germany starts a cautious lifting of its month long lockdown after a sharp drop in infection rates but many people are saying the government should move quickly and open up the economy. for the french government's under pressure for failing to cancel local elections back in march after several officials involved in the ballot died of covert 19. bills in the united states against the government's response to the pandemic is the death toll that passes $40000.00. blaming donald trump while others point the finger at governors for a series of missteps.

thanks so much for joining us here with your global news update this is r.t. . let's start the latest figures on the covert 900 and make there are now more than 2400000 confirmed cases worldwide around 165000 people have lost their lives the majority of those in europe and the united states and 629000 people have recovered from the virus. ok let's turn 1st to germany which is starting to lift its month long lockdown have to declaring the corona virus outbreak under control but the economy minister has warned that the measures could be reinstated if the situation deteriorates starting from monday shops in some regions are allowed to open schools and restaurants remain closed in berlin the restrictions of cause widespread frustration some people taking to the streets into oliver has details. germany's minister for

economic affairs coming out and saying that it showed people stick to those social distancing protocols that are still in place even if they are being eased then journey coach well perhaps avoid a 2nd lockdown he said essentially as long as people don't go running around like headless chickens and immediately back out onto the streets trying to live their lives as they were then things could be ok that's not washing with some no on saturday hear him when we saw a group of well around 250 people demonstrating against what the current measures that have been put in place and where they see the government here in germany taking us as we try and battle against coronavirus but i do you know i'm here to stand up for my fundamental rights guaranteed by the constitution and when the right to demonstrate is taken away and we cannot raise our voices against injustice that makes us take to the streets yet of those of you just the spread of the virus

isn't that bad but the measures that have been introduced aren't reasonably good still our politicians go down the same route and say look down remains in place perhaps right until they have the vaccine the monitoring app is voluntary but we'll see how it goes of the spike those people being unhappy with what's being done we are seeing an easing of some of the restrictions here in germany from monday some shops that are under 800 square meters will be allowed to gradually open that will be with restrictions on how many people can enter the store there also be hygiene standards that need to be met when looking to schools well we're looking at the 4th of may that the moment that is under constant review and could well be changed in the future some states though have said they may be on a different timetable in no way is this going to be a national. timetable it's laid out for when germany will be reopened market soda who's the head of the state of bavaria has said this his state may well work on

a diff. timeline the message from the government though from the central government here in berlin is this isn't the return to how things were the germans will have to adhere to some more restrictions some more social distancing some more anti corona measures otherwise well things could go right back to square one skip kind we got onto you to inflict their new guarantees of the infection curb people you know they're also risks and when we take the small steps towards opening up we must keep an eye on the impacts and more the means for the whole system and almost for matters of health the statistics we're looking at here in germany is around 150000 confirmed cases of corona virus with around $5000.00 people sadly housing died from the virus at a ratio than much of the comparable nations of a similar socio economic background what that's been put down to

a lot of is the amount of hospitals in germany the amount of hospital beds available the amount of protective equipment available for those working in hospital environment and the amount of testing that has been carried out here in germany when it comes to the economy though while some are a little more concerned we are expecting perhaps a contract ssion of around 10 percent in the german economy for the 2nd quarter of 2020 what we're hearing from the finance minister all f scholtz though is that perhaps things could be a little bit improved and couldn't be it could be a little better than that showed the economy kick on in the 2nd half of 2020 however the minister for economic affairs peter out myers a little less optimistic than his coalition colleague saying that times are tough and people need to be prepared for that the. german economy is in a more serious situation than anything we've seen since the war including any fine

. crisis not only are companies suffering losses they're fighting for survival our hope is that with the help that we've provided we will be able to get through the toughest period of the damage so that we can avoid job losses and bankruptcies all the latest from the world health organization is to those countries like germany that are starting to lift some of their coronavirus restrictions saying that people shouldn't think of this as a end to this situation that they should think of this as the next phase of what's happening in that pretty much echoes what we heard from chancellor angela merkel when she addressed the german people on t.v. earlier this month when she said essentially there won't be an end to this or return to normality until we have a vaccine that works this isn't the end of the story when it comes to corona it's certainly not even the beginning of the end of the story it could well be the

