Hollywood star Viola Davis opened up about being one of the very few young Black students at Julliard and how it affected her.

Speaking to The Telegraph, the Academy Award-winning star, 55, spoke up about her film, Ma Raineys Black Bottom, which earned her a Golden Globes nomination as well.

She harked back to the time when she watched the theaters onstage adaption of Ma Raineys Black Bottom.

"It was like I was watching a famous singer that I loved in private, even though I didn't even know who Ma Rainey was at all, she said.

She revealed further that during her time at Julliard, she never performed any plays by August Wilson, who is known for his cycle of 10 shows encircling African American community of the 20th century.

Davis revealed that this was because the few Black students in her graduating class werent cast for shows enough.

"I can't say that I'm not appreciative of my training there, but I did not find a sense of belonging. It was a place that taught classical, Eurocentric theatre as if it was the Bible and for me, as a chocolate, kinky-haired girl, there was no way in," she said.

"To perform in Shakespeare, or George Bernard Shaw, or Eugene O'Neill, I felt like what was required of me was to make any hint of my Blackness disappear, that it would somehow be a good thing if the audience could forget I was Black, she went on to say.

"There is still a sense that a woman has to look a certain way and be a certain age in order to be sexual on screen. And if those rules are broken, they're broken for white actresses only. And they're wonderful white actresses Meryl Streep in 'Hope Springs,' or Diane Keaton in 'Something's Gotta Give.' But I don't feel like that same freedom has been extended to black women, especially dark-skinned black women. I simply don't see it," she continued.

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Viola Davis says she had to make her Blackness disappear as a student at Julliard - The News International

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Press Review: Climate Change by Bill Gates and the Anti-Q Lobby - News - haveeruonline

#entertainment Viola Davis on racial bias in Hollywood: Dark-skinned Black women do not have the same freedom as white actresses in the industry.

Hollywood actor Viola Davis opened up about the racial bias in the film industry and told how white actors have it easier than the Blacks when it comes to portrayal of roles in terms of age and opportunities. In an interview with The Telegraph, she told, Dark-skinned Black women do not have the same freedom as white actresses in the industry. There is still a sense that a woman has to look a certain way and be a certain age in order to be sexual on screen. And if those rules are broken, theyre broken for white actresses only.

She gave examples of Meryl Streep in Hope Springs and Diane Keaton in Somethings Gotta Giveand said that although they are wonderful actors, the same freedom of portrayal has not been extended to Black actors, especially the dark-skinned Black women.

The 55-year old actor also spoke about her starring role in Netflixs Ma Raineys Black Bottom and reflected on the first time she saw the August Wilson play when she was working as an usher at a theatre during college.

It was like I was watching a famous singer that I loved in private, even though I didnt even know who Ma Rainey was at all, Viola said.

She went on to say that when she was a student at Julliard School, she never performed any plays by the theatres poet of Black America who wrote a cycle of 10 shows about African-Americans in the 20th century, all but one of which were set in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

I feel this was largely because our graduating class at the time didnt have enough Black students to cast in the shows, she told.

The award-winning having the Triple Crown of Acting, revealed how she didnt have any sense of belonging in the arena and felt like she had to make any hint of her Blackness disappear.

She said, I cant say that Im not appreciative of my training there, but I did not find a sense of belonging. It was a place that taught classical, Eurocentric theatre as if it was the Bible and for me, as a chocolate, kinky-haired girl, there was no way in.

To perform in Shakespeare, or George Bernard Shaw, or Eugene ONeill, I felt like what was required of me was to make any hint of my Blackness disappear, that it would somehow be a good thing if the audience could forget I was Black, she further added.

The outstanding actor has an Academy Award, a Primetime Emmy and two Tony Awards, being the first African-American to achieve the feat. In fact, she has been nominated for a Golden Globe for her role in Ma Raineys Blacck Bottom. Her next role is as the executive producer for First Ladies, a showtime series in which shell play Michelle Obama.

As the film has finally premiered on Netflix, she is working to get in shape for her next film Woman King. For Ma Raineys Black Bottom, the actor had to gain weight to look like the singer. However, her transformation for the next role sparked a controversial debate among fans on sexism and racism. Read more about it here.

