Society

Looking at the list breaking down the reasons for which people are granted Personal Independence Payments (PIPSs), up to £180 a week to help them with their daily living and mobility, one cannot help but be reminded of the London Bills of Mortality of the seventeenth century, when some people died ‘frighted’, or of ‘grief’, or ‘lethargy.’ Descanting on his own deformity does nothing to reduce Richard’s unease Of course, our nosology – our classification of disease – is far more scientific than it was nearly four hundred years ago, except perhaps in one important respect: that of psychological difficulties. This is important because such difficulties are responsible for by

Just Stop Oil are their own worst enemies. I support their aims and I do my best to minimise my carbon footprint. I haven’t flown since 1993, I don’t own a car and I have eleven solar panels on my roof, but I’m losing patience with the movement. Meeting the JSO activists who disrupted a West End play only confirmed my suspicions that the movement has gone off the rails. Weir and Walsh evidently care about the planet, yet they seem to lack ordinary human sympathy Most people think the protestors who sabotaged Sigourney Weaver’s performance as Prospero at London’s Drury Lane theatre in January are a nuisance. Not JSO. Earlier

Exams at the University of Oxford are tough, but there is one test that students nearly always pass with flying colours: 98 per cent of those who took part in an in-house university-funded assessment centre to screen for learning difficulties, including ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder), were told they may have a condition. The screening process involved answering questions like: ‘Would you describe yourself as a well-organised person?’ and ‘Do you tend to be on time to appointments?’. Students who met the criteria were then granted up to 25 per cent extra time in exams. If I’d gone through the screening for ADHD, that extra time in exams would have been