beginning of the next chapter when it comes to how to germany deals with it we've also spoken with neurosurgeon mohammed the roofs who said that most european countries are not yet ready to lift their containment measures. i don't think the majority of countries in europe have peaked regarding the spread of the infection of course we should continue being disciplined in every single country in order to be able to achieve positive results all over europe the most important thing in our life is health and only then follows the economy and other things however every single case should be looked at individually if the infection rate continues to decrease we can slowly carefully start launching the economy step by step of course it makes sense to take necessary precautionary measures in those federal states that are affected the most for example in bavaria the movement restrictions have been extended taking into account the infection rate there it makes total sense to me. the french government is facing some tough questions as to why it allowed last

month's local elections to go ahead despite the pandemic around the time several elderly regional officials including towel bears contracted the virus and passed away and a council official in a suburb of paris is now accusing the government of putting people at risk. dot com what you feel strong of course the virus 69 and was taken to hospital for 10 days because of the contagion that most likely took place on election day the government is responsible putting so many people in so many cities at risk with restaurants and all facilities be closed shortly before election day is something i can hardly understand why did they send us to vote just days before the national lockdown. the 1st round of local elections was held on march 15th that was about 7 weeks after the 1st cove in 1000 case was detected in france by that time schools and restaurants had already been closed as part of containment measures the 2nd round

was later postponed as yet no new date has been announced and the micron has admitted that allowing that vote to go ahead back in march was the wrong decision. if the science counsellor told me to keep in municipal elections would endanger french people's health i would not have kept them i take full responsibility for the decision i had no one the country to think that there was manipulation that people could say i had found an excuse not to organize and john lewis again believes that the safety rules on election day were widely disregard it. about children so to nearly gone some of the polling stations had no medical gloves there was sanitized a job the rules were often ignored there were a lot of people particularly during the votes count 2 people sitting on each side of the table when they should be just one social distancing was less than a meter that led to a lot of stuff contracting the virus in vineyard and across the country and we also like to protect ourselves we felt that we were risk of being the 1st to contract

the virus. the u.s. death toll from cova 19 has risen by almost 2000 in the past 24 hours to reach 40000 and it is by far the highest figure in the world and the political fallout is gaining pace with people sharply divided on the president's handling of the crisis after donald trump went after state governors and city mayors over the most is that they took combat over 90 hundreds of people poured into the streets to protest the government's handling of the pandemic at the same time and express their support over the president demanded an end to the lockdown jacqueline who has more. all americans just like everyone else in the world are facing an indiscriminate and powerful enemy is invisible enemy is tough and its mark and it's a vicious but true to form the only thing uniting people in the us is disagreeing on how to handle this threat trump and co have a task force churning out daily briefings which people either love or hate depends

on who you ask and the country split about $5050.00 when it comes to the administration's overall handling of the outbreak will come as little surprise to many that those numbers fall pretty neatly along party lines you know while all the top brass in d.c. keep repeating that this is no time for politics and name calling before doing just that lives are at stake this is not a time for name calling or playing politics i want to remind everyone here in our nation's capital especially in congress that this is not the time for politics. endless parties and investigations have already done extraordinary damage to our country in recent years by clashes are confined to capitol hill in new york city the place hit hardest by the pandemic doctors nurses and ordinary citizens have been protesting against trump's policies is completely incompetent at his job he tries to pretend like it's a 980 s. boardroom and it's not you do not gamble with people's lives that is morally bankrupt all of these things that lead to more debt here and more illnesses and

more economic damage if it wasn't for the truck that's raging it wouldn't be anywhere near this bad so for many the president's not done enough but on the other side of that coin are the hundreds of people protesting in states like nevada wisconsin and minnesota calling for an end to stay at home orders and giving trump a gold star already when he said we're standing we have right now wherever 40 responsibility for iraq and i need to tell it's kind of. like a right right right right right now are very much for our. our using our constitutional rights and we're hauling under a dictatorship and that's not carousing trump being trump he want to head and tweeted out a rallying cry of a liberation from lockdowns and a number of those states that had already seen protests and that led to a slew of criticism that the president is fanning the flames of unrest in his own country not that they needed any help trump defended himself saying particular

states have gone too far and then threw in some comments about the 2nd amendment for good measure because a gun debate was what this pandemic was really missing but i think some things are too tough and if you look at some of the states you just mentioned it it's too tough not only relative to this but what they've done in virginia with respect to the 2nd amendment is just a horrible thing they do a horrible 'd thing the governor and all of that only further ruffled the feathers of a number of governors who are already pushing back against trump the. an american president to encourage people to violate the law i can't remember any time during my time in america where we have seen such a thing this is such as schizophrenia the president of the united states has the authority to do what the president has the authority to do which is very powerful he does not have to go to a 3rd his proclamation is that he would be king that's what a king is a king has told to authority that statement cannot stand