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Viola Davis: Dark-Skinned Black Women Do Not Have The Same Freedom As White Actresses - SheThePeople

Ireland Reads campaign gathers momentum

People are encouraged to take part in the national day to celebrate reading on 25 February

As a country boasting a multitude of writers and no less than 4 Nobel Prizewinners in Literature: William Butler Yeats (1923), George Bernard Shaw (1925), Samuel Beckett (1969) and Samus Heaney (1995), Ireland is perfectly poised to declare 25 February as its national day to celebrate reading.

In the build up to this date, public libraries nationwide have launched a campaign called Ireland Readsin partnership with local councils, publishers, booksellers, authors and others. Campaign partners will be running Ireland Reads initiatives and events throughout the month, asking everyone to squeeze in a read (no matter what - a book, a poem, a comic, or a newspaper) onIreland ReadsDay, Thursday, 25 February.

A new websitehas been set up where people can take a pledge to read on the day and see how many minutes have been pledged by their fellow-readers all over Ireland. The website also offers 800 book recommendations from librarians across the country, suited to a persons interests and time at their disposal. There you can meet the campaign ambassadors from the sphere of writing, science, sport, health and broadcasting, who share their stories about what reading means to them.

Right now, many of the activities we used to take for granted are not available to us, but you can always enjoy a good book, newspaper or magazine. These are all available free online and any time to library members. Libraries and library staff are waiting to welcome people back whenever thats possible, but until then we always have books to remind us of other people, other places, and better days, says Marian Higgins, County Kildare Librarian, quoted by the county website.

Ireland Reads is part of the government-backed Keep Well initiative to help people maintain enjoyment and physical and mental wellbeing amid the lockdown.

Studies summed up by RT show that children who read a lot when they are young tend to become avid readers throughout their life, accumulating significant knowledge along the way. As for adults, reading for pleasure enhances empathy, self-understanding and is an effective antidote for loneliness. And last but not least, reading offers an easy escape from the mental treadmill of anxiety and depression caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

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Ireland Reads campaign leads up to national day to celebrate reading on 25 February - TheMayor.EU

By Sukant Deepak New Delhi, Feb 16 : Stressing that author and journalist Sandeep Bamzais recently released book Princestan: How Nehru, Patel and Mountbatten Made India manages to unearth multiple facets of the period between 1945 and 1947, Congress MP and writer Jairam Ramesh said that though history tells us that the British transferred power to India and Pakistan, there was also a third party to which the British were toying with the idea of transferring power to.

Most of our historical discussions and discourses tend to neglect Princestan. We focus only on the transfer of power to India and Pakistan. Bamzai has not only brought together all the material on Princestan but also tells his readers a fascinating tale of how three key personalities Nehru, Patel and Mountbatten, helped by V.P. Menon played a decisive role in ensuring that India did not get Balkanized, and the partition that took place was only into two dominions India and Pakistan.

Published by Rupa Publications, the book, which sheds light on a plan devised by some powerful princes to not join either India or Pakistan in run-up to independence, was discussed during a launch event organised by Oxford Bookstores on Monday.

Recalling that the idea of writing the book came to him while researching for the first book of the trilogy, Deconstructing the Accession: Bonfire of Kashmiriyat, when he came across rare material bequeathed to him by his grandfather, who was the OSD to the then Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, the author said, It was a treasure trove. I was to later discover that most of it was not even in the available at National Archives or the Nehru Museum.

In my possession are first copies of all documents in the form of letters and correspondences. It made all sense to build it into a bigger book, about all the ambition of 565 princely states. Of course, being a working journalist, snatching time to sit down and write a book is not easy. However, in 2015, during a sabbatical, I got down to work on this book. ORF was kind enough to give me a fellowship for that period.

Though a student of economics and not history, the author immersed himself in the documents, and researched at the Nehru Museum and National Archives. Adding that research also involves corroborating the material in hand, Bamzai says that it is important to interpret history in light of new material and findings.

