It's safe and effective, so why all the fuss over the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine? And how will the impending supply delays affect you receiving a dose? Science Editor Tom Clarke delivers all the answers and more to ITV News Presenter Lucrezia Millarini in this edition after the EU regulator gave its backing to the vaccine. Tom also explains how his own blood clot risk ranks compared to being struck by lightning, the issue raised in Norway and Germany that has gained attention and why there'll be...
Mar 19, 2021•15 min
Over 20 million people in the UK have been given the first dose of a Covid-19 vaccine, but why are some people still hesitant to take up the offer? Kylie Pentelow chats to paediatrician, TV doctor and now volunteer vaccinator Dr Ranj Singh about how to speak to friends and relatives who are reluctant to have the vaccine. In this episode, Dr Ranj discusses training with St. John's Ambulance, whether the jab is safe for pregnant women and helping BAME communities access the right information. He a...
Mar 09, 2021•24 min
You asked the key vaccine questions. We got the answers… Could they be made compulsory for work? Should asthmatics take greater priority? Will we need vaccine passports to eat at a restaurant or drink at the pub? Are there long-term side effects to the vaccine? And what do you do if you've booked a holiday but haven't had the jab yet? ITV News presenter Lucrezia Millarini puts all those burning questions on the vaccine rollout (and many more) to Professor Anthony Harnden, who advises the governm...
Mar 04, 2021•20 min
No one on earth travels quite like Johnny Ward. The adventurer is the only person to have visited every nation on the planet, both poles and most of the main peaks but - like everybody else - he has seen his movements severely limited by the pandemic. So how has Johnny adapted his wanderlust and active ambitions in these strange times? What advice does he have for those keen to keep a spirit of adventure alive in lockdown? And is he really set to row the Atlantic ocean despite not being able to ...
Mar 02, 2021•15 min
As a working mother of three, ITV News Presenter Faye Barker is among millions of parents and guardians preparing to send their children back to the classroom from March 8 after months of home schooling. In this episode, Erin Price, the head of school at Ramsgate Holy Trinity in Kent, joins Deirdre Kehoe of the Young Minds charity to give Faye everything she - and you - need to know. So what can she and others do before the big return? What practical steps can be taken to give children the confi...
Feb 25, 2021•29 min
Vaccine passports - allowing those jabbed to travel - could give holidaymakers a fast tracked route back to the continent. So how far away are they and even once travel does return, will traditional tourist cities or cruise ships recover? Few at the ITV News are as well travelled as our Europe Editor James Mates. Stationed for large parts in Italy, he has remained active across the continent and answers those questions above in an engaging conversation with Lucrezia Millarini....
Feb 23, 2021•26 min
If you follow ITV News on Twitter you'll have seen us put a message out to our audience recently, asking: “Do you have questions or concerns about the current UK vaccines rollout?” It turns out many of you did. So in this episode of Coronavirus: What You Need To Know, Lucrezia Millarini gets all the answers from Professor Anthony Harnden, who advises the government on the vaccine rollout as the deputy chair of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation. Prof Harnden - who also administe...
Feb 15, 2021•30 min
It may feel like it at the time but if you've been finding your sleep disrupted in lockdown you're very much not alone. Professor Jane Falkingham from the University of Southampton has studied the negative impact of lockdown on sleep and found it an increasing problem across the nation. In this episode, she shares her key findings with Lucrezia Millarini before James Wilson - aka The Sleep Geek - is on hand to give his professional advice to help you conquer your sleep woes. So stay listening fo...
Feb 12, 2021•23 min
In this special episode of the podcast, ITV News presenter Nina Hossain puts a wide range of audience questions to England’s Deputy Chief Medical Officer Jonathan Van-Tam. Professor Van-Tam, who has won his own loyal audience for his straight-talking guidance throughout the pandemic, addresses concerns over the AstraZeneca vaccine, the extended gap between the two jabs, the impact of mixing vaccines and the likelihood of summer holidays. He also answers questions on the prospect of vaccinated pe...
Feb 10, 2021•29 min
Email scammers feed on a crisis so it's no surprise that criminals have looked to exploit the global pandemic to try to steal money and data from unsuspecting victims. In this episode Lucrezia Millarini speaks to Adenike Cosgrove from the cybersecurity researcher firm Proofpoint, who are working to expose the fraudsters. These are the examples of fake emails disguised as vaccine alerts or health official warnings that Proofpoint have detected: https://www.proofpoint.com/us/blog/threat-insight/at...