a tweet coming from our president to liberate virginia i would just simply say that as the governor of the commonwealth of virginia along with his staff is fighting a biological war. do not have time to involve myself in twitter wars so everyone continues to become even more diehard and their opinions like the government should be handling it but without taking away our freedoms there's on the federal aid being sent to states that need it but how dare you cut back on help to foreign countries we should all stay inside and less we don't want to send out free money but not before times name is on it and then there's those carefree floridians who couldn't care less about any of that as long as they can finally hit the beach again which they did in massive crowds the 2nd they were reopened so much for social distancing eyes it seems to have become political because of the contradiction you know any time president takes

a certain course of action the political left wants to basically stand opposed to it and that creates and fester you know these sort of divisions in america well i hope that it does in time to unite the nation it will be nice to finally see that but unfortunately i think the united states is that a point right now because of there's so much mis direction in so much bad information this disseminated by the mainstream media that it's going to be next to impossible to ever really have a country that you know. i did in that way i think that the 2 party system has really polarized of the country in terms of politics and it's going to take a long series of political margaret coming out in taking power before we ever really see a united cultural america. to brazil where the covert 90 death toll is now approaching 2 and a half 1000 that's the highest figure in latin america the president's handling of

the outbreak is proved highly controversial but over the weekend major cities saw protests in support of shi'a both sonora and against local curfews so it was so narrow that sank his health minister for demanding tougher lockdown measures the president himself has resisted any form of shutdown and repeatedly downplayed the dangers of the virus so all the strictures on movement in brazil have been enforced at a local level the farming of the health minister from today mixed reaction. working to care for themselves i see this is an ordinary process in government the health minister was out of step with the policies being led by the president and i think he got caught up in all the hype as a minister he has to be accountable for his actions and the same goes for anyone in public office where things just don't work available we still trust the outgoing health minister and we hope that the new minister can build on what is done. when you look at the situation the government is in now it's going to be difficult to

change anything or make any progress i don't see that this move will make any difference because of all the corruption in the government most are narrow sad ministration is corrupt. in the brazilian city of man hours hospitals have been overloaded with covert 9000 patients videos have been posted online and broadcast on national t.v. showing dead bodies in hospital wards alongside living patients who are still fighting for their survival those images of cause widespread shock and anger but despite the rising death toll in brazil president also narrow says that the country must push to reopen its economy. i know life is priceless but the economy and employment must return to normal. brazilian journalist and says that president wilson are always prioritizing the interests of big business over those of public health. those 2 letter e's subordinate to the same men still

know all these we tapped book that means things in the beginning those groups are against social isolation because they don't want i did to stop the abuse it was me all of his that count visions measures to fanatic also mate when we go out towns and believe that criticising social isolation he's going to be helped by bills who had fear to get without a draw and income he wants to think this is a good team with the current i was trying to use the power of self he's not worried about people's lives he's not worried about i'm going to go to hell. so to come this hour scientists in the u.k. have questioned whether the corona virus actually originated in the chinese city of who found more lot after this break.

join me every thursday on the alex salmond short and i'll be speaking to guest of the world of politics sport i'm showbusiness i'll see you there.

welcome back a team of researchers led by cambridge university geneticist is claiming that the covert 19 outbreak did not start in the chinese city of as is widely believed the scientists in question lies genetic material from the corona virus and traced its mutations and they found 3 distinct variants of the 19 the final one of them being its final human efficient form we spoke to the geneticists behind the research. we

have identified 3 major variants of the corona virus and the original type according to a comparison with the bat coronavirus is the a type that is found in china at moderate frequencies but surprisingly not at high frequency and where b. is the major type and then you have a c. type which then occurs outside china mainly so the a.t.o. is more common at the early stage of the outbreak in other parts of china but not not in hand which was a bit of a surprise to us. since the virus appeared various conspiracy theories have appeared both online and in the media one popular version is that the virus was produced in a laboratory or the wu han institute of allergy donald trump himself recently said the idea quote makes sense after months of accusations the lab has broken his silence and responded to the clips of people who carry out viral studies we clearly