Many of Nehrus biographers didnt use the strand of thought that stood on the alliance between him and Mountbatten to combat the princes. Frankly, Nehru passed the baton to Mountbatten, who in turn passed it to Sardar, and that is how this exercise culminated in all the princes coming together.

Adding that Sardar Patel was the enforcer, Mountbatten the charmer, Nehru the ideologue with VP Malik the draftsman, Ramesh said that in our fixation on India and Pakistan, the third player Princestan never got the attention it deserved. And it is interesting to note that Princestan was a perfectly secular enterprise and straddled the Hindu-Muslim divide.

We know that it was Bengal and Punjab that got partitioned and not India. This book brings out the important fact that India might have got partitioned had the princes had their way. An important aspect of political history in the transfer of power did not get the attention it deserves. I am glad this book bridges that gap.

Although the authors grandfather would not discuss politics with him , his father would tell him stories from that era. While Nehru lived in 17, York Road, and his grandfather in the outhouse, Bamzai recalls, Nehru would frequently talk to my father, who was a child then. I have several photographs from that time. I grew up with a lot of stories of that era.

Pointing that while Patel and Nehru were clear that princely states had no role to play in independent India, while Mahatma Gandhi believed in the concept of trusteeship, Bamzai said, He felt that princes represent the trustees and should rule. However, Netaji also supported Nehru that India had to be one without any princes and provinces.

Nehru was influenced by Fabian socialism, Annie Besant and George Bernard Shaw and was completely anti-monarchy. In fact, the princes would tell Patel and Gandhi that it was impossible to talk to him.

When Ramesh pointed that much space has been devoted to discussing Ram Chandra Kak (Kashmirs Prime Minister during 19451947) and Ramaswami Iyer who served as the Diwan of Travancore, Bamzai said, Lets not forget that it was Kak who allowed the Maharaja of Kashmir, Hari Singh to think he should vacillate till there comes a time when he can be independent. Of course, it did not come to that. But we must remember that Hari Singh signs the instrument of accession only when the raiders come and there is no other option, on October 26. Travancore wanted to have its own secret pact with the British thanks to the strategic ports and the large Thorium reserves there.

When asked by Ramesh about the most surprising bits that he came across during the course of his research, the author said, At the time when Nehru had rejected the Dickie Bird Plan, Edwina Mountbatten calls VP Menon, informing him that both Nehru and Mountbatten were in Shimla. Menon goes to Shimla, takes Mountbatten to Nehru and an alternate plan is put together. Menon then calls Sardar. Here, I would like to stress that a major reason behind writing this book was to emphasize the role of many nameless and faceless individuals.

While Princestan took around five years with three years of research and a year to actually write, Bamzai has completed the research for his next book on Kashmir. This one was supposed to be released earlier but Covid-19 delayed our plans. From the materials in my possession, I have retained a large part on Kashmir, which is not out even in the first part of the trilogy.

In the next book too, I will use the same approach as the one adopted in Princestan. Kashmir will be seen through the prism of five people.

Bamzai further stressed on the need for a National Freedom Archive, an idea floated by Kanchan Gupta, Distinguished Fellow at ORF during a launch event for Princestan. There is some priceless historical material in various private collections including mine. Much more needs to be documented about the different facets of the Indian Independence movement which is a vast canvas.

Ramesh added that he too has some rare material and there existed several important documents scattered in different state archives. All that should come under one roof. The archives should also be digitalised so that everyone can access the documents easily.

Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from IANS service.

Continued here:
Princestan is many pages of revelations: Jairam Ramesh - The Siasat Daily

Love has been documented through the arts since the very beginning through stories of feeling, passionate songs and carefully crafted tales.

Each one sparks a series of emotions and its hard not to get a little chocked up when those all time classics are revisited.Sunday isthe biggest day of love of the year, but Valentines Day 2021 will be a little different given where things stand in the world. Doing some of the normal things with your valentine might not be possible, but never fear because there are options.

This weekend will be filled with opportunities to share that feeling of love with those around you througha livestreamed concert,play readings and a silent film classic on the big screen with live music.Love will certainly be in the air.

