The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical conceptsWhat evolutionary advantage comes from women having considerably less body hair than men? Mal Jones, CardiffSend new questions to nq@theguardian.com. Continue reading...

Faced with danger, we act without thinking, as Nicola Kelly found when a day out with her family almost ended in disasterWe were running late that day. Three months into parenthood and time seemed to be perpetually against us – a constant battle against the clock to get the baby fed, changed and out the door.It was the first Saturday afternoon since the pubs had reopened in England and we were meeting friends for lunch. The streets around southeast London were teeming. Wobbly tables spilled out on to the pavement, trays packed with pints, friends hugging, reunited after too long apart. Continue reading...

Rural community with an under-resourced health system came together to take on the virus, but anger at the authorities remains

It pays to always check what is actually being countedLast Wednesday, the Evening Standard trumpeted “Covid deaths rocket to 207 in deadliest day in nearly 6 months”. In fact, deaths within 24 days of a positive test were slightly down over the previous week. So what did it get wrong?It appears it fell for the common misunderstanding, even after 18 months of pandemic, that the daily death figure represents those occurring in the last 24 hours, whereas it is deaths that have been reported in that period and reports are fewer on weekends and holidays. The spike of 207 picked up the backlog from the bank holiday weekend – only 50 had been reported the previous day. Continue reading...

Key questions behind the government’s decree that care home staff must be vaccinated against Covid-19

Melbourne psychologist Chris Cheers says the pandemic’s effect has been akin to grief, and acceptance of it is hard to reachAfter 18 months, psychologist Chris Cheers has begun to understand emotional responses to the global Covid pandemic as a kind of grief.It’s a collective grief, experienced by the whole world at once, but also deeply personal: our losses are not the same just as our experiences have not been the same. Continue reading...

Boris Johnson is heading for a clash with backbench MPs over plans for mass vaccination of teenagers

I have never been seriously ill or spent a night in hospital, but I’m plagued by fears that a terrible sickness is coming for me. How did I fall victim to health anxiety?“This minute I was well, and am ill, this minute.” The pain arrives slowly, like a Polaroid sharpening into view, but the fear comes suddenly: a channel switched, a cloud sped across the sun. It’s June 1989, I recently turned 20, and I am supposed to be studying for first-year exams in English, at University College Dublin. Instead, I’m letting a morning’s MTV binge slide into the afternoon and paying keen attention to the fingers of my right hand, which have begun to ache. In the days that follow – though I only half believe it’s happening – stiffness spreads to my wrist and elbow, to the other arm, to my hips and knees. I start hobbling, and hunch over on the bus on my way to university. I will have to repeat some exams, but my affliction will have vanished by midsummer, walked off one hot day in St Stephen’s Green.Most of my life, from early adolescence onwards, has been punctuated by these episodes, more or less alarming, depending on my symptoms and the disease I have decided is expressed there. Fretful interludes have remained secret, never spoken about to parents, friends or professionals. Others have been, or felt, dramatic: the shock of a sudden lump, rash or pain must be taken to a GP, then to specialists, only to be quickly dismissed, or dissolved in the weeks-long agony of appointments and results. Still others have lingered for months or even years, dragging at daily life, relationships, career prospects. Continue reading...

Covid-positive girl, 4, infected by interstate truck driver in south-east Queensland was infectious at daycare

Therapeutic Goods Administration gives green light to use of Moderna’s Spikevax vaccine for people aged 12 years and older

A small team of ecologists and scientists are working to find new ways to bolster populations of Australia’s endangered native animals Continue reading...

Coronavirus patients with high-risk comorbidities are being given a newly approved antibody drug, which limits the virus’s ability to replicate in the body

A team of medics hiked in the mountains for hours to take supplies to the small village of Nakida

The space cemetery, named for the fictional captain in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, is where the International Space Station is likely to end upAt the furthest point from any landmass on earth, and 4km under the sea, lies the space cemetery.When their outer space journeys come to an end, old satellites, rocket parts and space stations are sent to this desolate spot in the Pacific Ocean to rest on the dark seabed forever. Continue reading...

Analysis: The JCVI would not back vaccination of all 12 to 15-year-olds, but the impact on schools will now have to be considered

House in southern France yielded find of outstanding wall paintings dating from 1st century BCOn the right bank of the Rhône in the Provençal town of Arles, the Roman-built House of the Harpist is being hailed as a remarkable record of ancient architecture and interior decoration.Now, experts have opened their workshop to reveal their painstaking attempts to piece together the vast jigsaw of magnificent and never before seen frescoes discovered in the property thought to date back more than two millennia. Continue reading...

