by Natalie Grover Science correspondent on (#5MKX9)
Findings of Office for National Statistics analysis consistent with previous research say expertsPeople from white and mixed ethnic groups had lower life expectancy compared with Black and Asian groups in England and Wales between 2011 and 2014, according to analysis by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).The study linked 2011 census and death registration data to produce estimates of life expectancy and cause of death by ethnic group. Continue reading...
The solutions to today’s puzzlesEarlier today I set you three ‘clueless’ Sudoku and an ‘almost clueless’ Killer Sudoku. For discussion and tips you can read the original column here.For a printable page of all the puzzles click here. Scroll down for the solutions. Continue reading...
by Damian Carrington Environment editor on (#5MKNS)
More heatwaves even worse than those seen recently in north-west of America forecast in research“Record-shattering” heatwaves, even worse than the one that recently hit north-west America, are set to become much more likely in future, according to research. The study is a stark new warning on the rapidly escalating risks the climate emergency poses to lives.The shocking temperature extremes suffered in the Pacific north-west and in Australia 2019-2020 were “exactly what we are talking about”, said the scientists. But they said the world had yet to see anything close to the worst impacts possible, even under the global heating that had already happened. Continue reading...
The trajectory of the pandemic might look more like a range of hills rather than a single mountainWhile the government’s decision to remove most lockdown measures in England was widely expected to result in a large wave of infection and disease, the number of new cases of Covid-19 has been falling over the last five days. Many hope this could mean that we’re past the peak. Yet the reality is more complicated. This is the first time an epidemic has taken place in a highly vaccinated population without control measures in place, so we are in uncharted territory. There is considerable uncertainty about what the next two months hold.The big questions are how high the current wave will get and how long it will last. The number of people in hospital and dying of Covid-19 is directly linked to the number of infections. It’s impossible to accurately predict when we’ll reach the peak of infections, or how long it will take to come back down from this (if I had a pound for every time I’m asked “are we there yet?”, I’d be able to give away a lot of money). Continue reading...
Believing others have fixed traits which don’t change yields defensiveness, failure to listen, and failure to set boundariesOver the past few years I’ve noticed a rise in the label “toxic” as a response to difficult or destructive behavior. Media outlets from Psychology Today to Harvard Business Review run articles on how to identify or avoid toxic people. Politicians like Mitch McConnell use the term to describe their adversaries. Even academic psychologists have begun to take up the language.Related: It’s time to rethink what loneliness is | Miriam Kirmayer Continue reading...
Puzzles where less is moreUPDATE: Solutions now available here.Sudoku is an extremely elegant puzzle, and this crucial to its appeal. The rules are simple to understand and the grid – with given numbers usually presented in a symmetric pattern – is striking. Yet perhaps Sudoku is not elegant enough. Perhaps the numbers on the starting grid are an unforgivable blemish, a needless sullying of the page.Or so argue a group of mathematicians, who have come up with a new puzzle genre: ‘clueless Sudoku’, which are Sudoku-style puzzles with a pristine starting grid. These puzzles literally don’t have a (numerical) clue. Continue reading...
by Philip Oltermann, Vincent Ni, Gabrielle Canon and on (#5MK8Z)
From Syrians helping in Germany’s floods to Russian CrossFitters fighting fires, ordinary people helping to tackle the climate crisisWhen Anas Alakkad, a Saarland-based translator and paramedic from Damascus, saw pictures of the flooded German towns on his Facebook feed on Sunday night, he fired off messages to Syrian friends around Germany. Continue reading...
Now is the chance to find Ophiuchus, which some view as the 13th sign of the zodiacThis time of year offers the opportunity to track down the large but faint constellation of Ophiuchus, the serpent bearer – literally a man holding a snake. One of the original 48 constellations listed by Ptolemy in the second century, there is no definitive association between the constellation and a myth, but several have been suggested. It could be Apollo grappling with the serpent that guarded the oracle of Delphi; or Apollo’s son Asclepius, who witnessed one serpent heal another by feeding it herbs; or maybe Laocoön, who was slain by sea serpents after he tried to warn the Trojans that the famous horse was a trap. Continue reading...
Researchers say cases linked to products claiming to promote muscle growth or weight loss are rising and more rigorous oversight is neededThe number of patients being admitted to hospital with severe liver injuries caused by herbal and dietary supplements claiming to promote muscle growth or weight loss is increasing, with some people harmed so severely they required a liver transplant.A study led by Dr Emily Nash from the Royal Prince Alfred hospital examined hospital records of 184 adults admitted to the AW Morrow Gastroenterology and Liver Centre with drug-induced liver injury between 2009 and 2020. She and her co-authors found liver injury cases linked to herbal and dietary supplements increased from two out of 11 patients (15%) during 2009–11, to 10 out of 19 patients (47%) during 2018–20. Continue reading...
