Pregnant women have been advised to get vaccinated against whooping cough after nine young babies died as cases of the illness surged in England.

Whooping cough, which affects the lungs and breathing tubes and spreads very easily, according to the NHS, is responsible for the deaths of nine babies between November and the end of May.

In January, there were 555 confirmed cases but by May it was 2,591, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said.

From January to May there were 7,599 cases, while in the whole of last year, there were only 858, the UKHSA said.

The agency has also told parents to check their youngsters are up to date with all their immunisations.

Also known as pertussis, whooping cough is a bacterial infection affecting the lungs, causing bouts of coughing that are typically worse at night, with babies under three months at the greatest risk of contracting it.

Its name comes from a distinctive “whoop” noise sometimes made by young babies, who may also have difficulty breathing.

Pregnant women are offered the whooping cough vaccine in every pregnancy, ideally between 20 and 32 weeks, which offers 92% protection against babies dying from the disease.

All babies are given three doses of the six-in-one combined vaccine at eight, 12 and 16 weeks of age to protect against whooping cough and other serious diseases such as diphtheria.

From January to May this year, while most cases (53% or 4,057) were in people aged 15 or older who usually get a mild illness, some 262 were in babies under three months who are at greatest risk from infection, the UKHSA said.

Whooping cough is known to peak every three to five years, but the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic means there is reduced immunity to the disease in the population.

Other figures show declining numbers of women accepting the jab in pregnancy, with a little less than 60% having the vaccine in March.

Dr Mary Ramsay, director of immunisation at the UKHSA, said: “Vaccination is the best defence against whooping cough and it is vital that pregnant women and young infants receive their vaccines at the right time.”

She said the jab “passes protection to their baby in the womb so that they are protected from birth in the first months of their life when they are most vulnerable and before they can receive their own vaccines.”

Dr Ramsay added: “With cases continuing to rise and sadly nine infant deaths since the outbreak began last November, ensuring women are vaccinated appropriately in pregnancy has never been more important.”

Kate Brintworth, chief midwifery officer for England, said women “can access the vaccine, which also protects against diphtheria and tetanus, through their GP or some antenatal services, and parents should also ensure that their children get protected in the first few months after birth as part of the routine NHS vaccine offer.”

Samsung has become the first tech giant to release a smart ring – which can track sleep, movement, periods and heart rate.

The South Korean company released the Galaxy Ring on Tuesday as part of its latest wearable technology – also announced was the new Galaxy Watch Ultra.

It said the £400 ring, which is scheduled to launch later this month, will come with a battery life of up to seven days and is designed to be worn 24 hours a day to help users monitor their health stats during the day, but also while they sleep.

Coming in three colours – gold, silver and black – and nine sizes, the ring uses artificial technology (AI) to analyse biometric data collected from the person wearing the device and connects to the Samsung health app.

It then has the ability to assess an individual’s well-being and deliver an “energy score” that will range from one to 100 and make recommendations like a virtual fitness coach.

Away from fitness, Samsung says users can also take photos or snooze alarm clocks by pinching their fingers.

Although smart rings are nothing new – members of the England squad were spotted wearing a tracking ring, from Finnish health technology company Oura, during training for the Euro 2024 last month – Samsung is the first out of larger companies like Apple and Google to release the technology.

The decision to do so has been called an “interesting bet” by industry expert, Ben Wood, chief analyst at CCS Insight.

Mr Wood said the smart ring has a strong selling point because many people do not wear smartwatches to bed so are missing out on potentially useful sleep data, but the “huge complexities” around the tech still makes it a risky launch.

“It’s a logistical nightmare considering smart rings typically come in nine different sizes and numerous colours,” he said.

“As a result, consumers require a sizing kit to get their finger sized before making a purchase. Having strong retail partners or a comprehensive retail network is essential to success. I’ll be watching the rollout with interest.”

He said ICC Insight is estimating a total of around four million smart rings to be sold in 2025, falling far behind the expected 250 million smartwatches.

However some, like Dave Thomas who works with England’s Olympic and Paralympic athletes at the UK Sports Institute, says smart rings can be more convenient for athletes – which means they actually use them.

Night owls may be sharper than morning people, according to a new study, with those most active and alert in the evening performing better in cognitive tests.

Researchers led by academics at Imperial College London examined data on thousands of people taking part in the UK Biobank study to investigate sleep patterns and cognition.

