Aimee Middlemiss

South West Water admits criminal offence over Devon parasite outbreak Firm admits supplying water unfit for human consumption after nearly 150 people fell ill

South West Water admits criminal offence over Devon parasite outbreak.

Water unfit for human consumption, 150 people fell ill.

SWW already has nearly 200 criminal convictions. Licence not cancelled, no exec prosecuted, record high customer bills, sewage dumped in rivers.

Privatisation is a scam.

Pretty sure AI would miss highly relevant monographs in my field, because that happens even with real reviews where people apparently think all research is in journal paper format.

Congratulations!!!

Say the quiet part out loud about “family voting” & “South Asian-type election practices”. These assume Brown men are telling their wives how to vote & that Muslims, by nature, violate democratic norms. Trope of Muslim women being oppressed and unable to participate fully in democracy is tiresome

Egenis seminar: "Strategic entanglements of moral and truth regimes in NHS maternity healthcare"

I'm talking at Egenis on Monday 23rd about moral and truth regimes in maternity care - it's mostly ended up about NHS England's Saving Babies Lives Care Bundle, but do come along if that's of interest. :) www.exeter.ac.uk/events/detai...

These two women are suing Andrew Tate, alleging he raped them. Here they visit the social media companies that created Tate. Please share.

*one voice altered to disguise identity

I once dropped my wallet. Someone transferred 1p to my bank account and added their mobile number as the reference *and* called my bank to pass on their details if I called to cancel the card. Reunited the next day.

And then it's possible to spend 9 months trying to align two institutions' different ethics boxes which don't have room for your actual ethical research thinking.

Thing is, people only seem to be able to conceptualise rigour and integrity as more and more bureaucracy and standardisation tick boxes - in ethics processes and in those publication checklists, just not set up for qualitative work.

Are Invasive Postmortems Barbaric? In my previous post, amongst other things, I mused on the meaning and role of compassion in death investigation. I was reacting to what I experienced as a cynical attempt to capitalise financially …

deadbodiesandthelaw.wordpress.com/2026/02/16/a...

In perimenopause oestrogen appears to have pushed me into histamine intolerance, now on a deeply tedious diet involving nothing nice.

obviously their main purpose...

If any of you metropolitan liberal elites are wondering what’s going on outside London, the answer is: mud. Roads: mud. Pavements: mud. Footpaths and fields and beaches: mud, mud, mud. The ground floor of my house: mud.

Other work of the Ladybird artists.
‘Redshanks Alighting’
Artist: CF Tunnicliffe

i didn’t realise that Malthus was still alive, much less that he was supervising PhDs at Essex

How is a Man Supposed to be a Man?: Male Childlessness – a Life Course Disrupted | Berghahn Books Independent Publishing since 1994

My research on male broodiness was the inspiration for today's #BBCRadio4 #Sideways
www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/...
Find out more @berghahnbooks.bsky.social #book:
On sale until Feb 28:
25% off Ebook/PB with code HAD25,
35% off HB with code HAD35
Get your copy here: bit.ly/3ZXBofH
#Anthropology

quick moment here also to reflect on how stressful this has to be for the *students* who are being targeted here

£5bn council SEND debts to be paid off by government It comes days after the Local Government Association warned that eight in 10 English councils would face bankruptcy, if they had to honour deficits.

This is big.

As part of our research into birth douals and medical law we are running focus groups with (1) birth doulas, (2) healthcare professionals (widely defined) involved in childbirth and (3) people who have used or seriously considered using a birth doula in the past five years. To take part you must have worked or given birth in the UK. Interviews will take place in English. (Please note, we will hold separate focus groups with each of these three groups) * If you choose to take part in this research, you will be invited to participate in a focus group discussion with 5-8 other participants. These may be online or in-person, and you will be given a chance to specify your preference on the expression of interest form. The groups will last approximately 90 minutes and will be facilitated by both of the researchers. They will take place between February-April 2026. * During the discussion, you will be asked to share your thoughts, experiences, and opinions on birth doulas, including understanding the boundaries of the role, the interprofessional dynamics in birth spaces, and navigating medico-legal frameworks. There are no right or wrong answers—we are interested in your honest perspectives. * Participation in this study is wholly voluntary. Participants will not recieve payment for taking part. * If you are interested in taking part, please fill in the expression of interest form linked below by 5pm MONDAY 23 FEB 2026. If you have any questions, please do get in touch. rd EOI FORM - LINK & QR CODE : https://forms.office.com/e/9ZREnz1SGA

