a faster vaccination drive a booster shots. week barker has more from london. the government is really weighing up its options and it's under a tremendous amount of pressure. firstly, to safeguard the economy of though they have been increasingly louder and louder, concerns coming from the hospitality sector about what new restrictions could been for them. predictions of thousands of businesses going out of business business by, by the new year. on top of that though, we are seeing the figures of micron rocket, it is the dominant strain here in the capital. and the only leading thing in the british government's arsenal is to ramp up. it's boost a drive, which is what we're seeing this weekend major stadiums at the home of chelsea, stamford bridge wembley stadium will accommodate tens of thousands of people getting their boosters in. those particular locations are 24 hour hub as opened in north london as well. but let's not forget, this isn't just simply about boosters. this is also about reaching people who haven't had any vaccines at all. and the numbers are pretty staggering. according to saudi cars, the mayor of london, 1300000 people here in the capital have not had a single dose. and that's a similar story. in other major cities in birmingham, a 40 percent of under forty's, in certain parts of that city, have not had a single dose. and each one of these people, it poses a potential risk of contracting the illness, getting seriously ill and impacting, obviously on the services. the hospitals can provide credit, i was cases and hospital admissions in the u. s. are also accelerating. the number of infections has increased by 40 percent compared to last month, while the numbers in hospital have risen by around 45 percent. many universities are going back to online teaching and sports events have been canceled or postponed . experts predict the armor, chrome will soon become the dominant strain there as well. a crime is increasing rapidly and we expect it to become the dominant strain in the united states as it has in other countries. in the coming weeks, we've seen cases of mac crohn among those who are both vaccinated and boosted. and we believe these cases are milder or a symptomatic because of vaccine protection. in other news, thousands of soldiers and emergency personnel have joined rescue efforts in the philippines. at least 31 people have now been reported killed as typhoon ry swept across southern and central regions on thursday and friday. hundreds of thousands of people have not been false from their homes. the stones being described as one of the strongest this year. the more heavy rain in northern iraq is but to, to hamper us griffith following flash floods for people have died in the deluge. one was struck by lightning and others drowned. dozens of properties in bill were damaged, and buses and trucks swept away. the united states, as it's prepared to talk to russia about its demands to curb need to activity in eastern europe. moscow will need to limit the membership and restrict activities in former soviet countries. the us is increasingly concerned by russia's military build up on the border with ukraine. presidents under the african leaders are in turkey to discuss boosting trade links. but the rest of the one is hoping to triple tech is $25000000000.00. trade links with african countries, sales of turkish weapons, including drone technology, also on the agenda at the economic summit in its stumbles for minneapolis, police officer kim potter has apologize for killing a 20 year old black man during a traffic stop. she's facing charges of manslaughter. the shooting dante rise, she claim she meant to draw her taser instead of her gun. jeffrey epstein, ledge partner in crime won't be giving evidence in her sex trafficking trial. elaine maxwell told the judge and neil the prosecutors hadn't proven that case. beyond reasonable doubt, do you follow those stories on websites out there? dot com. so dated through the day, i'll be back with more news in half knob and exxon launches. there is the bottom line to stay with us. oh i i am steve clements and i have a question. it's been almost 2 years since the world woke up to the corona virus and now with new variance like on the kron will we ever get the pandemic under control? let's get to the bottom line. ah, what started with one case of the flu in will hon. china has left more than $5000000.00 people around the world dead in less than 2 years. 800000 of them in the united states alone. scientists have discovered new mutations like lambda and delta, and the current wave of ami kron with no end in sight. they've also created amazing vaccines and medicines to deal with the virus, which brings us to the cycle. we're stuck in now. new surges in variance of illness, coupled with new measures to try to manage it. and a clear distinction between the haves and the have nots of the world. vaccination rates in rich countries have reached about 70 percent, but most of the world vaccination rates are hovering around 5 percent of the population. so is this year wraps up what lies in store for us in 2022, and can scientists create a pan virus vaccine? today we're talking with dr. eric total, a cardiologist who founded the scripps research translational institute, focusing on genomics and the author of many books on the future of medicine. i am a big fan and most recently, deep medicine, how artificial intelligence can make health care human