now, experts answer your questions from around the world on the coronavirus. hello, welcome to london for the latest in a special series of global questions, with me, zeinab badawi. it seems that, so far, africa has been spared the worst of the coronavirus pandemic, and it's not clear why. will this continue? or could africa become the next epicentre of covid—19? plenty of questions — we will bring you some of the answers. that's coronavirus crisis: focus on africa. i am now in bbc‘s headquarters here in central london, and to bring you this edition of global questions because of lockdown, i have to bring you our two panellists and our audience members, who are going to be posing questions, they are coming to you from all over the world, and we are going to be bringing them via video link. let me tell you who is in the hot seat this week. doctor ngozi okonjo—iweala is an economist, and has served as finance minister in her native nigeria. she's been a managing director at the world bank, and is now chair of gavi, that's the global alliance for vaccines and immunisation. she is also a special covid—19 envoy for africa, charged with mobilising international economical support for the continent. we are also joined by doctor tshidi moeti. she is a medical doctor from botswana, where she worked extensively in public health, including in programmes to tackle tuberculosis and hiv infections. five years ago, she became the first woman to be elected as the regional director for africa in the world health organization, the who. welcome to you both, ladies, and also to our audience. i'm going to give you a round of applause. you can't hear it maybe, but anyway, there we go. remember you, too, can join the conversation — it's #bbcglobalquestions. let's go to our first question. benedict, from the democratic republic of congo butjoins us from coventry in england. benedict, what's your question, please? my question to the panel is just wanting to know, is it true that the covid—19 cannot spread in hot temperature countries? we had so many questions on social media asking about this. do hot temperatures perhaps slow down the spread of the virus? i'm going to go to the medical doctorfirst, from the who — tshidi? yes, thank you for that question. unfortunately, there is no definitive evidence for this. unfortunately for us in africa, we are seeing, for example, that we have community spread, quite intense community spread, in some very hot countries in west africa. we are very concerned about west africa, countries like burkina faso, cote d'ivoire, senegal, nigeria. we are seeing, after the virus has arrived and got into the community, community spread happening. unfortunately, we cannot get protection from hot temperatures. that is why we are emphasising very much some of the physical distancing, public health interventions, even in hot contexts like our continent. the answer is no, then, from you, tshidi. ngozi? i'm not a medical doctor but it appears that there is no definitive evidence on that. let me just ask you some of the other questions that we have had on social media. i will come back to you on that, tshidi, as the medic. will affect those countries in africa as badly as it has affected other parts of the world because they have a younger population? that's one thing that you hear a lot. somebody else was saying, we are led to believe that it affects people from an ethnic background more — is this false news? we have also had the other side of that — is there any evidence that africa ns' immune system is stronger than others? address those two points for us please, tshidi, briefly. what we have seen in some of the developed countries, for example, where people of ethnic minorities might be more ill because of their social economical status is that they might be more affected. but there is no evidence that by race, there is any difference in the way people are affected per se. what about a youthful population? does that make them more resilient? we have seen that, again, people across a range of ages get infected. in fact, the other age of infection in africa is in people's 405, young people also do get infected. what is at higher risk for older people is the fact that they are more likely to have underlying conditions, like hypertension. in africa, we also have to be cautious about the fact that we have hiv infection among our young population. so far, we have not made a direct correlation with infection in terms of outcomes, but we are studying the data and trying to make sure that we take care of people with underlying conditions, like hiv, who are also young. ngozi, as an economist, we have also had a lot of people asking this on social media — is africa less affected by covid—i9 because it is less in touch with other parts of the world? so, globalisation there. because we have seen in these statistics that it the more globalised countries in africa, like south africa, north africa, which seem to have the highest rates of infection. youranswerto that, please, ngozi? you would have thought that because people think africa is less connected that it won't happen, but unfortunately, this is not so. they world are so interconnected now that many people travel around to different countries. of course, many african countries have gotten by people who travel outside or who came into visit. thank you. time for our next question, and it's all the way from jakarta, indonesia. what do you want to ask our two panellists? my question is, we can see the devastation created by the coronavirus pandemic across developed and emerging economies. the buzzword is testing, testing and testing. is africa prepared for this elaborate infrastructure of testing, isolating and contact tracing — knowing serious infections are not at all alien to africa? ngozi? africa is not as prepared in the sense that we do not have the test kits required. we are