Jody Hill Simpson, the founder of Music on Norway Pond,first met Nik Walker when as a 7-year-old second grader he joined her PALS Childrens Chorus in Massachusetts. Back then, Walker was focused and had talent, and Simpson knew he had a future in the arts. She just didnt know he was going to become a star on Broadway.

You could imagine it, but you never really know, Simpson said. But I could see it and hes going to be a force in the world; he already is.

The two kept in touch and Simpson followed his career as he starred as Aaron Burr in Hamilton, both on Broadway and touring around the country. Last March, Simpson made her way to New York to see him star in the Temptations musical Aint Too Proud. The following day, Broadway shut down.

On Sunday at 4 p.m., Music on Norway Pond will host Walker for a livestream concert from his home in New York City filled with songs from Hamilton, Aint Too Proud, Ragtime and Carousel as well as other classics that evoke a feeling of togetherness and love.

Theres a lot of moving songs, Simpson said.

Most of Music on Norway Ponds shows were canceled over the summer, only hosting a few socially distanced outdoor concerts, including a Carol Fest event on the Hancock Common in December.

But as Simpson tried to plan more for the organization she got the idea of asking Walker to do a livestreamed concert. It would be the first of its kind for Music on Norway Pond but Simpson felt Walker would be perfect for it.

I thought if I could do anything, this would be the one online concert, Simpson said. If were going to livestream something, were so lucky to have this happening.

During the broadcast, Simpson will showcase some of the video clips she found in her archives of Walker when he was a young chorus member.

The show is free, but those who wish can donate to Walkers favorite charity, Give Kids The World.

My goal is to just get lots of people watching because by the end they will feel like they know him, Simpson said. And because we all need happy right now.

Simpson is not sure what is next for Music on Norway Pond, but shes just happy to have the opportunity to showcase her student from so many years ago.

Im trying to figure out ways to keep the Music on Norway Pond community together in a safe way, she said.

To receive the link to the concert, visit http://www.musiconnorwaypond.org. The concert will be available on the Music on Norway Pond YouTube channel following the livestream.

Valentines Day will have a little extra love this year with The Park Theatre producing a live-streamed reading of two powerful and witty one-act plays from acclaimed British playwright Alfred Sutro. Beloved actors Lisa Bostnar and Gus Kaikkonen will read A Marriage Has Been Arranged and The Open Door live on Feb. 13 at 7 p.m.

They are so lovely and nuanced and powerful and funny, Bostnar said. Id like to do them (on the stage).

Bostnar and Kaikkonen first met in 1995 and have worked together on too many projects to count.

Hes directed me, I dont know how many times, hundreds probably, Bostnar said. Weve worked together so many places.

One of Bostnars top three plays was when she shared the stage with Kaikkonen for the two-character production of Annapurna at the Peterborough Players. They even did a Valentines Day reading in 2017, Famous Letters of Love, Passion and Romance at The River Street Theatre.

A Marriage Has Been Arranged tells the touching and funny story of a self-made millionaire proposing marriage to the noble but penniless Lady.

But its not your standard, run of the mill marriage proposal, Bostnar said.

In The Open Door Sir Geoffrey Transom has a frank and intimate conversation with his best friends wife late in the evening at a cottage by the sea, about love, about relationships, Bostnar said.

Sutro, a contemporary (and friend) of D.H. Lawrence and George Bernard Shaw, was well-known for his immensely popular plays produced in Londons West End at the beginning of the 20th century. Many of his plays were brought to Broadway with great success. Additionally, Sutro adapted several for the silver screen.

There will be a live audience talk-back after the production where Bostnar and Kaikkonen will take questions from the audience.

Encore on-demand showings of the production will be made available starting Tuesday, Feb. 16.

Tickets for the live-streamed show are $12 and can be purchased by visitinghttps://theparktheatre.org/or by calling the theatres box office at (603) 532-8888.

Sunflowers Caf in Jaffrey will be offering special Valentines Day Eve takeout dinners in conjunction with the live-streamed event. Interested patrons can reach the restaurant on Facebook, https://www.sunflowersnh.com, or by calling (603) 593-3303.

Its a one-of-a-kind film about a timeless topic: true love.

