this is d.w. news live from berlin germany reports a record number of corona virus infections for a 2nd day with nearly 30000 new cases the pressure is growing for a new nationwide lock down to begin before christmas is. also coming up. to be you agrees on a more ambitious goal in the fight against climate change after all night talks leaders agreed to cut greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55 percent in the next 5

years but is this target too ambitious. gunned down in afghanistan a popular t.v. journalist dies in an attack in jalalabad she showed women today to deserve to be part of the national conversation. i'm sure how else is welcome to the program we begin here in germany where the latest coronavirus numbers show a dramatic spike in new cases over the past day the country has has a new high of nearly 30000 cases and 598 people have died as a high as daily totally yes weeks of partial lockdown have been slow the spread of infection enough much tougher restrictions seen almost inevitable now with political momentum building for a harder lock down over the holidays. with only 2 weeks to go until christmas the

looming question across germany is will a hard lock down come before or after the holidays at its weekly briefing on wednesday germany's robert cock institute said it was alarmed and that it was bracing for a significant increase in case numbers. but if it's all going to a shrink literally typically end before it's a meeting to mirage an exponential growth but instead on. the situation is especially problematic in assisted living facilities according to german authorities residents of nursing homes are at more risk than ever. currently we're seeing double the amount of outbreaks in assisted living facilities than in spring and every outbreak affects a lot of people and are tough and. several german states are now considering tightening the measures already in place berlin's government is considering closing all non-essential retail before christmas the busiest period of the year winter

break may be extended and schools could return to distance learning. below but i believe these 2 and a half 3 weeks will give us plenty of opportunities regarding disease control. state leaders are now hoping to set out a coordinated plan in a meeting with chancellor angela merkel. you given moment off and also stimulus the gathering looks likely to take place on sunday. we're very interested in getting together as quickly as possible in order to rapidly gain clarity about the path our country will follow you to open door at one point they're cute. in light of recent developments religious services over the holidays are also being scrutinized. then i would if there is a possibility of a religious gathering endangering lives i'll be the 1st to call things off. the so-called most wonderful time of the here now marked by deep concerns

a new lockdown in germany isn't a matter of if but rather when. simon young joins me now simon a new high of nearly 30000 cases 598 people died one day all that despite the restrictions already imposed why are the figures still rising. well guess what there are a number of different explanations that are being offered for the rising infection numbers one of the things is to look at where the disease has been spreading earlier in the year it was really concentrated in several hot spots and of course that made it somewhat easier to deal with now. really kovan 1000 is spread across germany and that's putting a strain on health services to deal with also as you mentioned in the report the the disease seems to be affecting older people more back in the spring and the

initial spike of course older people in care homes and old people's homes were affected but the engineering the summer it seemed to spread more to younger groups now it's back in the older population of germany is 20000 dead 13000 over 80 so it's a very worrying picture and it makes it difficult for both or it is to work out their strategy but germany's interior minister jose offer made his position very clear today saying germany has wasted the advantage it managed to gain during the spring the only chance we have to get in control of the situation is a lock down but it needs to be immediate if we went on till christmas will have to continue fighting these numbers for. a statement how much agreement is there in this call for an immediate lockdown. well what we're seeing is

a growing number of states announcing measures and pushing for tougher lock downs barden burton bag has announced that there will be curfews that's to say restrictions on people leaving their homes. from from as early as tomorrow north rhine-westphalia another log state in the west saying that schools will tell their pupils to stay at home from monday and possibly even all non-essential retail shops will close so obviously these are very tough measures more and more states are thinking about it and there is a push for unity among the states because people say that that the public will accept such rules much more if all states move together but they're not going to wait i think in some cases for for a meeting with the chancellor a lot of the state premiers are saying we have to push ahead now and impose tough lockdowns you know his political correspondent simon thank you.