They looked at the link between sleep duration, quality and chronotype – categorised as “morningness”, “eveningness” or “intermediate” for those who don’t align with either.

People who reported between seven and nine hours of sleep each night appeared to perform best on tests examining intelligence, reasoning skills, reaction times and memory.

According to the study, which has been published in the journal BMJ Public Health, academics found night owls and those classed as “intermediate” had “superior cognitive function”.

“Our study found that adults who are naturally more active in the evening – what we called ‘eveningness’ – tended to perform better on cognitive tests than those who are ‘morning people’,” said lead author of the study, Dr Raha West, from the Department of Surgery and Cancer at Imperial College London.

“Rather than just being personal preferences, these chronotypes could impact our cognitive function.”

She added: “While understanding and working with your natural sleep tendencies is essential, it’s equally important to remember to get just enough sleep, not too long or too short.

“This is crucial for keeping your brain healthy and functioning at its best.”

The researchers analysed data on almost 27,000 people, comparing how well they performed on tests to their self-reported sleep duration, pattern and quality.

Being a woman, increasing age and having a diagnosis of angina, high blood pressure and diabetes appeared to “worsen cognitive performance”, researchers said.

Co-study leader Professor Daqing Ma, also from Imperial’s Department of Surgery and Cancer, added: “We found that sleep duration has a direct effect on brain function, and we believe that proactively managing sleep patterns is really important for boosting, and safeguarding, the way our brains work.

“We’d ideally like to see policy interventions to help sleep patterns improve in the general population.”

The GDP figures were not the only encouraging piece of news to cross the desk of Rachel Reeves, the new chancellor, on Thursday.

There was also news that the UK has retained its crown as the number one destination in Europe for investment by venture capital in the tech sector.

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Data published by Dealroom, the global provider of data and intelligence on start-ups and tech ecosystems, revealed that UK start-ups and scale-ups raised £7.4bn during the first six months of the year.

That was up 16% on the same period last year and accounted for nearly one-third of all venture capital funding in Europe during the six months.

UK tech companies raised more than their peers in France and Germany combined and more than five times their peers in Switzerland.

That was helped by a number of big funding rounds completed by individual businesses, led by Wayve, the autonomous vehicles technology firm. It raised £861m from investors in May and welcomed Rishi Sunak, the former prime minister, to its headquarters on the day the fund-raise was announced.

That month also saw the credit technology company Abound raise £400m while Highview Power, the long-duration energy storage firm whose backers include the UK Infrastructure Bank and Centrica, raised £300m last month – most of which is to be invested in what it hopes will be the UK’s first commercial-scale liquid air energy storage plant.

Other major fundraisings by UK tech companies during the first half of the year included ones by the online bank Monzo, which raised £150m in May and the electric vehicle charging group Char.gy, which last month raised £100m.

More to come

The second half of the year looks set to be just as strong.

The figures from Dealroom come a day after Index Ventures, the global venture capital firm well-known for backing the largest number of UK unicorns (start-ups to have achieved a valuation of $1bn or more), announced it had raised $2.3bn in two new funds to invest in start-ups – a chunk of which is expected to be deployed in the UK.

Dealroom’s figures suggest that tech companies specialising in energy attracted the lion’s share of funding during the first six months of the year, attracting some £4.3bn across Europe, with companies active in the generative AI space attracting some £2bn of money.

London is Europe’s centre for tech

The figures also reveal that London has maintained its position as Europe’s leading centre for tech investment during the first half of 2024.

Start-ups and scale-ups based in the UK capital attracted some £5.3bn in funding during the period – more than twice as much as second-placed Paris, whose start-ups attracted £2.4bn in funding and more than five times as much as third-placed Stockholm, whose start-ups raised £940m.

Cambridge, home to celebrated chip designer Arm Holdings, was also among Europe’s top 10 investment destinations, with its companies attracting some £517m, up 83% on the same period in 2023. Cambridge-based companies that raised money during the period included Luminance, the legal-focused generative AI business, which raised £321m in May.

Jeannette zu Furstenberg, managing director and head of Europe at the global VC firm General Catalyst, said: “These figures are very encouraging and demonstrate how Europe can be a key player in the immense economic opportunity unleashed by AI, which I like to call a European RenAIssance.

“Leveraging the power of AI to bolster European productivity and growth we believe will be key when building globally successful technology companies on this continent.