7th Heaven (1927), a romantic drama that won actress Janet Gaynor the first-ever Best Actress Academy Award, will be shown with live music on Sunday, Feb. 14, at 2 p.m. at the Wilton Town Hall Theatre. Live music will be provided by Jeff Rapsis, a New Hampshire-based silent film accompanist.

7th Heaven, which also netted Frank Borzage the first Best Director Oscar, is a fable set in Paris just before World War I. Its the story of an abused and abandoned young woman (Gaynor) who is cast aside by her family, only to be adopted by an ebullient sewer worker (Charles Farrell) with his sights set on higher things.

In her new home, the girl learns a fresh way of looking at life. Eventually love blossoms but will it survive the onset of war? Borzage used all the techniques of silent film at its height to craft a universal and timeless story that audiences have found moving since the pictures first release in 1927, one year before the talkie revolution.

7th Heaven received the most nominations of any film a total of five at the first-ever Academy Awards ceremony, held on May 16, 1929, in the waning days of the silent era.

Besides winning Best Actress for Gaynor and Best Director for Borzage, it also won an Oscar for Benjamin Glazer in the Best Writing, Adapted Story category. 7th Heaven was also nominated for Outstanding Picture, Production (the forerunner of todays Best Picture category) and Best Art Direction.

Live music will be provided by Rapsis, who improvises scores for silent films using a digital synthesizer to recreate the texture of the full orchestra.

Its kind of a high wire act, Rapsis said. But for me, the energy of live performance is an essential part of the silent film experience.

7th Heaven was remade in 1937 as a talking picture starring Simone Simon and Jimmy Stewart in the lead roles.

The Wilton Town Hall Theatre continues to observe procedures to comply with all state and CDC public health guidelines. Capacity is limited to 50 percent; patrons are required to maintain social distance and wear masks until seated.

Admission is free, but a donation of $10 per person is suggested to support the Wilton Town Hall Theatres silent film series.

For more information, visit http://www.wiltontownhalltheatre.com or call (603) 654-3456. For more about the music, visit http://www.jeffrapsis.com.

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Love is in the air and on the screen for Valentine's Day - Monadnock Ledger Transcript

In an excerpt from her recently published book Why Women Have Better Sex Under Socialism, Kristen Ghodsee freely quotes from the works of the playwright and Fabian Socialist George Bernard Shaw to bolster her argument that capitalism is inherently sexist. The free market forces women to be reliant upon men, wrote Shaw, turning sex into a virtual bribe for financial security. Based on Shaws analysis, Ghodsee concludes that capitalism makes slaves out of women who, under socialism, would supposedly be happy and free.

To say the least, citing Shaw is an odd choice if one is advocating for greater freedom and independence. An apologist for the worlds most brutal and oppressive dictators, Shaw had a passionate hatred for liberty, writing,

Mussolini, Kemal, Pilsudski, Hitler and the rest can all depend on me to judge them by their ability to deliver the goods and not by ... comfortable notions of freedom.

For Shaw, the goods could only be delivered if the people were bound in universal slavery to the state. This enslavement was necessary for the peoples welfare; most of the population were brutes who, when left to their own devices, could not fend for themselves and thus required the state to reorganize their lives for them.

In Shaws eyes, the pinnacle of civilization had been reached by the Soviet Union. During his 1931 pilgrimage to Stalins wonderland, Shaw was given a glimpse of what he referred to as a land of hope. He denied that the regime had imprisoned significant numbers of political dissidents, describing the gulags as popular vacation destinations. From what I gather, they can stay there as long they like, he said.

Shaw also advocated for a far-reaching eugenics program.

Thats not to say he was willfully ignorant of Stalins atrocities. Rather, he defended them. Blindly accepting Communist propaganda, Shaw argued that the dictator was forced to organize mass executions to keep the country safe from exploiters and speculators. Mass murders were also necessary to maintain a competent workforce. As Shaw wrote in 1933, the unfortunate Commissar must shoot his own workers so that he might the more impressively ask the rest of the staff whether they yet grasped the fact that orders are meant to be executed.

