covered cases and from these cases they hope to get a clearer picture of where to look for the origins of the virus. meanwhile the world health organization is holding an emergency meeting to discuss new variants of the corona virus there are concerns that they may be more infectious then the 1st strain that has emerged in china it is also on clear if new variants could potentially reduce the effectiveness of the current vaccines at this london hospital doctors are treating 3 times the usual number of patients in intensive care units. they say they are struggling to cope this is going to be with me in in the cold i think the thing is that if. someone from here. start quite where we respect. or where are you god where they work you know where a shopping increase in serious cave in $1000.00 cases and record deaths come a month after a new variant of the corona virus was detected in the u.k.

many countries have since restricted travel g.-h. the british variant but it still spread to at least 50 territories according to the world health organization other new variants have also been reported including in south africa and brazil the consequence of an ever changing virus. is that. being in them or they're more it spreads in an uncontrolled magnet in many places where the chances were getting that back to you. eerily empty streets again a feature of countries worldwide as governments extend all ramp up restrictions to try and limit the spread of the virus variants. well authorities say there's no evidence that british and south african variants make the virus more severe they

share a common trait that's believed to make them much more contagious. as a look at some other developments in a pandemic in brief turkey has started vaccinating health care workers using the chinese develops in over shots the country's health ministry says more than 200000 people have already received the vaccine in australia queensland's state premier is considering using remote mining camps to quarantine international arrivals and francis has received the coronavirus vaccine the 84 year old pontiff part of a lung removed due to an illness in his twenty's so he would be a high risk patient if he were to contract the virus. ugandans have been voting under a social media blackout in an election mobbed by widespread violence against the opposition veteran leader you're wearing was of a neo who's been in power for 35 years is seeking

a 6th term the president's main challenger is the star sen lawmaker bobby wind whose popularity among younger voters has fueled his campaign results are not expected for another 2 days candidate needs to win 50 percent of the vote to avoid a runoff. long lines of people waiting patiently to cost their vote and riot police out in full force off to an election campaign that seen almost daily violence that ugandans remain undeterred. we. should be so used. to this. and with of to make used to it. it's a clash of generations in one of africa's youngest countries incumbent veiny is one of africa's longest serving leaders the former guerrilla leader has spent 35 years

in office in a country where the average age is less than 30. ugandans because shouldn't we have able to see. our economy is strong the ime is strong. and experienced the 4 position. thursday's election pits him against opposition frontrunner bobby wine who voted me a compiler with his wife on thursday morning the former reggae artist has managed to channel the frustrations of a generation into a viable challenge against most of a nice ruling national resistance movement the n.r.m. has cracked down on opposition candidates banned social media and messenger apps and cut off all access to the internet pre-election violence has also taken the

lives of dozens of opposition supporters one recently appeared at one of their funerals. we are not preparing for the election we are rising very far her credit for. the right by the military and the money. the n r n promises the elections will be free and fair but without the presence of many outside observers the international community says the vote will lack accountability and transparency. to the u.s. now as president donald trump has become the 1st president to be impeached twice republicans broke ranks to join with democrats in the house of representatives charging truong with inciting insert action following the storming of the capitol by his supporters the president now faces a trial in the senate but will not be removed from office before his term ends next

week this was the moment that made history donald trump became the 1st us president ever to be impeached twice on this throw the eyes are 232 the nays are 197. there is a resolution is adopted without objection the motion to reconsider is laid upon the . and this time it wasn't just democrats who were in favor 10 members of trump's own republican party also voted to impeach the president the president took in 0 to defend the constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic last week there was a domestic threat at the door of the capitol and he did nothing to stop it that is why with a heavy heart and clear resolve i will vote yes on these articles of impeachment.

the impeachment proceedings moved at breakneck speed the result coming just a week after the violence the capital. democrats were hoping to remove trump from office just days before his term ends but that would 1st require a trial in the u.s. senate and their majority leader mitch mcconnell has rejected a quick process saying there is no chance of a fear or serious trial before the president leaves office. donald trump denying his fiery speech last week incited his supporters to storm the u.s. capitol building shortly after his impeachment was announced he released a video online in which he distanced himself from the violence. mob violence goes against everything i believe in and everything our movement stands for no true supporter of mine could ever endorse political violence no true supporter of mine could ever disrespect law enforcement or our great american flag.