Readers respond to an editorial about understanding quantum theory and defining the laws of physicsYour editorial on quantum physics (30 August) starts with a quote from Richard Feynman – “nobody understands quantum mechanics” – and then says “that is no longer true”. One of us (Norman Dombey) was taught quantum theory by Feynman at Caltech; the other (John Charap) was taught by Paul Dirac at Cambridge. Quantum theory was devised by several physicists including Dirac, Erwin Schrödinger and Werner Heisenberg in the 1920s and 1930s, and Dirac made their work relativistic.It is absurd to say that quantum mechanics is now understood whereas it was not 50 years ago. There have of course been advances in our understanding of quantum phenomena, but the conceptual framework of quantum physics remains as it was. The examples you give of nuclear plants, medical scans and lasers involve straightforward applications of quantum mechanics that were understood 50 years ago. Continue reading...

As living creatures, we are exquisitely evolved to interact with the world through perception, says David HughesGaia Vince, reviewing Anil Seth’s Being You: A New Science of Consciousness (The exhilarating new science of consciousness, 25 August), extols the thesis that because our perception of the world is a complex physical process, perception is itself a “hallucination” and “a big lie created by our deceptive brains”. But when we consider that dogs hear sounds we don’t, flies look through compound eyes, birds navigate using inbuilt GPS, it does seem perverse to claim that the very physicality of being alive downgrades perception to spontaneous fakery.Does, for example, the complex biochemistry of our arm and shoulder muscles make striking a tennis ball a hallucination? Are all our sensations of touch illusory? A Wimbledon winner and someone who has a burn would surely disagree. We are, as living creatures, exquisitely evolved to interact with the world through perception. Our survival depends on it. It is not dying of thirst that is a hallucination, it is the dehydration that accompanies such a death that causes hallucination: the misperception of reality. Continue reading...

This new class of planet hoped by scientists to harbour alien life is a hot waterworld. Let’s stop Earth turning into oneAstronomers have begun scrutinising a new class of planet that might support alien life: the hycean. This is a portmanteau coinage combining “hydrogen” and “ocean”, since the planets are hot waterworlds with hydrogen-rich atmospheres.In ancient Greek, Oceanus was the great river encompassing the disc of the Earth, personified as the son of Uranus and Gaia. Hydrogen, meanwhile, is Greek for “water-generating”, as H indeed is when combined with O. Continue reading...

Successor to Hubble has been hit by delays and a ballooning budget since work began on it in 1996Nasa has completed the final tests of the James Webb space telescope and is now preparing it for transportation to the launch site in Kourou, French Guiana.Webb is Nasa’s successor to the ageing Hubble space telescope. Work on it began way back in 1996. Back then, it was called the Next Generation space telescope. It was forecast to cost $500m (£363m) and was set for launch in 2007. Continue reading...

Arctic change increased chances of tightly spinning winds above North Pole, authors say, boosting chances of extreme weatherThe climate crisis has not only been leaving deadly heatwaves and more destructive hurricanes in its wake, but also probably creating extreme winter weather events, according to a new report released on Thursday by the American Association for the Advancement of Science’s journal Science.Related: ‘Fire weather’: dangerous days now far more common in US west, study finds Continue reading...

Exclusive: head of key research into third dose says it may be better to prioritise vulnerable first

From playing word games to using a memory palace, there are many ways to train your brain as we start to socialise in greater numbersSay what you will about the rule of six: at least it was easy to keep up with everyone. Now that most restrictions in the UK have been lifted, we might not only be catching up with acquaintances we have not seen for well over a year, but meeting new people – and our brains might be struggling to keep up. Here are 10 tips for priming your mind. Continue reading...

Boris Johnson’s passport plan sets the vaxxers against the anti-vaxxers without necessarily making anything saferVaccinations are the high point of human reason. Devised under clinical conditions by scientists interested only in what works, they represent the mastery of the rational world over chaotic nature; and also, of course, they save lives. Vaccine passports, then, should in theory be no more than the rubber stamp of reason. So why does the policy, not to mention the discussion surrounding it, look so irrational?In late July, shortly after nightclubs had reopened for the first time in over a year, Boris Johnson appeared to go against his previous approach – let’s call it, for brevity, “loosey goosey” – and announced a plan to make “full vaccination the condition of entry” to nightclubs and other crowded indoor events. The prime minister didn’t have the experience of Boardmasters, the Cornish festival in mid-August, which seeded so many Covid infections that the county, had it been abroad, would have been placed on the red list. Yet he did have that data by this week, when he restated this intention. Continue reading...

