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Medieval doodles
Fish, lute players and defaced demons: marginal doodles in some of Europe’s first printed books provide a tantalising glimpse into the late-medieval mind.
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Printing the body
The 18th century saw multiple technical developments in both printing and medicine. Colourful collaborations ensued – to the benefit of growing ranks of medical students.
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Born in the NHS
Despite underfunding, strikes and scandals, the first two decades of the 2000s has seen the British people’s love of and loyalty to the NHS soar.
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- Book extract
You know the drill
Richard Barnett opens wide the true meaning of a healthy mouth.
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Tripping for spiritualism and science
Getting high in the name of religion or creativity has been practised for centuries. Now it seems hallucinogenics could help treat mental illnesses too.
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The work of wet-nursing
Many of us know that in the past, babies were sometimes nourished by wet-nurses. But, perhaps surprisingly, the practice continues today – and the milk recipients are not only babies.
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Eugenics and the welfare state
Indy Bhullar explores the ideas of William Beveridge and Richard Titmuss, who were strongly influenced by eugenic thinking, and yet championed the idea of the welfare state.
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Bringing Braille back to the modern world
For anyone who thinks Braille is so last century, read on. New tech is helping dust Braille down and bring it to today’s visually impaired people.
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Writing in remission
Reading the writings of the lifelong hypochondriac Jacques Derrida during lockdown, Brian Dillon realises his own health anxiety has become unusually subdued.
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Thalidomide, a bitter pill
Hear from some of the women who took the drug thalidomide over sixty years ago about the fear, isolation and grief that they experienced as the appalling pharmaceutical scandal unfolded around them.
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Dynamo on the past, present and future of magic
The magician takes a tour and shares stories of history and inspiration.
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The conditional child
Deanna Fei asks what it means to sustain a life, drawing on her own experience of having a premature baby as well as an 18th-century essay.
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NHS Blue: the colour of universal healthcare
The 1980s and 1990s saw ideas from the world of business infiltrating the NHS, including the introduction of an internal market, followed by a corporate branding exercise.
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Exceptional talent and the trouble with IQ tests
Is a high IQ really a mark of genius, or does something else explain the exceptional?
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Ginger’s role in cures and courtroom battles
Some people will use a dose of ginger to help with hangovers – but it hasn’t always been a friend to the thirsty.
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‘Jessy’, a film about cerebral palsy
How the 1950s British film industry portrayed this disease.
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A quick guide to drugs, the brain and brain chemistry
Discover some of the major chemicals that govern activity in our brains, how they work, and why certain drugs have the effects they do.
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Doctor in the house
A house is not always a home – sometimes it’s impermanent, impersonal. But other aspects of the itinerant life can be the source of a sense of home.
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Journeying home
A serious health scare was the catalyst to Chris beginning the process of understanding his experiences more clearly, and using that new insight to help other intersex people.
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The joys and failures of audio description
Audio description enhances the experience of watching a film or TV show for people with a visual impairment, but it's not widely available in the UK. Alex Lee explains why.
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Ancestry, privacy and the family tree
Wanting to find out more about her Jamaican grandfather, Tanya Perdikou contemplates DNA testing. But first she has to consider the potential impact of unexpected results.
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Cowpox, Covid-19 and Jenner’s vaccination legacy
The well-known story of vaccination pioneer Edward Jenner has at its heart his drive to make vaccines free of charge and available to all. Now his principles extend to the global campaign for a people’s patent-free vaccine for Covid-19.
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The island of unclaimed bodies
In New York, those who live and die on the extreme edges of society are buried on an isolated island, often forgotten and unmourned. But recent legal changes aim to reduce stigma and restore their dignity.
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The building as tool of healing
When we’re ill, it’s not just medical care that helps to treat us. Architects have discovered that the right environment can play an important part too.
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Why the 1918 Spanish flu defied both memory and imagination
The Black Death, AIDS and Ebola outbreaks are part of our collective cultural memory, but the Spanish flu outbreak has not been.