they're having a special virtual meeting and dr ted ross will be addressing that meeting saying that they need to collaborate and they don't even don't don't only need to address the cases in their own countries they need to think about some of the poorest countries on earth clearly here at the u.n. where i am in u.n. headquarters they are particularly concerned about some of the poorest places on earth about places that are conflict zones and about refugees because clearly something like the coronavirus in some weather isn't great sanitation already is going to cause very many victims right and this call for unity in the fact that he's going to address the g. 20 how much unity or otherwise is there. well i think everyone is so occupied by this everyone is even where i am un headquarters in new york that is certainly the center of the disease in the united states people are struggling to cope here in the place that is the work capital of the world's financial markets and everyone is focusing nationally on their national response we're going to hear in the next few minutes from the u.

director general at ted ross at what i'm getting is a says governments need to do more to track down every potential case. the most effective way to prevent infections and save lives is breaking the chains of transmission and to do that you must test and isolate you cannot fight a fire burning folded and we can not stop this pond i mean if we don't know who is infected we have a simple message for all countries terrorist terrorist test. let's go back to johnson's announcement in the u.k. we're going to have to doubly correspondent a burger at mass in london welcome back it was boris johnson only suggesting avoiding unnecessary social contact rather than giving with the force of law or as we've seen elsewhere in europe well boris johnson stress that the u.k. was a. liberal mature democracy and i think he wants to be seen as a liberal leader he also said when he was questioned about this he said that the government does have the power to eventually strengthen anything has a lot of powers within the law to make sure that actually this does happen but at the moment it's just an advice it

geographic scale of it affects a much larger number of people the organizations director general ted ross at 10 said the spread of covering 1000 across more than 100 countries meant the virus required a new designation we need to be concerned most by the alarming levels of spread and see very easy and by the island i mean the levels of inaction. we have that for the mid the our system and that 19 can be characterized as a pandemic. well while out and what was being made in geneva italy and the death toll had from the virus had risen by almost 202827 ireland and sweden reported their 1st of fatalities from the virus and iran said further 62 people have died bringing the number of deaths there to 354 infection rates are increasing across the world the united states is reporting more than a 1000 confirmed cases. here in germany the chancellor angela merkel has warned that up to 70 percent of the population could contract to cover 90 as a country reports of its death from the disease the chancellor said the country was doing everything possible to slow the viruses spread and prevent the healt

i was- a and talk to ted ross- from who's pointed out thehe moe titime. that you combine the mall- impact you have on the spread of the virus and it means that your health systems. have a better chance of coping with the with the patients and the e most sererious cases when they arise. mr at the- of nottingham jonathan. uneasy calm in syria's idldlib province one day afterer a ceasefire was brokered by russia and turkey therere were some reports of clashes in the province this friday but the agreemement h has largely held elsewhere that ceceasefire c coming a aftereekf intense fighting bebetween the syririan army. russia rebel groups in sia's lasast opposition strtrongholds but w t do residentsts there think of te deal here's what some of them have to say. thank you for how my supposed to believe thatt there's a truruce if i'm listening to the sound of jets and bombingng that means there's no real truce. l listed and-- we dodon't feel reassureded adult.t didn't meet our oaks. degree montnth won't holold because the regime i was hardly respected any deals.

this has been the briefing every 2nd day this briefing comes from the world health organization dr ted ross there in the middle as the secretary general of the world health organization bringing people up to date with what is going on around the world with regards to corona virus and also ahead was interesting a sort of a public service announcement just talking to people about watching their own physical and mental health which is actually pretty good advice in the time james bass has been listening along with us let's talk to him about some of what we've heard from the world health organization a change in phrasing james we now hear physical distancing rather than social this thing as i guess is a good rider the people that or anyone who's still not doing it but it is about the physical distance between you and someone else that you actually really have to take note of. avoiding contact with other people avoid getting close to other people is the message that the world health organization has been stressing for a very long time but you're now hearing it from governments all over the world

