain has extended the country's coronavirus state of alert for another 2 weeks it came after

a day of sharp criticism in parliament from opposition parties spain is one of the hardest hit countries here in europe britain's health ministry has reported that the number of deaths linked to the corona virus has now passed the 30000 mark almost 650 people died in the u.k. in the last day alone britain has the highest number of code in 1900 taliban as in all of europe the u.s. secretary of state's my home page has blasted china for its handling of the corona virus outbreak and repeated allegations that the virus escaped from a lab in the city of new han and accused beijing of initially covering up the outbreak or the chinese communist party about the us president donald trump has tweeted that the country's coronavirus task force will continue to operate indefinitely now this is a reversal for the u.s. president who just yesterday said that the task force would be wound down observers say such a move would have signaled that reopening the economy not ending the pandemic is

the administration's top priority meanwhile some models are showing a spike in the number of new infections and deaths in the u.s. the hardest hit area new york has taken and president and some say historic step in its battle against the virus. this is history in the making. it's not the actual cleaning of the new york subway that's a film unusual. it's the fact that it's the 1st time the system will close during the night so that it can be disinfected. it's a measure of the lengths to which the city is going to protect its citizens. more than one 3rd of the 70000 deaths in the u.s. so far have occurred in the new york metropolitan area. fatalities there now appear to be declining but officials say this operation is set to go on for a while. to get there is that this will last during that during the shutdown that we don't know about you're not hard work yeah i think like you know the response

a little bit. but elsewhere in the u.s. a different message is starting to emerge. with this song live and let die playing in the background president trump toured a mass factory in arizona it was his 1st major trip out of the white house since the lockdown began. our country is now in the next stage of the battle a very safe phased and gradual reopening sorry opening of our country who would have ever thought we were going to be saying that the reopening reopening. some states such as washington have already started to ease restrictions and open parks and other public spaces but there are concerns that now is not the time to end the lockdown. most models show that outside of new york the rate of infections and this

is still going up so the fear is that many more americans could end up paying with the long life. or those take the story out of the u.s. i'm joined by our washington bureau chief alexander phenomena good evening to you alexandra let's start with the u.s. secretary of state his comments about there being and i'm quoting here no certainty but significant evidence that the corona virus originated in a chinese laboratory what's been the reaction to that claim. well there has been a lot of criticism skepticism as well with many reporters asking the question during this press briefing with secretary pompei oh how can it be to have significant evidence but not to be certain and even though secretary compare said that it doesn't have anything to do with politics it's not a secret that it is part of the republican strategy and president donald trump's

reelection strategy to be tough on china is to blame china to deflect attention from the administration's own shortcomings in dealing with this crisis so there has been a lot of criticism and we also have to add that secretary pump air has not provided any evidence to justify to support his claims on the contrary we have heard from the department of defense today that they don't know where the origin was and president own top infectious disease experts says dead it's very unlikely that the virus emerged from a lap in will harm the story continues let's talk about germany for a moment today germany announced new ground rules will be in place for a gradual easing of walk down the we know that in the u.s. the lobes of the german chancellor angela merkel merkel mania does the u.s. see these german measures here with the pandemic as an article

a positive role waddle for stopping the spread of the virus. well i think it's fair to say that many here in the u.s. have seen markel a leader who acts with caution and whose. actions are based on science and on the facts and many critics of president president strong steps and that's something that he's approached should show as well so. at points you're in in your ass media. definitely sees a germany as a leader in the west in taking on this pandemic and let's talk about the u.s. president donald trump you know says that the u.s. crew of bombers task force will continue indefinitely just today of course he suggested be opposite of that while you do this u.

turn well the reason he gave for his change of mind is very telling i think it tells a lot about what he's thinking and he's priorities he said today that he had no idea hope hope you are the top of the force was until yesterday when he started announcing that he's thinking about winding it down when he said he got a lot of phone calls from people telling here him that the work that task force is doing is highly appreciated so that was that moment he said that he decided that he wants to keep it on however he also added today that he may add new members to the task force next monday and i think that its focus will be was shifted from combating of the pens and ink to we opening the country reopen the country and we wonder what dr felt she will what kind of role he will play we will find bill

always on the phenomena in washington on the story for the alexander thank you. even physical attacks number of health workers caring for 19 patients are reporting that people are fearful they could spread the virus. reported around the world from europe to asia to north america here's a look now at what some hospital workers in columbia are experiencing. wearing her uniform fills her with pride especially in these trying times but in recent weeks she has repeatedly suffered discriminatory behavior after being identified as hospital staff. i recently had to transfer some money. and the place i went to didn't want to let me in.

