Enlarge / Computer illustration of Candida fungi. (credit: Kateryna Kon | Science Photo Library | Getty)

Fungi are an indispensable part of your microbiome , keeping the body’s host of microorganisms healthy as part of a system of checks and balances. But when you’re hit by an infection , fungi can be thrown out of equilibrium with other organisms inside you, leading to a more severe infection and other symptoms of illness.

For this reason, the pandemic immediately set off alarms for Iliyan Iliev, an immunologist at Weill Cornell Medical School. “We were thinking, the first thing that’s going to happen is people will start getting fungal co-infections,” he says. With the microbiome unbalanced, fungi might start running riot inside Covid patients, Iliev reasoned. His fears were soon realized.

In research published in Nature Immunology , he and his team discovered that in patients with severe Covid, certain strains of gut fungi—knocked off-kilter by the virus—set off a prolonged immune response that could last long after the initial infection. This response potentially led to some of the respiratory symptoms experienced by these patients. These results, Iliev says, point to the critical role of the gut microbiome in the human immune response and could lead to better disease treatments down the line.

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About seven years ago, Aaron Silverbook and his then-girlfriend, a biologist, were perusing old scientific literature online. “A romantic evening,” joked Silverbook. That night, he came across a study from 2000 that surprised him. Scientists had genetically engineered an oral bacterium that they said could possibly prevent tooth decay: “I read it and sort of boggled at it and said, ‘Wow, this is a cavity vaccine. Why don't we have this?’”

So, Silverbook tracked down the primary author, Jeffrey Hillman, a now-retired oral biologist formerly at the University of Florida, to see if he could pick up the torch.

In 2023, Silverbook founded Lantern Bioworks, which made a deal with Oragenics, the company Hillman co-founded and that owned the technology, for the materials. Lantern Bioworks then launched the genetically engineered bacteria under the name Lumina Probiotic. “I didn’t expect it to happen in my lifetime,” said Hillman.

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Charities say high rates of people signed off work are caused by crumbling public services after years of underinvestment

Rishi Sunak has been accused of making mental ill health “another front in the culture wars”, as critics warned his plan to curb benefits for some with anxiety and depression was an assault on disabled people.

In a speech on welfare , the prime minister said he wanted to explore withdrawing a major cash benefit claimed by people living with mental health problems and replacing it with treatment.

Shifting responsibility for issuing fit notes, formerly known as sicknotes, away from GPs to other “work and health professionals” in order to encourage more people to return to work.

Confirming plans to legislate “in the next parliament” to close benefit claims for anyone who has been claiming for 12 months but is not complying with conditions on accepting available work.

Asking more people on universal credit working part-time to look for more work by increasing the earnings threshold from £743 a month to £892 a month, so people paid below this amount have to seek extra hours.

Confirming plans to tighten the work capability assessment to require more people with “less severe conditions” to seek some form of employment.

The suggestion that the drug may be more helpful than regulated care for mental ill health is dangerous, writes Dr Rachel McNulty

Rose Cartwright’s article ( I was the poster girl for OCD. Then I began to question everything I’d been told about mental illness, 13 April ) claims to expose “the fallacy at the heart of mental healthcare”, arguing that the sector – including but not limited to psychiatrists, occupational therapists, social workers, employment advisers, psychologists, dementia nurses, experts by experience, care home staff, art therapists, carers and support workers – fails to grasp the multifaceted nature of mental health and, instead, reduces it to an illness/treatment model.

I was part of a recent multi-disciplinary team meeting. A psychiatrist shared their concern about patients facing homelessness and asked what might be done. To which a support worker replied that funding for the local homelessness organisation – a key resource for such patients – had just been cut. Everyone, including the psychiatrist, slumped in their chair, knowing that homelessness is a potent risk factor for addiction, mental health crises and suicide. Without such organisations, these risks often become a reality.

The prime minister’s speech on cracking down on ‘sicknote culture’ was heavy on rhetoric but light on evidence and detail

Rishi Sunak’s big speech on reforming disability benefits was intended to show that the government had a grip on the economic and health challenges of the UK’s rising levels of long-term sickness. Instead, it came over as an administration running out of ideas, high on strident rhetoric, and desperate to cut welfare bills at all costs.

It was a “moral mission”, Sunak declared, to overhaul the current welfare system, which was “unfit for purpose”. Disability benefits were too easy to cheat, too cushy, too easily claimed. The speech was a clear appeal to the notion, in vogue on the right, that “mental health culture” has “gone too far”.

While most who wrote in favoured some sort of action to reduce the damage caused by tobacco, some warned about the UK becoming a ‘nanny state’

Dozens of people have shared with the Guardian how they feel about Rishi Sunak’s tobacco and vapes bill , which aims to create the UK’s first smoke-free generation. The proposed legislation would not ban smoking outright, but ensure that anyone born after 1 January 2009 would be banned from buying cigarettes.

About half of respondents said they were in favour of the proposed ban, at least in principle, primarily due to the strain that smoking puts on the NHS. Many of them, however, questioned its enforceability and whether there would be unwelcome consequences.

Department under fire for forcing people to repay huge sums as data shows widespread ill health among those caring for relatives

• ‘We’re already vulnerable’: the carers told to repay huge sums by the DWP

Carers have described suffering an “avalanche of utter stress” due to the government’s “abhorrent” approach to clawing back benefits, as official figures revealed the widespread ill health of those caring for loved ones.

The Department for Work and Pensions has been under fire since the Guardian revealed that tens of thousands of unpaid carers are being forced to pay back huge sums – and in some cases prosecuted for fraud – over “honest mistakes” that it could have spotted years earlier.

Some shortages are so serious they are imperilling the health and even lives of patients with serious illnesses, pharmacy bosses say

Drug shortages are a “new normal” in the UK and are being exacerbated by Brexit, a report by the Nuffield Trust health thinktank has warned. A dramatic recent spike in the number of drugs that are unavailable has created serious problems for doctors, pharmacists, the NHS and patients, it found.

The number of warnings drug companies have issued about impending supply problems for certain products has more than doubled from 648 in 2020 to 1,634 last year.

Retailer says it is filling advice gap on subjects such as menstruation and hormones amid wellness-focused revamp

It used to be known mainly as a destination for dried fruit and vitamin tablets but now women can get advice on period pain, mood swings and sleep while shopping in Holland & Barrett.

The retailer has trained 600 staff to act as women’s health coaches after its research revealed demand for broader support on hormonal and menstrual issues, with menopause the “tip of the iceberg”.