18 h. ago Coatbridge and Bellshill MP Frank McNally used Commons speech to reflect on lasting impact of COVID pandemic

Mr McNally highlighted the profound challenges faced by local schoolchildren, carers and key workers during one of the most difficult periods in recent history.

Events

3 d. ago WhatsApp removed from Scottish Government phones after Nicola Sturgeon deleted messages in Covid backlash

Ministers and officials were previously criticised for deleting messages during the Covid pandemic

Politics

4 d. ago Market town jeweller, 66, was found hanged next to his wife's dead body after 'rapid deterioration' of his mental health during Covid, inquest hearing is told

A jeweller was found hanged near to his wife's dead body at their home after his mental health declined following the 'anxieties and challenges' of the covid pandemic, a coroner was told today.

Events

5 d. ago Danny Boyle: 28 Years Later Covid pandemic parallels were inevitable

Danny Boyle says it was inevitable the Covid-19 pandemic would shape his latest film, 28 Years Later, which premiered in London on Wednesday (18 June).

Events

5 d. ago Danny Boyle: Covid pandemic had ‘inevitable’ influence on new film 28 Years Later

Danny Boyle says it was inevitable the Covid-19 pandemic would shape his latest film, 28 Years Later, which premiered in London on Wednesday (18 June).

Events

6 d. ago Voices: Did we learn the right lessons from the Covid pandemic? Join The Independent Debate

As a new Covid variant spreads across the UK, we’re asking: did we learn the right lessons from the pandemic, or are we slipping back into old habits?

Events

7 d. ago Furniture chain At Home files for bankruptcy and announces plans to close stores

The furniture store listed several factors, including the aftermath of the Covid-19 pandemic and President Donald Trump’s tariffs, for its filing for bankruptcy

Politics

7 d. ago West Lothian residents fume 'why do we need to book quiet recycling centres?'

A booking system was introduced during the Covid pandemic for reasons of social distancing.

Politics

1 week ago Family of woman who died from Covid after giving birth sues Brazilian state

Exclusive: Lidiane Vieira Frazão, a black woman from Rio, was repeatedly denied appropriate treatment as President Bolsonaro downplayed the pandemic, lawsuit saysIn the early weeks of the Covid-19 pandemic, Lidiane Vieira Frazão, 35, was expecting her second child but, even at 40 weeks pregnant, she was unable to obtain a doctor’s note to start her maternity leave.Her job as a funeral agent – at times handling the bodies of people who had died from the virus – was on the long list of “essential services” that could not be suspended during lockdown, according to a decree issued by Brazil’s then-president, Jair Bolsonaro. Continue reading...

Events

1 week ago Company linked to Tory Peer Baroness Mone should pay back £121m for ‘faulty’ PPE, High Court hears

PPE Medpro is being sued for an alleged breach of contract over the supply of PPE during the Covid pandemic, with the Government claiming the gowns were unusable

Economics

1 week ago Greece panic as tourists abandon one of its 'most popular' islands

For the first time since the Covid-19 pandemic, Santorini is experiencing a decline in tourists.

Culture

2 w. ago Midwife struck off after claiming vaccines ‘attacked babies’ on social media

Seana Mary Kerr also approached a pregnant woman in a shop and told her she should not be wearing a face mask during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Events

2 w. ago Single Black women on Covid five years later: ‘The pandemic taught me, no regrets’

Three women share how isolation, instability and loneliness led to creativity, family and communityIt was business as usual for Jordan Madison in early 2020. Her commute included taking a bus from Silver Spring, Maryland, to her job in Bethesda. Madison, 25, was working at the time on her license to become a clinical marriage and family therapist, and worked part-time at Instacart to earn extra money. By March 2020, the world had shut down because of the Covid-19 pandemic.“The first two weeks, I was like: ‘OK, this is nice. I don’t have to leave my house. This is a nice little vacation. We’ll probably go back to work in like a month or so,’” Madison remembered thinking. Continue reading...

Events

2 w. ago The Potato Eaters review – a descent from visceral dread into full

Lazzaretto Vecchio, VeniceOn the site of a hospital for leprosy patients, audience members are invited to wander in near darkness among twitching body bags into a choreographed scene of ritualised tyrannyThere are strong Death in Venice vibes to the setting of Romeo Castellucci’s site specific production at the Venice Biennale Teatro. The show, by the Italian writer-director and his company, inhabits its own island – a long, lizard-like colony. The audience boards a shuttle and skims across the water to arrive at a building that was once a lazaretto – a hospital for leprosy patients. Associations with fatal infection and social isolation are chillingly resonance of the Covid pandemic. But as you wander into this disturbing promenade piece, things turn chilly in more ways than one.The building’s interior is stripped of its skin so that its brick and rafters lie bare, and there is a low electronic rumble of sound along its corridors which is as disquieting as the near darkness. Window...

Politics

2 w. ago New coronavirus discovered in China ‘only small step’ from infecting humans

HKU5 coronavirus detected in bats may spill over into people, study finds

Science

2 w. ago New virus discovered in China is 'one small step' away from triggering a pandemic, scientists warn

American researchers say the new strain of bat coronavirus could be multiple times deadlier the COVID-19 and can cause the next potential pandemic.

Events

2 w. ago 'Japan's Baba Vanga' foresees 'devastation' in chilling prediction for 2030

Comic artist Ryo Tatsuki, who predicted the Covid-19 pandemic and Princess Diana's death, has been dubbed as Japan's version of the famed Bulgarian psychic

Politics

2 w. ago A Different Kind of Power by Jacinda Ardern review – not your usual PM

New Zealand’s former prime minister is a refreshingly informal narrator of her remarkable rise and fallJacinda Ardern was the future, once. New Zealand’s prime minister captured the world’s imagination with her empathetic leadership, her desire to prioritise the nation’s happiness rather than just its GDP, and her bold but deeply human approach to the early stages of the pandemic (though her “zero Covid” strategy of sealing borders to keep death rates low came back to bite her). She governed differently, resigned differently – famously saying in 2023 that she just didn’t have “enough in the tank” to fight another election – and has now written a strikingly different kind of political memoir. It opens with her sitting on the toilet clutching a pregnancy test at the height of negotiations over forming a coalition government, wondering how to tell the nation that their probable new prime minister will need maternity leave.Ardern is a disarmingly likable, warm and funny narrator, a...

Politics

2 w. ago Psychic dubbed 'Japan's Baba Vanga' issues terrifying prediction for 2030

Ryo Tatsuki, a comic artist from Japan, has made many predictions which have come true including the Covid-19 pandemic, leading her to be compared to the Bulgarian mystic Baba Vanga

Events

3 w. ago High anxiety amongst adults has continued beyond Covid pandemic, new figures show

The proportion of adults reporting high anxiety has remained far higher than before the pandemic

Events