A wider al break after recording its 1st official case of the virus with infrastructure and health care decimated by nearly a decade of conflict well speak with a volunteer trying to help the most vulnerable. Im burnt off its good to have you with us it is one of the biggest disruptions so far from the coronavirus pandemic today japanese Prime Minister shinzo abi announced that the summer Olympic Games in tokyo are being postponed into 2021 japan of the International Olympic committee reached the decision after weeks and weeks of pressure from athletes across the globe. The tokyo lympics are off the decision came suddenly but was not unexpected after weeks of debate and speculation. I suggested to the i. O. C. President thomas spock that the games be perspiring for a year and he was 100 percent in favor of that for that matter its a decision that was not taken lightly or willingly but pressure had been mounting from athletes and sports federations canada had already announced it would not be sending competitors if the games took place. We have agreed with the i. O. C. That we will stay in close contact to make sure that the olympic and Paralympic Games will be able to take place eventually then we can send a message that humanity has overcome coronavirus because of the future of that. This is the 1st time the Olympic Games have been postponed and its a mammoth logistical task contracts need to be renegotiated tickets for sold out venues transferred or returned and postgame sales of apartments in the Olympic Village will have to be put on hold. No new date has been set for the tokyo and picks. And for more im joined here at the big table now by my colleague Chris Harrison from our sports desk me chris the decision really everyone expected it was just a matter of time yes it was a matter of time on sunday the i. O. C. Said it would take 4 weeks to decide whether or not to postpone the a lympics well that turned into 48 hours and it all makes sense because you have to look at the teams that already notified the public they would withdraw Canada Australia even usa track and field on sunday also shared that sentiment and britain i think were expected to follow as well and then when you factor in you know just the idea the athletes and have proper places to train and so forth i do give credit even though its a little late to give them credit thomas bucked the president he did come out and say this is pretty much about saving lives you know sport is not the most important thing right now preserving human life is and i think thats a common denominator across the globe right and the reaction from the you have fleets i heard that theyre still going to call the games the 2020 Olympic Games even if they take place in 2021 yeah i think thats a branding issue but in terms of the athletes of course theyre heartbroken but related in they understand you know the circumstances canada admission one of the 1st team so would draw well a canadian olympic champion erica we came out and said well be more ready than ever for 2021 and wearing the maple leaf with more pride than i thought possible so it kind of shows that there is going to be anticipation you know any years time you know in next of this summer because i mean i guess its good if you are not getting up in age but if youre younger youve got an extra year to prepare if youre at the sea at the end of your career checking on another year or 2 it could be make or break for some have fully qualified is going to be a concern also they dont know of to actually keep those places you know on hold or you know force athletes to qualify once again ive even heard some interested to know about drug cheats their suspensions and so forth maybe those expenses expire theyre allowed to compete but nonetheless we have to wait til 2021 to watch it all play out great friends here and its always chris thank you ok. Well here are some more of the latest developments in the corona virus pandemic a nationwide lockdown has gone into effect in india 1300000000 people are now barred from leaving their homes italys death toll from the virus has surged yet again 743 registered new deaths on tuesday broke 2 consecutive days of declines the number of global cases of the infection has now surpassed the 400000 mark doubling in less than a week and the World Health Organization is warning of a big exhilaration in case numbers in the United States it says the u. S. Could soon become the new epicenter of the Global Pandemic if there is one place on earth least prepared to deal with an outbreak of the role of virus it would have to be the war torn country of syria and yet that is exactly what appears to be on the horizon the country is bracing for a lockdown after the Assad Government confirmed its 1st case of covert 19 last weekend a full blown outbreak would have horrible consequences a decade of war has devastated the countrys Health Care System syria some full 100000 People Killed millions displaced entire neighborhoods bombed to rubble. 