But killing the disobedient and inefficient was only the first step in building a better society. Shaw also advocated for a far-reaching eugenics program. [I]f we desire a certain type of civilization and culture, he wrote, we must exterminate the sort of people who do not fit into it. This included a whole range of defectives.

In a 1931 newsreel, he excitedly echoed Nazi sentiment, stating,

If you cant justify your existence, if youre not pulling your weight ... then clearly, we cannot use the organizations of society for the purpose of keeping you alive, because your life does not benefit us and it cant be of very much use to you.

But his murderous impulses didnt stop there. A considerable number of people, Shaw argued in 1948, will never toe the line and are therefore no use to the rest of society. [T]he ungovernables, the ferocious, the conscienceless, the idiots, the self-centered myops and morons, what of them? he asked rhetorically. Do not punish them. Kill, kill, kill, kill, kill them.

Though many early 20th century intellectuals were enamored with eugenics, arguably none were as committed to the wholesale slaughter of millions as George Bernard Shaw. For decades, Shaw was a staunch proponent of genocide, refusing to soften his views even after the full horror of the Nazi death camps was brought to light. And yet, there are many leftists today who continue to look to Shaw for political wisdom.

Writing for The Irish Times, Fintan OToole declares The world has never needed George Bernard Shaw more. Employing a fittingly violent metaphor, OToole lauds the way in which Shaw trained his machine gun-like personality on the pieties of Victorian imperial patriarchy.

Socialists have not only been willing to ignore the bigots and authoritarians in their midst but have gone so far as to embrace them.

Like Kristen Ghodsee, OToole praises Shaw for his polemics against gender inequality and the tyranny of family life. No mention is made of his fondness for eugenics. Other writers have taken to Shaws defense, admitting he sometimes said distasteful things but ultimately brushing off his more extreme statements as mere satire. However, given that Shaws penchant for promoting totalitarianism carried on for decades, its difficult to believe there was anything satirical about it. His bloodthirsty political philosophy seems to be have been all too genuine.

Nonetheless, Shaw was also a steadfast critic of capitalism and Victorian social values. His fiery denunciations of wealth inequality and traditional sexual morality resonate well with modern progressives. For them, an individuals adherence to socialist orthodoxy is enough to absolve him of almost any crime.

From the relatively quiet and respectable anti-semitism of Ilhan Omar to the brutal and homicidal radicalism of Che Guevara, socialists have not only been willing to ignore the bigots and authoritarians in their midst but have gone so far as to embrace them. And few have been more adored than that eccentric playwright and unapologetic Stalinist George Bernard Shaw.

Excerpt from:
George Bernard Shaw Was so Enamored with Socialism He Advocated Genocide to Advance It | Tyler Curtis - Foundation for Economic

If you think back to the first lockdown, many people took to baking banana bread, others took to learning a new language or instrument with the extra free time they had.

Lockdown gave us a time to slow down and enjoy hobbies wed neglected. It also got us to rediscover the little things in life we can take pride in.

Gianni Clifford reconnected with his childhood hobby and took the time to recreate his favourite Dublin pubs that have been closed since last March.

His quarantine hobby of building Lego has resulted in a collaboration with the Danish toy giant.

The 35 year old shared his work on Instagram which captured the beauty of the citys traditional spots in a time when we miss them most.

The Instagram account @dublinbricks has built a steady fan base since Dublin Enquirer interviewed Clifford last November.

To date, he has recreated the following iconic boozers: Grogans, Anseo, The Long Hall on Georges Street, The Lord Edward Pub, The Bernard Shaw, and The Harold House.

Gianni has even added tiny customers and creamy pints of Guinness into his recreations.

He also included DJ decks in the Bernard Shaw, a dartboard in the Harold House, toasties in Grogans and there are also some replica packets of Tayto.

He told RTE that he was always big fan of Lego, and has been building it since he was a kid.

Speaking about his creations he said: "It's obviously something we're all particularly missing now. I think pubs symbolise a lot, they symbolise the place where you go and meet your friends.

"I think I speak for myself and many others probably, in that I would do anything to be in a pub and see some of those friends and have some hugs and some cheers as well."

