The Documentary Podcast

We bring together three hairdressers from around the world to talk about how their lives have changed because of the pandemic. Marcel in Jerusalem and Marion in Berlin can cut their clients' hair again - but with restrictions. Tamsyn in Johannesburg has only been allowed to open her salon to sell hair products so far. So what is the future of cutting hair while the world is dealing with Covid-19?

The impact of Covid-19 on Asia is explored with a panel of leading public health experts, politicians and analysts from across the region. What can be done to slow down the spread of the virus? And how should countries balance the needs of their economies with the need to save lives?

Across every continent, people are trying to make sense of a new world – one that happens mostly behind closed doors and often alone. Alan Dein connects with seven individuals whose lives have shifted under the coronavirus pandemic as they nervously anticipate what will come next in an uncertain future.

In March, Aafiyah was told the garment factory where she worked would be closing. And like many other garment workers, she was left destitute in the slums of Dhaka.

Bangladesh’s garment industry employs millions of workers, mainly women, who make clothes for high street brands in Europe and the US. Western retailers, who have seen sales plummet due to the pandemic, have cancelled or suspended more than 3 billion dollars’ worth of orders from Bangladeshi garment factories. Over a million jobs in the sector could now be at risk.

For Assignment, Caroline Bayley and Morshed Ali Khan hear Aafiyah’s story, and talk to factory owners and the British Retail Consortium about the huge challenges facing Bangladesh's main export industry.

Producer: Josephine Casserly

(Image: Women, wearing masks, work in a garment factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Credit: Reuters/Mohammad Ponir Hossain)

Listeners from Brazil, Germany, Rwanda, Australia and Norway report on their experiences of lockdown, from reaction to Jair Bolsanaro's coronavirus policies to the partial easing of lockdown in Germany, to racial abuse experienced by Chinese residents in Australia. By emailing a voice memo recorded on their smartphones listeners from different countries offer their unique perspectives on a global crisis,

We hear about Sophie Fagan, a nurse in London for over 50 years; Dr. J Ronald Verrier, a critical care surgeon in New York; and Vicenzo Leone, a beloved GP in Northern Italy. Their relatives talk about their enduring pride, but also the shock of losing them to Covid-19. And hospital chaplains talk to us about the religious, spiritual and emotional support they are providing for patients and their loved ones. Also, mothers in Spain tell us how the 40-day lockdown is emotionally impacting their children.

Why did so many people die in just one elderly care home in Madrid? After Covid-19 smashed its way across the globe, Spain - one of the worst-hit nations of Europe - is beginning to take stock of the devastation the virus has left in its wake. Most painful perhaps, will be an assessment of how the deadly contagion was able to rip through Spanish care homes at such speed, killing thousands of elderly people. In March 2020, the alarm was first sounded in a privately run institution, Monte Hermoso in Madrid. It is a story that has stayed with the BBC’s producer in Spain, Esperanza Escribano. She was in the capital when the reports of deaths at Monte Hermoso came to light. For Assignment, she joins Linda Pressly, to piece together the story of what happened within the care home’s red brick walls.

Editor: Bridget Harney

(Photo: Isabel Costales and her husband Ramon Hernandez. Isabel died during the coronavirus pandemic in a care home in Madrid. Photo Credit: Paula Panera)

There is growing interest in the idea of giving every member of society a Basic Income, as a way of tackling extreme poverty and the loss of jobs caused by automation. Pilot projects have been seen across the world - from India to Finland and Namibia to Canada - and there is talk of a one possibly happening here in the UK, in the city of Hull. So, attention is being paid to the Alaskan model. The Arctic American state has been paying out an annual dividend to every one of its permanent residents - man, woman and child - for almost 40 years.

Well over 400,000 elderly and disabled people in Britain rely on home care, and many of the care workers are from other parts of the world: Africa, the Middle East, South Asia and Eastern Europe. Some are highly qualified professionals, but have moved into badly paid care roles because they are finding it hard to gain a foothold in their own professions in the UK. As the population ages, these care workers are providing an ever more vital service. Yet their voices are very rarely heard. Blanche Girouard accompanies some of them on their rounds to hear their stories.

People from all over the world discuss our shared experience of the epidemic; from nurses in intensive care and vaccine researchers, to pregnant women and couples getting married in a lockdown. With host Nuala McGovern, they talk together about how they are living with the impact of these extraordinary times in different countries and how they are trying to get through it. This week: Paramedics and care home workers, living in slums during a pandemic, and the Covid-19 vaccine volunteers hoping to save lives.