What went right this week: goodbye ‘no ball games’ signs, plus more

A guerilla ad campaign that was rolled out this week targets some of the thousands of ‘no ball games’ signs that pepper London. Its aim? To remove barriers to sport and active play.

Grassroots charity London Sport has teamed up with advertising giant Saatchi & Saatchi to serve a red card to signs on Stockwell’s Mursell estate in the south of the UK capital.

London Sport estimates each sign deters around 80 young people per year from getting involved in sport, and with some 7,000 dotted around the capital, that leaves around half a million kids on the subs bench.

With support from Lambeth council, the charity this week stickered over signs with a ‘more ball games’ replacement, even adding basketball hoops for good measure.

It hopes the message will spread across the UK and inspire local authority, Westminster and housing association policymakers to provide equal access to free spaces and sport.

“This is not just about removing signs – it’s about creating a culture shift that prioritises play, movement and physical activity as essential to healthy childhoods, thriving communities and public wellbeing,” said London Sport’s director of fundraising, marketing and communications, Tanya Rabin.

Image: PinPep, London Sport 

A revolutionary ‘brain-pacemaker’ implant is to be trialled as a potential new treatment for alcohol and drug addiction.

Researchers from King’s College London have joined forces with colleagues from Oxford and Cambridge universities to study the effect of deep brain stimulation (DBS) on drink and drug cravings.

Scientists conducting the Brain-PACER study want to recruit volunteers living with severe substance issues, who are willing to have electrodes implanted in their brains. 

The intervention is already widely used to quell symptoms associated with a range of neurological disorders, including Parkinson’s disease, depression and obsessive compulsive disorder. In this case, regions of the brain associated with addiction will be targeted. 

Brain-PACER lead surgeon Keyoumars Ashkan, professor of neurosurgery at King’s College Hospital, said: “Deep brain stimulation is a powerful surgical technique that can transform lives. 

“It will be a major leap forward if we can show efficacy in this very difficult disease …”

Image: Anna Shvets

Time to roll up your sleeves and get litter-picking: the Great British Spring Clean kicks off this week. 

This year, an army of roving litter heroes have pledged to pick up more than 400,000 bags of rubbish as part of the nation’s biggest mass-action environmental effort.

Keep Britain Tidy marked the occasion by revealing that 8.5 million adults – 16% of the UK adult population – get involved with litter-picking at least once every six months. 

The figure rises to 20% among parents with children aged 18 or under, setting a fine example to future generations.

“It is amazing to see that so many of us are now taking action in our day-to-day lives to improve our environment,” said Keep Britain Tidy CEO Allison Ogden-Newton.

“The Great British Spring Clean is a moment when all those individuals who are now making litter-picking a part of their lives come together to show that small, individual actions, when taken collectively, can make a huge difference.”

Read more about how litter-pickers are taking the rubbish crisis into their own hands.

The Great British Spring Clean runs until 6 April. 

Image: Volha Flaxeco

Traditional bullfights have been outlawed in the Mexican capital, home to the world’s largest bullring, after the city’s congress voted to replace them with a violence-free spectacle. 

The move marks a degree of progress for bulls and animal rights defenders. It means matadors will have to down their array of weapons, while fights will be limited to just 15 minutes. It’s also now forbidden for bulls to die inside or outside the ring.

Activists from Humane World for Animals Mexico (HWAM) gave a cautious thumbs up to the measure this week, saying it represented “an important step toward eradicating the torment and killing of animals for entertainment”.

The charity said in a statement that despite blanket bans on bullfighting in several countries, including Argentina, Cuba and Italy, some 180,000 bulls are killed worldwide each year.

HWAM executive director Anton Aguilar added: “It’s important also to acknowledge that a bull event without violence does not mean one without suffering, as bulls will still be subjected to significant and completely unnecessary stress. We remain committed to a cruelty-free future.”

Image: Miguel Cuenca

Conservationists were hard at work this week scoping out a new home for the return of a rare moth to England.

The Kentish glory moth was once widespread across England’s southern counties, but the species was wiped out in the 1970s due to habitat loss.

Fragmented UK populations are now confined to remote regions of the Highlands of Scotland. That could be set to change, however, as a collaborative effort takes flight involving Twycross zoo, Butterfly Conservation, Natural England and Forestry England.

They have pinpointed a corner in Worcestershire’s Wyre Forest that’s ripe for reintroduction, and this week set about the task of clearing conifers and mapping the area that could sustain the moth’s return.