We have now started the next stage of our project: focus groups with (1) birth doulas, (2) healthcare professionals involved with birth and (3) people who have used or considered using a doula during birth in the past 5 years.

Please do share with networks!

@annanelson95.bsky.social

It is good to know, hopefully more employers are moving in that direction. I wish your relative well for the future.

I'm so sorry to hear that Kate. My book is an academic explanation of how this experience is marginalised and also resisted, it explains this through women's stories, but it might be a lot for someone who has had a recent loss - I think it would very much depend. It is free online so you could look.

Gladys Mae West obituary: mathematician who pioneered GPS technology She made key contributions to US cold-war science despite facing huge barriers as a Black woman.

No joke: I got angry hate mail today for writing an obituary of a Black woman scientist—because the person felt she did didn’t deserve the recognition.

Which just makes me want to share it again: www.nature.com/articles/d41...

My friend Rick was over here from Manchester, staying in my spare room, last week. Rick didn’t leave his home city for the first time until 2022 and didn’t even know what a donkey was until 2019, when he was 58, but now that he’s been to Devon, where I live, a few times, the pollution-coated twat thinks he’s William W***ing Wordsworth. “Slow and dreamy, the cow is the tortoise of the field,” he announced to me pompously on Friday. I didn’t reply, as I dislike confrontation, but the dude was talking utter shit. When properly motivated, British cattle can move at speeds of up to 65mph, as can be witnessed in our annual village Milk Race. Here a herd of Jerseys are challenged, over 18 miles of varied terrain, to beat a quad bike, normally driven by Sue who runs the post office, and Bill, a former Olympic runner who lives in the old mill. As usual, this year the Jerseys came out on top, leaving Bill (far right, in his customary Parisian designer denim) pathetically wheezing and crooked, although as you can see some of the herd’s progress has been impeded by their investigation of the cottage to the right, having heard the distracting opening bars of Paula Abdul’s 1988 hit ‘Straight Up’ coming from an open window.

I have now lived in the British countryside for most of my five decades on earth, within which time I have come to know it well. I thought, for newcomers to the place, I'd write a short guide to some of its more interesting aspects. You will find them in this thread.

1. EXCITING VILLAGE EVENTS.

A photo that appears to have a "gettyimages" watermark but the watermark is actually painted directly on the bridge.

This watermark graffiti by street artist Mathieu Tremblin is, like, the best thing ever.

'UKRI did not respond directly when asked about funding available for MRC grants, but referred RPN to a previous statement about the agency changing the way some of its investment is directed to align with national priorities and efforts to boost economic growth.'

An empty check-in hall with departures screens.

Reminder for my fellow UK dual/multi nationals that from 25 Feb 2026 you MUST travel into the UK on a UK or Irish passport.

You will no longer be able to travel to the UK on another passport — quite the change from the status quo, and problematic for those of us who travel frequently…🧵

if they can offer free AI training they could offer free media literacy training too. i know which of those would do more for the public good

A few months ago I was curious to know how much Anna's Archive was charging AI developers for access to their massive library of pirated works for training - so I emailed them saying I was interested in buying access.

Here is their reply.

🧵 1/n

So while preparing slides was once again been reminded of this little mystery....Huge gender gaps in support for 2 parties - Reform and Greens. Both genders are more likely to support the Greens, and gender gap in Green support is larger. But all the discussion focuses on young men & Reform

Following @jamesdaustin.bsky.social lead, here’s my starter pack of women journalists to follow. Apologies to any women I’ve inadvertently missed off. It’s not a slight. I’m just one woman, working in a specific area & region!

go.bsky.app/RaopwNN