"The most prominent pathway identified was educational attainment. Liberal policy environments in the past often involved greater investment in public resources, including schools... Education is believed to create cognitive reserve."

“The number of cases & deaths we’re seeing in such a short timeframe, combined with the spread across several health zones + now across the border, is extremely concerning. Trish Newport, Emergency Program Manager for @msf.ca. Learn more: www.msf.org/msf-preparin...

2/ UK COVID Inquiry Module 3 Ch 1& 2 "belief that it was possible to distinguish clearly between droplet and aerosol transmission – and the precautions required as a result – were and are wrong. They should no longer be relied on in healthcare guidance." covid19.public-inquiry.uk/reports/modu...

💯. For all the talk of a "shrinking state" that "doesn't do anything", the UK state since 2008 has repeatedly done massive, unprecedented & hugely expensive things: bail-outs, Brexit, furlough/ pandemic support & energy subsidies. But we almost never talk about the continuing costs of those things.

The internet used to be better. Someone should write a book about it...

Yes 💯 People using blue badges are becoming fearful. Government is whipping up this prejudice. www.theguardian.com/world/2026/a...

Alexander's comments are fully in line with Labour's rhetoric around ADHD, autism etc, and way they diminish and dismiss hidden disabilities, or claim "overdiagnosis" www.bbc.co.uk/news/article... This is despite experts pointing out they aren't being overdiagnosed. www.cam.ac.uk/research/new...

FFS. Literally nobody gets a blue badge for ADHD. It’s not even straightforward to get one for severe autism with co-morbid learning disability and epilepsy.

The government seems to believe it's main problem is Comms, not policy, but we could now be six weeks into a big "This is what is happening, this is what it means" campaign about oil prices... And we just aren't?

Farage has devastated our country. His Brexit campaign has crippled our growth, our businesses, and our opportunities. His rhetoric on immigration has poisoned our political debate and sowed deep division in our nation. He can never be allowed to enter Number 10.

First Arsenal game - he’s 26 now. First title

Forgive me for self promotion, but this book is about the history of racial designation in genealogical records, and it has a chapter on the "enclosure" of records by FamilySearch and ancestry. It's quite amazing and alarming. press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

Surely we'll get back at least 50% though through Delay Repay?

HS2 expected to cost £102.7bn - or more if you purchase on the day you travel.

Almost none of the people working on HS2 when it kicked off in 2010 will still be in work when it’s due to reach Euston in 2043, probably only a handful of graduate trainees

I often think of HS2 when people claim defence spending is uniquely shambolic. If Minsters keep changing their minds, want something new rather than 'off the shelf', and allow minor stakeholders too much influence, this is what happens.

A child born on the Regent’s Park estate when the demolition started will be in their late 20s when they can get a HS2 train to Birmingham. What an avoidable mess.

It’s not discussed nearly enough: austerity was a political project more than an economic one, aimed at shrinking the state - ie services supporting vulnerable people. Services that Tory politicians don’t use. Austerity broke Britain. It will probably never recover.

One of most destructive acts of the Cameron-Osborne era was the decision to target austerity on local government.

“The weirdos. The misfits. The losers. The mostly elderly desperados who cling to the certainty they were right all along. Untroubled by all the evidence to the contrary. Unaware that many of their arguments contradict one another” The Brexit bells have a reunion… www.theguardian.com/politics/202...

The contrast between the number of media requests I got when rich people on a cruise were facing a deadly, but contained outbreak versus now that some of the poorest people in the world are facing a deadly and devastating epidemic is just so so stark and it just really annoys the hell out of me.

Britain, 2335: The budget ceremony begins with the traditional Announcement of the Fuel Duty Rise. Two months later, there will be the traditional Postponement of the Fuel Duty Rise, continuing a ritual begun centuries earlier by Chancellors in the Fossil Fuel era

Met Police will ask the CPS to consider charging up to 57 people & 20 companies over the Grenfell Tower fire Alleged offences include corporate & gross negligence manslaughter, misconduct in public office & fraud 72 people were killed in the disaster

www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2026... 'Just when smart cities all over the world are moving away from the car, Galway is going all in, becoming more like a Texan city, wrapped in a shawl of roadside retail parks, paved parking lots and long-distance commutes'

I have written to the Minister to highlight concerns raised at my recent SEND roundtable. The meeting with parents and carers of children with special educational needs was invaluable and has informed me in my ongoing campaign. I’m still waiting for a meeting with the Minister.

