"We have to assume a future pandemic on this scale will occur," England's chief medical officer, Chris Whitty, told the Covid-19 inquiry last week. In fact, it would be "foolish" not to. 

The NHS faced an "absolutely catastrophic situation" when the coronavirus first hit in 2020, said Whitty, pointing to low intensive care capacity and staff shortages as particular weak spots. But all indications from the first report from the public inquiry, published in July, suggest the UK still "does not have an up-to-date pandemic plan or strategy", said The Telegraph.

When will the next pandemic start?
Some forecast that there's a "one in four chance of another outbreak on the scale of Covid-19" in the next decade, said the BBC.

Last year an international survey of infectious disease experts found that 79% ranked a flu virus as the pathogen most likely to spark the next pandemic. About 21% believed the likely cause would be an unknown virus, dubbed Disease X. This would "appear out of the blue" just as Covid-19 did in 2019, said The Guardian.

Is the UK prepared?
The UK's last pandemic plan was published in 2011 and has "not been revised since", said The Telegraph, even though it "proved ineffective for Covid-19". If a pandemic "hit tomorrow", we would "all but be starting again from scratch" on mass testing, and the UK "still has no special requirements for ports and airports" in a pandemic situation.

But there's a "bright spot" on vaccines. We have a "contract in place" for the supply of a vaccine against the H5N1 avian influenza virus within 16 weeks, "should the worst happen" and the virus makes the genetic leap to human-to-human transmission.

What about global preparedness?
Globally, "there's a huge degree of engagement by countries" on the issue, Ashley Bloomfield, co-chair of a global negotiation to amend the World Health Organization's International Health Regulations, told the FT. The world's first pandemic treaty will hopefully "still lead to significant improvements on the previous pandemic response".

We are also better prepared thanks to "technologies developed for vaccines, diagnostic tests and therapeutics", said the Chatham House think tank. Covid-19 "massively accelerated" that development.

A long-running battle to recover a "holy grail" shipwreck and claim its billion-dollar treasure is intensifying.

The "fabulous cargo of gold, silver and precious stones" of the "San José", a Spanish galleon that sank off Colombia in the early 18th century, has "long been the stuff of treasure hunters' dreams", said Le Monde – and that has put it at the heart of a tug of war.

Three-way battle
The wreck of the "San José" was first located in the 1980s by a US-based salvage company – but it is far from the only party with a claim on the bounty. Colombia "has no doubts about its rights to the wreck", which lies within its territorial waters, said Le Monde, and earlier this year began a $4.5 million (£3.4 million) recovery process.

Spain has also "staked its claim", said the BBC, arguing that the "San José" and its cargo remains state property, while Indigenous groups from Bolivia and Peru also say they are entitled to "at least a part of the booty", which might have been mined by their ancestors.

With so many competing claims, ownership of each item recovered will "probably have to be decided by independent experts", said Dr Ann Coats from the University of Portsmouth. A case is before the Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague.

The holy grail
Describing the potential haul as "the biggest treasure in the history of humanity", Rahim Moloo, the lawyer representing the US salvage company Sea Search Armada, said it will include seven million pesos, 116 steel chests full of emeralds and 30 million gold coins. The company estimates its value at $7-18 billion, although Carla Rahn Phillips, a historian who has written a book about the "San José", told the BBC it's "almost meaningless to try to come up with a number" so many centuries on.

Although the "San José" is "often described as the holy grail of shipwrecks", the UN believes it's "just one of around three million sunken vessels on our ocean floor", said the BBC. "There is often very little clarity over who owns them" and their treasure.

"In theatre as in comedy, timing is everything," said Alun Hood in What's On Stage. So Arthur Wing Pinero's 1890 tale of a "high-ranking MP embroiled in financial scandals" has come to London's Menier Chocolate Factory at just the right moment.

The new adaptation by Nancy Carroll offers an "evening of rare, unexpected pleasure". Directed by Paul Foster, the staging "isn't really a revival but more an all-guns-blazing reinvention of a Victorian farce that, let's be honest, nobody was really gagging to see disinterred".

It's a comedy as "sparkling as they come", said Arifa Akbar in The Guardian. "Springy, silly and full of satirical sting", the new staging is a "startling reminder of how our world can be deliciously sent up by the past".

"Delightfully pacy" and "elegant", Carroll's adaptation "brims with vitality, full of salacious double entendres" and "unmistakable contemporary political allusions", said Lindsay Johns in The Telegraph. Carroll also brings "impeccable comedic timing" to her starring role as Lady Kitty, while Janet Bird's period sets and costumes are "enchanting".

The plot is still "pure froth", said Clive Davis in The Times, but Foster has made sure "it's unpacked with real zest", and it zips along "so cheerfully that you barely have time to worry about the snobbery". It's like a "glass of fizz that hits the spot".

Until 16 November at Menier Chocolate Factory, London SE1

Sir Sponger isn't cut from a different cloth
Daily Mail editorial board
The prime minister's freebie row is particularly galling because "no one was more pious in lecturing the country over the supposed corruption, cronyism and impropriety of the last Tory government", says the Daily Mail. Keir Starmer claimed his "uninhibited acceptance of suits, frocks for his wife, football and gig tickets" was within "'the rules'", but "that doesn't make it right". He says he is repaying some of the freebies to "set a new standard in propriety". "He got caught", more like.

Britain could regret handing over the Chagos Islands to Mauritius
James Heale in The Spectator
The decision to cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius "follows a shift in the UK's long-standing position on the islands", writes James Heale. International pressure has forced the UK's hand – "Britain's focus on maintaining support for Ukraine means it cannot afford to alienate allies". But "the governments of Mauritius and China have been increasing their ties" and "Beijing's expansionist posturing" could well see the sovereignty of the islands changing hands again.

Why do so many LGBTQ+ people still have to snatch moments of affection when we know others aren't looking?
Sophie Wilkinson in The Guardian
Recent research from Stonewall "showed that only 44% of LGBTQ+ couples in the UK feel safe holding their partner's hand in public", writes Sophie Wilkinson. Despite "the increase in our visibility, for all our abundance, the profile of our potential assailants remains vague. We don't know who to be wary of, so we watch out for everyone." That's why "work must be done to get a clearer idea of who is actually harming LGBTQ+ people".