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Health Check: Escalating Covid-19 infections across Brazil

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Public transport passengers in São Paulo

2020/05/20 GMT

Escalating Covid-19 infections across Brazil

BBC World Service - Health Check, Escalating Covid-19 infections across Brazil

How are Brazilians reacting to mixed messages on restrictions, as virus deaths increase?

Escalating deaths in Brazil; plasma therapy as treatment for Covid-19; cytokine storms; a new way of screening for prostate cancer.

Health Check has the latest on the management of coronavirus in Brazil, now the epicentre of the pandemic in the Americas, where cases of Covid-19 have been rising rapidly and the mayor of São Paulo has warned that the city’s health system could collapse. BBC  correspondent Katy Watson explains how people are responding to some of the mixed messages they’re getting. Also in the programme, the hopes for convalescent plasma therapy: Jeff Henderson, co-leader of the world largest convalescent plasma therapy trial, discusses how blood plasma from people who have recovered from Covid-19 could help those currently fighting the infection.

And in all the talk about Covid-19 you may have heard the phrase cytokine storm.  Not a weather event, but a hyperactive immune reaction. We hear what causes it and how it might be treated. General medical practitioner Ann Robinson is on hand to discuss antibody tests, the dangers of comparing Covid-19 statistics with those of seasonal influenza, and a new non-invasive way of diagnosing prostate cancer. 

Presenter Claudia Hammond
Producer Adrian Washbourne  

(Picture: Public transport passengers in São Paulo, Brazil during the coronavirus pandemic. Photo credit: Fabio Vieira/FotoRua/NurPhoto/ Getty Images.)

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