looking for test kits and other supplies that could help us to test, test, test as you have said. so we are not prepared in that sense. i will tell you, there is one sense in which we have a bit of an advantage in some countries. because we have had ebola, polio and some other diseases — we do have the ability to do contact tracing and some of that follow—up that is needed to detect people who have the disease and those who have had contact with them. tshidi, we have had countries like senegal, for instance, in west africa, which has done very well on testing. what is the overall picture like with testing in africa? i willjust follow up on what ngozi said. african countries are used to dealing with outbreaks and epidemics, so they are used to having to ramp up a response very quickly. this is what countries have done, for example, the testing capacity... in february, we only had two countries that could test — south africa and senegal. within a month and a bit, we had a0 countries that could test — they very quickly deployed their capacities for testing. it is true that the global shortage of test kits has made this very challenging. i am very pleased that senegal is working now on developing a test kit that could be affordable, we are talking to them about testing its performance and then working together to make it available. so we are very glad about this innovation, as well, from an african country. just give us some figures. are you saying there are about 50,000 cases in africa, 2000 people dead so far. is that a reliable figure or is there undertesting, which means it could be much worse? yes, we recognise at the moment that the epidemic was landing in africa and taking off. the global shortage of test kits made it quite a challenge for african countries to test. we know that this number is an underestimate of the actual number of people that are infected in africa. we are tracking through some means including our surveillance for influenza, which has similar symptoms to covid—i9, to see if there are clusters of large numbers of deaths. we are not seeing that yet. we recognise there's some degree of underestimation. we do not think this is extremely severe. we know where the virus is arriving, more or less, even if the number of cases there might be undercounting. let's go to monrovia, the capital of liberia in west africa, and tojohn. what do you want to ask our panellists? now the who has warned that africa could be the next epicentre — what can we do to avoid this? ngozi? i think that... unfortunately, yes, we cannot be complacent in africa, and i think we have to practice all the advice given to us by who and by the africa cdc. which is to practice social distancing, don't gather in crowds because of the way it spread very quickly. wash your hands constantly and practice good hygiene. make sure that older people are kept away from crowds as well. these are some of these simple steps we just have to follow in order to protect ourselves and to contain the spread. ngozi, you say these are some of these simple steps, we have had a question on social media — how do african governments slow the spread of covid—i9 in slums and crowded places? you're from nigeria, we know that lagos is a mega—city with around 2a million people who live there, they are all living cheek byjowl — how do you manage to practice distancing there? it's completely a challenge, i agree with the question. not only are we crowded in many places in our cities, but we also don't have water in some of these slums. i strongly believe that with regard to water, our government should try to track water into those communities who don't have them and put in hand washing stands. many african countries are practising this and we should try to do that. tshidi, who are saying figures could be something like 300,000 dead from coronavirus in africa with 3 million infections — how confident are you that, that scenario will not come to pass? we are hopeful. we made these projections using a modelling tool of what could happen if nothing is done. something is being done, we are seeing people being tested, contacts being traced and isolated. this needs to be expanded. the biggest thing that countries need to do now is to expand the capacity to put in these interventions beyond capital cities where the virus first entered. we are seeing counties mobilising retired health workers, young people, community health workers. we need a certain depth in terms of those who are intervening to reach people quickly and to be able to help them to take preventative measures as necessary. john, what does it look like from monrovia? are people practising social distancing, are you happy with the government's response? yes, actually, the citizens themselves are trying to stick by the rules. it is difficult for somebody who cannot really feed themselves that depend on going out to get food on a daily basis to just stay at home. and these are some of the challenges that we have. let's go to nairobi to robert. what do you want to find out today? what will be the economic impact post—covid on africa, especially on economics and trade? a lot of worried heads already in africa, how worried is your head, ngozi? i am quite worried because i think the economic impact will be severe. the imf has estimated that the african economies will contract by about 2% this year. if this pandemic continues and the global economy itself contracts by 3% as expected, it means the impact on us will be very severe. we have seen supply chains disrupted for some of the things we import from abroad, some foods and medicines. therefore i think that africa has to prepare for a very difficult time as we move forward and we need to get up to be able to deal with this. lastly, let me just say that one of the reasons that the impact of this is severe is because we do not have the fiscal space, we do not have