Feb 05, 2021•20 min
Her song parody videos as a Tired and Tested mum on Instagram and Facebook have won Sophie McCartney a huge online audience during the pandemic. But what ITV News presenter Faye Barker wants to know is: are Sophie's comic mash-ups born from gritty experience or is the mother-of-two secretly having a lot of fun in lockdown? It doesn't take Sophie long to set the record straight and reveal her struggles, as Faye shares her own tricky experiences of homeschooling her three children - before Deirdre...
Feb 02, 2021•32 min
Lockdown - or any restricted living across the UK - presents a major challenge for everyone's mental health while the pandemic continues to rage. So how can you cope with the winter woes as we all continue to live largely indoors with even exercise largely restricted? Psychologist Elissa Makris of Thrive - a game-based mental health app endorsed by the NHS - talks Kylie Pentelow through several ways you can adapt your actions and ways of thinking to find positivity in negative surroundings. For ...
Jan 27, 2021•18 min
UK. South Africa. Brazil. The new variants of the Covid-19 vaccines - originating here and in Africa and South America - are now common parlance but how deadly are they and can the current vaccines protect against them? With some concerning news emerging from South Africa, Science Editor Tom Clarke explains everything you need to know on the various variants to Lucrezia Millarini. Why do they occur? Can we expect more? And why could there be more undetected variants in the US that we may not kno...
Jan 19, 2021•22 min
How long does immunity to Covid-19 last after you’ve been infected or received the vaccine? Since the pandemic began it's one of the main questions we’ve wanted to answer. Now the SIREN study - the world’s largest investigation into Covid infections - has found antibodies protect us for far longer than the original estimation of three months. In this episode, Science Editor Tom Clarke speaks to the study lead Professor Susan Hopkins, senior medical adviser to Public Health England, about how she...
Jan 15, 2021•12 min
The closure of schools across the UK amid national lockdowns in England and Scotland has intensified pressure on parents and guardians yet again as weeks of home schooling resume. So what can they do to help children - and themselves - cope with the stressful challenge of turning the home once again into a classroom? Kerry-Jane Packman of the charity Parentkind tells Lucrezia Millarini what you need to know to ease the stress of home schooling, explains who you can reach out to for help and offe...
Jan 12, 2021•14 min
The start of 2021 feels like a critical moment in the fight against coronavirus. Record levels of daily cases fuelled by a new variant of the virus and the national lockdowns in England and Scotland and mass restrictions in Wales and Northern Ireland mean there are few reasons to be cheerful. Yet the mass rollout of two vaccines shows there is an end in sight. So how far from normality are we? And is everything being done fast enough? ITV News Health Editor Emily Morgan answers those questions a...
Jan 07, 2021•20 min
Christmas is often a time belt-strings are loosened but this year's social restrictions and the economic hardship caused by the pandemic have increased the financial pressures of the season. So how can you spend your money wisely amid the present giving and preparations for this year's limited festivities in our first - and hopefully last - Covid era Christmas? ITV News presenter Kylie Pentelow speaks to Ellie Austin-Williams, a financial coach and founder of the This Girl Talks Money blog, who ...
Dec 16, 2020•16 min
In this special edition, Science Editor Tom Clarke speaks to the chair of the UK vaccine task force Kate Bingham on the day history is made in the battle against Covid-19 with the first vaccines being administered in Britain. Kate delivers all you need to know about the rollout, how the vaccine will be delivered across the globe and also talks about its legacy as the NHS launches its biggest ever vaccine campaign. And before that we meet the first person in Britain to receive the Pfizer vaccine....
Dec 08, 2020•26 min
In this special edition of the podcast, Science Editor Tom Clarke talks to Ben Osborn, the UK boss of pharmaceuticals giant Pfizer, after the breakthrough news that the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine has been judged safe for use in the UK. Tom puts all the key questions to Ben, including how many doses can be delivered, whether the UK should have ordered more of its vaccine compared to the alternative vaccines, why the Pfizer is more expensive than others and why people can be confident to take the vac...
Dec 03, 2020•12 min
At first glance it appears that, at 70%, Oxford-AstraZeneca's vaccine offers less potential protection against Covid-19 than the 95% protection potentially provided by vaccines being developed by Pfizer and Moderna. However, in this podcast edition, Professor Jen Rogers tells Science Editor Tom Clarke why there is very legitimate cause for celebration at the Oxford University interim data results. And she goes on to explain why attempts to compare the three leading vaccines are quickly flawed, a...
