number of states. protesters in mexico of march to the presidential palace to condemn violence against women were outraged at newspaper publishing photos of the body of a murder victim 25 year old ingrid. killed earlier this month the mexican government says 10 women were killed every day last year. and u.s. federal prosecutors have dropped a criminal investigation into the former deputy director of the f.b.i. over his role in leaking to the media was accused of lying repeatedly about allowing a subordinate to brief a journalist on an investigation into the clinton foundation always denied any wrongdoing there you go you're up to date with the headlines on al-jazeera the latest inside story is next.

is china losing control of the corona virus outbreak the number of cases in the. communist party leaders handling the response of. a change of strategy needed this is inside story. hello there welcome to the program i met clark china's president is admitting shortfalls in the response to the corona virus outbreak and choosing paying is promising to fix problems the loopholes in the health system solutions cannot come too soon nearly 65000 coronavirus cases are recorded worldwide 99 percent of them in china the epicenter of the outbreak that's a province reported

a sharp increase in new cases but the world health organization says that's because doctors are using a broader definition to diagnose the infected who base communist party chief is among 4 local leaders to be sacked tens of millions of chinese are running out of food and patients 80 cities have been in lockdown for a month leaving everyone trapped at home with katrina you know reports empty streets and an increasingly empty fridge there are plenty of vegetables but not much meat for the one family's next meal during the coronavirus lockdown speaking via video call from who pay one she told us his family was doing its best not to panic you would only go home with this infection liquid all over our bodies when we go out we wear masks we don't know if we go out we come back with a virus stuck on our clothes so we disinfect every day he lives in ging many a city neighboring will hide the epicenter of the virus outbreak for 3 weeks the

family's been ordered to stay indoors the movement is increasingly restricted once every 3 days one family member is allowed to leave the house to pick up groceries and supplies and a limited shelf to stand in lines one meter apart waiting to enter. it's been almost a month since wanks saw his daughters who are staying with relatives in southeast china is it true that there are few relieved that my wife and daughters are not there who by now we chat online every day they're doing ok just worry about me the vast majority of confirmed coronavirus cases more than 50000 are province. patients have been sharing videos and social media of life inside makeshift hospitals in quarantine sentence at least 1700 medical staff are among the infected . elsewhere in china people taking any chances. wanks in

hopes leaders will learn a lesson from the outbreak. at the beginning nobody paid enough attention everyone saw it was under control until it was too late. and looks forward to life and a lockdown coming to an end. al-jazeera beijing. or at its bring in our guests a in the hong kong we have 'd talked to john nichols is a clinical professor in pathology at the university of off hong kong who is also an expert in flu viruses from oxford in the united kingdom we have dr peter drawback who's a global health specialist and director of the university of oxford skull center for social entrepreneurship and in culture in the u.k. as well. as you reader in modern history at the university of essex among research that is china's health system welcome to you all dr nicholls if i could start with

you 1st of all before we get into the nitty gritty of the question in hand let's just spend a little time with you and the suspense of where we're at with this far so we really any near understanding where we are with this virus and its impact globally and in china what kind of threat is it. well that's a very long question which is difficult to answer but certainly not that in hong kong we've had the samples of the virus but minette was to actually start growing it in the heart rate and we're now able to actually infect normal human tissues in a culture system to actually have to actually see which part of the body this virus replicates which will help us to determine where it may spread to also looking to see within the crowd of viruses where this virus will lie we don't think it's nearly as severe as the one like sars or mers but the question is how much more severe is it than the other so late in chronic arses which are in the environment

so hopefully the liberty point of view will get a better idea about where this will severity of this infection and this rock slides in terms of the what's happening for support and in china it's a very complex situation but as you indicated there's very similar similarities with with sars is that during the sars outbreak in 2003 which unfortunately we were involved with a number of health care workers becoming infected is a repeat of what we saw in the in the sars outbreak and that's a big concern because we get state health care workers that was impede on the policy for the health care system to manage the am i right in saying that this virus appears less lethal than the sorrow as far as put but more infectious. that's right it you're totally right is that if you look at the overall mortality and morbidity at this stage it is much less lethal than the start or the most

