Georgia Banjo
@georgiabanjo.bsky.social
Writing mostly about health, innovation and people. Britain correspondent at The Economist.
Nick Clegg not mincing his words at an IPPR event tonight on Britain's place in the world. Says all the Silicon Valley bros tell him Europe is "dead". Also that hardly anyone in America cares about us, apart from when they send their kids to LSE, play golf in Scotland and enjoy our period dramas.
It was a real pleasure to be one of the judges for the ABSW awards this year. Some brilliant entries; well done to everyone shortlisted!
ABSW@absw.bsky.social · 2mo ago📣 #ABSWawards Finalists announced! 🔗 zurl.co/ghOYq Of note this year were the range of pieces focused on the cuts to scientific research funding in the USA. UK and Irish journalists investigated the impact on individuals, institutions and communities both in the USA and internationally.
I'm currently on my way to Tommy Robinson's latest rally. He's a convicted criminal, too extreme even for Nigel Farage & liked by only 14% of Brits. Yet last September he got 150,000 people onto the streets. He's helped shift the Overton window on immigration. How? I try to explain in this article 👇
How Tommy Robinson gained extraordinary influence
The far-right influencer’s world is closer than you might think
economist.com
Thrilled that my paper (w/@sarahobolt.bsky.social,@catherinedevries.bsky.social,@simonecremaschi.bsky.social) was accepted at the American Political Science Review! We find that declining public services fuel support for the populist right — and show why the right benefits more than other parties 🧵
I first wrote about this in 2023 in a cover story for The Economist. I interviewed Simon Wessely, who became the co-chair of this review. The article cost me two friends and a therapist. Wes Streeting (who commissioned this report) agreed with me, but back then it was still taboo 1/6
Children ‘incentivised’ to get ADHD and autism diagnoses, say experts
A report into overdiagnosis and the increase in demand for mental health services has suggested that common childhood behaviours are being medicalised
thetimes.com
This is a heartbreaking story from Spain. This young woman was gang raped and later tried to kill herself by jumping from a building. She became paraplegic and now lives in constant pain. After years of appeals, including from her father and Christian Lawyers, she is scheduled to die tomorrow.
Noelia Castillo, la joven parapléjica de Barcelona, anuncia que recibirá la eutanasia | EL PAÍS
YouTube video by EL PAÍS
m.youtube.com
Sarah Mullally is being enthroned at Canterbury Cathedral this morning. She's the first female Archbishop of Canterbury in 1,400 years. She's walking into an institution that is increasingly irrelevant, scandal-hit, and divided over whether a gay-friendly woman should lead it at all. My long read:
The battle for the soul of the Church of England
Can the first female Archbishop of Canterbury stop the institution from tearing itself apart?
economist.com
The Church of England crowns kings, runs a quarter of English primary schools and it's bishops sit in parliament. It also has fewer than 1m weekly worshippers, and is deeply divided. Something has to give. In my long read for 1843 I write about what could come next
The battle for the soul of the Church of England
Can the first female Archbishop of Canterbury stop the institution from tearing itself apart?
economist.com
Probably a trick from Mandelson's playbook
Ignore the smears: I was never a close friend of Peter Mandelson. And I fully understand the lessons we must learn | Wes Streeting
I knew him but not well, and worry now that he thrived in our political culture. There was a failure of moral seriousness, says health secretary Wes Streeting
theguardian.com
A letter from Carlos Hernández, the Spanish journalist who died this week. Our job as journalists is to hold power to account, explain what's happening and give voice to the voiceless. Many still do this, but we don't do it enough. It's a big reason why trust in the mainstream media has cratered.
Great analysis. It was also clear from the beginning it wouldn't work. Guy's and St Thomas's was the model for all this, but after starting the programme the trust's wait times fell slower than the national average and the theatre staff went on strike...
Charles Tallack@charlestallack.bsky.social · 6mo agoOn 14 January Wes Streeting said that waiting lists had fallen three times faster in 20 areas of the country where crack teams had been deployed. We’ve looked at this claim and have questions. 🧵 www.gov.uk/government/n...
Enjoyed writing about the two faces of Harley Street this week. Home to 40% of London's private healthcare market, it's known for its quality and treating royals. It's also where TikTokkers go for botched penis-filler ops and sperm-salmon facials. A townhouse was once a hub for international fraud
Harley Street resists a facelift
The world-famous medical district wants science, not salmon-sperm facials
economist.com
My take on England’s daftest sport: Should cheese rolling be protected as British heritage? economist.com/britain/2025...
Should cheese rolling be protected as British heritage?