again, eric, it's great to see you. and i just want to start out with this issue about something that you've been writing about with on the crime virus and understanding the data. let me just give, ask you to give our audience and understanding of how serious the evolution of these variance are and how prepared we are or aren't for dealing with them. well 1st, steve, it's great to be with you. ah, knowing you for many years and having to chance to weigh in on this whole of pandemic in i'm a crime, you know, if it hadn't been for the evolution of ours, we would have been done with this pandemic many, many months ago. but unfortunately i read around thanksgiving was the 1st report of the, our crime variant, which is the most challenging by far, it really takes the vaccines that we have to day out. and it makes them less effective. makes even the booster dose 3rd dose are not as effective as what we've seen with all of a previous marriage. so this so called immune escape is a problem. and of course we don't know of the virus will stop evolving here. if we don't contain it, which is you started in your intro about not having the global vaccine equity and covering the planet unless we get containment, we could see further evolution and complete a escape from our vaccine and infection immunity. so this is another major bump in the road as we try to get an exit ram from the pandemic to an endemic state. do you think that we understand the complexities of these virus well enough and its evolution to understand whether it is evolving in a more deadly way, a less deadly way? you know, i remind people that are, you know, annual flu vaccines are essentially, you know, caused by a very deadly varied of a flu. at some point that evolved and became less deadly over time. is there any chance that might be the vector? ah, that coven 19 takes? well, you know, this virus is so different than slew super flu is a hyper mutation virus. and that's why we're, our vaccines are not very good. we can't keep up with the mutations or protect them very well. here. we've only had 5 major variance in over 2 years. you've all, with the armor time being by far the most difficult to deal with. but, you know, did the capability for us to develop? i pan corona's, a corona virus vaccine for this family of the server. co virus is, is imminent. it's in our reach, and it's been so much progress about that. and that's what we should be doing right now. instead of trying to come up with the offer con, specific vaccine, which appears it will be necessary, we're gonna start to get hold of and control of this particular variant. so, you know, we can do better. the science has been, as you touched on, just remarkable. and even though influenza has never yet had a universal vaccine, the corona virus, it lends itself much better to that. you've just mentioned the science has been remarkable. tell the folks that if you haven't been through this before, if you're a young person, a developing a vaccine for a virus in a year was unheard of it's. it is practically miraculous operation. warp speed came up with a, with a set of variance. but eric, you also wrote something a while back and, and i'm just going to paraphrase, it says it brings us to the united states sitting in the zone of denial for then the 4th time during the pandemic thinking in some way it's going to be immune to what's happening in the world and, and so i find this juxtaposition of almost will for willful ignorance. we're sitting right next to profound successful science. you know, one of the most alarming elements of this time. but i that, you know, as we say in, in this business, can you separate the signal from the noise here? what's happening, particularly in the united states with this denial of science and what it, it, and the, and the lessons and benefits it's offering us. i know this is truly incomprehensible to me now or in the fish denial of alma cra. we have 820000 new cases a day. we have 67000 people in the hospital over 1200 just a day and we haven't even yet seen they amr con effect. so we are looking at a very serious potential of more than a 1000000 new cases a day in the united states. but yet we're not doing anything about it. we're not contain daughter and we have more trouble lying ahead. so this continued repetitive notion that what's happening in south africa or europe, or wherever it is not going to happen. the united states is pure stupidity and i'm just amazed that it continues. now there were various institutions created over the last decade, one of the month and they are with is the coalition for epidemic preparedness innovations. we also knew of simulations done by the u. s. government, as well as european governments, anticipating how to behave, how to react. ah, before the next pandemic comes, the rockefeller foundation is worked with people like dr. rick bright, who is very note to basically set up new institutions. you know, to look at this. i guess my question to you is i see a lot of these institutions that have come online. what are your view from a science view, but you're also so savvy with blind spots in science and blind spots and public policy? what blind spots do we really need to remove? what leadership that we need to see to, to, to fix? what still looks to me like a wobbly response to the next pandemic? right, well the 1st year of our pandemic response was checkered by a pure political of bots. should bungle and you