The freeman foundation. By judy and Peter Blum Kovler foundation; pursuing solutions for americas neglected needs. And by contributions to this pbs station from viewers like you. Thank you. Im katty kay in washington and this is bbc world news america. There are only a few chances ft to change American Voters minds. Tonights president ial debate is one of th. One million. Thats how many have diedco from d19, but one country got this pandemic right. We will be in singore for lessons learned. s not a bird, its not a plane. Its a flying paramedic. The u. K. Mbulance service is testing a jetpack rescue kit. Katty bbc world news america welcome to bbc world news america on pbs and around the wod. They have rehearsed, taken dadvice, o doubt prepared attack lines, but when the lights go on in cleveland, it will be up to donald trump a joe biden alone on stage to battle it out in the first president ial debate. There will be no studiot a audience. Are expected to waom home,cans perhaps as many as 100 million. Laura trevelyan is in cleveland, oh for us. She joins us. Igreat to have ycleveland tonight. It is not going to be the kind of president ial debate we are use to tonight. Does that playor to onther candidate advantage . Reporter it might be t big crowd President Trump likes to referff only between 80 and 100 people are allowed in the hall, not the 900 as usual. You go dont get the big applause lines you would usually expect. Each candidate is only allowed 20 guests each. I spoke to the top joe biden ally, senator chris coons. He said, we can expect rock him ccer him robots and ths what he is expecting. The challenge for joe biden is to get the message out against the image of donald trump as a robot bangingp against him the whole time. Katty i guess the expectation is joe biden has a lot more tose lose in the that the Trump Campaign h said quite often that hes not up to the job they, suggested he needed a drug test going into the debate. Could that paradoxically work into joe bidens favor . Reporter it is true that the bar is very low. Atif you Trump Campaign ads, if joe biden shows up and is able to string a sentence together, he will do well. The campaigns well, theou hear Trump Campaign is sayingca bay joe bidens campaign agreed to an inspection of air pieces anyone was carrying an electronic earpiece and said they w thatec bevingto that. Instructions from outside. The Biden Campaign meanwhile said President Trumps team says can there be no mention of 200,000 dead from coronavirus . I should note the president ial commission on to mate debate said they havent heard nothing about these demands. The debate about the debate is underway. Katty thank youand for now im joined by loie chan, who wasre policy or to mitt romneys campaign in 2010. Thank you for joinings. You have experience of prepping republican candidates for debates. Whatou you have been expecting joe biden and donald trump to go through for the last few weeks . The thing about debate vrep is it isy individualized process. Different styles. S have joe biden, very methodical, probably study of material. I understand donaldocrumps s has been more freewheeling. Hes been interested in sitting around a table, discussing items and issues and coming up wit riffs. You have to individualize the process to the candidate and how they absorb information. Katty what do you think the risks are for joe biden tonight . The biggest riff for him is a major gaffe. The trajectory is very well set. Thry few americans a point are undecided. What could swing them is a major mistake by biden. Some demonstration that for some reason he is not capableg of e president. Thuld be nightmare scenarios from the Biden Campaign. Aside from that, i dont see too many opinions being alby what is said and seen tonight for the most part. Katty you prepped marco rubio when he was running back in 2016. Of course he went up against donald trump. He kind of tried at one point in the campaign to out trump trump, if you like. Es it work for a candidatens running ag someone like donald trump to take on the mannerisms of the person they are opposing . S u say, it is difficult to o trump donald trump. You will not win that contest. The question is, is there umanything that can knock off of his game . He is so used to being all that, that distraction will not come from the opponent on the stage. The most difficult part of preparing for debate against trump is this problem. You t know what hs going to say and you dont know when. Andidates in u. S. Politi are fairly predictable. You know what the attack lines are. You k not so with trump that. Makes him tough to p for. Joe biden has to come in methodical and graceful. He has to demonstrate a contrast to trump and if he does tha he has a sh at being successful. Katty you said this not a debate, its a job interview. What did you mean . This is the only opportunity americans will have to see the candidates sidebyside and compare them and essentially by proxy have questions asked of them that they are curious to t the answers to peer this is the highest stake interview in the world. Its an opportunity for tsh candidates t what they know but also how they will these debates tend to be more. Serious than the primary debates we have se previously in the campaign. Ba tonights is the opportunity for the American People to see, to test on how the candidates feel, and ultimately to make a decision between them. Katty ok, lanhee chen, thank you for joining us. It will be fascinating to watch the debate. And it may not sway very many minds, but 100 Million People are expected to wch on television or live streaming. Number of people. Some of them will be waiting to see whether this debate can change their opinion. The first death from the coronavirus was back on january 9. It was a 61yearold man in wuhan, china. And the months since, thadvirus has spround the world and now more than one Million People have died. It milestone in a year that has seen far too many of them. Here is our medical correspondent for fergus walsh. Reporter ery grave marks a life cut short. A mother, father, brother and sister lost to covid19. This is indonesia, but the f pactronavirus since it emerged in china late last year has been trulyl glo. These are the five countries that have recorded the most deaths with cov19. The unit states is top with more than 200,000, followed by brazil, india, mexico and the united kingdom. Many of those deaths, especially among the frail elderly, are at least partially due to other Underlying Health problems. 