it's unclear if lawmakers will get the 2 thirds majority needed in the senate to officially convict trumpet of incitement of insurrection but now it does seem clear that any trial will take place once he's already left office. earlier i spoke to stormy on the committee now executive director of the aspen institute germany we asked her whether she thought trump's final days in office had brought the republican party to its knees. not just the republican party but i would say conservative in the united states of the whole we just heard that 10 republicans yesterday voted to start the impeachment process and i have to say and some of them down there was very courageous are coming fun swing states like ohio and michigan i think with their own so to say maybe also put it in the future at the back like

this and on the other hand i have to say it's almost 6 i think it's only 10. left loaded from treatment after what happened the last day or the last. in football training german cup champions by munich have been knocked out in the 2nd round of the competition by a 2nd division side keep tired by and took the lead twice equalized once in the very last 2nd to send the match to extra time at $22.00 it went to penalties where killed crucially converted every kick but by and missed one it's the 1st time in 20 years that have exited the german cup this or. hundreds of thousands of hindu pilgrims have descended on the banks of the river ganges for a festival billed as the world's largest of 2000000 people expected on the 1st day all trusting in faith rather than face masks to protect them from the coronavirus

india as the 2nd highest number of cases in the world with more than 150000 deaths so far. bathing in the holy ganges hindus believe this war will rid them of sin and save them from any future evil including from the coronavirus this summer god will take care of the pandemic says humans do their duty and god does his. india's festival is billed as the world's largest gathering of people this year only around 1000000 are expected for the 1st day of the pilgrimage people travel from all around india to bathe in the symbolic water most on twitter and mosques and that makes the job of enforcing social distancing a logistical nightmare. braised of all of the sort of the part of our guns greg i'm very proud of a. proper source of the sense that. india has the world's

2nd highest number of coded 19 cases now more than 10000000 and more than 150000 people have died of the virus but as the riverbanks team with pilgrims and then doors and families take it in turns to plunge into the river it seems people here are more than happy to entrust their fate to mother ganges. now this one of a kind of original tintin artwork has gone under the hammer at auction and paris and fetched record 3200000 euros belgian cartoonist as a work was intended for the original cover of the 1936 comic adventures of tintin in the far east the blue lotus but is editor rejected it as the complicated 4 color process required to reproduce the image was deemed too expensive at the top.

and that's it from me and the news stream up next as i called it 19 special don't miss that. also don't forget you can always get all the latest news on our web site in such a languages that's d.w. dot com and to follow us on instagram and twitter. as. the fight against the coronavirus pandemic. has the rate of infection been developing what does the latest research say. information and contacts the coronavirus update 19. on t w. i was issued when i arrived here i slept with 6 people in a room. it was hard i was fair. i even got white hair.

the german language helped me out a lot this gives me a little bunch maybe to entrap the flavor you want to do their story. it's her finding a reliable information for margaret. blood plasma is saving the lives of people with covert 19 but there isn't enough of it. that's why scientists have been trying to recreate the antibodies it contains in the lab and they've done it. they've developed defensive proteins that can successfully fight off corona virus the us president was even treated with them. but these antibody drugs aren't in wide use even though they could make the difference between life and death if. all sounds

great we still don't have definitive data but trials are set to get underway like so much in this crisis it's learning by doing and it's thanks to some brilliant minds from the world of science. this blood plasma can stop a coronavirus infection in its tracks the antibodies of recovered patients can be used to treat people with covered 19 it's already proven effective for patients including loot. on point was at the start i was very sick my wife sent me here in an ambulance i spent 2 days in the normal ward but then they decided to send me to intensive care and i was just drained. your my. blue tooth condition became so severe that he was placed on a ventilator it was then the doctor how burned his team gave him plasma from

a recovered patient at the end had the patient receive the plasma after his risperidone condition and his lung function to tarry aerated significantly within a day or 2 he stabilized and we were able to take away the breathing support. to get the plasma you need blood donors who have already survived covered 19 their blood has neutralizing antibodies that can render the coronavirus harmless. the class marries given to the patient through a transfusion then the antibodies within it get to work fighting the virus before the patient's immune system has produced enough defensive proteins of its own. the class clearly did the trick for lou true dutchy but the successes remain isolated cases and the general effectiveness has yet to be proven in studies have a doctor say plasma therapy is helping the most severely ill patients.

many doctors would like to use plasma more often ideally giving it to patients in the early stages of the disease when it's likely to work best but the problem is there isn't enough of it. to realize that everyone who recovers from corona virus has a different amount of antibodies in their blood only those with a high level can be suitable donors. but can the antibodies be produced without the need for a donor that's exactly what research is in braunschweig are working on. this to contains an entire gene library so a collection of genetic material in acca lection we have 10000000000 different genes that's the entire repertoire of what our body has available to produce antibodies. to build. in this gene library the scientists found an antibody that works perfectly against sasco 2 in lab tests it completely prevented

the human cells from being attacked they were then able to reproduce the antibody based on its genetic blueprint and produced the 1st dose of the antibody drug. it has major advantages over the plasma therapy because it can be manufactured in large quantities and it's a consistent quality with the right funding human trials of the teams drug could begin as soon as next month and the scientists work can begin to save lives. let's talk to chef undoable who featured in that report we just saw you holding up a chook to the camera what was in there. actually this very small vial it contains literally the complete immune reaction of mankind in respect to 20 bodies so more than 100 people from all over the globe donated blood and be extracted from their blood the blueprints to build antibodies against almost