crowded virus and that actually is one of the things which we're trying to do here is to a public. be more aware that this is not as going to be as severe in terms of mortality that's leading to a very high degree of anxiety on that but certainly it's it's causing a major can concern about the impact of how. the health care system right and one very fine a quick final question on this virus is don't like heat do they so does that mean that this could be seasonal and as that as the seasons change the this will this virus will disappear. well this is not the $64000000.00 but monster $64000000000.00 question. look at the historical evidence is that the seasonal chronographs it's sort of the the ones are the milder ones that have

a seasonal influence a center peak in the winter and they decrease in the summer and so the hope is that this virus will do the same in size we saw that the outbreak stopped in about may or june. that we have been due to the population being more aware and changes in social hygiene or the weather we severely hope that the weather will be an impediment for the past on the other hand it means that if this would mean that the virus could go down to the southern hemisphere it would become much cooler. there's a lot of unknowns at the moment it's certainly very much here at the moment dr drew let's look at the situation in china itself and how it's being dealt with china done enough in your opinion in my opinion. china has done enough and it depends which way you look at it. from the

start there was really to a public health. and how. you know the crisis being handed it's largely lit equals approach that's very gaunt or florid carrying and so the measures. we was introduced was largely to ease sure social stability for example the control of the laboratory to prevent the information as a chinese government safe to leak out all the rumors and so. a lot of work which was carried out in china in the nice initial state was to console the formation and yeah so. until you know when we find our way through and are there sucking of officials it is this is just scapegoating bobo the leadership covering up or what is or could be an overloaded health system

. it's what yeah it's obviously a chinese health care system it's it's weak it's overloaded effect and it's unsafe and chaotic. the sec of the official yeah it's a. normal practice full comin it's the rooty see you in a kind of you not to be home a cunt full it's weak in you face in health care system so it was. the come on the the people on the ground who were incapable of handling the crisis the old they had me think we just let the problem right pitted drive back and it's easy to level criticism isn't it but isn't it a very difficult situation in dealing with an outbreak like this anyway and then

this fire is itself is different because it can spread before symptoms show themselves absolutely and this is a of course a isn't a new virus and human population and so we're still learning about the dynamics of how it spreads and how easily it spreads and so there were so many and still really remains so many unknowns that it's very difficult to predict and so obviously after a slow start there with the response in china has been quite extraordinary in terms of the lengths that have been gone to to isolate millions of people to build field hospitals and we don't yet know if those things will work but it of course has been quite an aggressive response and internationally they're been promising signs of cooperation and while the number of cases outside of china continue to rise of those numbers to remain small and the w.h.o. of course the world health organization they've they've extolled the virtues of china's response what would you make of that. here again they've taken really unprecedented measures in terms of trying to control this outbreak and i think at

this time what's really require is unprecedented sharing of information transparency and international cooperation so we've seen china allowing experts internationally and elsewhere to come in and provide support where it's needed sharing of scientific information is incredibly important you know viruses don't respect borders and and so anything that suppresses the sharing of information or secrecy really favors the virus and so cooperation is what we need and do you think the actions of the w.h.o. itself a satisfactory there's been a lot of criticism over the years it's been building up about how the w.h.o. operates in that the time has come for reforming its system to handle emergency situations like this do you think it's push back on those criticisms by this response. yes i think that of atos response or involvement has been has been appropriate and in general a lot of tory in helping to. share information and to fight some of the epidemics

of misinformation that we've seen to promote cooperation and try to marshal resources we need to remember as a w.h.o. or as a body is really more of a coordinating body and has very little power on its own to enact public health measures but really to work with and influence countries on the ground to do so and that i think of doing a nice job dr nichols we saw this this big spike this huge spike in reported cases in who were a province on thursday and that's because the criteria for reporting the cases was changed just tell us a little bit more about that and what that means and what it means as to how we should interpret the figures that are coming out of china ok so basically what's changing is that before the way in which they're trying to isolate process this in a way this to normal ways which you do takes of a person's got a virus is a look for the virus itself using include and kit we're looking for