33 million cases of coronavirus have been recorded. We know the pandemic is accelerating with 2 million new cases every week. But that is a gross cases are simply nause so many registered, in part because so many people ha no symptoms. And makes it toally difficul work out an accurate mortality rate for this disease. The coronavirus can also leave people with Chronic Health problems, what has been dubbed long covid, affecting regions like the heart lungs, kidneys, brain, and nervous system. Humanity is actually going into quite dark zone right w. We just have to look around the world. The virus is coming bacwith a vengeance intoe. Eur it is still active in the americas. It is also very active in the indian subntinent. Its picking up again in russia and indonesia. This is a global, serious situation. Reporter reporter every year, around 57 Million People died globally from all causes. We look at three other infectious diseases, tuberculosis, a bacterial infection, ilargely a disease of poverty and is curable with antibiotics, yet it kills about 1. 5 Million People a year. Many of those are coinfected withiv. Seasonal influenza kills up to 650,000 people in a bad year, despite there being a vaccine. Measles are highly contagious viral infections. 000 deaths a year. Most of them younghildren, yet it is entirely preventable by vaccine. Scientists are working flat out on coronavirus fixings, but th World Health Organization has warned the covid death tl to couldil hit 2on before one is widely available. Fergus walsh, bbc news. Katty o s we got to this point because the virus itself is very contagious, but also because some countries struggle to. Contain outbreaks. Of others thgh did take action and were able to minimize the impact. Takega sre. Initially, there were concerns mass travel around the Lunar New Year holiday in january would float the island with cas, but officials learned from sars and other contagious diseases and puin place st Public Health precautions. Everyone has to we r a mask outse home. There are a few exceptions. Visito traveling would have to spend time in quarantine with the daily check hns fromlth officials and Contact Tracing is in place for anyone entering offices, shops, d schools. Singapore is not out of the woodspl cely, but so far has reported only 27. Out of a pulation of more than 5 llion deaths out of a population for than 5 million. Is sinpore a example of how to do this right . I know it isery early in the rning there, but thank you for getting up for us. Give us a picture of what daily life isike for people in singapore at the moment. On a daily basis, i send my children to school, i do a Temperature Check before they get on the bus. I have to wear masks because they are both above the age of only recently the government has put into place a law that children under the age of six, it doesnt matter if they dont wear a mask because they recognize that it is quiteid difficult forthat young. After that, i go off to work. Increasingly the government has encouraged people to come back to the office as long as employers can ensure they are in separate teams, maintain social distancing, and of course everybody s to wear a mask wherever they are, outside of their homes. There are sict penalties in place if you are found without one. The government is not afraid of enforcg these. These penalties can go up to a financial cost, something around two hundred dollars, as well as jail time. Theyre ver serious about making sure the rules are enforced. Thes also a degree of societal discipline within singapore. Ther is an understanding that society is m important than the individual so people do follow the rules. Katty and also ive seen there are strict fools on people entering singapore. You have to go into quarantine. You are kept in a hotel. You are not allowed to leave your room. Atwo people reb all . We have seen big protests here in europe and in the United States. Ny is thereense of people rebelling againstge impnt on personal freedoms . In the beginning certainly there were. There were highly publicized cases of people who broke quarantine. But there are daily checkins and ways for the authorities to keep in touch. That very strict penalty, they are not kidding when they say they are not goingo take any exceptions to the rules. They have kicked people out, taken work permits away, given them prison time as well. The way singaportries to go about enforcing this is saying the government is trying to keep you safe. We put the rules in place. Follow the rules and we will get level,int where at some we will be able to live in a normalish coronavirus world, but if you dont follow the rules, there wilbe fines. Katty this is the kind of Million Dollar question. Do you think that what is happening in singapore could be replicated here in the United States or in europe . Are they societies that could follow or things we could follow so my kids could go to school . Absolutely. The day my children went to school, i felt that same sense but it point it is worth pointing out that sie is a very small country. It is