@martinmccluskey @MartinSLewis @BBCRadio4 @BBCWatchdog Who is going to take accountability for this failed scheme? #ECO4 #warmhomesnotdamagedhomes #govtscheme #eco4fail #eco4scheme #trustmark #ofgem #desnz #retrofit

UK Defence Secretary John Healey resigns over military spending plans - follow live bbc.in/4efyKZn

It always reminds me of my favorite tweet. Every time.

#ECO4 #retrofit @martinmccluskey

The idea that “natural = good” falls apart the moment you learn what nature actually is. Arsenic is natural. Botulism is natural. Smallpox was natural. Insulin, vaccines, and clean drinking water are not. Nature doesn’t care if you live. Science does.

This isn't just about the tens of thousands of householdsnegatively affected by the scheme. It is also a very serious concern about loopholes in regulation resulting in fraudulent use of public money. And an exercise in greenwashing. Energy companies get carbon credits for ECO4.

No, the peptide craze is not backed by science. "What people are shooting up with out there I would give to mice." “The influencer crowd has sort of created this perception that these are miracle drugs."— @mkaeberlein New feature @nature nature.com/articles/d41586-0…

This

Parents/carers of autistic children in the U.K. please tell us what sleep aids you use to manage your child’s sleep problems. @uclserl qualtrics.ucl.ac.uk/jfe/form…

Fascinating. On sleep issues in neurodivergent people.

I'm a cardiologist. A 42-year-old mother of two came to my office complaining of jaw pain and crushing fatigue. She ran half-marathons. Her EKG was normal. Another doctor had sent her home with anxiety medication. When I got her into the cath lab, I found severe microvascular disease — plaque choking the tiniest vessels of her heart, the ones standard angiograms routinely miss. Her heart had been starving in silence while everyone told her she was stressed. She is alive today. Too many women like her are not. Heart disease kills more women than every cancer combined. And medicine is still diagnosing it through a male lens. 84% of cardiologists report having patients in the past year whose heart disease was misdiagnosed by another physician. Women with a STEMI heart attack have a 59% greater chance of being misdiagnosed compared to men. Women with an NSTEMI — 41% greater chance. The reason is structural. For decades, we screened, tested, and treated women using a template built for men. Men's heart attacks announce themselves — the crushing chest pain, the clutched fist, the Hollywood collapse. Women's hearts whisper. Crushing fatigue that feels like wearing a lead vest. Jaw pain written off as TMJ. Nausea blamed on a stomach bug. An ache between the shoulder blades blamed on a long week. Shortness of breath blamed on being out of shape. For years, medicine called these "atypical" symptoms. They are not atypical. They are female-typical. Half of humanity is not a variant. And the biology runs deeper than symptoms. Women have smaller hearts and narrower coronary arteries. Plaque doesn't only clog the big highway vessels — it hides in the microvasculature, the tiny branches feeding the heart muscle itself. A woman can have a heart attack with a completely "clean" standard angiogram. SCAD — spontaneous coronary artery dissection — occurs 90% of the time in women. Often young, fit women with zero traditional risk factors. It's the leading cause of heart attack in women under 50, accounting for roughly one quarter of all cases in that age group. Most doctors have never diagnosed one. And some of the most dangerous cardiac risk factors are hidden in women's medical histories where no one thinks to look: Preeclampsia or gestational hypertension doubles to quadruples lifetime heart disease and stroke risk. Pregnancy is the body's first cardiac stress test — and these complications are early warning sirens, not closed chapters. Autoimmune disease — lupus, rheumatoid arthritis, psoriasis — far more common in women, turbocharges inflammation and plaque formation at any age. Cardiovascular disease in women aged 20-44 is projected to surge nearly 50% by 2050. The youngest patients in my practice keep getting younger. What every woman should ask her doctor — and what every doctor should be asking: "Given my pregnancy history, autoimmune status, and family history — what is my full cardiovascular risk?" If they don't ask about preeclampsia or gestational diabetes, volunteer it. "Should I have an Lp(a) test and a coronary calcium score?" Standard cholesterol panels miss too much. Lp(a) is genetic, one-time, and most women have never been tested. "My tests came back normal but my symptoms haven't stopped — what's next?" Normal stress tests and angiograms can miss microvascular disease, spasm, and SCAD. Persistent symptoms warrant coronary CT angiography or cardiac MRI. And if something feels wrong — say these exact words to your doctor: "I am concerned this could be my heart." That single sentence changes the workup. Do not soften it. Do not apologize for it. 80% of heart disease is preventable. But the playbook has to be built for female biology. Two decades ago, I wrote one of the first books warning that heart disease was the number one killer of women and that medicine was diagnosing it through a male lens. It was recognized by First Lady Laura Bush at the White House during the early years of the national conversation about women's heart health. I'm haunted by how much of that book I could republish today unchanged. The science has advanced. The awareness has grown. But the gap between what we know and what happens in the exam room is still costing women their lives. Share this with every woman you love — and every doctor who treats them. READ MORE: open.substack.com/pub/afshin…

Petition: Direct NHS England to adopt 'uterectomy' as the primary term in all patient-facing materials, consent forms & clinical guidelines, replacing 'hysterectomy' - a term we believe is rooted in misogyny, not anatomy. petition.parliament.uk/petit…

Has anyone had any experience dealing with a carpet moth infestation?

Thanks for your critique, Janet. We actually tried a couple of episodes where House (Hugh Laurie) (please put the brackets in the right place) gets it right first time, but they were only 6 minutes long. NBC weren’t happy. Then we tried some where House never gets it right and the patient dies. The audience wasn’t happy. One could apply your trenchant analysis to other art forms: JS Bach wrote 30 Goldberg variations on the same chord structure; Frida Kahlo painted 50 portraits of herself; Henry Moore, what?? The point is, or was, variations on a theme; if all you see is hospital, medical blah blah, then it wasn’t meant for you. Nonetheless, I look forward to your first novel!

Is there a word for the sense of despair one feels when one realises a person isn't who you thought they were? When you realise they lack integrity. It is soul crushing.

“I have a foreboding of an America in my children's or grandchildren's time -- when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; when, clutching our crystals and nervously consulting our horoscopes, our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what's true, we slide, almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness... The dumbing down of American is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30 second sound bites (now down to 10 seconds or less), lowest common denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance” ― Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark

how about posting the details of this scientific study? Utter twaddle to suggest avoiding environmental chemicals can cut out a whole gene & as for switching off “cancer “ genes is hysterical. Whatever you are selling is snake oil

Dear Bumpkins, if you insist on driving enormous 4WD vehicles could you at least try to learn how wide they are?* Also, don't barge smaller cars onto the verge/passing space. You have 4WD. Use it. *clue, not as big as an effing tank.