UK - The lift shudders to a halt, in total darkness. You reach for your mobile phone. No signal. You find the alarm button. No answer. As the seconds, minutes and hours go by, you can contemplate the vulnerability of our highly sophisticated society to breakdowns, and recall stories of corpses found in abandoned lifts. The power cuts that plunged Spain and Portugal into darkness this week caused few fatalities. But they are a timely reminder of how vulnerable our physical and social infrastructure is to breakdown. Trains stopped in tunnels. Payment systems froze. Communications packed up. Millions of people suffered stress, cost and inconvenience. And it is still unclear why. At least with the cyberattack that crippled Marks & Spencer we probably know the culprit: a greedy, wily gang of pseudonymous teenage cybercriminals. Not that it helps in trying to catch them. The fragility of our systems will not escape our enemies’ notice.

UK - Pembrolizumab is one of the first immunotherapy drugs for cancer. It harnesses the body’s own immune system and teaches it to attack tumours. It’s fair to say drugs such as Keytruda have transformed the landscape of cancer treatment. But there is a price to pay – and it’s a ‘grotesque’ one, according to Dr Andrew Hill, a visiting research fellow in the department of pharmacology and therapeutics at the University of Liverpool. ‘These cancer drugs are sold routinely for between 100 and 1,000 times what they cost to make,’ says Dr Hill. Global Justice Now estimates that pembrolizumab costs the NHS around £775 per 50mg, but its actual cost to manufacture, according to its calculations, is estimated to be no more than £18 per 50mg. The typical dosage for a single treatment varies depending on the cancer, but can be 200mg every three weeks. The UK is far from alone in its growing reliance on pembrolizumab, with Keytruda generating a staggering £19 billion in revenue globally for pharmaceutical giant MSD in 2023 alone.

USA - The cost of living squeeze is real and it’s making Americans completely stuck. Buying and renting are both out of reach for most Americans. $1 million 30 year mortgage at 6.85% (current national average) = $6,553/monthly payment. Annualized that is a $31,224 difference. If you took out a mortgage or refiled with a mortgage that begins with 2 percent, why would you ever move now? The cost of rent is out of control in America. These 2 bedroom apartments in California are $2,779 per month. They look like a dump. This is not abnormal, the average cost for a 2 bedroom in many areas of Southern California is over $2,700 per month. A 1 bedroom averages $2,200.

USA - The CEOs of some of the United States’ largest retailers, including Walmart, Target, and Home Depot, visited President Donald Trump at the White House this week, with a very stern warning: consumers could be seeing empty shelves in their stores soon, due to Trump’s tariffs, especially from goods imported from China, the country with the highest current tariffs. Trump tried to calm their fears and the markets by promising a deal would be made with China soon, and stating that President Xi had already called him “several times.” But China mocked Trump’s comments, stating that there were currently no discussions underway, and that there would be none until Trump dropped his tariffs against China.

USA - As inflation continues to strain household budgets, a growing number of Americans are resorting to Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) services to cover grocery costs, according to multiple reports. This trend highlights the financial pressures many face amid rising food prices and economic uncertainty. A recent article by CNBC notes that BNPL services, traditionally used for discretionary purchases like electronics or clothing, are increasingly being used for necessities like groceries. Companies such as Affirm, Klarna, and Afterpay have seen a spike in users opting for short-term loans to manage weekly food shopping. The article cites data from Adobe Analytics, which found that BNPL transactions for groceries rose by 40% year-over-year in 2024, reflecting a shift in consumer behavior driven by economic challenges. The Wall Street Journal corroborates this trend, reporting that grocery chains like Kroger and Walmart have partnered with BNPL providers to offer installment payment options at checkout.

UK - European power outages provide a warning to the UK. Experts tell The Telegraph that nationwide blackouts could quickly lead to disaster. Cyber attack? Electro-magnetic pulse? Solar storm or sabotage? Or maybe just the weather. Whatever caused the collapse of the Spanish and Portuguese power grids on Monday, it has focused attention on the extreme vulnerability of Western society. Take away electricity, and things can go very wrong, very fast. The UK’s National Risk Register, a catalogue of threats updated annually by the Cabinet Office, lists a failure of the national electricity transmission system as a category five – “catastrophic” – impact event. “All consumers without backup generators would lose their mains electricity supply instantaneously and without warning,” it states bluntly. “A nationwide loss of power would result in secondary impacts across critical utilities networks (including mobile and internet telecommunications, water, sewage, fuel and gas).” The outage would cause “significant and widespread disruption to public services provisions, businesses and households, as well as loss of life”, the document notes.

EUROPE - A blackout of reason appears to have engulfed the bloc's collective mind in darkness. The widespread power cuts in Spain and Portugal this week caused chaos and exposed the risks of switching almost entirely to electricity to power our way of life – plus the possible perils of a wholly-renewable energy supply. Spain had upped its wind and solar power when blackouts struck, just days after its grid ran entirely on green power for the first time. And while it is too early to know definitively what caused the catastrophic Iberian outage, clearly, the ability to fall back on other forms of energy-generation like gas could have mitigated the impact of power cuts. The suspicion is falling on its rising use of renewable energy, with solar and wind reaching a peak of 64% of generation earlier this week before the crash. What no one wants to question is Spain’s huge reliance on renewables as so much capital and political will has been invested in the net zero project. Neither the EU nor the left-wing media want this to be the explanation.