tightly controlled. Theres a big degree of followinghat the government says. There has been rte political in power since independence. This was also an Election Year which parallels to the United States as well. The government was under a l of pressure to get the response right. We talk a lot about how singapore is the poster child for the restf the world, but it didnt get it completely right in the beginning either. There was a msive outbreak in a lowpaid workers dormitory here. Mthe governmesed it and then they had to put the government in a Strict Lockdown to address the issue. I think there are lessons. Things like testing, Contact Technology ng ensure if you do go outside, you are in contact with someone who was infected, there are ways to find out who those people are and ensure they stay away from infecting the rest of the population. But thiss a small country with a high degree of compliance with rules. Iot think we can say the same for other parts of the world. Katty o, perhaps n here, it is a very big country. Thank you so much. Glad to get your perspective. Im glad your children are back in school andhat life somewheren the planet is latively normal. Thank you for getting up so early to join us. Other news from around the world, j. P. Morgan chase has reed to pay almost 1 billion after agreeing to wrongdoing into an investigatn into market manipulation. This follows investigation by federal agencies into alleged price rigging of global markets. It involved the practice of flooding markets with orders which was banned after the financia crisis. Vie Public Prosecution ser of Northern Ireland has stuck to its original decision and announced it wont prosecute any further former soldiers over their actions on bloody suny. Thatw follows a rof the cases of 15 veterans. One man remains the only formera serviceman to legal action. 13 wereth killed and 15s wounded when the army opened fire on civil rights demonstrators in londonderry in january 1972. You are watching ber world news a. Still to come on this program, amnesty internatnal says it is being forced to stop operating in india becauset of w it says our incessant reprisals from the government there. More on that. Britain and canada have imposed officials including president alexander and his oldest son. S the move folldisputed result in the countrys recent president ial election. Wexplain how effective it might be. These sanctions mainly target his son a heads of the Security Forces and the army and these people dont traveth to canada ounited kingdom. I would say these sanctions are very significant. But ty matter more as a signal rather than direct action which will influence or be a rl push. The European Union has not introduced sanctions. There are talks about that, but cyprus hasng been worn that decision for a while. The main challenge f european leaders is to agree with her nctions for the European Union should be introced. Vekatty indias ment has accused Amnesty International of being in violation of indian financial laws. The Worlds LargestHuman Rights Group says repeated harassment by the state has forced them to thalt operations country. Amnesty claims exaggerated a unfortunate. From mumbai, here is our india correspondent. Repoer a country born out of protest. The rightt to dissenssed through the decades, fierceay upheld, trred, defended. But continued crackdowns of basic freedoms by indias current government have led to questions about the health of the countrys democracy. Now global Rights OrganizationAmnesty International has told the bbc that repeated harassment by the government has forced them to close all operations in india. Treprisals,y say, for their reports into human rights abuses. The government has previously said the group is being investigated for violating funding laws, a claim in this tea rejects. Ts amnesty rej. I spoke to the groups senior i think this is sohould be vy utrrie. Bod the kind of systematic stifling of dissent and crumbling of institutions that has taken place, lack of any independent accountability in the country, is extremely worrying. India does not stand in good company. The only previously that had been forced to shut off operations was russia in 2016. Reporter amnesty has been speaking up withozens of activists who have been jailed on serious charges. Retribution many belieng for their st criticism of the government. It is not just activists. M the world o business, entertainment, even the media privately say they fear speaking out against Government Policies or actions. An indication the space for debate and disagreement. There has been at the heart of this that at the heart of this is democracy. We have elections but that is as far as the democratic process goes. All the other features of a democracy, whether it is dissent, the rig of free speech, the right to be a antigovernme yet not be antinational, that is an inherent rht of every indian. Thth is under at today. Reporter none of this has affected the prime minputers pority. He continues to enjoy strong support from large swaths of india because of his ability to connect with ordinary people. His party did not want to speak to the bbc, but i spoke to a progovernment analyst. If that space fora issent in inday shrinks i dont buy into that at all. I personally do not buy into that at all. If you look at newspapers, if you look at the news channels, not everybody is rooting for the government or the Prime Minister or the party in power. This is a country where you can squat in the middle of the road and stopped traffic for months and then you say theres no. Right to disse reporter in a of democracy has been seen as ag strength now seen aa worrying turn. Bbc news. Katty the International Raising questions about the future of democracy in india. It might look like s sething out ofenc