know, i worked with the rockefeller foundation on the action plans which we submitted to the white house and the government will just ignore totally ignore this year. with the new administration, we have other problems we have in finding among the leadership. we have the inability to execute with respect to getting rapid tests out there, which are essential and should be free. i should be available for every household. and you know, in just not happening so that along with, you know, the booster issue, we knew about this in august from israel. and we basically ignore it and said, well, we don't have us do. well, that's another issue in the 2nd year of the pandemic in the u. s. r. navigational system, our data tracking is that it, you know, we don't have a handle on the breakthrough hospitalizations and desks that are occurring no less . all of the hospitalizations with respect to all of the demographics that you know, which sequence of the virus and these are just the most extreme cases. so data tracking and not having rapid test have not improve whatsoever in this country despite the urges of, of all of us that we have to get this resolved because, you know, we have a lot more months if not the whole year of 2022 to get through in this pandemic in, you know, it's taking much too long to get this on track. you know, i, i can agree with you more on when i was in paris. ah, and i needed to get a rapid test. look, there was a tent outside my hotel. they were tense all over paris. you could easily get an immediate test almost anywhere on a, on the spur of the moment. if you were a french citizen, it was free. for me, it was 30 euros. you know, it, but it was there and available today the united it's, it's so hard. there are places you can go, but you've got to be, you know, a kind of a complex game player to find out where they are, then to navigate the costs, etc. so i guess my question is, why isn't the scientific community screaming at the, by the administration to work out this dysfunction, to prioritize tests to price. i mean, we used to talk about contact raising no one mean you a lot. if you mentioned contact racing, people laugh, so there seems to be an abandonment of all the public health steps that were being advocated during the trump administration. it seems like the pied ministration is in even trying. do i have that wrong? well, i think it's not far off. we haven't screamed, i've been screaming. michael mena, many others. they get this rapid test are, you know, right. and in colorado, now they are free to all people in the state. and as you say in select places like in some of the few skew cities in the us, it's like what you described in paris. but that's, you know, a tiny, tiny fraction of the u. s. and, you know, it just is truly unexplainable. this is the context reasoning. as you say, we're starting to see that for armstrong, for the 1st time in the panoramic. that's oh wow. we want to do some checks here. but, you know, we haven't done public health one or one, and that is what made us performance, you know, giving an ass great on the science, you know, a plus for the vaccines. and so many other aspects of the science advances that have been centered here. but far as managing the damage, it is just been part. one of the things i would recommend to our audience to do is to go read eric, totals twitter feed because it is a quick lesson. i mean, it's deeper than most out there, but it's a quick lesson in many of the different dimensions of the spread of a pandemic this pandemic. how to respond, what the deficits in policy are. but you also highlighted who you felt were heroes on the team in south africa who identified and then tried to say, it's here, it's here, it's here went to a process of trying to tell the world about it and want to watch work. and it wasn't easy, which was surprise me. so tell us why you saw them as heroes and, and why, what they did was so important and what lessons we should take from it and replicate with possible variance down the road. right, well, you know, we saw in the prior variance alpha, beta gamma delta, and those 4, it took quite a while for the world to be alerted about the presence of a variant of concern and varying of concern. you know, it's a big deal. i said it's only been 5, but without a whole different look to the own. avira and colleagues in south africa, south african ministry, crisper organization. what they did was just extraordinary because they knew by announcing this, our con variant with the sequence that they had. and the outbreak in your tang, the problems that that was gonna create trouble for south africa. and indeed what happened. steve is just horrible that they, their travel was banned from south africa as a result of announcing the, our crime bearing. i mean, just extraordinary. but i that within 2 days, the w h o had an emergency meeting, i labeled it categorize it a very in concern. and we've seen what has been doing out throughout the world. i mean, throughout europe in denmark, in norway, in belgium, in the u. k. what is going to do in the u. s. basically, it has destiny is becoming the dominant new strength throughout the world, unless it doesn't compete fully with delta. so it's really the south africans that know within days instead of months that took this. i'm trying very and, and gave us awareness that gave us a head start getting back to like what you mentioned earlier, steve, you're going to do contact