British ministers and their advisers were in an unenviable position when it became clear that covid-19 had reached the UK. This was a new virus, with characteristics that were still […]
Columnists
Peter Brindley: Covid-19 has shown us the difference between solitude and loneliness
When it comes to covid-19, numerous column inches have repeated the mantra: “stay apart and flatten the curve.” Recently, a new hymn has emerged: “enough already; open things up”. Like […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Change and decay
Last week I discussed the way in which the function ext can result in curves that go up or down with time, depending on whether x is greater or less […]
Richard Smith: How to talk to the dying—a lesson from a novel
In one chapter of Elizabeth Strout’s novel Olive, Again Olive Kitteridge, a large, blunt-speaking, retired schoolmistress, encounters in a supermarket Cindy Coombs, who is being treated for cancer and has […]
Abraar Karan: Alone with our patients in a pandemic
As the number of people dying from covid-19 rises, Abraar Karan discusses how doctors are witnesses to the aftermath of society’s mishaps […]
The arrival of covid-19 in low and middle-income countries should promote training in palliative care
Chances of a healthy recovery from covid-19 are not bright for the elderly who need hospital care. In a series of 5700 patients with covid-19 treated in New York hospitals, […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Exponential finances—increasing/decreasing
Last week I suggested that there is widespread misunderstanding about the meaning of “exponential” in mathematics. Colloquially, it means a huge increase, which it need not be. And when events […]
Tara Lamont: Learning from social sciences at a time of crisis
I remember being at an academic gathering of healthcare social scientists a few years back. A lot of withering talk of the dominant paradigm of biomedical research and the limitations […]
William Cayley: The new normal
It is beginning to sink in that this societal upheaval is not just a temporary “time out,” writes William Cayley […]
Charlotte Squires: The shielded doctor
I am a medical registrar and therefore should be an asset to the current covid-19 pandemic; unlike trainees being redeployed from other specialties, acute medicine is where I have trained, […]