Last week, public health officials declared a ‘national incident’ after they found vaccine-derived poliovirus in London sewage samples. No cases of polio symptoms have been reported but there is evidence the virus is spreading. So what does it mean to have found the virus almost 20 years after the UK was declared polio-free? Ian Sample speaks to epidemiologist Nicholas Grassly to find out how worried we should be and what it means for the global effort to eradicate polio.

Archive: Sky News

The US congressional hearings on the Capitol Hill attack have been prime time viewing. And the case against Donald Trump has been building for all to see, says Lawrence Douglas

The testimony was unprecedented. In an extraordinary sitting in Washington DC of the congressional committee investigating the attack on the US Capitol building, a White House staffer detailed how Donald Trump had attempted to grab the steering wheel of his presidential car in determination to join his supporters as they rioted. Cassidy Hutchinson also testified that Trump would fly into rages, on one occasion throwing a plate at the wall, smashing it in anger and leaving ketchup dripping down a White House wall.

Lawrence Douglas, a professor of law at Amherst College, tells Michael Safi that, throughout the series of slickly produced hearings, the committee has told a compelling narrative of the events that led up to the riots on January 6. And it goes beyond that, to alleged attempts to “steal” the election via slates of “fake electors” and by piling pressure on key officials such as the vice president and the justice secretary.

Australian Border Force officials searched more than 40,000 mobile phones, laptops and other devices at the border between 2017 and the end of 2021. ABF has broad powers to search travellers and ask for their passcodes. Reporter Josh Taylor talks to Jane Lee about what these powers are for and the difficulties in refusing these requests

Read more:

Max Rushden is joined by Barry Glendenning, Rishi Madlani, Chris Paouros and Nicky Bandini as they share their experiences along with listeners

Rate, review, share on Apple Podcasts, Soundcloud, Audioboom, Mixcloud, Acast and Stitcher, and join the conversation on Facebook, Twitter and email.

On the podcast today, we talk about the experiences of LGBTQ+ football fans – be it attending live games, playing Sunday League or engaging online. Have things improved in recent years, and how can allies help to create a more welcoming atmosphere in those environments?

We are raiding the Audio Long Read archives to bring you some classic pieces from years past, with new introductions from the authors.

This week, from 2016: Whether he wins the US presidency or not, his rise reveals a growing attraction to political demagogues – and points to a wider crisis of democracy

President Zelenskiy has urged G7 leaders to urgently send more heavy weapons to Ukraine to bring the war to an end before winter. But, as Dan Sabbagh reports, there is no clear resolution in sight

World leaders are gathering in Madrid today for the Nato conference, and one issue will loom above all else: the war in Ukraine. The conflict has been described as the biggest security challenge to the west since 9/11 and, alongside practical considerations of military aid, leaders are desperate to project an image of unity.

The Guardian’s Dan Sabbagh, who is in Madrid for the conference, has just returned from eastern Ukraine, where he witnessed the relentless shelling of Ukrainian troops. He talks to Michael Safi about a frontline that has come to resemble the battlefields of the first world war.

Guardian Australia political editor Katharine Murphy is joined by Richard Denniss, the chief economist at the Australian Institute, and John Remington from Essential Media. Together they analyse the latest Guardian Essential poll and discuss why the Labor government has its work cut out for themselves – if they are to meet their own policy agenda

Essential poll: voters back minimum wage rise but divided on Labor’s climate target

Months after former NSW deputy premier John Barilaro quit politics, he was appointed NSW’s trade commissioner to New York City – a role he created while he was in office. As the first of two inquiries into Barilaro’s appointment begins today, Guardian Australia’s NSW state correspondent Michael McGowan explains to Jane Lee what we know so far about how he was selected for the job

Read more:

Starting on 4 July and running throughout Euro 2022, host Faye Carruthers will be joined by Suzanne Wrack and a plethora of women’s football experts to guide you through the tournament. Whether you know your Putellas from your Popp, or are getting into the game for the first time, Women’s Football Weekly will be on hand providing reaction and analysis from the tournament three times a week.

