News Round-Up

• “A third of Covid deaths now not actually due to the virus” – ONS data show that 34% of Covid deaths in England last month – all fatalities where Covid is written on the death certificate – were not primarily caused by the virus, reports the Mail.
• “Covid inquiry called out for ‘disgraceful’ omission of disabled people” – Labour MP Marsha De Cordova says she was assured the inquiry would look at the pandemic’s disproportionate impact on ill and disabled people, but the terms of reference include no mention of it, according to the Telegraph.
• “China may be facing its greatest Covid crisis yet” – The coronavirus is spreading through Hong Kong, Shenzhen and other cities in China like a bush fire; tens of millions of Chinese are locked down again, but it won’t work, says Matt Ridley in the Spectator.
• “Ep 43. Too stupid to browse the web? – The Real Normal Podcast” – The guys talk the Online Harms Bill, the end of SAGE and the lifting of restrictions, and the ‘EU aid’ for Ukraine. Also, an extra episode this week – a new interview with Tanya, Alex and Dimar to talk about life in the city of Kyiv, Ukraine, during the Russia Ukrainian war.
• “Lockdown was bad enough, but this one crazy rule could have made it even worse” – If you think Britain’s restrictions were claustrophobic and nonsensical, then spare a thought for those who spent the pandemic in Panama, where men and women were given different days they could leave the house, writes Michael Deacon in the Telegraph.
• “New COVID-19 Variant Surges in Israel” – TrialSite News reports that there’s been yet another surge in COVID-19 cases in highly vaccinated Israel, this time linked to the BA.2 Omicron variant – prompting talk by the Israeli Health Ministry of possibly reinstating the ‘Green Pass’ vaccine passport programme.
• “The Origins of COVID-19 – Free Speech Champions Online Drop-In” – Watch the Free Speech Champions‘ recent event with Matt Ridley on the Origins of COVID-19: Science, Scepticism, and Free Speech.
• “Airline CEOs Send King Biden a Letter Asking Him To Remove Useless Mask Mandates” – The CEOs of American Airlines, Delta Airlines, United Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and other major carriers sent a letter to Joe Biden urging him to end federal mask mandates on aeroplanes as well as international pre-departure testing requirements, reports 100PerCentFedUp.
• “Why can’t some scientists just admit they were wrong about Covid?” – Dreadful article in the Guardian from constantly wrong anthropologist Devi Sridhar claiming epidemiologist John Ioannidis, who got it right, is stubbornly refusing to admit it he got it wrong. It’s like walking through the looking glass.
• “Pandemic Police State: The Rise of Authoritarianism in the U.K.” – Watch the documentary from Big Brother Watch, examining how the coronavirus pandemic led to the most draconian emergency powers in the U.K.’s history.
• “New York City Exempts Performers, Athletes From COVID-19 Vaccine Mandate” – Epoch Times reports that New York City has exempted all performers and athletes from its private business COVID-19 vaccine mandate, but has kept it in place for everyone else, in the latest nonsensical policy based on ‘The Science’.
• “Why Nicola Sturgeon’s approach to Covid may have done little but damage our economy” – It is something of a contradiction that as we finally lose the great majority of our Covid restrictions this week, our case rates are at record levels, writes MSP Murdo Fraser in the Scotsman.
• “Covid Heart, Covid Brain, Covid Diabetes?” – The latest on Covid disease, Long Covid, and Covid treatment from the Swiss Doctor.
• “Govt plans to increase North Sea oil production” – Chief Secretary to the Treasury Simon Clarke told BBC’s Newsnight that more oil and gas will form part of the Government’s strategic energy strategy which is due to be released next week, according to the Mail.
• “Britain could become a tidal energy superpower” – Our uniquely high tides provide a huge opportunity for inward investment, writes David Green in the Telegraph.
• “Nuclear power is the future – let’s seize it” – The UK’s plans for new nuclear plants need to be far more ambitious, argues Zion Lights in Spiked.
• “Debunked, the great renewables delusion” – Patrick Benham-Crosswell on the flaws in renewable energy in TCW Defending Freedom.
• “Dishonesty, hypocrisy, and why the decision not to remove memorial to 17th century benefactor Tobias Rustat over slave trade links from my old Cambridge college must inspire an anti-woke revolution” – For Jesus College the case has been an embarrassment: the college’s leadership have wasted tens of thousands of pounds in a case they deserved to lose, writes Dominic Sandbrook in the Mail.
• “‘It’s a culture war that’s totally out of control’: Margaret Atwood calls book bans in school ‘woke snowflakery’ while Art Spiegelman brands society ‘Orwellian’ amid publishing’s sensitivity crisis” – American cartoonist Art Spiegelman, who penned the Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel Maus about the Holocaust, said society has become “Orwellian” while Handmaid’s Tale author Margaret Atwood said: “They’re playing woke snowflakery back: [by saying] ‘This might upset people’”, reports the Mail.
• “Philip Pullman could be ‘cancelled’ over support for Kate Clanchy in ‘racist’ stereotyping row” – Telegraph report that Pullman could be sacked as President of the Society of Authors after defending Clanchy’s acclaimed memoir of life as a school teacher in the latest instance of the revolution eating its own children.
• “Are beauty brands too ‘woke’ for consumers?” – Research shows 68% of consumers are uneasy about health and beauty brands promoting social causes, reports Cosmetics Business.
• “Time to end the grievance-industrial complex” – The U.K. Government’s official response to last year’s Sewell report on race and ethnic disparities tells us one thing – Britain’s grievance industry is not going to have it all its way, writes Rakib Ehsan in the Critic.
• “Government rejects making ‘robust’ and ‘rigorous’ gender change system easier” – The Women and Equalities Committee had recommended that the process of obtaining a Gender Recognition Certificate should be simplified, but the Government has rejected this move, reports the Telegraph.
• “NHS trans guidelines are straight from 1984” – Why are once sedate, conservative organisations like Putney Lawn Tennis Club colluding with this modish erasure of women, asks Allison Pearson in the Telegraph.
• “Understanding India” – To the puzzlement and disappointment of many Westerners, India has abstained on several UN votes rather than join the vociferous chorus of condemnations of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, writes Ramesh Thakur in Spectator Australia.
• “Michael Grade, critic of the ‘woke brigade’, named Ofcom chairman” – Former ITV and Channel 4 chief has branded the £159 licence fee a “regressive tax”, reports the Telegraph.

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