When we find it difficult to say ‘no’ at work or at home, our responsibilities can quickly become overwhelming. For good mental health, focusing on our own needs and capabilities is crucialNo. A tiny, yet mighty word. To hear it can make us feel childlike; sheepish or in trouble. How does it make you feel to say “no”? Strong? Nervous? Guilty? Do you say it often enough?In July, when the gymnast Simone Biles withdrew from most of her Olympics appearances, citing emotional exhaustion that was affecting her ability to perform, her “no” was a thunderbolt. Reactions were largely supportive, but opinions were divided along political lines in the US. White, male sports pundits (and, predictable as the arrow of time, Piers Morgan) used the word “selfish”. It was a similar story when the tennis player Naomi Osaka withdrew from the French Open in May, speaking of “long bouts of depression” and “huge waves of anxiety” before her pre- and post-match press conferences. Continue reading...

Getting trees into the ground isn’t simple. Reforestation often involves trade-offs and challenges. Phoebe Weston checks in on two projects where people are planting trees, and one where it’s not humans doing the planting at all. She and Patrick Greenfield from The age of extinction are back with two new episodes Continue reading...

Health groups say move would leave many patients in England unable to afford medication, intensifying existing health inequalitiesScrapping free prescription charges for people over 60 and raising the qualifying age to 66 could have a devastating impact on the health of tens of thousands of older people, new analysis by Age UK suggests.In a joint open letter urging the government to reconsider proposals to scrap free prescriptions for over-60s in England, 20 healthcare organisations expressed “deep shared concerns” that the move would leave many patients unable to afford medication, intensifying existing health inequalities and having a devastating impact on some older people’s health. Continue reading...

Researchers also find no difference in mental health scores between children who test positive or negative

Health officials say shots are not boosters but part of vaccination schedule for half a million patients

South of UK was duller and wetter than usual, while extreme weather hit hard across the worldGlasgow, the host city of the crucial Cop26 UN climate summit in November, has experienced its hottest summer on record, the Met Office has said. Continue reading...

Bones found in 2014 in what is now South Dakota described as ‘miracle of nature and work of art’In its time, approximately 66m years ago, the triceratops, with its massive collared skull and three attacking horns, was one of the most dangerous and daunting of dinosaurs.Now the remains of one of the giants of the Cretaceous period, a herbivore despite its fearsome appearance, have gone on display in Paris before they are auctioned next month. Continue reading...

From sending a quick check-in message to getting vaccinated for their benefit, there are many ways to make your high-risk friends feel loved, even if they are still having to isolateNow that almost all pandemic restrictions have been lifted in the UK, many of us are enjoying getting our social lives back. But if you are clinically vulnerable, you might still be living with self-imposed rules, such as avoiding the indoors or crowds. With more than 3.8 million people in the UK previously told to shield in lockdown, statistically, most of us will have friends or family who are in this boat. It can be a hard thing to navigate. How can you support them and keep relationships going? Here are 10 ideas. Continue reading...

University College hospital allows access to its new facility and staff to show how the health service is trying to tackle backlogs

New centre in Berlin aims to make it easier for governments to compare notes on emerging infectious diseases

As a Black scientist in a traditionally white field, the Brown University professor has often been ostracized. But to move forward, he says, science must embrace diversityAs a Black physicist, Dr Stephon Alexander has been doubted, spoken over and met with intentional silence. The tenured Brown University professor has even faced this treatment from his students.This is par for the course for many Black professionals in traditionally white environments, but Alexander happens to excel in an especially insular field that was once thought to be too advanced for people like him. In the 70s, the American Physical Society, the country’s most recognized organization of physicists, remained silent as some members claimed that people of African heritage were incapable of engaging in physics because of their inferior intellect – a damning assertion in a field that requires supporting colleagues as they make huge conceptual leaps. Continue reading...

Canines seem to understand whether actions are deliberate or accidental, ‘theory of mind’ study suggestsFrom a canny look to a quizzical grumble, dogs have long conveyed the impression they know more about what their owners are up to than what might be expected. Now researchers have found fresh evidence of canine savviness, revealing dogs seem to be able to tell whether human actions are deliberate or accidental.While theory of mind – the ability to attribute thoughts to others and to recognise that can result in certain behaviours – is often thought to be uniquely human, the study suggests at least some elements may be common to canines. Continue reading...

Health body says Mu, or B.1.621, first identified in Colombia, has been designated as a variant of interest

Models of how the Earth could look in 250m years, with huge land masses and longer days, can help exoplanet huntersIt’s unlikely humans will be around to see it, but in about 250m years Earth’s land masses will have moved together to form the next supercontinent. By this time the sun will be a little brighter and the Earth’s rotation will have slowed down, making a day about 30 minutes longer than now. So how will it feel to live on this future Earth?Michael Way, from the Nasa Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, and colleagues have used computer models to travel forward in time. They investigated two plausible scenarios: Aurica (a low latitude supercontinent developing around 250m years from now) and Amasia (a high latitude northern supercontinent plus a smaller Antarctic subcontinent about 200m years from now). Continue reading...