The government mulls making England’s daftest sport official
economist.com
The PM has just announced the abolition of NHS England, the body responsible for running the £192bn NHS. That was just a formality though: it's death was confirmed with a DOGE-style purge that I wrote about this week. Too soon to say whether it will devolve power or centralise it even further.
DOGE comes to England’s health service
Death by several thousand cuts at a vast public-sector body
economist.com
I’m well aware of the risks of trial (or retrial) by media but much about the Lucy Letby case seems deeply troubling. There seems to be a distinct possibility that what was thought to be signs of a killer nurse may actually have just been poor medical care www.economist.com/britain/2025...
It increasingly looks as if Lucy Letby’s conviction was unsafe
The case of a nurse jailed for killing babies exposes deep problems with British justice
economist.com
America is finished as the dominant global power which made the world in its image. This is only the beginning of the end, but it is the end. Now it behaves like any other brazen empire
Acyn@acyn.bsky.social · last yr.Trump: The US will take over the Gaza Strip… we’ll own it
This chart from my article this week is pretty scary. 12-hour waits in emergency departments were non-existent in the 2010s in England. Now they're the new normal and are leading to thousands of extra deaths a year: www.economist.com/britain/2025...
There are many reasons why rising flu cases are putting pressure on A&E this winter. But if this government is really serious about shifting to prevention, now would be a good time to look at inadequate vaccination programmes, and the number of old people we have living in cold and damp homes
I don't agree with Kate Andrews often but she does have a point here. In a tax-based system more money for the NHS does mean less money for schools, local govt, defence etc. The answer is to focus more on the wider determinants of health and do NHS reform, but that does mean higher taxes.
Best for Britain@bestforbritain.org · 2y ago"Where will the money come from?" - Kate Andrews keeps asking, in order to press her attack on the NHS funding model. Well, where will the money come from under ANY other model? Does adding a profit-making insurance layer make healthcare cheaper? No. It just makes it less fair. ~AA
How is it that an influencer with a financial interest in promoting quackery can end up as a main source of info for health and wellness? This man has 8.6m YouTube subscribers and his show is saying things like diet can reverse autism. Another consequence of the distrust in mainstream media!
Steven Bartlett sharing harmful health misinformation on Diary of CEO podcast
Disproven health claims are accepted with little challenge by host on number one podcast, BBC investigation finds.
bbc.co.uk
This is staggering even for me who covers the NHS every week. Report out estimating that the NHS spends £15bn a year treating patients harmed by its own care. That doesn’t include negligence claims
NHS spends £14.7bn a year treating patients in England hurt by care mistakes, says report | NHS | The Guardian
Experts from Imperial College London cite ‘alarming declines’ in 12 key metrics of patient safety
amp.theguardian.com
It never fails to amaze me how whenever I get on a train everyone (including me right now) is on their phones. The world transformed in a generation
Best news of the day: Swedish study finds that the occasional sweet treat is good for your heart (or at least it needn’t be bad). The study tracked 70,000 participants and found that those who ate a few sweets/pastries a week had a lower risk of cardiovascular disease than those who didn’t eat any
Sugary drinks significantly raise cardiovascular disease risk, but occasional sweet treats don’t, scientists find
A large-scale study in Sweden suggests that drinking sweetened drinks significantly increases your risk of serious cardiovascular disease, but limited consumpti
frontiersin.org
One more reason for the govt to get its act together on #socialcare reform. If you’re going to change the way local govt is funded, best to have an idea of what councils will need to spend on their single largest area of expenditure - adult social care. ifs.org.uk/publications...
Reforming local government funding in England: the issues and options | Institute for Fiscal Studies
A new, up-to-date system for allocating funding between councils is vital, and reforms must align with the broader vision for local government.
ifs.org.uk
Agree this is good, but tightening eligibility criteria (as governments always do) won’t solve the problem. We have stagnant real wages and the stingiest unemployment benefits in Europe: until we fix both we’ll always oscillate between incentivising gaming of incapacity and leaving people destitute
Duncan Robinson@duncanrobinson.bsky.social · 2y agoGood piece by JBM on economic inactivity and health www.ft.com/content/1409...
Lots going on in France but a lovely piece by @sophiepedder.bsky.social on the reconstruction of Notre Dame. Until his death last year it was led by Jean-Louis Georgelin, my old prof at Sciences Po & the most patriotic man I ever met (he insisted we call him “mon général”). He would've been proud!
Emmanuel Macron shows off the gloriously restored Notre Dame
Five years after it was gutted by fire, the cathedral is more beautiful than ever
economist.com