He embraced his love of Lego as a way to get through lockdowns, he said it gave him a sense of "escapism" and it was a "really, really positive thing"

"To be able to do a hobby like this, where you're being creative, you're trying to figure some things out but you're also getting a lot of escapism from your day to day.

He highlighted that his hobby was positive towards his mental health.

Clifford has also been creating replicas of popular spots in the city such as the generating station in Poolbeg, Leo Burdock's chipper, the first floor of the National History Museum, and Green 19 restaurant.

You can visit Giannis website here and purchase his Lego recreations here.

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Dublin pubs: Lego artist recreates the citys iconic boozers with tiny bricks - Dublin Live

Todays birthdays

Janet Suzman, actress, 82

Carole King, singer/songwriter, 79

Joe Pesci, actor, 78

Mia Farrow, actress, 76

Gordon Strachan, football manager, 64

Sandy Lyle, golfer, 63

Glenn McGrath, former cricketer, 51

Darren Ferguson, football manager, 49

Tom Hiddleston, actor, 40

Michael B Jordan (pictured), actor, 34

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1540: The first recorded horse racing meeting in Britain was held at the Roodeye Field, Chester.

1855: The Devils Footprints appeared in snowbound South Devon 100miles of cloven hoofprints, eight inches apart in a single line and measuring four inches by two.

1865: Mrs Patrick Campbell, the actress famous for creating roles such as Eliza Doolittle in Pygmalion (1914), was born Beatrice Tanner in London. Her stage name came from her elopement in 1884 with a Patrick Campbell and she kept it despite a later marriage as well as a well-documented relationship with the playwright George Bernard Shaw.

1891: Ronald Colman, English actor who became a romantic star in Hollywood, was born in Richmond, Surrey. His films included The Prisoner Of Zenda.

1893: The worlds first public striptease took place at the Moulin Rouge in Paris.

1942: Soap rationing began in Britain.

1949: Actor Robert Mitchum was jailed in Los Angeles for smoking marijuana.

1961: The Beatles made their first appearance at Liverpools Cavern Club during a lunchtime session.

1964: Beatlemania gripped America as around 70million tuned in to see the Fab Four on the Ed Sullivan Show.

1981: Rock n roller Bill Haley died. He spearheaded the 1950s rock revolution with Rock Around The Clock.

2020: The Solar Orbiter, a spacecraft designed and built in the UK, prepared for launch on its journey to unlock the secrets of the Sun.

I like to think Ive got a pretty high tolerance. I wear a lot of glitter and I wear a lot of armour and I also wear my heart on my sleeve, but it gets broken a lot Singer Miley Cyrus (pictured) during her star-studded pre-Super Bowl performance.

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On this day: February 9 - Metro Newspaper UK

Ahead of the next covid-19 known unknowns webinar, Allyson Pollock discusses the uncertainties around testing for SARS-CoV-2 in asymptomatic people

The topic of our next The BMJ/MRC Integrative Epidemiology Unit covid-19 webinar is testing for SARS-CoV-2 in asymptomatic people. It continues the theme of our previous webinars, which have looked at public health interventions that have been rolled out without adequate evaluation of the dataeither data that are already available or data which are being collected during the rollout. Mass testingand mass testing of asymptomatic people in particularin schools, universities, care homes, hospitals, prisons, communities, and workplaces is close to an evidence-free zone. While many countries agencies (e.g. Germanys Robert Koch Institute, or the European Centre for Disease Prevention & Control), and the UKs SAGE committee, advise that the focus of effort and resources should be on identifying symptomatic people and their contacts, the UK government sees mass testing simply as another world-beating initiative. [1,2]

Finding and diagnosing symptomatic people, tracing their contacts, and isolating cases and contacts are the classic tools of communicable disease control. Sounds simple? In practice, each of these little steps is a complex task involving multiple organisations and different types of professionals. Miss a step and you miss the opportunity to break the chains of infection and transmission. Our success rate isnt good. Almost a year into the covid-19 pandemic, the effectiveness of the UKs contact tracing, the key intervention for breaking the chain of transmission, has still not been evaluated; fewer than 20% of people isolate, with financial constraints and caring responsibilities the main impediments to compliance. [3] According to media reports an estimated 22bn has been spent so far on test and trace for symptomatic people for which the benefits are still uncertain.