“The uptick in late-stage funding in the first half of this year we think demonstrates the appetite for Europe’s most ambitious companies.”

Hopes for the future

The figures will raise hopes for venture capital funding, which fell sharply from mid-2022 as interest rate rises around the world began to bite.

Separately, the British Business Bank – the UK’s state-backed economic development agency, has published figures suggesting that the UK has leapfrogged India to become the world’s third-biggest venture capital market to trail only the United States and China.

The figures come just a week after Mr Sunak, who was seen as an enthusiastic backer of UK tech, was ejected from office by voters.

However, despite Mr Sunak’s vocal support for UK tech, the sector was frequently disappointed by his government’s curbs on visas – making it harder to attract overseas talent.

The sector is, accordingly, keen to hear what Labour has to offer it.

The party’s manifesto had little to say about investment in tech start-ups and the tech sector has changed beyond all recognition since the last Labour government left office in 2010.

But it is hopeful that a more supportive approach to skilled migrants could further entrench the lead of UK tech start-ups over their peers in continental Europe – particularly in areas such as helping to commercialise the intellectual property and research coming out of the country’s universities.

Women’s brains, blood, hormones and bones change drastically during pregnancy, research suggests.

We are only just discovering the full extent of what is going on with women’s bodies during pregnancy and beyond after decades of only studying male bodies, say scientists.

Bones

Biologists have revealed that a new hormone protects bone density during breast-feeding.

The new research, which studied mice, solves a long-standing puzzle over how the bones of breastfeeding women stay strong even as they lose calcium to milk, say researchers at the University of California San Francisco and UC Davis.

The hormone, CCN3, works by blocking certain oestrogen receptors in the brain and leads to “huge increases in bone mass”, according to Professor Holly Ingram.

CCN3 even healed elderly bones faster when it was applied as a patch, suggesting the hormone could help with diseases like osteoporosis which women are particularly at risk of after menopause.

Professor Ingram added: “One of the remarkable things about these findings is that if we hadn’t been studying female mice, we could have completely missed out on this finding.

“It underscores just how important it is to look at both male and female animals across the lifespan to get a full understanding of biology.”

Elsewhere in the body, “powerful” changes in women’s brains and healing power in mothers’ blood are being revealed.

Brains

A woman’s brain drastically changes shape during pregnancy, and never fully goes back to the way it was before, multiple studies have discovered.

The changes in a woman’s brain are so significant researchers recently found they could correctly tell if a woman was pregnant 100% of the time, just by looking at the shape of her brain.

Dr Susana Carmona, who led the research at General University Hospital Gregorio Maranon in Spain, said the changes in a woman’s brain during pregnancy “are the most powerful changes I have seen in my whole neuroscience career”.

She previously studied brain changes during schizophrenic episodes and people with ADHD and OCD.

During pregnancy, the brain is altering itself to prepare for parenthood, a process triggered by hormones which activate an instinct to focus almost completely on the baby, says Dr Carmona.

“You think, ‘This [baby] is super interesting, I’m going to try to interact with this’ and then you learn all the maternal behaviours,” she said.

Some parts of the brain associated with socialising and self-perception become smaller and thinner, and are slower to bounce back after giving birth.

Blood

As well as drastically changing their mothers’ brains, babies also change their mothers’ blood – forever.

By the time she is six weeks pregnant, an expectant mother will have her child’s blood cells running through her veins, according to Dr Diana Bianchi who first observed the phenomenon in 1996.

Back then, she found that women who had given birth to boys up to 27 years earlier still had their sons’ cells circulating in their blood.

Scientists are now discovering those cells all across the body, with a recent study from University of Jaen, Spain, confirming the cells were present in mothers’ hearts.

They’ve also been observed in areas that need healing like a diseased organ or scar tissue, suggesting the cells could help the healing process in mothers and their children long after they’ve left the womb.

Even if a woman miscarries, she still carries her child’s blood with her for years.

Studying women’s bodies

The vast changes an expectant mother goes through are still being discovered, and extend to the entire body.

Dr Carmona blames the fact we know so little about pregnant bodies on old scientific methods.

“Until very recently, studies performed on animals only included males because they thought that controlling for the menstrual cycle was too complicated,” she said.

In fact, researcher Emily Jacobs from UC Santa Barbara found that of the 43,000 studies in neuroimaging during the last 25 years, only 0.5% study how women’s brains are impacted by things like pregnancy, menopause and hormonal contraceptives.