November 20th  2020. Updated January 2021

The rush for a vaccine for Covid-19 has sparked a frenzy of billion dollar investments into new vaccine consortiums, veteran pharmaceutical corporations and start ups. Drugs regulators have approved synthetic biology, gene editing and other untested biotechnologies in the new crop of vaccines to halt the spread of the virus. 

What is CEPI and COVAX?

In 2015, the former Microsoft chairman Bill Gates was talking about a global contagion, a virus that could spread by “getting on a plane or going to a market.” (Gates TED talk https://vimeo.com/399471276 ) And, a market is precisely where the Chinese government said the Wuhan outbreak of Covid-19 originated. Gates described microbes, not missiles as the new enemy in what he describes as ‘germ games,’ and predicts ten million deaths from a pandemic.

In 2017, he called for funding to be re-directed into the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI) for research from which Bill Gates, as a key player in CEPI, would directly benefit. In January 2019, he told The Wall Street Journal that vaccines were his best investment yet, turning a smidge over $10 billion investment into three vaccine consortiums into a $200 billion profit, a return of 20-1. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/17/bill-gates-says-this-is-the-best-investment-he-has-ever-made.

In March 2020, the British government pledged £210 million to CEPI to specifically focus on a vaccine for the coronavirus Covid-19, making them the largest individual donors to the project. A whip round of the governments of Australia, Belgium and Canada brought the total  of donations to CEPI to US$760 million. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-02-13/this-oslo-facility-may-be-the-key-to-the-coronavirus-vaccine

Now CEPI has collaborated with the World Health Organisation (WHO) and Gavi (the Vaccine Alliance) to accelerate the development, production, and access of Covid-19 vaccines and tests under the banner of COVAX .https://www.who.int/news/item/15-07-2020-more-than-150-countries-engaged-in-covid-19-vaccine-global-access-facility By the end of 2021, COVAX aims to deliver two billion vaccine doses to protect healthcare workers and the 20% most vulnerable populations first. Participating countries will pay for a share of the doses and poorer countries can make discretionary voluntary donations to COVAX.

Read more: A Modified Vaccine For Covid-19

By Phil Smith, 10th November 2020

 “We are on this planet together – are we really going to watch screens?”

Introduction

We are living through a crisis of separation enforced by the technology of communications. Everything we do to connect through machines drives us apart from each other and everything else. Finding ways to be there, in and with a pattern in the terrain, is a means to reconnect to forces of attraction.

‘The Pattern’ (Crab & Bee, Triarchy Press, 2020) describes a hyper-charged journey during which shifty methods for being there were devised. There is not much room in the book for explanation. This essay is an attempt to give some reasons for a practice that is mostly about not doing, more about attending, about being there and being with: stepping back and acknowledging places as primary agents; approaching places with the minimum amount of mission, function or question; going to listen to what places have to say. 

Considering the apparent vacuity of these methods, they do seem to generate an awful lot of information and responsive activity from extraordinary partners; maybe even a few constituents of an art of living in the magical mode. One result is that a pattern steps forward; a diagram in the landscape combining fortuitous entanglements of various elements with the efforts of humans to embellish – with wells, road signs, temples, place names, information boards, towers, stories and chalk horses – places that connect intensely with everything else. A second outcome is a tentative journeying towards being there: eating buds from the brambles, picking gems of plastic trash from the gutter, splashing water from solution holes and holy wells on your face, standing still and letting the animals come forward from the shadows. Putting your body in there and adding some art – tying threads, sprinkling ash, scrying puddles – until, mostly gently but sometimes violently, things from there begin to make their art in your life. By going there, you get caught up in the existence and excess of these places’ unhuman others; in the process you may lose some of your separation from them. 

During the UK lockdown, roads that were usually noisy with traffic were empty for weeks. Pedestrians could walk in the middle of the road rather than on the pavements. As the quiet fell deeper, the terraced houses along these streets began to present themselves as personalities rather than as an anonymous backdrop; they began to act up, asked to be noticed, coughed up residents onto their front lawns. These moments can be enjoyed for themselves, but as they string together, human entanglements with such powerful things with personalities get more intense, while the thickening web of connections offers more support. Then comes a chance to become a part of an ensemble, to dispense with the need for great vision or purposeful mission, and feel a way with unhuman others, making things up together as we all go along. If that sounds like something you would like to explore... read on.