The idea that squeezing supermarkets will dramatically cut prices at the till simply does not reflect how the food supply chain works. The real inflationary pressure in food is input costs: energy, fertiliser, fuel & water. Farmers are absorbing huge increases. 2/7 www.farminguk.com/news/union-w...

A friend's PhD studies hinged on the fact that the hearing frequency range of moles was previously thought to be known, but he discovered this was from a mis-translation of a German paper which had only tested within a certain range, so the actual range could be much wider.

I had to spend a while looking for a citation in a language that I don't speak, only to find out that people had been wrongly citing it for decades. Turns out Hans Asperger never called autistic people 'little professors'

To be clear, that attitude is by no means exclusive to lawyers. I don't know that the percentage is higher or lower or what, but there are a lot of, "but how *can* I screw people?" individuals in every part of our society.

Heard a story about an ethics class at a law school where half the room was like "I need to understand these concepts and practices so the law functions right in a free society," and the other half was like, "how do I technically follow these rules while enriching myself and screwing people over?"

"African countries that were first to roll out a breakthrough malaria vaccine have seen a “significant reduction” in child deaths, a landmark report found this week. "

“polycystic #ovary syndrome ( #PCOS ) will be renamed polyendocrine #metabolic ovarian syndrome ( #PMOS )..Experts said that by focusing only on #cysts, the prev name meant many struggled to get a diagnosis &..treated.”: buff.ly/OcphtT4 via @rachelcdailey.bsky.social #WomensHealth

Greater Manchester still says no to #NHS data platform with Palantir at its heart Public concern has only grown, says ICB, while evidence of benefits remains thin Manchester showing the way England needs to go Wales and Scotland agree No to Palantir www.theregister.com/public-secto...

I’m wondering when we’ll start to see headlines talking about ‘Ebola anxiety’… Footnote: Ebola has an average case fatality rate of 50%.

The fact that a neo-Nazi teenager who attempted to behead a Kurdish barber in Bristol last year has just been sentenced to almost 20 years in prison isn’t *national* news is enormously telling. It’s really not just a South West story, is it?

Nigel Farage insisting "I cannot be bought," after being exposed for secretly trousering £5 million from a crypto billionaire, buying a house with the money, and then immediately launching a lobbying campaign for the crypto industry, is quite something

Also, given Farage is even prepared to say 'Up the 'RA' for 70 quid, it's not remotely true

He’s dropped the ‘security’ claim already. Tricky to sustain when you’ve been buying houses for cash…

Nigel Farage tells The Sun's Harry Cole that Elon Musk offered to give Reform loads of money "if we said certain things" and he refused. "I can't be bought." Two things: 1. This is an allegation of attempted bribery. Very serious. 2. It shows the obvious: donors expect something for their money.

This is just in Dublin, spread this all across #VacantIreland and we have a cheaper, quicker and more sustainable solution to the housing crisis. Better than beds in sheds too Will the government be brave enough to bring in real solutions? #spéirgorm #DerelictIreland

Angela Rayner was dragged through every front page for weeks... HMRC's verdict: NOT deliberate. NOT even careless. Farage pockets £5 million and chooses not to declare it So where's the wall-to-wall coverage? Tell me this isn't a rigged game.

(I generally try to hit a new doctor with some sort of bleak disability humor in the first few minutes and if they don't laugh, that's a bad sign, heh.)

(The woman dismissed as having anxiety is "not confirmed" as having hantavirus, which is not the same as not having hantavirus and I would like to have seen a statement that she was tested and the test was negative, but.)

Updating: the Grauniad has retracted the article because it was apparently a mistranslation and the woman who was hospitalized with hantavirus is not the same woman who was dismissed as having anxiety

Seeking health care as a woman in one headline www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...

Data from a study carried out by the Behavioural Insights Unit (BIU) of the Portuguese Catholic University points to concern... by RTP in Portugal

Literally just finished reading this piece. It's quite good. cheftova.substack.com/p/i-met-clav...

“No one has a right to sit down and feel hopeless. There’s too much work to do.” ~ Dorothy Day

Just met a Reform UK voting couple who had no idea that it opposed: Recent rise in the minimum wage End of the two-child benefit cap Expansion of free school meals, free breakfast clubs Help with school uniforms Horrified that they would lose big from Reform How many others voted without knowing?