hundreds of virus always looking for their passage messick make up these and they are in a it's not a box using a single p.c. up so right now there is no rapid antigen test or detecting the current process forced to use the p.c. and it is got a few problems with how you take the sample and because also this stage it's still unclear which part of the response he tried the fastest replicating in way of taking the sample could lead to a bit of a problem so the way in which you can change it is to actually try to get more big cases so then moving towards using chest x. rays which will actually so if the patient is there and got clinical signs of a new money they can easily be a brought in and then managed so anyway. trying to train harder the more the more severe cases you actually need admission and treatment and also because it means

that you have called many more facilities that got chest x. rays and wrote the go fast turnaround and i think it's a good way in which you can actually get a good idea of what we call the the denominator because right now when the young unanswered questions about its parts if we talk about what's called the tip of the iceberg is is what we're seeing in who. is this just a clinical sort severe cases and there's a large large fortune. as can only get very mild symptoms so this is a in a way to try and classify you know to what degree of severity is this virus is i think was emphasized that this rise in the number of cases wasn't them dama people becoming sick but actually at the number of being entrapped like that so in general i think it's very appropriate when you have problems with a diagnostic it's not not kids trying to use a tool which allows a more better evaluation of who really need it mr dent and trace it right so they

kind of casting the net wider to a degree dr stanley iraq you try to write it that that's what it is you're right dr things are there that we've had this rash of announcement from the chinese government today about improving the response to major diseases related to them earlier about how it's expose new polls and how the chinese government will close these loopholes and with this kind of disparity in figures that we heard about this week. do you do you trust the chinese government to do what is necessary you satisfied with the figures coming out of china i was going to say something about the chinese. chinese from my experience working in the archive and look at the chinese stiffs you know had to do with this prevention except try and i say the chinese are not reliable i can tell you why because those ones quite often on those people on the grass roots level those ones who are

responsible for collecting the. statistics the data us. you know they don't have enough time they're overworked all they don't have the capability they just been called you know kind of. specially with such a major outbreak with such a huge number and not people being recruited to the work they had no previous experience and. the data they collected was unreliable on their cases in some cases they some they simply didn't have time so they just write down anything. and know when they fake accounts are the next level that x. but all their superior and they have this while still very files to the state to us but they have no means of doing. so what they do if they must sidestep that data to make it look like it's more or less right. yeah

then he goes to you now let's level with you know him the professional authority and the lung they don't want. you know kind of the freak out to make them look bad they want to show that they can come to a less asian racing so you know kind of over reporting sex safe all i want to report in you know kind of file fadia will casualties the moment active ok when it's only been a change of tone from the from the transparency that we saw in january and it's now given way to the state media not touching on the negative an accent rating the positive dr drew back what do you make of this if. they're not coming out and it's probably you see inform our crew say yes so you know kind of to me to do reporting on the good stories yet the succeeds the touching stories right and

go to dry but what's your view on this if if he seems that we can trust the data the statistics being mass arjun changed and in that case it changes the whole parameters of how we deal with this yeah absolutely i mean it's important that we have as accurate data as is possible and suppressing any information if that's happening is obviously going to really hamper of the response can play a role in invalidating some of the statistics so i don't know if those reports are true obviously that's that's very difficult. and in your view is what's been this combined effort from the w.h.o. and the chinese government is it enough to stop this epidemic spreading. well i hope so and time will tell again it's difficult to understand the trends both because we have some questions about the validity of the data as has been pointed out but also because this reclassification of cases over the last couple of days has caused a spike in the number of reported cases so it's difficult to understand whether we

are near a leveling off of cases or a tipping point or not it appears that that's not the case yet at least within the epicenter of the epidemic and have a province don't enable that if you want to come back on that but i also want to ask you about movie it on to the prospects of a vaccine and where we all with that ok sagal it doesn't follow is that you know i think that if we look more at the cases which are occurring outside mainland china . well you actually get you know you have the people and the resources i think that that is or probably be a better indicator of the actual disease verity and the natural history of the of this moral right rather than you know the over works and the overloaded system across in mainland china so that's why i think we should not be separating out you know run of cases worldwide just said but look into those that naturally region so