Twycross conservation programme manager Stuart Young told Positive News there was still much work to be done and it could be another three years before the Kentish glory moth is seen flitting about its favoured habitat of birch saplings.

Young added that he hoped the lessons learned from the Wyre Forest would catalyse reintroduction projects across England and the rest of the UK.

“It’s about showing that we can restore wildlife, we can restore populations of lost species if the partnership’s there, if the habitat’s right and if the conservation efforts are there,” he said.

Image: Adam Kay at Twycross zoo

Ever felt overcome by a feeling of calm when spending time in nature? It turns out that that healing power extends to pain management, too.

Researchers from the University of Exeter teamed up with colleagues in Vienna on a neuroimaging study of pain perception.

They discovered that study participants felt less pain from minor electric shocks when they viewed natural scenes on video, compared with images of office and city life.

Scans also revealed changes in specific brain responses that are linked with processing pain.

University of Vienna PhD student Max Steininger, lead author of the study, cautioned that the effect was significantly less than painkillers, and advised anyone taking medication to continue.

“But we hope in future alternative ways of relieving pain, such as experiencing nature, may be used to help improve pain management,” he said.

“Our study is the first to provide evidence from brain scans that this isn’t just a ‘placebo’ effect – driven by people’s beliefs and expectations that nature is good for them. Instead, the brain is reacting less to information about where the pain is coming from and how intense it feels.”

Image: Mike Baker

Believing in the kindness of others is key to happiness, according to the world’s foremost study on global wellbeing.

The latest incarnation of the World Happiness Report was published this week, with Finland topping its ‘happiest countries’ list for the eighth year in a row. 

Mexico and Costa Rica made it into the top 10 for the first time, while the UK slipped from 20th to 23rd place. 

The study, by the University of Oxford’s Wellbeing Research Centre in partnership with Gallup, also delved into what exactly puts smiles on our faces. It found that acts of benevolence and positive social connections such as meal sharing deliver a happiness boost.

Importantly, the work also revealed we are happier when we believe we are living in a caring community, and found that people are generally kinder than most of us expect. 

“Happiness isn’t just about wealth or growth – it’s about trust, connection and knowing people have your back,” said Gallup CEO Jon Clifton. “This year’s report proves we underestimate how kind the world really is. If we want stronger communities and economies, we must invest in what truly matters: each other.”

Image: Anthony Shkraba

Fisheries are set to join the ranks of companies committing to science-backed sustainability goals.

Although they have come under scrutiny in recent times, Science Based Targets remain the gold standard for corporates committing to climate action. Some 4,000 firms have signed up to the initiative but, until recently, the focus has been on reducing carbon footprints. Global giants like Nestlé and Ikea have used them to cut emissions, invest in renewable energy and create greener supply chains, for example. 

The mission expanded last year when the Science Based Targets Network (SBTN) announced the first companies to back its new goals for land and freshwater biodiversity.

Now, it’s taking to the high seas with the launch this week of ocean sustainability goals. 

They aim to help companies across the seafood industry tackle overfishing, safeguard habitats and protect threatened marine life.  

Danish trout farming firm Musholm was involved in trials of SBTN’s new standards. Vice managing director Thorbjørn Harkamp said the measure would “provide crucial support for seafood companies looking to future-proof their business”.

SBTN executive director Erin Billman added: “These targets help companies go beyond incremental change, strengthening marine ecosystems, supply chain resilience and long-term viability.”

Image: Knut Troim

A 120m mile space odyssey reached a happy ending this week as four intrepid explorers returned from the final frontier after months marooned in orbit. 

Nasa astronauts Suni Williams, Butch Wilmore and Nick Hague, along with their Russian colleague Aleksandr Gorbunov, were greeted by a pod of dolphins as their SpaceX Dragon capsule splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Florida.

Williams and Wilmore had set out for what was meant to be a week-long mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS) in June last year, but were left stranded by technical problems. Hague and Gorbunov had been on the ISS since September.

Wilmore and Williams travelled some 121,347,491 miles (195,289,856 km) in the course of their nine-month mission, completing 4,576 laps of the Earth. Williams also returned a record-holder after logging 62 spacewalking hours, the most clocked up by a female astronaut.

“We are thrilled to have Suni, Butch, Nick and Aleksandr home after their months-long mission conducting vital science, technology demonstrations, and maintenance aboard the International Space Station,” said Nasa acting administrator Janet Petro.

Image: NASA/Keegan Barber

Main image: PinPep, London Sport