News Round-Up

• “Barclays to hunt down the £1bn Covid crooks: Bank to send in a crack team of fraudbusters to claw back loans – as taxpayers face huge losses” – It is estimated that bogus borrowers may have got their hands on up to about £5 billion of the total of £47 billion issued by all of the banks, according to a report in This is Money.
• “Nearly 1M patients speak to pharmacists as surgery wait lists hit 4.3M” – The Mail reports that pharmacists saw a rise of 44% more patients turning to them for advice after failing to get a GP appointment, as another study reveals 4.3 million people are currently awaiting invasive surgery.
• “Covid and Neurodegenerative Disorders – A Non-story” – Thorsteinn Siglaugsson on a misleading tweet about a misleading story in Medical Xpress that gives the false impression that a study showed Covid was worse than similar viruses for triggering neurodegenerative disorders.
• “Covid Update – Myocarditis, Birth Rates, Fertility, BA.5 and more” – An informative vaccine-related update from the Naked Emperor.
• “Thanks Pfizer!” – Alex Berenson tells the story of his mum, who suffered atrial fibrillation following each of her Covid boosters.
• “Towards a General Theory of Corona and Why No Interventions Ever Seem to Work As Intended” – Eugyppius suggests that Robert Edgar Hope-Simpson’s theories of influenza may offer insight into COVID-19. Worth keeping in mind that Hope-Simpson’s ideas of latency of the influenza virus and waves of asymptomatic transmission have not so far been backed up by direct empirical evidence.
• “The socialist case against the strikes” – The unions themselves must bear some responsibility for the situation we are in, given that some of their members were among those clamouring for coronavirus restrictions, even months after the advent of the vaccines, writes Sarah Linney in the Spectator.
• “Dutch join Germany, Austria, in reverting to coal” – The Dutch joined Germany and Austria in reverting to coal power on Monday following an energy crisis provoked by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, according to a report from France24.
• “Coal Burning Germany: Pay Poor Countries to Switch to Renewables” – Eric Worrall in Watts Up With That? says it’s difficult to cajole developing countries to abandon coal while reopening your own coal-fired power plants.
• “Germany Green Energy Crisis: Warning of “Lehman Like” Contagion” – Eric Worrall also reports in Watts Up With That? that Germany’s renewable policy-inspired energy insecurity has reached crisis levels, with the country’s Vice Chancellor warning of “Lehman like” economic contagion if energy prices rise any further.
• “Joe Biden to block Boris Johnson’s answer to global food crisis” – The U.S. President opposes the Prime Minister’s plan to ease the cost of living by curbing green fuels, the Telegraph reports.
• “Shame on publishers for snubbing J.K. Rowling” – Harry Potter saved their industry – 25 years later, they’re pretending she doesn’t exist; it’s pure hypocrisy, says Jake Kerridge in the Telegraph.
• “‘Shambolic’ slavery report sparks fury from Cambridge dons” – A Cambridge University college hires a researcher to investigate legacies of slavery, prompting a backlash from senior historians, reports the Telegraph.
• “Prince Charles wants ‘slave trade to be taught alongside Holocaust’” – Prince Charles wants Britain’s role in the transatlantic slave trade to be taught to the nation in the same way that schoolchildren learn about the Holocaust, reports the Express.
• “Parents’ battle to see ‘secret’ lessons on white privilege” – The parents of a teenager who is quitting a school that teaches topics such as white privilege and being gender queer are seeking the right to see “secret” lessons, the Times reports. The story is also in the Mail.
• “Council axes talk by feminist writer because of her views on trans rights” – Nottingham City Council says allowing Julie Bindel to speak at a library would violate its commitment to being an “inclusive city”, reports the Telegraph. Ah yes, that kind of inclusive.
• “Nottingham City Council listens to activists, not women” – Julie Bindel writes in UnHerd that they banned her from speaking at a public venue over her gender critical views.
• “Clarence Thomas and the racism of the woke elites” – Brendan O’Neill in Spiked says the U.S. Supreme Court’s only black justice has been subjected to so much hatred because to woke ‘liberals’ he is the wrong kind of black.

If you have any tips for inclusion in the round-up, email us here.