9 years of civil war have left much of the country in ruins and now theres a new enemy the one that were all fighting right now. These volunteers belong to the Syrian Civil Defense better known as the white house. In recent years theyve been providing Emergency Health care to wall victims in serious opposition strongholds. These days theyre trying to save lives by sterilizing surfaces. Corona virus is spreading around the world and in arab countries and its turning into a global epidemic that threatens human life so weve the Syrian Civil Defense in cooperation with the department of education in our free are carrying out a preventative Sterilization Campaign on syria reported its 1st case of the Novel Coronavirus on sunday and the whole country is on high alert. As we are ready the Health Ministry is ready the Higher Education ministry is ready all medical and Health Sectors in the country are ready to be on one team and we hope to overcome this thing with a small but serious Health Care System is severely strained according to the World Health Organization less than 2 thirds of the countrys hospitals were functioning late last year and 70 percent of Health Workers have fled the country. Theres particular concern about the virus spreading in the north west in italy a province where up to a 1000000 people live in overcrowded camps like this. Its the perfect breeding ground for the virus and not the only one that would actually consider syria as very high this country especially if we see that we do have populations and. Refugees slum areas. So for for for flood of the incentives all these actually hi this core corner of us. In a province checkpoints have been erected where the White Helmets the taking the temperatures of people who are traveling through. That if developments in other countries are anything to go by it when stop the corona virus from spreading among syrias most vulnerable. And for more on the situation in syria im joined now by m. R. So moved from the White Helmets he joins me tonight from providence in syria good to have you on the program we know about the humanitarian disaster in live where you are i want to know are you able to prepare in any way for an outbreak of the coronavirus. Thanks a lot for having me and we wish 72 your citizen 1st of all there is another twist of failure there is no single cases confirmed of coronavirus and this could be a loser and. Dont reflect the actual. Actual thinking here because there is no real blood of equipment visualize equipment and tools to detect these vials actually the outbreak of these fires here is extremely improbable because hand of the fall of 2000 i. D. B. Is living in a pretty crowded. Cam comes out sanitation comes with lots of anguishing Services Come around them come and this is and this one here actually didnt care because. If you want to yes if i could just let me ask you are you able to do are you able to do anything right now to protect the population from the virus. We are talking about hospital. 98 stacked on little during the last 6 months actually not functioning and if you lose. With equipment they dont want any shipping. Organization here. To establish a sense of government. To give equipment to these. Sensors but you know that the longer scenes and i dont think would have been a critic procedure of. This equipment do i think this is a place and you know what what means the days later. I mean what does it mean what does it mean there for the people there in the province are you saying that youre not getting any help from the International Community at all. Yes of course because and even the help is not enough youre not you see the lack of equipment a blog a lack of equipment for example masks there is a global lack of this like a strong country country with a stronger and with Strong Health system actually incapable to face the silence was about syria here we are talking about if you will smith old if we are going to the just then the ventilator and the northeast of syria we actually we we are if if this of this virus spread here we will die like cattle we will be the 1st sitting actually the right element trying to do what we can to do for example make incumbent of our governments to our arab world how to protect themselves how to to make social stance and we make videos to be bold informative hands informative and education the seans and last and trying to make about action of this infection but this is not enough and why do you have do you have one request to make tonight to the International Community to the World Health Organization what is that one request. You know i want to. Do it obviously. Because i was sent there is bureaucratic. And oh im going to im going to. Have dinner and if we dont think about it im sure if you ask any man and his he will be out of. It will be spent. Elsewhere and go out of their tents to do. Ok. From the White Helmets joining us tonight from province in syria and more thank you very much we appreciate your time and we wish you all the best thank you thank you thank you. Time now for a quick check of the markets wall street stocks have been trading higher on expectations that more help from the u. S. Or for the u. S. Economy is on the way the dow jones is up more than 8 percent as Congress Moves closer to approving a package worth almost 2 trillion dollars the rises on wall street followed significant gains on asian markets today they were in part reacting to the federal reserves commitment to make unlimited bond purchases to protect the u. S. Economy japans nikkei closed 7 percent higher south koreas index was up 8 percent european stocks have also recovered some of the lost ground they marked last week with germanys dax up around 7 percent. Or heres some of the other coronavirus stories that are making headlines