Visionary biochemist who was appointed head of the Medical Research Council in 1987As its head from the late 1980s, the research scientist Sir Dai Rees, who has died aged 85, revolutionised the way the Medical Research Council (MRC) interacted with industry. In this respect, he was a visionary: he understood the importance of a successful interface between basic research and industry, including its impact on attracting public funds.Under his leadership, centres were established with strong industrial links, with the aim of encouraging the practical application of MRC research and inventions. The work of these centres contributed to the development of the “blockbuster” Keytruda antibody for cancer treatment, and of the world’s top-selling pharmaceutical drug, the antibody Humira, which treats rheumatoid arthritis and Crohn’s disease. Continue reading...
Hunt begins near Oslo for fragments after sightings of large space rock hurtling across night skyAn “unusually large meteor” briefly lit up southern Norway on Sunday, creating a spectacular sound and light display as it rumbled across the sky, and a part of it may have hit Earth, possibly not far from the capital, Oslo, experts said.Reports of sightings started arriving at around 1am, and the phenomenon was seen as far north as Trondheim. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage. Continue reading...
An 'unusually large' meteor briefly lit up southern Norway on Sunday as it sped at up to 20km per second across the morning sky. Reports of sightings started at around 1am, with sightings of the phenomenon recorded as far north as Trondheim. There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage Continue reading...
Champion of autistic people who explored the attention that they devote to a leading interestDinah Murray, who has died aged 75 of pancreatic cancer, was a key figure in autism studies, and an indefatigable advocate for autistic people for three decades. Her acute insight lay in the importance of attention and interests to an understanding of the condition.On the autistic spectrum herself and fascinated with language and the mind, in 1991 Murray read Uta Frith’s book Autism: Explaining the Enigma. She had a eureka moment when it spoke of an autistic person’s attention “going to their leading interest”. Continue reading...
She’d always found them evil and scary, but when I wanted a cat in lockdown I appealed to my mum’s faithCats are perfect to most people, but not to my 42-year-old mother. She is just like any of my 17-year-old friends’ parents – she is spirited, sparky, generous and can be feisty when she needs to be. She cooks arguably the best chicken parmesan in the world, and also has impeccable taste in Bollywood music. But there is one annoying trait that makes her different from the other mothers – she unequivocally loathes all animals, unless they are in a palatable format, like her chicken parmesan.In Britain, a hatred for pets is unheard of, any bitterness towards animals is considered completely unacceptable. After all, we are considered a zoophilist nation. Throughout lockdown, pet ownership has surged. According to statistics from the Pet Food Manufacturers’ Association, there are now 34m pets in the UK including 12m cats and 12m dogs, along with 3.2m small mammals, such as guinea pigs and hamsters, 3m birds and 1.5m reptiles. Continue reading...
Insects have declined by 75% in the past 50 years – and the consequences may soon be catastrophic. Biologist Dave Goulson reveals the vital services they performI have been fascinated by insects all my life. One of my earliest memories is of finding, at the age of five or six, some stripy yellow-and-black caterpillars feeding on weeds in the school playground. I put them in my empty lunchbox, and took them home. Eventually they transformed into handsome magenta and black moths. This seemed like magic to me – and still does. I was hooked.In pursuit of insects I have travelled the world, from the deserts of Patagonia to the icy peaks of Fjordland in New Zealand and the forested mountains of Bhutan. I have watched clouds of birdwing butterflies sipping minerals from the banks of a river in Borneo, and thousands of fireflies flashing in synchrony at night in the swamps of Thailand. At home in my garden in Sussex I have spent countless hours watching grasshoppers court a mate and see off rivals, earwigs tend their young, ants milk honeydew from aphids, and leaf-cutter bees snip leaves to line their nests. Continue reading...
by Robin McKie, Toby Helm & Fiona Harvey on (#5MJJD)
‘Disastrous’ energy policies of China, Russia, Brazil and Australia could stoke 5C rise in temperatures if adopted by the rest of the worldA key group of leading G20 nations is committed to climate targets that would lead to disastrous global warming, scientists have warned. They say China, Russia, Brazil and Australia all have energy policies associated with 5C rises in atmospheric temperatures, a heating hike that would bring devastation to much of the planet.The analysis, by the peer-reviewed group Paris Equity Check, raises serious worries about the prospects of key climate agreements being achieved at the Cop26 summit in Glasgow in three months. The conference – rated as one of the most important climate summits ever staged – will attempt to hammer out policies to hold global heating to 1.5C by agreeing on a global policy for ending net emissions of greenhouse gases by 2050. Continue reading...