everything so more than 10000000000 different blueprints in form of genetic code for antibodies against different diseases are in this wild and my letter atory has now developed a technology to i did you fight one specific antibody which binds to sascoc to for example or to other viruses so this antibody can then neutralize a virus and can be used as a doc to fight the disease and it's a molecule which is made in our own bodies so it's not a chemical or not an artificial substance it's a molecule which is identical to the one which is in our body anyway if we get the infection can you briefly briefly let me in on the secret had how did you actually pinpoint that out of how many did you say 10000000000. how did you do that. it's a trick which i co-invented about 30 years ago together with some other people and

it's a. trick where we managed to connect the blueprint though the genetic information to the function which is the proteins in front of not all particles so we have 10000000000 different not all particles which can be then selected by a simple. experiment. for the binding itself and when you have the binding of the protein it has the genetic information inspect back and be done but get it back and grown and get the antibodies so you've managed to produce antibodies otherwise only found in the blood plasma of coverts the virus are they just as good though. well that has to be of course has to be shown in the clinical studies but in principle our antibody is derived from the blood of patients and performed in the plot. and performed in the experiments we did in the preclinical studies

very very effective and it neutralized the antibody in the lungs and it 100 percent protect it. against infection so it's very efficient in respect of protecting against to what about these clinical studies of anybody therapies that show severe side effects like the overreaction of the immune system how can you prevent that this is a very important point and we thought of that since the beginning of the design of our only of our antibody and we managed actually to address this problem by changing the signal it part of the n.t. body a little bit by our logical means so that we completely avoid the simulation of this overreaction so in the clinic we expect not to see any of these overreactions

which are seen in the other antibodies and just tell me briefly do antibody treatments provide long term protection against the virus they provide immediate protection which is different from the back side but then they only last for about one to 3 months and have to be repeated but they can be given repeatedly 100 thank you very much interesting stuff and congratulations on your work and take a look at some of the other corona related stories making news preliminary results from a study show recovering from covert protects against infection for at least 5 months public health england trying to $20000.00 health care workers and found a previous infection provided 83 percent immunity similar to a vaccine. the world health organization is looking at introducing covert 19 vaccination passports for travelers some countries are already trialing them critics call the passports discriminatory. and w.h.o. scientists are now in the chinese city of new holland to investigate the origins of

the pandemic the long delayed trip follows months of diplomatic wrangling beijing argues the virus may not have originated in the southwest as scientists suspect. it out to our science correspondent eric williams if you've got a question he's the e-mail feedback dot english at d.f.w. dot com type expert in the subject line or leave a comment on how you should channel. if you get a 1st back scene shot made by one developer what happens if you a 2nd shelters from a different developer. as the pandemic reaches a really critical stage in many countries in one of them britain health authorities have changed some rules on how they're going to max an 8. 1 of them was this that for the 2nd shot in a 2 shot regime in some rare and exceptional circumstances for example if the individual concerned as they ought to be immediate high risk vaccinators will be

allowed to mix and match vaccines if they don't have any more of the product from the 1st shot so just to clarify there are 3 candidates currently approved for use in the u.k. from pfizer biotech from adana and from astra zeneca and they all require 2 shots of the same back seem to work as well as trials demonstrated this decision means that if someone there gets the 1st shot say of the madonna vaccine when they come back for the 2nd one they could theoretically receive one made for example by astra zeneca if the authorities have run out of the madonna vaccine the thing is nobody yet knows exactly what kind of impact that could have because there have been no mix and match trials on each manufacturer of curie doubt their own trials involving

only 2 doses of their own product so the question of how interchangeable they are is really wide open one american professor told the new york times that in his view the british authorities in the current emergency were trying to guess their way out of the mess the british guidelines however call the move reasonable since in different ways. all 3 vaccines target the same area on the virus what's called the spike protein and experts in the u.k. think a 2nd dose of any other approved vaccine would be better than no 2nd dose at all to be honest i don't know enough about vaccine science to make any confident predictions and opinions among those who do know enough are divided but i can say i think basing decisions like this on on the reasonable assumptions rather than on hard data is risky and a lot of experts agree. and putting your

trust in faith or a mosque we leave you with footage of the festival in india hundreds of thousands of hindus are descending on the banks of the ganges even though india has the world's 2nd highest number of coronavirus cases most pilgrims refuse to wear mosques social distancing doesn't open as a show like this. why

subscribe to d.w. books you meet your favorite writer sometimes through the story calls me and he gets to respond to every book under 2. why are people forced to hide in trucks. there are many precepts. there are many answers. and there are many

stories some. may go oh my. w made for mind. this is deja news africa on the program today uganda it decides uganda is has voted on behavior security and internet blackouts it's a tense election longtime leader un was safe and he wants to extend his role his main challenger bobby wind ses it's time to remove the dick's face. and indeed.