Doctors say inclisiran will prevent tens of thousands of deaths from heart attack and strokePatients in England are to start receiving a “gamechanger” drug that doctors say will protect tens of thousands of lives by cutting the number of people who have a heart attack or stroke.The treatment, inclisiran, works by boosting the liver’s ability to reduce the body’s level of “bad” cholesterol, even in those who have already tried using statins. Continue reading...

Concerns raised that some people may be cancelling their second AstraZeneca dose hoping to obtain a shot of Pfizer instead

Seán Boyle suspects that the Gaelicised spelling of ‘craic’ may be a more recent ploy to attract touristsAndrew Poole (Letters, 26 August) is of course correct that “crack” has a long history in Scots and north-eastern English. But it also existed in Ireland well before its late 20th-century emergence as “craic”. Growing up in south Ulster, it was in regular use by young and old – “Sure, he’s great crack”; “Was there any crack in town last night?”; “She’d go anywhere for a bit of crack”. We seldom had recourse to spelling it out, but wouldn’t have considered any spelling other than “crack”.I agree that the adoption of the Gaelicised “craic” is of fairly recent origin. I have no recollection of its use among Gaelic speakers and I suspect that it’s a tourism marketing man’s invention, circa 1980. Gaelicising it suggests that there’s something unique about Irish fun and distances it from other meanings of the word. Otherwise, a slogan such as “Come to Ireland for the crack” might well attract the wrong sort of tourist.

There is scant evidence that ivermectin can treat or prevent Covid - but that hasn’t stopped rightwing pundits and conservative politicians from promoting itYou are not a horse. You are not a cow. You are, I’m afraid, a homo sapiens living in a world so deranged that people would rather poison themselves with worm medicine meant for farm animals than take a vaccine meant for human beings.Related: Australian imports of ivermectin increase tenfold, prompting warning from TGA Continue reading...

The long-running series in which readers answer other readers’ questions on subjects ranging from trivial flights of fancy to profound scientific and philosophical conceptsWhat evolutionary advantage comes from women having considerably less body hair than men? Mal Jones, CardiffPost your answers (and new questions) below or send them to nq@theguardian.com. A selection will be published on Sunday. Continue reading...

Food and water were thought to be the main ways humans are exposed to PFAS, but study points to risk of breathing them inToxic PFAS compounds are contaminating the air inside homes, classrooms and stores at alarming levels, a new study has found.Researchers with the University of Rhode Island and Green Science Policy Institute tested indoor air at 20 sites and detected the “forever chemicals” in 17 locations. The airborne compounds are thought to break off of PFAS-treated products such as carpeting and clothing and attach to dust or freely float through the indoor environment. Continue reading...

Country to press ahead with school openings as it encourages all over-12s to get third jab

In an era of divisions over the climate breakdown, tree planting seems to bring everyone together. But are there situations where tree planting can cause more harm than good? And how much can it help us counteract global heating? Patrick Greenfield leads you through the science and controversy behind the decisions we’re making and how those decisions could shape our future environment. He and Phoebe Weston from The age of extinction are back with two new episodes Continue reading...

The drug, used to deworm livestock, has been touted among rightwing media as a Covid treatment, prompting the US FDA to tweet ‘You are not a cow’

UK and international studies show the impact pandemic has had on health services and patients

A coin toss could give me two completely different lives. But once I know the result there’s no going backI’ve spent most of my life knowing I may have inherited a faulty gene that would cause Huntington’s disease, a neurodegenerative disease that can be fatal. My grandad had the disease, my mum has it, and I am yet to take the test to find out if I have it too. It’s a 50/50 chance of inheritance. Right now, I am happily ignorant of whether I carry the mutation or not. A coin toss could give me two completely different lives. Once I know the results, there’s no going back. So far, everyone who has been tested in my family has tested positive. It seems the odds are against me. I’m 27 years old, and I’m starting to think seriously about my future, whether that is moving overseas or contemplating having children. Whatever big decisions I am facing now, I can’t help but wonder, could this disease overshadow them? I explore this tension in a newly released short documentary, Fifty Percent.Related: After the Nobel, what next for Crispr gene-editing therapies? Continue reading...

Six countries removed from EU ‘white list’ of countries with restriction-free travel; South African scientists trying to establish potency of ‘new variant’