The new space race between the world’s richest men proves one thing to the rest of us – the sooner they leave this planet the betterThe time has come to abolish billionaires. I mean, it’s been coming for a while, but now the alarm is ringing.It started ringing when it first became clear that the existence of billionaires revealed a huge failure in our economic system. When it first became clear where wealth comes from, a combination of inheritance, corruption and exploitation. When the benefits of billionaires, who have often been believed to helpfully provide a trickle-down of cash to the rest of us ordinaries, were revealed to be at best minimal and at worst devastating, as their tax avoidance fatally impacts education and healthcare. In June, ProPublica reported that American billionaires essentially pay no taxes – they didn’t break the rules; the rules were broken already. And in this way wealth begets wealth – a millionaire can become a billionaire by simply sitting very still. Continue reading...
People with invisible disabilities have long asked for flexible options such as working from home. Then came the pandemicI struggle with a mild form of face blindness, or prosopagnosia. The condition, usually associated with autism, makes it difficult to remember people’s faces. This means that, in high-stress situations, I am often unable to match someone’s face to their name or even remember if I’ve met them before. When I worked at an office, I inadvertently offended colleagues who did not understand why I struggled to place who they were.This is just one way that the daily office environment made my career difficult to navigate. Working from home, as I have for the past three years, has made a positive difference in my ability to be a successful, confident journalist, and a happier person overall. Continue reading...
The Wellcome Trust director and Sage member on what politicians and scientists got right and wrong on Covid and why we need an immediate public inquiry
Bezos, Musk and Branson have achieved much – but the biggest challenge facing humanity is not the stars, but our planetFor three of the world’s most famous billionaires, space is indeed the final frontier – for their egos. Jeff Bezos, the planet’s richest man, launched into the great beyond last week via his Blue Origin venture, days after Sir Richard Branson did the same on a Virgin Galactic craft. Elon Musk, the sometime world’s richest man, has yet to join his rivals in the heavens with his SpaceX business, but has bought a ticket to ride with Branson at some point.Space travel is the stuff of legend and these lauded entrepreneurs are clearly caught up in the mythology. Humanity and space have connotations of bravery, and technological and intellectual brilliance, that run through the ages, from Galileo to Gagarin and the moon landings. Continue reading...
The Amazon founder returned to Earth last week with a pledge to help save the planet, but technology alone is not the answerSo Jeff Bezos made it safely back to the universe that most of us lesser mortals inhabit. He graciously thanked his Amazon employees and customers (that’s you and me, folks) who made the realisation of his childhood Star Trek dreams possible. “I want to thank every Amazon employee and every Amazon customer because you guys paid for this,” he said. “Seriously, for every Amazon customer out there and every employee thank you from the bottom of my heart very much. It’s very appreciated.”Aw, shucks. Thanks, Jeff. In a post-flight press conference he declared that the venture had reinforced his commitment to tackling the climate crisis and using his project as a stepping stone towards colonising space for the benefit of Earth. “We’re going to build a road to space,” he said, “so our kids, and their kids, can build the future. This is not about escaping Earth … this is the only good planet in the solar system and we have to take care of it. When you go to space and see how fragile it is you want to take care of it even more.” Continue reading...
Being a good listener isn’t just about shutting up and not interrupting – it’s about really taking in what someone is telling youWhen I was a young girl, a fabulous woman called Pam who lived opposite us would come to do my mum’s hair once a week. Pam was a retired hairdresser and beautician who had been taught partly by Vivien Leigh’s mother.I knew this because I listened as she and my mother talked. My mum would sit under the stand hairdryer with wads of cotton wool curling out from under her hairnet to protect her ears from the heat, and Pam would talk and talk: about Margaret Thatcher (my mum wasn’t a fan); their early lives (Pam’s in Yorkshire, my mum’s in Naples); and about life up and down the London street where we all lived. Continue reading...
Hope’s scientific mission is to study atmosphere and climate of Mars and is remarkable successIt is one year since the United Arab Emirates launched the Hope space mission from the Tanegashima Space Centre in Kagoshima prefecture, in south-west Japan, to begin its journey to Mars.By 9 February 2021, Hope had crossed 493m km of space and performed the Mars Orbit Insertion (MOI) manoeuvre. On 23 March, Hope manoeuvred into its final operating orbit, a highly elliptical path that carried it from 20,000km to 43,000km in altitude above Mars, and, after a period of commissioning the instruments, science operations began on 23 May. Continue reading...
by Richard Partington, Jessica Elgot and Sarah Butler on (#5MG68)
Separate pilot daily testing programme will be expanded to up to 500 food and drink supply chain employersWorkers from 16 key sectors including health, transport and energy will not have to isolate after being pinged by the NHS Covid app, as it was revealed that more than 600,000 people in England and Wales were sent self-isolation alerts last week.The raft of changes, after days of frantic talks with industry leaders, came amid open Conservative revolt over the so-called “pingdemic” with the former health secretary Jeremy Hunt warning the government that it was facing a crisis of public trust in the system. Continue reading...