Read more: Being There with The Pattern

Susan McFie, 4th October 2020

Not long ago few of us had heard of the coronavirus, and yet this curious entity has rapidly altered life as we know it. The spiky bugs have been around for millions of years infecting almost everyone but seldom killing us – at least not until 2003 when SARS-CoV appeared in Hong Kong with a death rate of around 10%. No coronavirus had ever done that before. The outbreak was blamed on animals. 

Thousands of civets were killed as suspects, and then wild pigs, bats, and snakes also tested positive for SARS-like viruses.  

A similar coronavirus appeared in 2012 in Saudi Arabia. It was named MERS and blamed on camels. Then in December 2019 Chinese authorities notified the World Health Organisation that a novel coronavirus was circulating, subsequently named SARS-CoV-2. Once more animals were blamed, this time bats and pangolins. It was said to have emerged from the live animal market in Wuhan but there was growing scepticism, as Wuhan is also home to a high security bio-laboratory involved in long-term research into bat coronaviruses.  

Concerns that the pandemic may have resulted from a laboratory accident were refuted in March by Scripps Research Institute claiming that “If someone were seeking to engineer a new coronavirus as a pathogen, they would have constructed it from the backbone of a virus known to cause illness.” The statement was backed by a representative of the UK Wellcome Trust who said the investigation showed that the virus was “the product of natural evolution” which they claimed ended “any speculation about deliberate genetic engineering.”

Read more: Invisible Enemies

The Dalai Lama says that the future belongs to women. But there are women from our past who continually shape our thinking, and deserve to be remembered today. One such woman is the author and activist Mary Wollstonecraft.

An Iconic Feminist

Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein, wrote the well-known story at the tender age of 19 on the shores of Lake Geneva. It was a challenge issued amongst her travelling companions Lord Byron, Percy Shelley, Claire Clairmont and Byron’s physician Dr Polidore to create the most frightening story. Mary’s tale emerged victorious and her book became a precursor of the modern horror novel.

Less well-known is the story of her mother, Mary Wollstonecraft, who died giving birth to Mary Shelley just over 200 years ago. Today, Wollstonecraft is a touchstone for activists who recognise her as an iconic proto-feminist and advocate for votes for women one hundred years before the suffragettes, along with state funded education for girls and boys, diversity and human rights.

In Mary Wollstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Men (1790) followed by A Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792) she calls for justice for one half of the human race. She questions the validity of marriage, since it benefited women neither the vote or financial independence. In 1792, she embarked on her own unconventional relationship with Gilbert Imlay, an American merchant living in Paris. And, from there she penned influential critiques on the French Revolution.

Read more: Mary Wollstonecraft

Almost twenty years ago I found myself sitting eye to eye with Nick Papadimitriou in the basement of an art gallery, just off Queen Square in Bloomsbury. It was our first day on a research project and we were both nervously rearing to write, even if science was not our primary concern. Over those weeks, I got to know Nick and admired his roll-your-sleeves-up dedication to writing, and was intrigued by his wayward and somewhat wild side.

I enjoy eccentricity, so happily listened to Nick prattle on about Gilbert White, the Woodcraft Folk, and the mysteries of Middlesex. His tales of a marginalised, middle-aged man with glasses bearing a sort of resonance. And, the more he told his stories and repeated his often humorous schtick, the more I realised that Nick had everything he needed to become a successful writer.

Over the years Nick would often call round to mine. We talked about everything as he would lend a helping hand in the garden, editing my first collection of poetry, playing with the assorted cats and dogs, and amusing the long-term boyfriends that might be around. Once, I switched on my recorder and just let it run while we talked. (http://www.samburcher.com/articles/notes-on/152-interview-with-nick-papadimitriou-november-2011.html) During another lovely day, I held my film camera on my lap as Nick talked about his latest project. (See below).

Read more: Lockdown Notes on Nick Papadimitriou

There is widespread concern about genetic engineering, and now the new generation CRISPR gene editing. People are becoming worried that labelling of food containing modified genes for human consumption may be removed and food standards lowered after Brexit. If the Withdrawal Agreement is ratified, the UK must abide by EU rules until December 2020, which states food containing GMO’s must be labelled. If the UK leaves without a deal, the relevant regulations will temporarily pass into UK law from 1st November 2019. However, these rules will then be open to immediate amendments with potentially far-reaching effects.