enough resources to be able to stimulate our economies. just see what has happened in the rich countries. they have been able to spend trillions of dollars, 10% of gdp, to get the economy working — we do not have those resources. staying with the economics. the effect of the log down. let's go to keuka stand. what want to ask? i am worried about hunger in africa and how people are dealing with the situation? we have had that kind of thought on social media, people saying, look, we are already feeling the effects of lockdown, we might survive coronavirus but we are going to die of hunger. how would you answer that question? you have said people shouldn't go to the market, that will deprive people of their livelihood. i know people are saying that the hunger virus might kill as before the coronavirus. that is the challenge we face. when you practice of the techniques of social distancing and lockdowns, you have the impact that those of us, on a daily basis, cannot earn enough to find food for their families. therefore, governments have to take steps to assist. this is where social safety nets put together by governments are vital, they have got to find a way to distribute food to people, to get some money into their hands. they can open markets are periodically during the day, i know that some governments are doing this, so that people can purchase food. let's go to somalia. abdul abdi. he is living in london. how can the diaspora be more involved in helping africa to combat the virus? what can the africa diaspora do? thank you for that question. i think the african diaspora can play an important role. number one, on the immediate health challenge, i can see that the diaspora can help to pull together resources that can also help african governments, their countries, to acquire some of the needed supplies and equipment. some of our diaspora are very clued into logistics and the supply chain. they can help the countries to break the logjam and get some of these supplies together. secondly, please send remittances to the countries. do not stop because this is a very important source for your families and for the government. lastly, a lot of people in the diaspora are health care personnel. if you have the ability to go home and help and your own country, kindly do so because we need allthe hands — nurses, health care workers, doctors — that we can get. dr tshidi? i would very much second what ngozi has said. we've very much seen the african diaspora get engaged. for example, some of the virtual training we have been doing in who for clinicians since we could not organise face—to—face training, we have involved some experts from the african diaspora. they have had our teams in some of these trainings. we have had another example in business and medical people from zambia getting together with the international partners and zambian experts and thought about solutions on how the country can scale up the production of oxygen, for example. so people in the diaspora sometimes have had experiences and connections that can be extremely valuable to what countries are doing so we would very much like to encourage that and benefit from that knowledge and networks and resources. the lack of equipment and materials is a big worry, i think there are about 2,000 ventilators across 41 african countries, and you need about 30,000, so that shows you the huge gap. abdul abdi, what you think about what our panellists said? ngozi said, "please go back to your countries of origin to help," do you go back to somalia, for instance, to help? i think in terms of the individual contributions, i think everybody, the people i know are doing their best in cleaning up their remittance and giving money going back to their extended families. i didn't get what i wanted from the answers because i was hoping to see some sort of named campaigns that would help us to mobilise the diaspora communities. it's a very difficult for an individual to start a new campaign or to launch a project. we wanted to hear names and examples of projects we could contribute to. ngozi, briefly on that, why not start a campaign? you're just talking to individuals. go on. i will thank our abdul abdi for the inspiration and the great idea. we know the diaspora is organising in many countries so we will endeavour to reach out and provide information on how people can get together. i think, start locally in your association and people from your country. from outside, let me say that we will then reach out to the diaspora associations that we are aware of and in contact with and ask them to mobilise their members and see how they can contribute their knowledge, expertise, connections, any resources, so that they can be linked to their country. thank you for that idea. are you going start a campaign, ngozi? it is a good idea, we have a big resort on a civil society on our country. we just spoke to a coalition of civic african civil society. they want to do something, they want to act. one suggestion i have is that since we already have experts in mobilising and our civil society, we can connect the diaspora to the civil society and then they can do at the campaign together. there you go, abdul, you have your answer there. let's go to daniel massonda, who is actually from malawi but is currently based in myanmar. thank you, zainab. my question is, what can be done to ensure that if and when vaccines become available, they are also available in africa as early as possible? tshidi? thanks. great question. first of all, we are very aware that sometimes when new tools come out, low—income countries do not have access in it the way that those with more money do. who and partners recently launched the access to covid—i9 roles also called accelerator with partners who have worked in the past, like gavi and sepi, a coalition for access to tools in an equitable way. you may know, a few days ago, the