Learn English with Light British News Stories Ep 789
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Hi there and welcome to the Adept English podcast. It's not quite Christmas. There's another week of work left.

But people are starting to have their meals out, nights out, celebrations for Christmas this week. I haven't yet got my Christmas tree up. It's in a bucket in the back garden having a drink. But it will be in the house and decorated very soon. So let's save most of the Christmas theme for next week's podcast.

And let's have a look instead at some lighter news stories today. We know you love these podcasts about news and that they really help with your understanding of English using current news topics, things that are happening in the world. And if you're familiar with the Adept English podcast, you'll know that I usually leave the really big contentious pieces of news alone. We aren't just an English language podcast.

And I don't want to get into big disputes with listeners about contentious topics. I do read about the big topics in the news, of course, but let's focus on smaller news items today. One of my news items perhaps is a bit contentious, but let's see what you think.

Hello, I'm Hilary and you're listening to Adept English. We will help you to speak English fluently. All you have to do is listen. So start listening now and find out how it works.

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there's actually a search function. So it's easier to find previous podcasts than it is on YouTube, for instance. You can search with a keyword. Also, while you're there, have a look at our courses page. We have a number of courses, one on pronunciation, another on English conversation, but our most popular course continues to be the most common 500 words.

It makes sure you're really familiar with the common words in English. If you don't feel you need this and that the podcasts are the right level for you, either to improve your English or to keep it polished, for a very small monthly fee, you can get much more adept English content online

through our subscription service. Have a look on Spotify for some of the titles that you're missing out on. Why not subscribe for 2025 and give your English language learning a massive boost? I've got so many topics lined up for 2025. It's really exciting. So in the news this week, I noticed Prince Andrew once again. He's the brother of King Charles.

head of our British royal family, and Prince Andrew also has the title Duke of York. Well, he's in trouble again for having inappropriate friendships. The word inappropriate, A-P-P-R-O-P-R-I-A-T-E, it's a word we use a lot in English. It basically means ill-judged, not using good judgment. Prince Andrew is well known for his friendship-based

with Geoffrey Epstein, which seems really hard to defend given what we now know about Geoffrey Epstein. Prince Andrew had to step down from his duties as a member of the royal family several years ago after a sex scandal involving a woman who was also abused by Geoffrey Epstein and whom Geoffrey Epstein introduced Prince Andrew to.

And last month, a book about the royal family by Robert Hardman said that Prince Andrew's brother, King Charles, had cut him off financially. King Charles has stopped paying for Prince Andrew's security or providing him with a personal allowance, giving him money in other words. The man that Prince Andrew chose to have a close friendship with this time was banned from the UK on security grounds.

This man's name isn't mentioned in the reports. He's just called H6. This gives it the feel of a spy novel. And indeed, H6 is believed to be, is suspected to be a spy. That's S-P-Y. Apparently, H6 lost his appeal to be able to return to the UK just this last week.

So H6 will still be banned. But as part of this process, part of this process in court, the phones and electronic devices belonging to H6 were taken and

and looked at. And they show that Prince Andrew had previously given this person permission to act on his behalf with regards to Prince Andrew's business interests in China, whatever they were. So this person now seemed to be a spy, previously had permission to act for Prince Andrew. I'm afraid Prince Andrew is now seen as more of a liability

That's L-I-A-V-I-L-I-T-Y, liability. And it means someone who will only bring problems whose judgments are not good. It must be hard for Prince Andrew with his royal upbringing to be outside the protection of the royal family. But he does seem to like good judgment and the British royal family do need good publicity, not bad.

So King Charles distancing from whatever Prince Andrew is up to. Very understandable, I think. A slightly contentious story now. I noticed a news story from the BBC about how online podcasts are putting out harmful health information. The article warns readers about the influence of

podcasts on people's views on health and lifestyle and how this information differs from what's mainstream. That's M-A-I-N-S-T-R-E-A-M. What's the usual advice?

the received wisdom, if you like. This material is often branded misinformation, M-I-S-I-N-F-O-R-M-A-T-I-O-N, bad information in other words. I don't know the podcast that was cited in this news story. It's a podcast hosted by Stephen Bartlett or whether it goes further than other health podcasts of this type in its claims.

However, I do recognise two of the guests. That's Dr. Asim Malhotra of the UK and Dr. Thomas Seyfried of the US. These doctors both have a high level of experience, qualification and ability.

are world-renowned in their own fields. I see Malhotra is a cardiologist and Thomas Seyfried is a cancer specialist. But their views on certain aspects of health are not mainstream. However, they

If you take the time to listen to these people speak, their claims are based on scientific data and research and seem worth hearing, worth considering, if not compelling. But they're just not mainstream. They don't always agree with the mainstream information put out by organisations like the NHS.

the National Health Service in the UK. As I've observed in previous podcasts, the NHS is great at emergency medicine, at saving your life.

And sometimes it's great at helping people who are already sick, but it really doesn't do nutrition and lifestyle advice very well at all. And I wouldn't go to my GP, my doctor for this type of advice. I find much better researched and evidence-based advice online. You have world-renowned experts at your fingertips, and I love this.

