The UK has often appeared out of step with the rest of Europe during the coronavirus crisis. Back in early February, prime minister Boris Johnson was breezily telling his compatriots to stay “confident and calm” in the face of a potential global pandemic. Just over two weeks later, Italy appealedContinue Reading
When the UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, announced the reduction of social distancing from two metres to “one-metre plus”, he reassured the public that the decision was based on expert advice. He claimed that by adhering to a raft of “mitigating” measures – such as screens and partitions and usingContinue Reading
What were you doing 30 years ago? Were you even born? Let me mark your card here. Research at CERN in Switzerland by British computer scientist Tim Berners-Lee in 1989-90 would eventually result in the World Wide Web, linking hypertext documents into an information system accessible from any node onContinue Reading
Unrest in Chile in October 2019 over inequality of income, but some argue it was as much to do with fair opportunity. abriendomundo/Shutterstock In a sermon in 1956, Martin Luther King distinguished negative peace (as the absence of tension) from positive peace (as the presence of justice). It is certainlyContinue Reading
Boris Johnson has had a tricky time as UK prime minister of late. He faces criticism that he has mishandled the national response to the coronavirus crisis, leading to public confusion and a very high death toll. I would argue that part of Johnson’s struggle stems from his political brand.Continue Reading
While the English language media gushes over how successful New Zealand has been in dealing with the coronavirus pandemic, it has largely failed to report on another part of the world where both infection rates and fatalities remain low. Significant success stories in Central Europe are being overlooked. Slovakia, homeContinue Reading
Thousands of rough sleepers accommodated in hotels as part of the UK government strategy to control the spread of coronavirus will be moved on as lockdown restrictions ease. The ambition is that people will be moved to alternative accommodation, although how this might be achieved for all remains uncertain. PublicContinue Reading
Societies of the past were often better at dealing with problems than those of the present. It’s a sign of our complacency that early warning systems were not in place before COVID-19 struck. This was despite the fact that the past century witnessed four major respiratory pandemics – the 1918-19Continue Reading
Taiwan and Iceland have won praise for their effective responses to the coronavirus pandemic. They are among a group of countries which adopted a cooperative strategy early on in the pandemic, bringing together multiple organisations to tackle the challenges in containing COVID-19. A cooperative strategy is when organisations try toContinue Reading
The COVID-19 pandemic has stress-tested countries, economies and political systems like never before. Nowhere has the outcome been more devastating than in Brazil, arguably the country with the worst pandemic response in the world. Brazil’s vulnerabilities are visible in the mass graves in São Paulo and Manaus. The country isContinue Reading