around the Business World ryan air has told customers it is not expecting to operate flights in the next 2 months but the irish budget carrier says its prepared to pick up stranded passengers as well as carry medical supplies the passenger aviation sector has faced massive disruption from coke at 19 amid air travel restrictions and a collapse in demand the carmaker ford is joining forces with general electrics Health Care Unit and 3 am to manufacture ventilators and respirators ford says it is expecting the possibility of producing the devices at one of its michigan factories the rapid outbreak of the corona virus has caused a shortage of respiratory equipment all over the world. I bring it off youre watching the news ill be back at the top of the hour with more world news followed by the day well have complete coverage of the pandemic from asia to europe to north america hope to see you this. Combating the pandemic. Where does research stand. What are scientists learning. Our daily update. From the 19th special next on d w. How does a virus spread. Why do we panic and when well. Just through the tactics and i read your blog is called spectrum if you would like to thank me for information on the crown of virus or any other science topic you should really check out our podcast you can get it wherever you can get your podcast you can also find us at. Science. But. This is 1900. 11 the corona virus has forced millions of people into quarantine and isolation that means millions of people are working from home some for the 1st time we take a look at how people cope with working from home and we ask an expert how the crisis might change how we work for good. Im sumi so much going to thank you for joining us people all over the world are working from home that includes many of my colleagues here at the view our reporter sent us a report from her apartment in berlin where she set up her temporary office and she has some tips on how to make it work. Half circles in the office right now here are. Actually from her. Room and no one was easy today shall i put some actual close up. All of this telling great time. This may sound super on here but i havent gotten my Microsoft Teams to work the entire day learn from my mistakes make sure is me being well before you have to stay. I know its super tempting but its a separate clean quiet where spaces away from the destruction. Are now its easy for me to say because i dont have kids my only distraction in some i think even t. V. s even get on the fridge and the laundry and the dishes and the books. To get my point. Yes that means you might have to look presentable but looking face to face isnt best way to feel less alone. And happy hours can be gradual to. Sleep while you can usually be commuting cook yourself a yummy luck. Finally blackout a big reveal you think well what. If the whole situation is tough for those of us who are privileged enough to still on money and do things on the thinking of our her we should make them. Lets speak now to norbert to crow now hes a researcher from the university of potsdam studying how people work from home number thank you for joining us 1st of all what do you think of those tips you know dont work from bad stay in touch on Video Conference you have anything to add there. Yeah this is not only an advantage but it might also be acquired to use does a box just because all travel times are no go on and immediately be replaced by another you know conference not to talk of rest and not all this all the work and density is thats why science on it is much higher and to do a good office work where you have to walk from one meeting room to a not knowing where you can walk to the contrary are or have a brick as a water cooler all the coffee machine thats all no longer possible all right so you also have for yourself you might have more time a clock then youre saying i mean looking at the fact that millions of people are now in their home offices essentially what if you found i mean how does this change the way we work are we more productive or are we less productive at home. Well in some cases independence in some cases we dont was productive because now we cant exactly see what the other colleague was talking about because we have power point slides Crystal Clear all because you know its Crystal Clear on the screen not 8 meters away got going through and thats an advantage but on the other hand what we are focusing on in our research is that creative and knowledge intensive process is in it isnt isness they need the nia ness of people that cant work in the same men are online and in digital the meetings and therefore we are missing something so we. Today we had with my research us virtual lunch break there everybody said in front of his camera and ate something and trying something and thats a lot of the same if you cannot achieve the Knowledge Transfer between video screens you need the near miss off persons and right in some on the less intense processes we have 75 percent of Knowledge Transfer out i socialize ation by personal meeting between persons and all but you know what all of this is all for how do you think this will fundamentally change the way that we work will more people stay with working from home permanently. I dont think so i think some tasks can be done remotely and some other tasks will need a personal meeting and it will be resumed in full when we are able