coronavirus
Why Sage got Omicron wrong
Given that lockdown was very nearly ordered on the advice of Sage last month, it’s worth keeping an eye on…
We must never abandon children during lockdown again
Schools are far more than mere exam factories. Across the UK, teachers in 32,000 schools and colleges care for children…
A lot of bottle
Thirteen years ago we shared an office building with a large international bank. A common lift connected both businesses to…
After Omicron
Covid-19 is in decline in Britain, with Omicron cases now falling as fast as they rose. The booster programme —…
Sceptic shock
I got Covid a couple of weeks ago. Second time for me, which was annoying because I’d told Caroline that…
Omicron is on its way out
Omicron peaked in England in early January, according to figures just released by the ONS. The estimates from the weekly…
Why I don’t walk under ladders
Well, I did warn you. As I typed my column last week on the imminent end of Covid I said…
The truth about that No. 10 party
People seem surprised and a little doubting that the Prime Minister is incapable of remembering if he attended a party…
Doctor’s note
Why should I be sacked for refusing the Covid vaccine?
Dishonest mistakes
On 20 May 2020, the Metropolitan Police issued a statement on social media which summed up the conditions in the…
Letters
Take care Sir: Your editorial (‘Counting the costs’, 8 January) makes valid points regarding the funding of social care. The…
Portrait of the week
Home Boris Johnson admitted to attending evening drinks for about 40 staff in the garden of 10 Downing Street on…
Boris Johnson is running out of road
There has been no good news for Boris Johnson today. After an email leaked on Monday evening showing that the Prime…
Masks in schools: how convincing is the government’s evidence?
Why has the government changed its mind and asked children to wear masks in school? When Plan B was announced…
Boris Johnson rejects lockdown (again)
Boris Johnson latest Covid press conference was slightly confusing. The Prime Minister spent nearly an hour saying nothing particularly new.…
The problem with ‘vaccine equity’
‘A stain on our soul’. That was how Gordon Brown, in his latest missive on the subject, described the failure…
Remember panic-buying? Here’s what will happen next time
It’s post-Christmas, and there are already murmurs about supermarkets with empty shelves. Just as with the petrol shortage in September and…
The churches must stay open
Hooray for Cardinal Vincent Nichols, who used the one day of the year when his pronouncements are amplified by the…
Sage modellers start to accept that Omicron is milder
Public health officials in Britain and South Africa were on different planets for about a fortnight. While those in South Africa…
Sage memo makes the case for lockdown
On Monday, Covid restrictions were rejected after the cabinet debated the issue robustly for the first time since the pandemic…
Should businesses receive more Covid support?
As government considers whether to lock us down once again, should it put economic support for businesses affected back on…
Is Omicron now falling in South Africa?
Man makes Covid predictionsand God laughs. Yet with the stakes this high in Britain, every bit of real-world data is…
How the BBC lost its way on Covid
I have been a BBC journalist for many years, and in that time I have been committed to impartiality and…
Don’t underestimate the Omicron variant
As the Omicron variant makes its way through the population of the UK, the Chief Medical Officer’s warning that we…
My Twitter conversation with the chairman of the Sage Covid modelling committee
The latest Sage papers have been published , envisaging anything from 200 to 6,000 deaths a day from Omicron depending on how…
