Melbourne psychologist Chris Cheers says the pandemic’s effect has been akin to grief, and acceptance of it is hard to reachAfter 18 months, psychologist Chris Cheers has begun to understand emotional responses to the global Covid pandemic as a kind of grief.It’s a collective grief, experienced by the whole world at once, but also deeply personal: our losses are not the same just as our...

Boris Johnson is heading for a clash with backbench MPs over plans for mass vaccination of teenagers Coronavirus – latest updatesSee all our coronavirus coverageParents should choose whether they allow their children to be vaccinated against Covid-19 if ministers overrule scientific advice against mass vaccination of healthy 12- to 15-year-olds, the government’s independent vaccine advisers...

I have never been seriously ill or spent a night in hospital, but I’m plagued by fears that a terrible sickness is coming for me. How did I fall victim to health anxiety?“This minute I was well, and am ill, this minute.” The pain arrives slowly, like a Polaroid sharpening into view, but the fear comes suddenly: a channel switched, a cloud sped across the sun. It’s June 1989, I recently...