Make sure to search, subscribe and listen wherever you get your podcasts

When the Guardian’s UK technology editor Alex Hern was contacted on Twitter to ask if he was involved in a new cryptocurrency called Tsuka, he assumed they just wanted him to buy it. He ignored the messages. But soon after Alex realised that, without knowing it, he was already involved. What happened next reveals a lot about the strange world of ‘shitcoins’ – cryptocurrencies with no reason for existence beyond buying low and selling high. Madeleine Finlay speaks to Alex Hern about his shitcoin saga, and how the lines can get blurred between a gamble and a scam

Archive: CNBC, Sky News Australia, NBC News, Bloomberg

Grace’s guest this week is the Irish novelist Marian Keyes. They discuss the joys of going feral when home alone, Marian’s childhood trips to stare at empty runways and how baking helped her through serious depression. And she reveals which comfort foods have seen her through it all

New episodes of Comfort Eating with Grace Dent are released every Tuesday

Jessica Glenza reports on the supreme court ruling and the profound consequences it will have for women facing unwanted pregnancies across the United States

On Friday the US supreme court overturned Roe vs Wade, the legal precedent that had protected the right to an abortion since 1973.

After the decision, 26 state legislatures moved to ban abortion immediately or as soon as practically possible. This will leave millions of women without access to a legal termination in their home state. Many will have to travel hundreds of miles to access a safe abortion in another state or try to terminate their pregnancy themselves.

So-called ‘beauty filters’ have become commonplace for selfies on social media. They offer users an instantly made-up, blemish-free version of themselves to share with the world online. But filters can insidiously reinforce western beauty standards, and encourage some to resort to drastic measures in order to conform with them in real life.

Full Story producer Karishma Luthria speaks with social media reporter Matilda Boseley about cosmetic filters’ harms and what can be done to prevent them.

Read more:

The story of the modern web is often told through the stories of Google, Facebook, Amazon. But eBay was the first conqueror

Read the article here

Gustavo Petro has been elected as the Latin American country’s first leftist leader. But he faces a huge challenge if he is to deliver on his promises, says Joe Parkin Daniels

Throughout Latin American history, as leftwing parties have taken power across the continent, one country has kept them out of office, very often through force: Colombia.

Last week that changed – and when Gustavo Petro formally takes over in August, Colombia will have its first leftist leader.

After the UK home secretary decided to extradite Julian Assange to face trial and a possible life sentence in the US, Ben Quinn reports on what the ruling means for the WikiLeaks founder – and for press freedom

Few public figures are harder to categorise than the WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange. To his fans, he is a fearless truth-teller, exposing state wrongdoing; to many governments, he’s a dangerous fanatic akin to a “digital terrorist”.

This week, Marina Hyde on Boris Johnson’s ability to blame everything on anyone but himself (1m42s), musician Norman Cook, AKA Fatboy Slim, on his mental health DJ classes (8m48s), Emma Beddington investigates whether winging it to the top really works (19m07s), and Imogen West-Knights looks at how the ‘mid-century millennial’ look took over our homes (33m03s)

As survivors and the bereaved mark the disaster’s fifth anniversary, the inquiry hearings are finally nearing their end

Read the article here

We learned this week that the public hearings held by the January 6 select committee would be extended into July. The Guardian’s Hugo Lowell tells Jonathan Freedland what we’ve learned so far, why they need more time and what happens next

Alex Hern reports on recent developments in artificial intelligence and how a Google employee became convinced an AI chatbot was sentient

Google software engineer Blake Lemoine was put on leave by his employer after claiming that the company had produced a sentient artificial intelligence and posting its thoughts online. Google said it suspended him for breaching confidentiality policies.

Earlier this month, Lemoine published conversations between him and LaMDA (Language Model for Dialogue Applications), Google’s chatbot development system. He argued that Lambda was a being, with the intelligence of a child, who should be freed from Google’s ownership.