the lady at the front desk told me she couldn't serve me because i was clearly health. and could be infected. humiliated. and hurt with the situation we're not out to harm anybody. since the pandemic reached colombia numerous doctors and nurses have reported social stigmatise ation. that won't stop for them supermarkets that won't let them do their shopping. nurse was reportedly beaten on the street and accused of spreading the virus. christiane but touchy is a doctor in the city of cali he was evicted after residents in his building demanded he leave fearing he would bring coded into their homes just in general maybe he told me that people were very scared the tenants threatened to leave if i didn't and that case they would refuse to pay the cancellation fee saying me moving

in hasn't been their choice and that it had put their lives in danger. so the landlady told me that she was sorry but i had to leave because she had to protect you or other tenants with. cases like those of christiane and liz are fortunately quite rare but even isolated incidents put added pressure on those already carrying society's biggest burden most times it seems to be a common misconception that motivates abuse and people think that the clothes health care workers wear on their way to the hospital are the same garments they were at work. but actually they get a new set once they enter the promises. but seeing the uniform is what leads to a 1st level of rejection they reach as well as hurtful as this rejection might be the good outweighs the bad unexpected expressions of solidarity and gratitude are what keeps liz going. to get tax the other day when i was about to

get out but a driver didn't want to take my money i was wearing my uniform he told me you don't owe me anything thanks for what you're doing for our society. and to those who are still fearful of her and her colleagues she has a clear message. please don't discriminate against please don't abuses don't attack because if we are gone who will come out and help you when your need to move. more than 5 years ago 150 people died when a german wings copilot crashed his plane into the side of a mountain in the french alps now victims' families are suing germany's flagship tons of german wings at the time the families are seeking more compensation and they argue the pilot. should not have been allowed to fly

a plane not a day goes by that clock gardner does not think about his daughter her husband and his grandson all 3 died in the german wings crash 5 years ago gardner has been offered compensation for his losses but he wants more he says for him it's not about the money than it is for me because the 1st and foremost it's important to me that the court recognizes that a person like that. with preexisting conditions should have never been allowed to sit in a cockpit or fly a plane. and ultimately i want to see those responsible brought to justice. on the 24th of march 25th dane german wings flight 9525 crashed into the french alps killing all 150 passengers on board ideation authorities concluded that the copilot crashed the plane deliberately in order to kill himself according to klaus

gardiner on the other plaintiffs people in charge knew about the co-pilot's preexisting psychological conditions. clarifying this is almost more important than the compensation itself because people want to know how it happened what should have been done to avoid this disaster in the courts it would 1st have to determine if the airline was the defendant in this case individual countries are responsible for governing their own airspace and the case might have to be brought against the german state. well as a reminder of the top story that we're following for you the german chancellor angela merkel has announced a further easing of germany's coronavirus lockdown people from 2 households 20 will be allowed to meet and all shops will be allowed to reopen but social distancing groups they will remain in place until at least the 5th of june lockdowns could be reimposed its infection spike again. the iconic german

electronic band has lost one of its founding members florian schneider has died at the age of 73 after a short battle with cancer crosshair achieved international fame in the 1970 s. with hits like dust devil although bon and trans europe express the band's pioneering electronic sound is credited with influencing john ranging from hip hop to techno after a short break i'll be back to take you through the day but 1st some of the music from coffee.

and then you. do some things a bit differently and other things very differently. the younger generation on the labor markets. their focus not confident and optimistic. they want nothing less than to change the world. we check the pools of generation one. made in germany. in 60 minutes on w.

. how to. discover your concept. discover it with the powerhouse. school. of legend after 100 years the ideals of the bombers are more relevant today the it was. a 100 years ago visionaries reshapes things to come. people understood design is a way of shaping society. with ideas that are part of our future. of our house that's crossed over into a narrative and. sadly about to me found house means a vision of the future good of. what makes no bounds and its

creation. into this very. exciting power card to all. our household 300 documentary stars made on w. . europe is headed for an economic recession of historic proportions the likes of which it hasn't seen since the great depression the loss of jobs this year will be deep but not even spain italy and greece will take the biggest hit the recession is expected to be the worst in germany since the 2nd world war now businesses have been telling the government and the chancellor lift the walk down before it's too late tonight's in europe's largest economy that lifting its under way i'm bored goffin berlin this is the day.