I found it interesting that this news story was promoted in a number of places. It popped up on my laptop and on my phone. One of the problems with healthcare systems in the US and in the UK is...

The big influence that pharmaceutical companies have over mainstream information. My fear is we're only dimly aware of the extent of this. So news stories about alternative health podcasts and their misinformation interest me.

particularly where I can see that those health podcasts do have some scientific backing. I'm not a fan of Donald Trump, as you know, and there are certain elements of his upcoming presidency that worry me. But I do find the appointment of Robert Kennedy interesting. Robert Kennedy has been fighting cancer.

big food, big pharma and big agriculture in lawsuits for many years. And he wants to turn around the health care system of the United States so that it's based on objective evidence from sources that don't have huge financial investment around what people eat, how food is produced,

and around what drugs people are prescribed. I'm really excited to see what Robert Kennedy does. It's easy to dismiss him as an anti-vaxxer. That's the word used for people who are against vaccination. If you go a little deeper, you'll find this is not quite the true representation and that many people who brand him an anti-vaxxer have vested interest.

If you've got vested interest, it means you're receiving money from organisations and that influence is what you say. Robert Kennedy has all sorts of ideas about Big Pharma and how to reduce the influence. If you go below the surface,

and get past the dismissive anti-vaxxer label, you find that Robert Kennedy's ideas on health and big pharma are really interesting. He wants to challenge the status quo, change things, and reduce the influence

of Big Pharma and the billions of dollars that are made from that industry. It will be fascinating to watch. Personally, I think pharmaceutical drugs should be manufactured by government owned organisations and any profits

fed back into governments so that the money can be used for healthcare. That would be a much better system, but it means big changes. We could then perhaps have healthcare based on objective, unbiased data. What a great world that would be. I think there's another issue here too. Audiences for mainstream news, well, they're declining.

Young people don't watch mainstream news in the same way as the older generations. And news outlets like the BBC, even though it's great on certain types of reporting, well, they're suspected of being too influenced by government. The government influences the BBC and what they report.

And sometimes what they don't report, it's as much what's missing from the news as what's in it. I've seen evidence of this on so many news stories. It's worth digging deeper yourself to get nearer to the truth. I do wonder if there's a bit of a panic amongst mainstream news providers.

in lots of different countries because they've lost credibility. People would rather judge for themselves by looking online for their information. People would rather use their own judgment and choose what online content they want to subscribe to. Of course, it can be a bit of a wild west online, but you can use your own intelligence to work out what is right.

credible content. And get away from mainstream dogma, that's D-O-G-M-A, which means fixed ideas. If you put forward dogma, it means you're no longer listening to new ideas. I hope we don't live in an era where new ideas are going to get closed down. So I'm fascinated to see what happens with all of this. I wasn't going to get contentious, but maybe that one is. Let me know.

Lastly, let's go with a slightly Christmassy story, but one which is nice and makes some interesting points about our modern world. In Edinburgh in Scotland, a community group have created a 16-foot knitted Christmas tree, which aims to tackle loneliness. Vocabulary here, loneliness, L-O-N-E-L-I-N-E-S-S,

That's a noun. And it means the state of being alone when you don't want to be. Being alone can make you very sad. That's loneliness. And a knitted Christmas tree. Well, the verb to knit, K-N-I-T, means to create things. Things like jumpers and scarves from wool and knitting needles. The traditional way of making knitted clothing like this

by hand. That's knitting. Note the silent K at the beginning of that word. And lots of people love to knit. Knitting may be associated with old people, your grandmother perhaps. And indeed, lots of people on the video that I've linked to about this knitted Christmas tree are elderly. But in the UK, there are also lots of young people who find knitting therapeutic.

and enjoy being creative. Do you remember that craze in the UK that I've spoken about of knitted postbox covers? That's P-O-S-T-B-O-X, postboxes. That's where we post our mail, our letters. Well, it continues. Our local postbox, the previous postbox cover, celebrated 25 years of park run, and it's just been replaced with...

with a lovely wintry scene with snow and reindeer. So people like crafts.

That's C-R-A-F-T. Things like knitting. So the 16 foot knitted Christmas tree in Edinburgh was someone's idea to tackle loneliness. And it got older people coming together to knit. Apparently, this idea really took off and more and more people joined together, joined the group to knit together. People came together to knit and friendships were made and people

benefited from this community shared activity. Long ago when the people of Cornwall in the UK and places like Arran and Shetland used to knit jumpers, that was important local industry. The only way to turn sheep's wool into

into clothing. And this was important to local economies. So knitting is a tradition and has a long history here in the UK. People coming together to knit, they enjoy it. It makes them feel better. And people do well when they have a creative outlet and more social contact. I think perhaps we should have more local knitting circles.

more local knitting groups. I think it would do people's mental health a great deal of good. Let us know what you think of these news stories, whether you agree with me or not. It would be lovely to hear from you. Enough for now. Have a lovely day. Speak to you again soon. Goodbye. Thank you so much for listening. Please help me tell others about this podcast by reviewing or rating it. And please share it on social media.

You can find more listening lessons and a free English course at adeptenglish.com.