2020 has been an exhausting and eventful year for all of us, and as it is we already have trouble focusing on the positives rather than the negatives, so in case anyone needed a reminder (because I know I do), here are some of the best things to come out of 2020

There are many reasons to love sport: it makes you fitter, it is part of socialising and it may motivate you to reach your goal, among other things. Amateurs and professionals alike can enjoy the multitude of benefits sport provides. Nevertheless, there are some aspects of sport that have been neglected in discussion, and thus remain prevalent. Large scandals, such as those involving doping, will reach the headlines; meanwhile, the pain many athletes experience due the nature of sporting environments is infrequently thought of.

Content warning: discussion of physical and emotional abuse (in moderate detail) and mention of sexual assault

However you feel about Mondays, it cannot be denied that the past three have been an exciting time for the world of immunology. On Monday 23rd November, for the third Monday in a row, we received news of another promising anti-COVID-19 vaccine trial. This time it was Oxford University and the British-Swedish pharmaceutical company AstraZeneca hailing the good news. The press release announced that their vaccine was 70% effective against COVID-19, drawing from Phase 2 and 3 trials in Britain and Brazil.

The Arab Spring was a pro-democracy movement and a series of uprisings that broke the mould in Middle Eastern history, but its momentum didn’t last long before the region reversed into its autocratic and divided state. In both North Africa and the Middle East, by 2010, protestors fought for deep regime changes, for cultural freedom, and for democracy in their nations. First Tunisia and Egypt and then by domino effect, Yemen, Bahrain, Syria and many others followed motivated by the short-term successes they saw in neighboring nations.

“For how long will English constituencies and English hon. Members tolerate not just 71 Scots, 36 Welsh and a number of Ulstermen but at least 119 hon. Members from Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland exercising an important, and probably often decisive, effect on English politics while they themselves have no say in the same matters in Scotland, Wales and Ireland?”