Sulphur-crested cockatoos are learning to pry open bins, with researchers finding the new skill has caught on in 44 Sydney suburbs in just two years. With help from the public, Australian and German ecologists have documented cockatoos learning the bin-diving behaviour through social interactions. The research, published in the journal Science, also found differences in the cockatoos’ bin-opening technique between different suburbs, arising from 'local subcultures'.
The flight by the Amazon boss could mark the unchecked commercial exploitation of the ultimate virgin environmentOne very small step for mankind, one giant ego trip for Jeff Bezos. The world’s richest man ejaculated himself into space this week, in what was not quite the first suborbital tourist flight – Richard Branson beat him up there – but definitely the fastest. “Everybody who’s been up into space, they say that it changes them,” Bezos said earnestly, of a trip that lasted roughly the time it takes to hard boil an egg.If you say so, Jeff. But it looked very much like the intergalactic equivalent of one of those cruises where a vast herd is disgorged ashore for a brief, bewildered trample over the nearest landmark before being rounded up and whisked away to the next port. Sure, you’ve been to Venice, technically. But which one was Venice, again? Continue reading...
Research suggests that chronic loneliness may be as damaging to health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day. But do we know what loneliness actually is?As a clinical psychologist who specializes in friendships and social connection, I am deeply concerned about the feelings of loneliness that so many of us are experiencing.Three in five American adults report feeling lonely and 18% (roughly 46 million people) report that they have just one person or nobody that they can trust or turn to for help in their personal lives. These worrisome numbers are echoed across studies and across borders. Continue reading...
The politics of this new, extreme individualism will make collective responses to social crises impossibleSoon, a few of the more shameless newspaper commentators will urge the rest of us to “learn to live” with climate breakdown. Soon, a couple of especially sharp-elbowed cabinet ministers will sigh to the Spectator that, yes, carbon emissions should ideally be slashed – but we must make a trade-off between “lives and livelihoods”. Soon, a little platoon of Tory backbenchers will respond to TV pictures of another devastating flash flood or deadly heatwave by complaining about “fearmongering”. “Why is the BBC so doomy?” they’ll ask, as the death toll rises.Soon, shockingly soon, the cheap shots, the brazen stat-bending and the coprophagic cynicism that have warped British discourse since March 2020 will migrate from Covid to an even bigger and more lethal crisis: the climate emergency. And just as they have helped shape the self-inflicted catastrophe that England has embarked upon this week, so they will work their terrible influence on that one. Continue reading...
by Presented and produced by Shivani Dave on (#5MF2R)
We learned in our previous episode about the very real consequences that extreme heat has on human health and wellbeing, but there is little research into what actually happens to our bodies when exposed to extreme heat apart from in the world of sports science. In the second part of our discussion, as fears mount that the Tokyo Olympics will be the hottest on record and the world gears up for Cop26, Shivani Dave speaks to Mike Tipton, a professor of human and applied physiology
I’ve been studying the effects of restrictions on pregnant women since last year. Some are too harshHaving a baby is one of the most significant life events in the human spectrum of experiences.While it is a physical experience, it is also a profoundly social, psychological, cultural, and spiritual experience. This is something that is forgotten at times by busy health providers, but never by those giving birth and their partners. Continue reading...
A lack of note-taking is not always a red flag in therapy, writes Dr Helen Damon, and Ruth Medhurst says that the terminology around illness is totally outdatedYour article (‘It was devastating’: what happens when therapy makes things worse?, 17 July) lists several “red flags” that indicate a therapist is unprofessional, including never taking notes in session. I am a counselling psychologist – a profession regulated by the Health and Care Professions Council and the British Psychological Society. I am also a lecturer on a professional doctorate in counselling psychology and I see clients in private practice. I have previously worked in the NHS and in the education and charity sectors. I would like to clarify that it is not a red flag per se if a therapist does not write notes in session.Maintaining accurate and up-to-date session notes is central to therapeutic practice, but many therapists, myself included, write notes (as soon as possible) after each session. Indeed, one rationale for therapy sessions typically lasting for 50 minutes rather than an hour is that this enables therapists to write notes on their previous session in the space before their next one. Given that there are more than 400 forms of psychological therapy, it is unsurprising that therapists practise in different ways; there are therapeutic rationales for writing and for not writing notes in session. Continue reading...
Science | The Guardian