UK - The only ever judge to publicly say they are transgender in the UK is taking the government to the European Court of Human Rights over the ruling that trans women are not legally women under the Equalities Act. The long-awaited judgment from the Supreme Court was hailed by gender-critical campaigners but led to warnings it would “exclude trans people wholesale from participating in UK society”. Dr Victoria McCloud, 55, who stood down last year, is bringing action against arguing a breach of her rights under article six of the European Convention on Human Rights. Dr McCloud came out as trans in her twenties and is one of about 8,000 people to have legally changed the sex on their birth certificate.

UK - Once a year, we are reminded with bowed heads and solemn rituals of a horror that should have ensured, once and for all, that the Jewish people would never again walk alone into the abyss. Yom HaShoah — Israel’s Holocaust Remembrance Day — stands not just as a commemoration, but as a warning. And yet, astonishingly, the warning is going unheeded. It begins, as it always does, with words. The kind that blame. That isolate. That cast aspersions. “They control.” “They manipulate.” “They oppress.” From the university lecture hall to the social media echo chamber, from celebrity pulpits to parliament back benches, the language has returned. Not the German of the 1930s, but the rhetoric is chillingly familiar. And all of it, we are assured, is done in the name of “justice.” When, precisely, did we become so numb to history? Because anyone who has studied antisemitism — really studied it — knows that it doesn’t leap overnight from graffiti to gas chambers. It evolves. It walks a deliberate path. And what do we do? We march. We light candles. We make speeches about never again — while “from the river to the sea” echoes through London like a hymn.

UK - “If the British public knew about the scale of cases coming into the courts around Islamist extremism, maybe then they would realise the risk that we all face”. This is a comment I made to a few friends recently. As a British Muslim, I have long questioned why some within parts of my community have sought to downplay the cancerous extremism that has taken hold of the minds of some young Muslims. Given the sheer number of Islamist extremist cases that have gone through our courts, it is patently obvious that the scale and the depth of Islamist extremism continues to pose a real and ongoing danger to our society and our national values. In a simple snapshot of cases over the last 8 weeks, I have counted 7 cases where Islamist groups and their extremism has percolated into the minds of people who have lived in or arrived into our country.

UK - Britain’s food industry is at a crossroads. It has been neglected by successive governments who pay lip service to the idea of a food strategy, but fail to follow through with meaningful plans. A food security strategy, which safeguards the supply of the most basic needs, has always been important. Brexit made it imperative. More recent developments have made it urgent. We used to believe that global supply chains were a sure way to meet our needs. Britain is a trading nation and international trade, delivering greater choice, higher quality and better value for consumers, remains vital. But the pandemic showed us how suddenly supply chains can be disrupted. The Ukraine war has underlined our vulnerability to external shocks, resulting in the highest inflation we have experienced in over a generation. Our food industry employs more than four million people and it has huge potential for growth.

JAPAN - The Japanese air force is getting ready for a war with China. Acquiring stealth fighters, buying up air-to-air missiles in large quantities and now sending its best planes and pilots to Guam for realistic training, the air arm – one of the biggest and most sophisticated in the Pacific region – isn’t taking any chances as it prepares to clash with a much bigger Chinese air force. The recent Japan Air Self-Defence Force deployment to Guam for exercise Cope North, involving 250 airmen, six Lockheed Martin F-35 stealth fighters, one Boeing KC-46 aerial tanker and two Northrop Grumman E-2 Hawkeye radar planes, is a first for the JASDF – and a sign of the Japanese air arm’s determination to align its training and doctrine with the US Air Force and the Royal Australian Air Force, both of which also sent F-35s to the war game.

USA - California. Kamala Harris’s home state. The focus of a dizzying amount of woke insanity, particularly in the Bay Area, including public authorities providing drugs to addicts, sprawling needle-strewn homeless tent encampments, a policy of not punishing crimes like shoplifting because of “racism”, and nightmarishly low rates of literacy among the very people who were intended to benefit from the lurch to social justice. Let us not forget Hollywood, either, and the performatively progressive conurbation that is Los Angeles. But could the Western seaboard be about to get a Trumpy jolt? The political character of the state does seem to be shifting. How else to interpret news that Steve Hilton, former David Cameron adviser, has reinvented himself as a Maga bro and the possible future governor of California? Newsom’s no fool, and if he can bring California a little to the Right, without falling for Trump’s snake oil, that would be good for the state and the country.

EUROPE - Portugese power bosses blamed the widepread power outages on "anomalous oscillations" in very high-voltage lines. The effect is known as "induced atmospheric variation" and it could take up to a week for the network to fully normalise again. Portugal's grid operator, REN (Rede Eletrica Nacional) has claimed interruptions to its own power supply were the result of a "fault in the Spanish electricity grid". Spain has not yet responded to the claim. Earlier, it was claimed by the head of Spain's electricity network that restoring power could take between six and 10 hours. REN added that "due to extreme temperature variations in the interior of Spain, there were anomalous oscillations in the very high voltage lines (400 KV), a phenomenon known as 'induced atmospheric vibration'".

MIDDLE EAST - A US Navy fighter jet was lost overboard from the USS Harry S Truman after an apparent emergency manoeuvre to evade a Houthi missile, raising new concerns about the threat posed by the Yemen-based rebels. The Navy confirmed an F/A-18E Super Hornet and its towing vehicle plunged into the Red Sea on Monday after the towing crew "lost control" during operations in the hangar bay. The Navy’s statement referred to the incident as an accident during a towing operation — but analysts have suggested there may be a more serious cause. Charles Lister, senior fellow at the Middle East Institute, said the loss was “alarming,” adding: “It implies that a #Houthi missile evaded detection &/or interception & got close enough to USS Truman to force an emergency evasive manoeuvre." However, the incident has raised fresh questions about the effectiveness of US ship defences against increasingly sophisticated Houthi attacks.