While we are all self-isolating, people are starting to think about autarky, self-sufficiency. For example, that doyen of ancient Greek and Roman history as a reflection on modern affairs, Peter […]
Columnists
Richard Lehman: Why don’t GPs use satnav?
Imagine that you are driving a taxi which cannot stop, except in dire emergencies. Every ten minutes, you must take it to a new destination. If you take too long, […]
Abraar Karan: Covid-19—on trust, experts, and the brilliance of everyday people
Abraar Karan considers the nature of expertise during a pandemic and argues that the notion of “the expert” is largely misplaced […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Isolation
“No man is an island, entire of itself”. Eight words from John Donne’s “Meditation XVII”, one of his Devotions upon Emergent Occasions (1624), that remind us why isolation, a necessary […]
Richard Smith: What was difficult if not impossible two weeks ago is happening fast now with covid-19
Almost a quarter of a century ago I wrote in The BMJ about an evolution from “industrial age medicine” to “information age healthcare.” Despite the spread of the internet, social […]
Daniel Sokol: The life and death decisions of covid-19
If the NHS’s intensive care capacity is breached, how do we decide which patients should get priority? Daniel Sokol considers the various ethical arguments […]
Tom Jefferson: Covid-19—supermarket wisdom
The woman is speaking to me through a mask. Her voice is muffled. I know her by sight. I think her name is Anna and she is a nurse at […]
William Cayley: Statistics are people too
In our ongoing preoccupation with the number of “cases” of covid-19, we must not forget that behind every number is an individual, says William Cayley […]
Julie K. Silver: Prehabilitation could save lives in a pandemic
By definition, prehabilitation involves interventions aimed at improving patients’ health prior to an anticipated upcoming physiologic stressor so that they are better able to withstand that stress. Many decades ago, […]
Mary E Black: Covid-19—This too shall pass
And so we enter a new world of social distancing, people stocking their larders, and limitations on how we can gather. Borders are closing, airports are shutting down, and in […]