Nov 25, 2020•15 min
For ITV News's resident Covid-19 statistician, Professor Jen Rogers, keeping across the deluge of data on the pandemic is an occupational hazard. But what can the rest of us do to make sense of the standout statistics which have filled the news headlines for months? Jen shares her expert advice with Lucrezia Millarini, while also reacting to the latest update on the advances towards a long-awaited viable vaccine.
Nov 19, 2020•11 min
Everyone’s excited about the vaccine breakthrough by developers Pfizer and BioNTech. But what does the study tell us? When can you get it? And, crucially, how do we know that it's both effective and safe? ITV News's Covid-19 statistician - a clinical trial specialist - Prof Jen Rogers tells Science Editor Tom Clarke exactly what you need to know in this special podcast. Including, why we should take confidence from a small number of cases , why the 90% effectiveness isn’t certain , how and when ...
Nov 11, 2020•14 min
“Addiction is an illness of isolation.” So says Michael Rawlinson of Action on Addiction in this conversation with ITV News presenter Lucrezia Millarini. He says he has seen a clear rise in the number of people battling addictions - be it alcohol, drugs, gambling, pornography or other vices - since the UK began a national lockdown back in March. Now the nation is locked down for a second time, how can people cope with addictive behaviour thriving amid the restrictions, what help is available and...
Nov 05, 2020•15 min
Life amid a pandemic has thrown up so many challenges and mathematician David Sumpter accepts that crunching the numbers can't solve all of our problems. Yet the author of The Ten Equations That Rule The World: And How You Can Use Them To Improve Your Life tells Lucrezia Millarini that some relatively simple maths could help guide you while making decisions during the crisis. In this podcast, he explains the key numbers to track in gauging the spread of the virus and how maths can help reassure ...
Oct 22, 2020•22 min
Many have called the autumn surge in UK virus cases a critical moment in the coronavirus crisis, amid ever-changing local restrictions. Health Editor Emily Morgan updates ITV News Presenter Mary Nightingale on what this means for the country's health as a nation as we head into the winter. How prepared is the NHS? Why has England's test and trace system performed so poorly? And what other challenges lie ahead as we head to the end of 2020?
Oct 16, 2020•17 min
In the history of post-war television news there has never been a story like the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. And, of course, with several months still to go until the end of the year, it is far from over. In this special edition of the podcast, ITV News Presenter Mary Nightingale is joined by three colleagues to share their experiences of reporting on the first six months of the pandemic. Along with Mary, Asia Correspondent Debi Edward, International Affairs Editor and Presenter Rageh Omaar and I...
Sep 27, 2020•36 min
“The critical issue is not whether the economy as a whole will recover - it will. But it’s the nature of the recovery which matters.” While optimistic that Britain will restore economic order following the pandemic crash, Robert Peston is less confident on the future of our collective workforce. It's a topic he has been investigating for the Tonight programme and readily admits, to presenter Julie Etchingham on this special podcast, that he's been "slightly obsessed with for years and years and ...
Sep 23, 2020•26 min
While we’ve all adjusted to a new way of living these past six months, anthropologist James Suzman argues the time is right to really push for radical change in our lives. The author of Work: A History of How We Spend Our Time tells ITV News presenter Lucrezia Millarini what would have been viewed at the start of 2020 as “ridiculously radical” is ready for re-evaluation and embracement. “Something like a pandemic … is a great stimulus for making people think about potential new futures for thems...
Sep 18, 2020•18 min
She's best known as Alan Sugar's fearsome interviewer on The Apprentice so how will Linda Plant deal with being in the hotseat herself? ITV News presenter Lucrezia Millarini puts Linda through her paces in an engaging debate on whether working from home should become a permanent part of our working lives. It's fair to say Linda is not a fan of the concept, but does Lucrezia get a little bit of flexibility out of her by the end of the debate? As the CEO of the Linda Plant Academy, the esteemed bu...
Sep 11, 2020•22 min
Months of lockdown has given many people more time than ever to reconnect with reading - but it also brought an almighty halt to the publishing industry's summer offerings. A rush of new titles is being released this autumn and smash hit Jack Reacher author Lee Child - speaking from Colorado - and esteemed poet and broadcaster Lemn Sissay - from Hackney, east London - share their thoughts on a year like no other in the book industry with ITV News Correspondent Rupert Evelyn. Both writers had the...
Sep 04, 2020•21 min
