ANSELM ELDERGILL draws attention to a legal case on Tuesday in which a human rights group is challenging the government’s decision to allow the sale of weapons used against Palestinians

IN Illness as Metaphor, Susan Sontag wrote: “Any disease that is treated as a mystery and acutely enough feared will be felt to be morally, if not literally, contagious.” Although the Covid-19 situation is changing rapidly by the day — at the time of writing, five people have died in Britain and there are 319 confirmed cases — the disease has not yet truly arrived.
Normal life continues, nervously. For most people, Covid-19 remains a mystery and the main contagion is fear. So far, the government has held off putting in place drastic public health measures. Major disruption has not yet arrived. But with evidence from the spread elsewhere, it is certain that it will, and soon.

A maverick’s self-inflicted snake bites could unlock breakthrough treatments – but they also reveal deeper tensions between noble scientific curiosity and cold corporate callousness, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT
Science has always been mixed up with money and power, but as a decorative facade for megayachts, it risks leaving reality behind altogether, write ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and MIRIAM GAUNTLETT