What is CRISPR?

CRISPR-Cas 9, or CRISPR for short, stands for Clustered Regularly Interspace Short Palindromic Repeats. It is an idea that genetic engineers have copied from bacterial communities defending themselves against viruses and foreign DNA. Cas 9 is a protein, that with the help of guide RNA, recognises and 'cuts and pastes' the sequence of DNA to be edited.

Just like the previous generation of genetic engineering uses a viral promoter to add itself to a DNA sequence, gene editing can change more than the target genes. The possibility of recombinant DNA producing changes to a large number of genes and making unwanted edits to other sequences is very high using this technology.

Read more: GM Human and Animal Farm?

July 1st 2019

Lisbon is a city of lines: amarela, azul, verde, vermelho or red, blue, green and yellow. The simplicity of the network of fifty-five cool tiled stations is a weary travellers dream. I come down into my body from out of my head and feel safe from the prying eyes of a Metro line predator.

On the bus leaving the city the temperature reads 35 degrees centigrade, and thankfully dropping. The hills are yellow and the people are yellow and hot. The Torres das Amoreiras, also known as the Amoreiras Towers are standing to attention.The architect of these yellow fortresses of post-modernity became a standing joke after sex tapes showing him roughly buggering a succession of young girls in his Lisbon office were released onto the internet.

Renewables Revolution

An Atlantic wind is blowing through the hills and whistles noisily inside the bus's air conditioning system. Outside the tinted windows Nordex wind turbines are busily spinning megawatts of energy for a yellow city. Amongst the verdant native forests patches of drooping genetically modified eucalyptus and pine stand out like dry, sore thumbs dwarfed by plantations of steel windmills that produce nearly a quarter of Portugal’s electricity.

A revolutionary wind blows through Portugal. The Carnation Revolution in 1974 heralded the change from an authoritarian state to a democracy with barely a shot fired. It was thanks to the people who, despite being told to stay indoors, mingled peacefully with the insurgent army, putting flowers in their rifles and defusing hostilities. The spirit of freedom and self-empowerment lives on. No longer dependent on natural gas, 63% of the country’s total energy is provided by renewables; a carbon saving combination of on-shore and off-shore wind, wave and solar. (In January 2020, Portugal achieved 100% renewable energy, a target other developed countries should be striving for).

Read more: Olliopolis - Lisbon - And Beyond

Monday 3rd June 2019

Extinction Rebellion has collaborated with folk singer Sam Lee and The Nest Collective to perform a musical rebellion in Berkeley Square. The song of a nightingale (Luscinia megarhynchos) was live-streamed throughout the Square to a large crowd highlighting the plight of a bird not heard in Central London for around three centuries and nearing extinction in the UK. The chart topping RSPB’s single featuring the songs of critically endangered birds was also heard. The assembly joined Sam in his re-worded rendition of the original song made famous by Cole Porter, and written in 1939 by Eric Maschwitz and Manning Sherwin about the nightingale in it’s notional home.

Cosmo Sheldrake, the musician son of biologist and author Rupert Sheldrake and Buddhist overtone chanteuse Jill Purce, created a poignant soundscape by naming insects, amphibians, mammals and birds that have disappeared in what the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science journal has described as “biological annihilation via the ongoing Sixth Mass Extinction.” Cosmo named the Atlas Bear, the Tasmanian Tiger and the Passenger Pigeon amongst many others, all now extinct.

A circle of candles representing the distinctive Extinction Rebellion logo lit up the glorious Square, where London Plane (Platanus x hispanica) trees have stood for 300 years. Participants were invited to take the candles on to other places and other protests. Satish Kumar, veteran editor of Resurgence & Ecologist magazine told the gathering that we can only save the Earth by taking personal responsibility. “What we do to Nature, we do to ourselves,” he said, praising the efforts of David Attenborough, Greta Thunberg, and reminding us of Rachel Carson’s early warning about the effects of pesticides in her 1962 book Silent Spring.

Read more: A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square