After the financial crash, Britain’s young shouldered the burden. The Conservatives must not let that happen againThe kids are boomeranging back again. Up and down the country, overgrown children are shuffling home to roost, refugees from a virus that has stalled their adult lives mid-launch. University lectures and supervisions have all been moved online, so there’s no point student children moping around deserted halls when they could be home ransacking the parental fridge. Gap years too are ending abruptly in a mad scrabble for the last flight out. And for those losing wobbly first jobs in the early wave of coronavirus redundancies, from bar and shop workers to freelancers whose commissions have dried up overnight, home is the refuge of last resort. But now what?Everyone rightly sympathises with forlorn GCSE and A-level students, left in limbo when their exams were cancelled and still unsure of their path to university. But the worst hit in many ways are 18-year-old school leavers and final-year university students, due to emerge this summer into the world of work. Who will be hiring in the wake of what looks like a vertiginous crash? It’s hard to see many openings at the bottom of the ladder, and the temporary jobs in pubs or coffee shops that graduates took during the last recession when the “milk round†recruiters stopped calling are precisely the ones now going to the wall. Continue reading...
From cucumber-crunchers to cranial exams, YouTube is full of ASMRtists provoking the strangely pleasurable autonomous sensory meridian response. Now they’ve got their own euphoric museum showSome whisper gently into the microphone, while tapping their nails along the spine of a book. Others take a bar of soap and slice it methodically into tiny cubes, letting the pieces clatter into a plastic tray. There are those who dress up as doctors and pretend to perform a cranial nerve exam, and the ones who eat food as noisily as they can, recording every crunch and slurp in 3D stereo sound.
Tuesday’s top story: NY governor says state’s coronavirus deluge is a harbinger of what’s to come for the US. Plus, a heatwave in the coldest place on EarthGood morning, I’m Tim Walker with today’s essential stories. Continue reading...
by Presented by Hannah Devlin and produced by Madelei on (#51FTE)
Hannah Devlin speaks with Prof David Smith about the various ways in which clinicians can test whether or not someone is infected with Sars-CoV-2. And, following the recent announcement that the UK government has bought millions of antibody tests, explores what these might be able to tell us Continue reading...
by Helen Sullivan (now and earlier), Kevin Rawlinson, on (#51DZF)
Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu in self-isolation; Moscow announces lockdown of 12m people; Syria records first death. This blog is now closed
System uses machine learning to offer new way to screen for hard-to-detect cancersA new blood test that can detect more than 50 types of cancer has been revealed by researchers in the latest study to offer hope for early detection.The test is based on DNA that is shed by tumours and found circulating in the blood. More specifically, it focuses on chemical changes to this DNA, known as methylation patterns. Continue reading...
Ireland and Portugal have acted to protect asylum seekers and migrants. The UK has made a political choice not to do soA week after Priti Patel stood in the House of Commons and issued an apology for the Windrush scandal, Abanda was trying to figure out how to survive during the Covid-19 pandemic. “I haven’t seen anything addressed to us,†she says. Abanda is a refused asylum seeker who advocates for migrant rights. “I don’t think we exist.â€Days later, as part of a number of measures announced for migrants, the Home Office extended support for some of those seeking asylum. But the standard financial assistance remains under £40 a week, less than half of the statutory sick pay. It’s an amount ministers should be asked if they could survive on, particularly when vital migrant services have had to to be scaled back. Continue reading...
People assume that we’re vulnerable to false information. But even in times of crisis, common sense usually prevails• Coronavirus – latest updates• See all our coronavirus coverageIn times of crisis, misinformation abounds. Covid-19 can be cured by ingesting fish-tank cleaning products. Coronavirus was developed in Chinese (or American, or French) labs. Cristiano Ronaldo and the pope tested positive.Why does misinformation flourish? Does all this fake news mean that people are hopelessly gullible, their anxiety making them receptive to the most blatant baloney? Continue reading...
by Hannah Devlin, Ekaterina Ochagavia and Nikhita Chu on (#51EKC)
The best thing to do when trying to understand a new virus like Covid-19 is to look at the data. The Guardian's science correspondent Hannah Devlin uses the latest figures to explain who is most at risk of contracting this coronavirus, why men are more likely to die from the disease, and the reasons health workers could be particularly vulnerable
Australian Dr Daniel Reardon ended up in hospital after inserting magnets in his nostrils while building a necklace that warns you when you touch your face
Thousands of nurses expected to stop work this week over concerns about lack of personal protective equipmentFour thousand nurses are expected to participate in strikes across Papua New Guinea this week over concerns that the Pacific nation lacks the medical supplies and funding to handle a potential coronavirus outbreak.The industrial action follows a sit-in by nearly 600 nurses in the capital of Port Moresby on Thursday over concerns about the lack of personal protective equipment for medical staff. Continue reading...
by Hannah Ellis-Petersen in Delhi and Shaikh Azizur R on (#51E3P)
Medical staff on the frontline face ostracisation and are being forced to sleep in their hospitalsDoctors and medical workers in India are being ostracised from communities, evicted from their homes and forced to sleep in hospital bathrooms and on floors over fears they may be carrying coronavirus.In cases reported across the country, healthcare professionals described the growing stigma they are facing from their neighbours and landlords, resulting in many being refused taxis, barricaded from their own homes, or made homeless. Continue reading...
The constellation Cancer, with the beehive cluster, is high in the sky and well-placed for observationThis week is a good time to track down one of the fainter constellations: Cancer, the Crab. It is one of the zodiacal constellations, meaning that the sun passes through it during the year. It is bordered on the west by Gemini, the Twins, and to the east by Leo, the Lion – both zodiacal constellations. Continue reading...
by Ullrich Ecker and Douglas MacFarlane on (#51DPQ)
People will remain calm if they have clear and simple guidelines. The first step is to listenWe are not experts on epidemiology, virology or economics. Our personal view is that we need to proactively isolate non-essential workers and children. We base our opinion on the evidence and modelling that we find most compelling. This is our view, but we acknowledge that this is a wicked problem and there are no easy decisions.What we do have expertise in is the psychology of misinformation, communication and behaviour change, so here we offer a few thoughts on how leaders should be engaging with the public. Continue reading...