european unit launch an appeal for funding for a vaccine, with the idea that once a vaccine is developed, there will be an absolute focus on equity and access, including targeting african countries and making sure they are not disadvantaged. it is this kind of global solidarity, working across boundaries by governments, the private sector, technical partners, organisations like who, that will make sure africans are not disadvantaged when a vaccine becomes available. if i could just go back to daniel, are you happy with what you heard there about that from the who? it sounds good, but i think there should also be space for african scientists and virologists to participate in the efforts to develop some of these tools. ngozi, well a vaccine be made widely available and why not engage with african expertise? let me first say the idea of engaging with an axe african expertise is absolutely spot on. we have our own scientists and researchers, and it would be very good if they could get in with the global consortium of people working on these issues. let me mention and add to what tshidi said. for us to get the vaccine everywhere, it has to be treated like a global public good, meaning that those who developed the vaccine within the consortium should be able to allow the intellectual property to be a global good that can be used so that the vaccine can be manufactured in great quantity, and then can be afforded to everyone all over the world, including on the continent. if we don't get that, if people do this for profit, then it will not work. that is when people are left out. thank you very much indeed. so, audience members from all over the world there, you have listened to our two panellists, two people literally on the front line fighting coronavirus in africa. put your thumbs up for me please if you are confident that africa is going to really weather the storm in the light of what you have heard them say. oh, my, that is a full house there. excellent, thank you. all our audience members have said they are relatively confident after hearing what you have said, tshidi and ngozi. what about you ? thumbs up from you, ngozi? excellent, well, there we go. thank you very much to our two panels and audience members. that's all from this edition of global questions. remember that we are the programme eventually global trend lines behind the headlines. thank you to you from wherever you are watching. if you would like to be part of this programme or submit a question, please do e—mail us. from now, from me and the panel — goodbye and thank you. hello again. we've got another few cool days coming our way before the weather turns milder as we head into the weekend. now, at the moment, the satellite picture shows cloud in france. that's been bringing some extreme falls of rain here. satellite pictures to the north of the uk, where our eye is coming from, shows a lot of cloud working into scotland. that cloud is bringing showers at the moment, and they'll continue over the next few hours as well, mostly across northern scotland. elsewhere, it's largely dry. quite a bit of cloud for eastern areas. it stays quite breezy as well, and that should keep the temperatures for the most part above freezing. but with lighter winds and clearer skies in wales, parts of the midlands and south—west england, these are the areas where we're most likely to see temperatures drop low enough to give us some frost to start the day on tuesday. now, high pressure's still influencing the weather on tuesday, but we've got this cold front diving southwards into scotland as the day goes by. so, for many of us, a bright start to the day. there'll be some sunshine around. it tends to turn a bit cloudier through the day, and there is a risk of a few showers working into perhaps north—western areas of england and wales. but, at the same time, we've got this cold front bringing rain and probably a bit of snow into parts of scotland. northern ireland, england and wales, temperatures 11—13 degrees, but through the afternoon, as that cold front works southwards, we get colder air, 5—6 celsius. the rain turning to snow for a time. wintry showers follow for shetland and orkney. it will be a colder day for these far northern areas than it was compared with monday. high pressure is still there on wednesday, but eventually, it's going start to bring in a more of a north—westerly flow of air. so eventually, it starts to turn a bit milder, but the cold air still filters its way southwards down the north sea. so, wednesday, these northerly winds probably bringing a slight drop in temperatures to parts of eastern england, and again, there will be some bright whether around. probably turning quite cloudy for a time during the afternoon. it's across western areas that we'll start to see the temperatures begin to lift a little bit, with highs up to 15 degrees in cardiff and plymouth, and maybe 12 or so in glasgow. as we head towards the end of the week and the weekend, high pressure keeps the mainly dry weather. eventually, though, that starts to decline, and we've got these weather fronts just toppling in across the north of the high pressure, bringing some thicker cloud, and that will ultimately bring the threat of rain this weekend to parts of scotland. but for most of us, it will be turning milder this weekend. this is bbc news with the latest headlines for viewers in the uk and around the world. my name is mike embley. the british prime minister defends his plan to relax the lockdown in england at a faster rate than the rest of the uk. it is very good advice for the entire population of the united kingdom. families' joy as spain begins to ease one of europe's strictest lockdowns. in the united states, president trump announces virus testing for more americans. as lockdowns are loosened, how can countries prevent a second wave of infections? we speak to a health expert.