When it comes to testing for covid-19, the fundamental tenets of public health have been set aside. Community testing has been divorced from health services, bypassing GPs, NHS labs, and public health departments. [4] Instead of rebuilding capacity in the public system, the government has funded a hugely expensive parallel edifice of fragmented private providers, with no previous experience. For over eight months, GPs were denied access to tests and results for their patients. [5] The tests themselves are being used outside their prescribed purpose, and manufacturers instructions, namely, clinical correlation with patient history and other diagnostic information is necessary to determine infection status are ignored. [6]

In August 2020, Tony Blairs Institute for Global Change felt sufficiently confident to issue two reports advocating mass testing and credentiallingno test, no travel, no work, no play. [7] Jeremy Hunt, one of the reports co-signatories and current chair of the Health Select Committee, has been an enthusiastic supporter of mass testing, and the Health Select Committee has thus far failed to address the lack of evidence in support of mass testing.

In September 2020, leaked government documents revealed the scale of planned expenditure on mass testing to be 100bn, almost 70% of the NHS annual budget for England in 2019. Hundreds of millions of tests have been purchased so far, prior to evaluations in field settings.

While theres an understandable desire to move fast, pandemic preparedness should have ensured systems were in place to ensure robust procurement and allow for some form of evaluation.

The true test of intelligence is not how much we know how to do, but how we behave when we dont know what to do.[8] The billions of pounds spent on contracts for tests without formal tender and bypassing tendering procedures reveals that thus far commercial interests have trumped the public health concerns.

Communicable disease know-how built up over a century and more has been ignored. Experts in public health and communicable disease control and on the UK National Screening Committee have been sidelined, and replaced by captains of industry, most notably the appointment of Dido Harding and outsourcing of testing and tracing to Serco, Deloitte, and Amazon.

The long established rules and standards for scientific evaluation have not been followed. And nowhere is this more evident than in the reporting of UK test and trace data on cases. These make no distinction between people who are asymptomatic, presymptomatic, paucisymptomatic, and symptomatic, or whether infectious or not. A case is simply a positive test, regardless of symptoms and purpose of testing. And yet a case definition is key to evaluating the effectiveness of screening, contact tracing, and estimating secondary attack rates. [9] To add to the confusion and blur, since 27 January 2021 people testing positive with lateral flow tests (LFTs) are counted as cases under track and trace, and confirmatory PCR is no longer required. [10]

Since 10 January mass testing using LFTs has been ramped up across local authorities such that LFTs now number approximately 350,000 tests or more each day, outnumbering PCR tests. [11,12]

Given that all screening programmes do harm; some do good as well, and, of these, some do more good than harm at reasonable cost. [13] It is crucial to address the question as to whether mass testing of healthy people is cost effectivenot least given the scale of spending.

The uncertainties generated by the failure to follow the fundamental principles and establish the purpose of testing programmes including costs, benefits, and harms has created space for division. To paraphrase George Bernard Shaw, the test of good science and evidence is seeing how people behave in a quarrel.

Until we subject mass testing programmes and other non pharmaceutical interventions to rigorous evaluation in the way we are required to do for medicines or vaccines, disputes over whether LFTs are more sensitive and more likely to detect infectious people than PCR tests, and the effectiveness of test and trace (including whether screening asymptomatic people is more effective than test and trace for symptomatic people at breaking chains of transmission ) are unsubstantiatedleaving us in the realm of unknowns. [14]

Details of the content and free registration for the next covid webinar is here. The next webinar will be about covid-19 testing in asymptomatic people #covidunknowns on 11 February 2021, 16:00-18:00.

Allyson M Pollock, Professor in Public Health, Population Health Sciences Institute, Faculty of Medical Sciences, Newcastle University, Newcastle, UK

Competing interests: AP was a member of Independent SAGE.

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Allyson Pollock: Testing, testing...for SARS-CoV-2 in asymptomatic people - The BMJ - The BMJ