that might get some better idea of the of what the true nature of this disease is and the vaccine i think really think that those who think the commute acting in 6 months of the washing to much hollywood because in reality to get a vaccine you have to make sure that it works is that it's got no side effects and the disease model in an animal's way contested which shows us the risk of ministration the can you scale it up and that's on the side effects so i think the last thing which you want to do is be rushing rushing a vaccine into a population and getting side effects and then you get such a negative reaction like what we saw in the philippines with the outbreak of things like measles which occurred on our field of one of the vaccines so this current outbreak. really would not be able to have any hope for

a vaccine and the problem is also in the past i think there's been limited success of chronic prospects in the influenza is a long history of getting reliable that seems with coronavirus i think we're in with chose the. adult to draw back i'm some school of thought that for every case that is report of the 7 or 8 more help there is that your view of how things work. it's difficult to know for sure again because we're getting incomplete information from within china i think as dr nicol suggests that outside of china particularly countries with more robust health systems the numbers are likely much more accurate i think it's probably fairly safe to assume that the overall number of cases is is higher than what has been reported so far particular because of the number of mild cases that may go unrecorded whether that's 7 or 8 times or more or less than that you know there are mathematical models but i

couldn't say right and some jewish within china what are you hearing about the general response to how the government has handled this satisfaction is how will they come out at the end of all is well evening and people's response to the government's response the people's response to out of the population at large how do they regard how the government has responded to this outbreak. well people is being very divided to it and some you know telephone there is a different reaction today's and some. are on the same page with the government they think ringback this as political to take and this is a this earth you know kind of china's rise and they want to see you in a concert and be very much a sort of being who you know you'd like to be it's government to party to do thief and that's a lot of people also don't trust. both the political system and the health system

and there's a lot of panic a sense of panic and fear and yet will be if distrust so which makes the prevention and control of the virus more difficult if people don't trust the systems don't trust the government they are not less likely to do what they've been taught today i have very very quickly i talked to nicholson is going to jump in there these are praise to appear pretty frequently in china a current of our sars in 2003 bird flu etc in 30 seconds or so it is outlined why that is it because this is where you get a high population density near wild animals and basically also yours and have we also have a like a rural economy very close to $800.00. so that allows the intermingling of viruses and one host to another i think from the bats to an intermediate humans to be very you know it's very likely but having said that even

though sheeting king might be able to close down the wildlife markets in china in viet nam and in engine asia there's still going to be these small village type markets where sanitation and infection control is not that high and that's what we still get the avian influenza occurring and not in the. major cities but in in the rural areas so china may be able to stand out but i think other asian countries can still be a problem all right well we'll see how things develop but we run out of time a dr john nichols talk to some jew and dr peter dreadlock thanks very much indeed for joining us here on the program and thank you too for watching you can see this program again any time by visiting our website al-jazeera dot com and for further discussion just go to our facebook page that facebook dot com ford slash a.j. insights story and you can also join the conversation on twitter our handle is at a.j. inside story from

a nick clark the whole team here of whack. the plundering of armenia's natural riches has uprooted residents and desecrated the habitat of some of europe's most endangered species. but a remarkable campaign by local residents is challenging the miked of the country's investors and pinning high hopes on its newly elected prime minister people in power investigates armenia mining out the left. on

a. quarter of an essential resource for all humankind across europe pressure to recognise water as a human right and put its management back into public hands is increasing i think that the european commission would be very very good that this was a privatization and anybody see any kids. those people who seem ever to have something to invest the profit of a one dollar up to the last drop on al jazeera. and . al jazeera where every.

1200 hours g.m.t. on al-jazeera i'm kemal sons of maria with a look at the top stories on the u.s. defense secretary is calling china the biggest threat to the global order he was speaking at the munich security conference. accusing the chinese government of seeking advantage across the world by any means and at any cost the chinese foreign minister when ye called those accusations lies under president she's ruled the chinese communist party is heading even faster and further in the wrong direction more internal repression more predatory economic practices more heavy handedness and most concerning for me a more aggressive military posture it is essential that we.