and i'm now joined by her doctor johnson sees an intensive care doctor and a member of the german association of critical can emergency medicine doctor what's the situation in german hospitals and particularly in intensive care units right now. state it cleary the burden is very high the pressure is very high about not just starting this week for weeks we are working on a very big pressure in some areas the pressure is so big that people are getting sick over this the psychological and the physical stress fall they have to work is immense they stand up against. to end. this inevitable situation but we fear that the strength of these people is

getting. in the next few days so we stated this morning that we want the government and all the governments in germany the 16 states to get to a locked on much harder than it was trying on early in november this is the only way to slow down the high infection rates and to stop the rising numbers of infected covered 9000 people on the i.c.u. was all over germany but give us an idea how far away from capacity are we in the i.c.u. . we have areas. the capacity is just left 5 to 10 percent open beds that's not enough to cover the broad range of civilly patients you must imagine we have in some areas like burning up to say 26 percent cope with 19 patients in other areas like before panos let me caution 0

percent so we have a broad range and this is the only hope we have that the moment that the other guys use in place because the before on in countries of germany which have. open beds will help. other hospitals which don't have any beds anymore so in north rhine-westphalia the situation is in some areas quite critical that we at the moment we get to the point we help all people but if it last it won't work anymore. well the infection rate among the elderly the over eighty's is particularly high why is that and what does that mean for hospitals. yes it seems that the virus ask us to spread again into the old population and this is that is the fact these people live at home they leave an old people's home and somebody has

to bring the virus in these old people's home and this facility is and these are people from outside the virus doesn't go through the window it comes with other people so this is the result of this locked on line at the virus spread throughout the population and now we have the problem that all of peoples are getting infected and if they get infected their immune system is not quite so properly like 304050 year old man or woman they suffer a very severely ill from this virus and they don't have any immune weapon to fight the virus and to control the vice so the course of the disease in these old people is very severe and they have a very. mortality rate even when they come on the intensive care units over the age of $7080.00 the want tell it in intensive care units is above 80 percent as quite astonishing figures that look at this 2nd wave so are you happy with the

job that the politicians have done so far. my credo is that stern talk about what happened in the end we have to see that that what they did the last 2 believes they should not do the same thing and 21 so we have learned now that we should hear our chancellor angela merkel we should hear to the intensive care medicines who says keep keep down keep it down and to to think the locked eliad would help the economy etc etc that's ridiculous because the economy like this and the moment will last for weeks for mums and the restaurants and the bars will close for months if we do a strict lock on the infection rates go down you saw it in ireland you saw it in france you saw in belgian every demonstrated that it was successful so now it was

the last chance to recognize this and to do lockdown. intensive care doctor and member of the german association of critical care in emergency medicine thank you for joining us here at u.w. news i think you're going to have time now to take a look at some of the other developments in the pandemic french drugmaker sanofi and britain's glaxo smith kline say their vaccine won't be ready until the end of next year interim results showed a low immune response in older people australia has cancelled the production of its own covert 19 vaccine after produced false positive results for hiv and some trial participants and researchers say the global response to the pandemic has driven a record 7 percent drop in and it will c o 2 emissions the un says that have to continue to decline at that rate for the next decade to reach international climate goals. time to have

a look at some of the other stories making headlines around the world today germany is lifting a ban on deportations to syria for the 1st time in 8 years despite the ongoing conflict in the country the decision means that syrian nationals convicted of a crime or deemed a security risk now face deportation from january 1st. media says democracy activist jimmy lie has been charged under the controversial new security law he's accused of colluding with foreign forces under danger in national security lies the most high profile person yet to be charged under the new law police say he will face the charges of course on saturday. in the u.s. death row inmate brandon bernard has been executed it was the 1st federal execution during the presidential transition in 100 interest and 30 years and the nights since president trump restarted federal executions after a 17 year pause his administration plans to rush through another 4 for the his term

ends next month's. european union leaders have reached a hard fought deal to make dramatic cuts to the e.u.'s greenhouse gas emissions after all night talks the member states agreed to reduce emissions by 55 percent by the end of the decade as head of the e.u. presidency german chancellor angela merkel wellcome the deal saying it had been worth staying up all night to clear a new target range to reach net 0 emissions by 2050 e.u. council president sean shelves says it will make europe the leader in the fight against climate. let's listen in towards the german chancellor had to say about the agreement there green do you justice i encounter green deal is a core project of ours we don't just want to impose a plan we want one that will take us into the future and that's something the commission will be paying close attention to me as. we are present our national

program soon so the fact that we have now been able to commit ourselves just a day before the u.n. climate summit to a joint european reduction target of 55 percent by 2030 i consider that a very important result one worth losing a night's sleep over and i don't even want to think about what would have happened if we hadn't been able to achieve such a result in this in these technologies and can. so much of a breakthrough is this is a question for you correspondent martin so of course you know what what else can you tell us about this climate agreement look at 5 years ago at the climate climate paris conference when the e.u. pledged that they would cut their emissions entirely become carbon neutral and.