to travel again i think that it wont change a lot right now at all your point this is are both ok well have to leave it there in our back row now from the university of potsdam thank you so much for joining us. And we will be following this story closely at g. W. Our social Media Editors will be reporting weekly and we want to know how you are coping with working from home were all new to this crazy line boggling situation is why this is an old influenza we are in uncharted. Territory all life as we know it is changing. But were all in this together in this new series we want to find out 7 how to handle on new lives in times of the corona pandemic thankfully with the help of a leading expert it seems like its been a very popular study how do we stay mentally and physically healthy how do we handle family and all partners without driving each other completely insane. Just up how to deal with cabin fever. How are you dealing with being cooped up let me know leave a comment and i would love to profit from your experiences for our upcoming episode. Well we asked you to send us some of your questions on the kobe 1000 pandemic and many of you did get in touch our science correspondent Dirk Williams has some answers take a look. Why did you come from. To the best of our knowledge the 1st cases of covert 19 appeared in the chinese city of rouhani back in december of 2019 they were closely associated with the wildlife market they are now coronaviruses can jump from animals to humans and we think that thats what happened here at the sars virus to the same back in 2000 here in 2003 it was traced back to bats the civets sold in wildlife markets we dont yet know what animals might have acted as intermediaries here but we have seen very similar coronaviruses and bats and we think that they are the ultimate reservoir in the wild. How does it spread. That 19 is a pretty infectious respiratory disease that spread by droplets of saliva or discharge from the nurse someone when they cough or sneeze thats why its important to stay at least a metre away and preferably farther from anyone whos coughing or sneezing it doesnt stay airborne for very long we dont think but it can remain infectious after landing on surfaces which is why you also need to Pay Attention to how often you wash your hands and you should try not to touch your face as much as possible. How do i know if im in fact it. We only way to know for sure if you have coded 19 is to take a test because many of the symptoms are similar to those people experience when they have other respiratory ailments like the flu in covert 19 the primary symptoms that people have reported are fever dry cough and fatigue and then to a lesser extent things like congestion a sore throat or diarrhea some people who catch the disease dont have any symptoms at all their case. Symptomatic around 4 in 5 people who get it will recover from the disease without any special treatment or having to go to the hospital. What can i do if im in fact it. Because this virus is and novel one in humans no one has any immunity the 1st time they catch it even if someone doesnt show any symptoms they still go in fact it and can in fact others we dont yet have any specific vaccines to prevent covert 19 and we dont have any medications to treat it so at this point if you are infected theres no way to interrupt the course of the disease the best thing to do if youre infected is to talk with your local medical authorities and follow their advice if you arent in a High Risk Group for the disease the chances are very good youll return to full health within a couple of weeks. If i thought it was going i catch it again in the future. Because this is a new virus we still dont know much about how the immune system well reacts to subsequent infections with copd at 19. Doctors assume that catching it will give you some kind of immunity but a big question is exactly how long that immunity well last hour immunity levels to related coronaviruses like some that cause common colds are not permanent and we dont really know why the question of immunity is a question that really only time will answer. A news team that the austrian public broadcaster o. R. F. Will go into voluntary isolation to brett prevent any of them from becoming infected now theyll be isolated on site in vienna theyve all tested negative for the virus and no one will be allowed in the door will be guarded and food will be delivered these 180 employees will guarantee that new Services Continue to run on interrupted oh r. F. Is not the only Austrian Company to seal off key chains of staff last week around 50 healthy employees from the main Energy Company were isolated within certain power stations to make sure that the Electricity Supply would not be affected. Thank you for joining our covert 1900. S. Always you can get the latest on our website interview dot com for all of us here in berlin thank you for watching. Even if the coronavirus is sending football into a forced brain. We will still be bringing you. Stories very small. And the stories of tension surrounding our favorite sports. Because we wont match the soccer fun stop just yet. To go. Next on d w. Whats the secret behind this classic. Is it to say. As soon as you hear beethoven lose your mind. Or the story behind the music. For the ages register. Tobins 9th. Starts on t w. A space and up system for stanza best scholars india