Taraji P. Henson mourning loss of beloved bulldog
Taraji P. Henson is a "wreck" after having to bid farewell to her beloved French bulldog.
Poet laureate says he wanted to avoid the ‘sycophancy’ that the late royal despised
Myah Richards, who has cerebral palsy, said doing the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award increased her confidence and spurred her on to do new things.
Family of three contract Covid from infected neighbours in hotel quarantine in Sydney. NSW Health reclassifies three coronavirus cases to locally-acquired after testing showed they shared same viral sequence as infected family next door
Everything you need to know ahead of tonight’s WBO world title bout
The Government said a further 35 people had died within 28 days of testing positive for Covid-19 as of Saturday, bringing the UK total to 127,260. Separate figures published by the UK’s statistics agencies show there have now been 151,000 deaths registered in the UK where Covid-19 was mentioned on the death certificate. The Government also said that, as of 9am on Saturday, there had been a further 2,206 lab-confirmed cases in the UK. It brings the total to 4,385,938.
My night out in New York took me across the latest Covid dividing lineAs restrictions ease, tensions linger about what you should and shouldn’t do. So booking a babysitter felt outlandishly exciting ‘Stepping out of the cab was like being dropped into Ayia Napa after spending a year in a monastery.’ New Yorkers wander among reopened restaurants, March 2021. Photograph: Eduardo Muñoz/Reuters
The Duchess of Sussex wrote the card attached to the wreath sent by her and Prince Harry to ensure that, in a small way, she played a part in the Duke of Edinburgh's funeral service. Meghan, who is heavily pregnant with the couple's second child, had hoped to attend the ceremony but was advised against travelling by her doctor. The 39-year-old was watching the funeral on television at home in Montecito, California. The Sussexes' tribute was among nine family wreaths laid in the Quire of St George's Chapel, propped against the stalls on each side of the Duke's coffin. Buckingham Palace aides declined to provide details of the other wreaths, saying they were private. But a source close to the Sussexes confirmed that theirs had been designed and handmade by Willow Crossley, a Cotswold florist known for her natural, rustic arrangements. The variety of locally sourced flowers, some of which were picked from the designer's garden, were chosen due to their particular significance.
France's Academy of Medicine has called for the delay between doses of the Covid-19 vaccine to be extended from six weeks to six months, in the case of the Pfizer and Moderna injections, in order to allow more people to get the first jab. Pushing the second injection back in the under-55 age bracket would "accelerate the vaccination campaign...and achieve herd immunity much faster with the same number of doses, while ensuring satisfactory individual protection", the National Academy of Medicine said in a statement on Thursday.The academy has no decision-making power in France, unlike the High Authority for Health (HAS), which can make such recommendations with the backing of the government. On Wednesday, the delay between the first two doses of the Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna vaccines, which use new messenger RNA technology, was extended from 4 to six weeks."This will allow us to speed up the vaccination campaign without compromising public protection," Health Minister Olivier Véran explained to French weekly Journal du Dimanche.High-risk professionsThe Academy of Medicine said that, based on recent studies in the United States and United Kingdom, a single dose of the mRNA vaccine had been shown to provide very high level of protection against the coronavirus. With the more contagious British variant now the dominant strain in France, the academy said it made sense to delay second injections for those aged under 55 years with no history of immune deficiency, to allow more people in high-risk professions, such as teachers, to receive their first dose.In France, the only under-55s currently eligible for the vaccination are frontline priority workers (health workers, home care workers, firefighters) or those with pre-existing health conditions.Some scientists are reluctant to extend the delay between doses, fearing incomplete protection provided by the first injection may favour the emergence of new variants.The academy also called for the first injection to be postponed in the case of patients who had tested positive for the coronavirus within the preceding six months.
A beach town seized a Black couple’s land in the 1920s. Now their family could get it backLos Angeles officials have announced an effort to return the valuable Manhattan Beach property to the descendants of Willa and Charles Bruce Chief Duane Yellow Feather Shepard is a relative of the Bruce family. Photograph: Damon Casarez/The Guardian
2020 Games have already been postponed by a year due to the coronavirus pandemic
The Royals have not been able to "say goodbye in the way they'd hope or planned" like millions this year, the Archbishop of Canterbury has lamented. The Most Rev Justin Welby, who will deliver a blessing at the Duke of Edinburgh's funeral, said members of the Royal Family were united in grief with Britons who had lost their loved-ones during the pandemic. He praised the household for sticking to the Covid-19 social restrictions and said this means it "represents all funerals" in the last year - which have been characterised by the "burden" of not being able to have ideal send-offs for relatives. "My first thought when I heard the news was for the family," he said. "This is like every other funeral and distinct from every other funeral. It's like every other funeral because the family is the family is the family. But it's distinct because they're having to bear this loss and sorrow in the glare of goodness knows how many people watching them around the world. "The Royal Family has behaved superbly, they've just kept to the rules. That means that they're going through what between six and eight million other people have gone through in this country alone over the last year - not really being able to say goodbye in the way they'd hoped or planned. And that's an extra burden. "But as people around the world watch them tomorrow, I think they can identify with this and feel that here is a funeral that represents all funerals in a wonderful way."
Philip’s insignia, laid out on the altar of St George’ Chapel, provided a reminder of his family links and his many roles in the nation’s life.
The Czech police have issued a wanted notice for Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov, the two Russian intelligence agents wanted in the UK for the 2018 attempted poisoning of Sergei Skripal in Salisbury. At the same time the Czech government announced it was expelling 18 Russian diplomats from Prague in connection with two explosions at an ammunition dump in 2014 that killed two people. Although the Czech police only said Petrov and Boshirov were wanted in connection with a “serious crime” the wanted notice said the two men were in the Czech Republic from October 11 to 16, 2014. On October 16 a massive blast ripped through an ammunition dump in the town of Vrbetice, killing two people and causing massive amounts of damage. Another explosion occurred at the same facility in December. According to the Czech authorities, all the 18 diplomats, who now have 48 hours to leave the country, are members of either the GRU, Russia’s foreign military intelligence agency, or the SVR, the foreign intelligence agency.
The Capital FM presenter is no stranger to celebrity nightlife.
Niviane Petit Phelps, from Miami, allegedly shared the death threats with her husband who is serving time in jail
Moment ‘usually only witnessed by the royal family,’ says commentator
An independent Scotland could turn to Denmark for inspiration. Instead of looking south, campaigners are looking north, to the egalitarian models of small Nordic nations
‘Some messages have been just sobbing’: phone line helps headteachers with burden of CovidA group of former heads have set up a vital service for colleagues with nowhere to turn The head’s office at a primary school in Cheshire. Photograph: Nathan Stirk/Getty
The former Spice Girl got the celebrations under way early… by herself.
The 18-year-old man from Ohio was discovered with assault rifle, bullets and a gas mask at Times Square station on Friday