covid-19
Does Boris's 'new deal' offer anything new?
Today Boris Johnson launched his ‘new deal’ for Britain – billed as an economic recovery plan to follow the Covid…
How fast can Britain recover from its economic free-fall?
Putting the UK into lockdown was only going to send growth in one direction: down. While today’s figures from the…
Letters: the NHS shutdown is hurting patients and costing lives
Poor treatment Sir: My recent experience supports Dr Max Pemberton’s view that the NHS is letting down thousands of patients…
Portrait of the week: MPs return, dentists reopen and racing resumes
Home Primary schools were allowed to reopen but many did not want to. MPs voted to return to their physical…
Why is YouTube so afraid of free speech?
On Sunday, the hosts of Trigger–nometry, a YouTube show, posted an interview they’d done with Peter Hitchens. They labelled it…
The intense pleasures of lockdown
I used to live in Mogadishu for months at a time, cooped up in compounds behind fortified walls. Venturing on…
A death, live-streamed: my husband’s Skype funeral
The strange experience of my husband’s Skype funeral
Dear Mary: is it OK to drop by to see a friend’s garden during the pandemic?
Q. I own a small, somewhat shabby and antiquated but well-located flat in central London which I have been happy…
A short guide to justifying re-lockdown
Fear is gripping the American public health and media establishments: they are losing control. States are belatedly (and far too…
Dominic Cummings has a human shield: Boris Johnson
The rule of modern politics, let’s call it Trump’s first law, is that if you are being attacked for apparently…
What's more disturbing: Cummings' behaviour - or the mob pursuing him?
The Dominic Cummings story is deeply disturbing. No, not the fact that Cummings and his wife, Mary Wakefield, took what…
Why Dominic Cummings' departure may only be a 'matter of time'
Dominic Cummings’s role in government no longer looks sustainable, as members of the cabinet and Tory MPs turn against him…
Switzerland is now an enemy of the rich
Gstaad The staff are back and all is well, as they used to say long ago in faraway places. The…
Taiwan's balancing act is becoming ever more precarious
After a landslide victory in January’s election, Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen was re-inaugurated on Wednesday at a scaled-down ceremony in…
Do the experts believe in the R number?
The R-number has been declared the most important metric in monitoring Covid in Britain. For young children to return to school…
My positive antibody test is an ‘immunity passport’ in all but name
I wouldn’t say I felt I had joined a master race when my coronavirus ‘immunity passport’ arrived this week. But…
Covid's knock-on effect on child deaths
The daily death toll has been a constant backdrop to the Covid-19 crisis. Would we ever have entered lockdown, would…
Why we’ll all be fleeing to Nigeria
I keep thinking what I’ll do when we regain our liberty — and I picture that beer at the end…
Ten reasons to end the lockdown now
Writing in this magazine a month ago, I applauded the government’s stated aim of trying to follow the science in…
Has Trump finally decided to dump Saudi?
In a dramatic move even by his own mercurial standards, Donald Trump has authorised the withdrawal of two Patriot missile…
Can we rely on a V-shaped recovery?
Can the UK expect a V-shape recovery? The Bank of England has this morning published data revealing very deep V,…
Is it 'speculation' to say the UK has the most deaths in Europe?
It’s a grim news week for the government with Dominic Raab announcing in Tuesday’s press conference that the UK coronavirus death toll…
A German court has plunged the eurozone into fresh crisis
An epidemic has been raging across the continent. The economy is in lockdown, and GDP is in freefall. But, hey,…
Our toothless response to China is embarrassing
If you have been troubled by the government’s failure to get tough on the country responsible for our present malaise,…