he has said, doctor ted ross, the bottom—line is we are at the mercy of the virus so things are workingjections of funds that you're advocating. i would say it is too early to say. it has worked in china, dramatic applications. in italy, we have an absolute clampdown. that is not what is happening in other countries, not least in the uk and are generally in the us. it is too early to tell how this virus is going to spread and the effect on economies but i am saying it could be dramatic and we should be prepared for that and be prepared to react dramatically to stop that happening. you have said we have to act dramatically, lots of money, new ways of working, greater cooperation because this is a global threat so you cannotjust have nationstates responding in that way. what are you advocating? what should nations be doing? what has compounded the risks is that in 2008, the world was relatively harmonious. george bush called a meeting immediately after the 2008 crisis and he had 28 heads of state including the chinese. china flew in more than the rest of the world to mitigate the impact o

census question from if if we can go to see more from africa so we've just been listening to dr ted ross from the world health organization giving an update but really just reiterating that this is an unprecedented threat to humanity he also emphasized the importance of testing he said isolating testing treating and tracing every suspected case of corona virus must be the backbone to the world's response and then earlier we did hear from president trump an update from the white house as well the u.s. is now invoking the defense production act to strengthen the response this is important because it will allow the government to make sure that companies in the private sector shift their production lines to emergency medical supplies and of course there are concerns that hospitals will be overwhelmed by patients in the coming weeks and that will mean that they do need more beds for spiritual mosques for medical workers and also ventilators for the patients and actually that was some concern by u.s. health officials that young people of reports of young people in france and italy getting seri

transmission of this virus and to some extent the evidence that it can be contained that led dr ted ross the director general of the world health organization earlier in his daily press briefing to give a somewhat more upbeat assessment than we've been hearing lately pointed to the fact that this virus is unique both in the fact that it can be transmitted human to human but also in the fact that it can be contained and adviser to iran's supreme leader has died from the corona virus as the disease continues to ravage the country $66.00 people have died while the number of cases stands at $11500.00 or germany and france have offered a package worth more than 5 and a half $1000000.00 to help iran. has arrived in tehran to support their authority response. this gentleman who passed away mohamed mir mohamed he was in his seventies so at risk of certainly succumbing to the virus at risk of of passing away and unfortunately that is what's happened he was a member of the expediency council and a group of advisors to the supreme leader made up of technocrats military officers government officials

transmission of this virus and to some extent the evidence that it can be contained that led dr ted ross the director general of the world health organization earlier in his daily press briefing to give a somewhat more upbeat assessment than we've been hearing lately he pointed to the fact that this virus is unique both in the fact that it can be transmitted human to human but also in the fact that it can be contained a key advisor and supreme leader has died from corona virus as infection number surge again on monday the government confirmed another 12 deaths and 523 new cases dozens of senior government officials have now tested positive. still ahead on the al-jazeera news hour a day long hostage situation in the philippines comes to an end after a security guard releases his captives ills in sport so the biggest names in basketball go head to head in the n.b.a. details coming up in just moments. from the alabama satellite tells a tale over north america at the moment if you watch this streaming cloud here the fact is streaming is what's relevant here patches elsewhere which is somethi

i thank you thank you got to take us now and that is the world health organization chief adopted ted ross. calling on all countries who have introduced so-called lockdown measures to use this time to attack the virus to find every suspected case he said and the concern that some health care systems may collapse particularly in poor countries let's cross to our diplomatic editor james bays who's also been listening in he joins us from the united nations in new york and james worry of course is that when restrictions are eventually lifted the virus might come back says essential that these restrictions stem place. yes passing on a message i think to leaders around the world don't open things up too early because you might get a 2nd wave i do somewhat wonder whether that message is in part directed to where i am the u.n. headquarters of course is in new york and president donald trump has said that in a couple of weeks time by easter he is hoping to reopen parts of the u.s. economy now that certainly has been greeted by some medical experts with concern that that's just going to spread the d

leave horace johnson the british prime minister there to go to geneva the latest address from dr ted the ross the non who is the director general of the world health organization good afternoon and good evening wherever you are. every day 19 seems to reach a new tragic milestone. more than 210000 cases. have now been reported to dublin john and more than 1000 people have lost their lives. every loss of life is a tragedy it's also a motivation to double down and do everything we can to stop transmission and save lives. of course we have good good news today yesterday reported no new cases for the 1st time since the outbreak started what provides hope for the rest of the world and that even the most severe situation can be turned around of course we must exercise caution the situation can be birds but the experience of cities and countries that have pushed by this virus give hope and courage to the rest of the world. every day we are learning more about this virus and that this is it because one of the things we're learning is that although all the people are the hardest hit younger people are