tracy. we got on this in the us, even though there was some delay in getting the 1st sequence is the u. s. now it's, you know, everywhere, but we got to those cases very shortly after they arrived very shortly after community transmission was started and we owe that debt to the south african sciences. let me ask you to talk about, you know, cutting off travel. and there seems to be, you know, in this drama, this major health pandemic drama, a desire in some places to blame a country to blame a place as opposed to saying, hey, you did the right thing by stepping forward because of the consequences. it would come out and as we know, and as we've seen, you know, once you've identified it, it's likely already out somewhere else. me. this was, you know, part of the lesson we didn't learn before. but you know, it does reeses interested of, divides in the world, and let's listen to what south africa's president cyril rom opposed i had to say recently. i really didn't disappoint with rich countries have to issue the order order of asians required. we want seen you know, not to come from the table. i am interested in this because there seems to be along the lines of what you were critiquing. united states for doing. i sense that if we take care of it here, we're ok that we don't have to worry about the developing world or other corners of the world that may have, may have this. and i'm just interesting it from you. what we need to do in terms of approaching a whole world solution to dealing with this pandemic. right, well, you know, is clear that we have to do much better. the continent of africa has been almost completely ignored with respect to getting the people vaccinated. they are in south africa, were 25 percent full vaccine and it is one of the outliers on the, in the positive side. but as you know, you know, you know, many countries are well over 70, even e, approaching 90 percent. now, the problem we have though, is not just the global equity. united states is an outlier, contributing an enormous number of new cases each day. so we have under vaccinated, you know, we are rank number 67 in the world. the united states are vaccination, which is so incredible having the m r n a vaccines originated from the u. s. work so as far as inaccurate inequity. there's also inequity of the case burden, which is the breeding grounds for yet another very at which could even be worse than our car. so we have to look at both of these, you know, where there's tremendous number of new cases in spread. we've got to put the fire off, and so we need to attend to both of the under vaccinated parts of the world, the lower and middle income countries, but also the culprits. and the u. s. is culprit number one as a country? obviously, the continent of europe is also contributing a lot of cases, but no country like the u. s. right now, do you think we should be much more forceful when it comes to mandates? then our system has been so far, either at the federal level or the state level that, that this notion, ah, that some folks considered out. and that's there right. versus the collective health of american society, global society. you know, are we getting the, the equilibrium right between those 2 poles. right. well see if we haven't gotten the librium right. and it's very sad that mandates even had to come off as an issue . because you would have thought that all americans would one of the united against a formidable foe of this virus. but it hasn't happened. and we have a balkanized country with very profound globalization. oh, vaccines and mass and the science and everything else. and math, which held us back all the misinformation, edition, formation of politics. and that's really the best explanation of how we have failed . and how we are number 67 in the world of countries that are fully vaccinated right now and sliding, you know, every week further down the list. so, you know, we're performing in terms of vaccination, much worse than many countries that are not even in the developed world right now. and we can account for that just because of the, the politics, the lack of community sense. and we have to then resort to manage, but as we've seen, steve, we have courts, we have governors and states taking this on. and we haven't been able to make the progress. we can't even get health care workers to have mandated to be fully vaccinate. no less the rest of the population. why have we not, you know, filled that gap with the developing world and gotten him the vaccines? and so they're calling as the south african president said, for a waiver this because they, they want the i p to be able to, you know, reach their audience. what, why haven't we taken the obvious course, which is just to pay for vaccines for this developing what is also paying for our health? right now, we should be managing just pain, but you know, donating vaccines in enormous supplies. not little, piddling a mouse. also, we need to set up production facilities in other continents and much faster than that's been happening. so we haven't had this, you know, true humanitarian or global. i overarching objective. there's been so much nationalistic behavior, not just in the us, of course, but throughout many other countries. there's been a big fight about boosters and how they're detracting from getting other countries to their initial vaccination. but frankly, you have to do both. because if you, if you lose a protection for the people