know what kind of research is going on in the institute and how the institute manages viruses and samples there is no way this virus came from us i think the picture up to now has seen that the fish market in or the wildlife market in was the source of the pandemic and this is based on the observation of the 1st 42 patients i think nearly half had had contact with this fish market but it's not the earliest patients i think our results could be taken to imply that we might have to look further than for the source of the hour or so for the outside in china that would be where i would look for the start of the spread. the corona virus lockdown has forced millions of people around the world to stay at home which might keep them safe from infection but there are other risks that they'll have to deal with

as they kiran explains. with billions of people around the world is now in some kind of lockdown there is growing concern that the psychological toll of such measures could prompt a new global crisis a mental health one if we see it coming and we start thinking about it and we start thinking about how well you can tackle that most effectively we've got a very good chances of mitigating and this is. a huge health crisis which is going to hans impacts not just on physical health as we've heard so much about recent weeks but also i think mental health may be some months to come psychologists now say that people are increasingly seeking support ass colona virus forces them to stay home there's probably been about a 50 percent increase in the number of people looking for talking terror since the since carting started in ireland anyway and it's because people are at home and

people are out of time to think people are worried about the future well because of covert people are worried about their jobs their relationships you know people are worried about the world is going to be like after this is ended for some the impact has been stronger than for others laura has been living with agra phobia for almost 5 years and her lowest point even the thought of stepping outside of her front door would trigger an anxiety attack she has managed to overcome her fears over the years but with the order for people to stay indoors laura is now facing losing much if not all of her progress the avoidance behavior as they can creep up on you if you don't keep on top of them so because now i'm not able to go out and practice going in states market going out so we are going to look like i can't keep doing those things so i am quite worried and i already know that i have started to feel anxious about the thought of going out and so i'm worried that i'm going to slip

back into they behave. well i just don't feel comfortable going out social distancing has been highlighted is vital to halt the spread of covert 90 but for those with mental health issues from depression to conditions like anorexia it's exacerbating an already stressful scenario in the u.k. a spike in the number of mental health incidents including suicides were reported to police in the 1st 2 weeks of lockdown and it's warned this trend could continue well in the states one of the country's largest suicide crisis hotlines saw a $75.00 fold increase in calls in the past month the prospects that the reaction to the corona virus could be as deadly as the disease itself paints a grim forecast and the distress is made worse by the uncertainty of how long the lockdown will last it's difficult that we don't have an end point because ultimately people know when something is going to stop if you think you are people

who are in prison or you know seders you were on submarines or on naval ships or people who are at the space station they know when it's going to be over and they know when their end point is you know if they know when or when whole use this of course are available to you have a routine use exercise when you you know speak to people through social media and i don't i really just take this is an opportunity to stay low safe and i don't you know just wait it out i suppose. the world news in brief for you now and the gunman disguised as a police officer has killed 16 people in canada in the country's worst ever mass shooting massacre happened in a small town in nova scotia on sunday police initially announced that they had arrested a 51 year old male suspect but later said that he had died the motive for the shooting is not known. israelis are held a rally against prime minister benjamin netanyahu while observing social distancing

netanyahu is under criminal indictment in 3 corruption cases 2000 activists in facemask standing at least 2 metres apart call for his resignation they accuse the prime minister of using the pandemic under lockdown to strengthen his power. and at least registered 433 deaths from cove in 19 in the past 24 hours the country has europe's highest death toll the figures have been a steady decline for several weeks now and officials believe that the outbreak has pete some italian cities are starting to plan for life after the long down furnace is considering whether to permanently restrict visitor numbers to allow the city to be better maintained. appreciate staying with us here on r.t. international will give me right up to date with all things relating to the corona virus pandemic are about with more than half.

this is a story about what happens auster a stray bullet kills a young girl in the streets. what happens to her family and daughters in florida the mother daughter is very serious and terry it really messes with your head what happens to the community the public was screaming for

a scapegoat the police needed a scapegoat so why not choose a 19 year old black kid with a criminal record who better to pin this on than him and what happens in course he be. shocked shocked as far as i feel. we don't know children just from. the end of this unfortunately due to the. still love know all children. the world is driven by dreamers shaped by phone person.

who dares thinks. we dare to ask. for years i had treated patients with heroin addiction with high dose methadone which is the appropriate treatment and so. i was thinking well i see how well that works for all these people and they don't tend to overdose on it or have a lot of side effects or have any problems so why wouldn't that be fine for pain patients i do recall individual young men who had a rough go early in life. without paulism was in alcohol recovery a number of back surgeries and i was in the middle of.