who are vaccinated, you're in particular with our crime, you're basically back to square one. so we have to get this right. we're not moving fast enough, where as we got, as you noted, within 10 months of the sequence, we had vaccines that were taken through pivotal large phase 3 trials. but in order to get the production of manufacturing, distribution, and supply chain of the vaccines throughout the world, we have not come up with a parallel high velocity strategy. eric, which, which, you know, if you're basically a family person here worried about your children, worried about your, you know, grandparents, you know, others out there. there's been a lot of different information and signals sent regarding which vaccine to take to deal with on the chron how effective it is. it's almost, and i understand as a person in the news business how hard it is to be formulaic and to issue, you know, precise instruction to people. but almost the debate about efficacious ness of these drugs translates into uncertainty and a big question mark. and i'm just interested from you, if you're advising people, what's the best step forward? is it visor it is that astrazeneca is it, johnson and johnson, is it you? madera? is the booster critical? well, you know, what's your best counsel to people who don't know a lot, but want to go down the right path? well, it partly depends on where you are in the world, because different vaccines are available in the us. it's basically, you know, pfizer and donna and now it's very clear that a 3rd child is going to be necessary for those to maintain effectiveness against amr crime. but if there's a for j and j, which is the cousin of astrazeneca, these are ad, no viral vaccines. the difference with j and j was supposed to be a one and done. it's not true. you really need data. at least 2 shots. we don't know about a 3rd, and it's probably advisable to take an m r in a 2nd shot for j and j or a m r and a that's visor or madonna for astrazeneca we, we're seeing a really nice effect of this mixing. that is, you had an annual viral that seen my doctor's anake or a j j, and then you get an m r and a vaccine. and that peers to be, this is boost beyond just a booth which is that the different types of vaccines are more than additive for the immune response. that's one thing we could do. and as you're, i think getting to steve, that's not what the manufacturers recommend. or the government recommend in general there are some exceptions. but for people that would be a very prudent approach to get the maximum, the biggest bang out of vaccination. so you know, we, at the moment calf can seen a consistent edge of modernity over pfizer. about 8 to 10 percent points for efficacy that's held up. but with the weighting the same type of waning that's likely due to the higher dose of m r and a of madonna over pfizer. remember it's 100 micrograms old compared to 30 my to room. but near now the booster router is 50 and we're also seeing, you know, now the children age 5 to 11, the teens. so this nursing and the different vaccines, there's lots of different issues when you start to get into different age groups or people will thank you for that. well, we'll have to end up there. cardiologist, scientists, author, doctor eric topple. thank you so much for your candid bots. today, thank you steve. so what's the bottom line? 600 years ago, galileo was punished by the catholic church for insisting that the earth rotated around the sun. and to day, despite his supposedly living in the age of science and rationality. the debate about the corona virus reminds me about galileo all the time. no matter how much disdain some folks have for science and scientists. guess what folks, the crone of iris is here. the west is fighting it with masks and testing, and vaccines, and contact creasing and avoiding crowds. but for the majority of the world, all of these measures even washing hands with clean water, is a really big challenge. in the end, the scientific approach is going to succeed. it's gonna take time and money, but it is possible. and then all people on this planet should have fair access. no matter the content, no matter the zipcode. that's the only way. and that's the bottom line. ah, a musician, performer, visionary teacher, ah, out is there a world meet the man bringing traditional arabic sounds to a whole new audience, being a woman and being american, playing over it already is something new from boston to palestine, the land of his birth. he noticed the next generation of musical talent, simon shaheen. musical journey on al jazeera. ah, can you hear it? anticipation, these rising. excitement is growing. as cattle anyways, brings your favourite team to cut off for the fee for arab carp. 2021. greatness is in the air. let saul is juan and rich new heights. join us in cut off from november, the 30th to december. the 18th booked your package now at qatar airways dot com. ah, no geology 0. me sell robin in doha. reminder of our top news story is a record number of code 19 cases have been recorded in the u. k for a 3rd day in a row calls from across the political vida, growing for the british government to bring in more restrictions. 93000 infections were registered on friday and case numbers nationwide have increased by about 39 percent in a week. but the death rate remains relatively low. ne parker has more from london on the government's vaccination drive. it's only choice is to turbocharged.