Exposed: the business linked to baby deaths across the world – The Latest

A year-long investigation into the Free Birth Society reveals how mothers lost children after being radicalised by uplifting podcast tales of births without midwives or doctors.

Lucy Hough talks to the investigative correspondent Lucy Osborne about her reporting – watch on YouTube

Published: December 12, 2025, 6:01 pm

Friday briefing: How the Free Birth Society’s ​philosophy ​contributed to a ​preventable ​death

In today’s newsletter: A new Guardian podcast, The Birth Keepers, explores how a global network promoting unassisted childbirth has shaped women’s decisions​ around childbirth. One mother’s story stands as a stark warning

Good morning. Last month, we brought you the story behind the Guardian’s year-long investigation into the US-based Free Birth Society, a multi-million dollar business whose philosophy has been linked to traumatic births and even baby deaths around the world.

The society promotes a version of free birth (or unassisted birth) with no medical support that is seen as extreme, even among advocates of the practice. Unlike home births, which have a midwife in attendance, free birth involves delivering without medical help. The group influences women via podcasts, social media and online schools and, the Guardian found, advises mothers to steer clear of doctors and midwives, is anti-ultrasound, which it falsely claims harms babies, and downplays serious medical conditions.

UK news | The US is engaging in “extreme rightwing tropes” reminiscent of the 1930s, British MPs warned ministers on Thursday, after the release of Donald Trump’s national security strategy.

Health | The NHS is facing its “worst-case scenario” for flu cases this month across England after the number of people in hospital with the illness increased by 55% in a week.

Iran | A child bride who was due to be executed this month in Iran over the death of her husband has had her life spared by his parents, who were paid the equivalent of £70,000 in exchange for their forgiveness.

UK politics | Downing Street has vowed to force the Lords to vote on the employment rights bill again next week, after Conservative and cross-bench peers blocked it on Wednesday night.

Topic | The US wants Ukraine to withdraw its troops from the Donbas region, and Washington would then create a “free economic zone” in the parts where Kyiv has held off the Russian invasion – but “they don’t know” under whose control it would be, Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said.

Published: December 12, 2025, 6:50 am

YouTube channels spreading fake, anti-Labour videos viewed 1.2bn times in 2025

Exclusive: More than 150 anonymous channels using cheap AI tools to spread false stories about Keir Starmer, study finds

YouTube channels spreading fake, anti-Labour videos have amassed more than a billion views this year, as opportunists attempt to use AI-generated content to profit from political division in the UK.

More than 150 channels have been detected in the last year that promote anti-Labour narratives, as well as outright fake and inflammatory accusations about Keir Starmer.

Published: December 13, 2025, 5:00 pm

Reddit launches high court challenge to Australia’s under-16s social media ban

Platform fighting world-leading ban on grounds it contravenes implied freedom of political communication in constitution

• Will Australia’s social media ban survive a high court challenge?

Reddit has filed a challenge against Australia’s under-16s social media ban in the high court, lodging its case two days after implementing age restrictions on its website.

The company said in a Reddit post on Friday that while it agreed with protecting people under 16, the law “has the unfortunate effect of forcing intrusive and potentially insecure verification processes on adults as well as minors, isolating teens from the ability to engage in age-appropriate community experiences”.

Reddit said there was an “illogical patchwork” of platforms included in the ban.

Published: December 12, 2025, 4:21 am

Gavin Newsom pushes back on Trump AI executive order preempting state laws

California governor says order pushes ‘grift and corruption’ instead of innovation just hours after president’s dictum

The ink was barely dry on Donald Trump’s artificial intelligence executive order when Gavin Newsom came out swinging. Just hours after the order went public Thursday evening, the California governor issued a statement saying the presidential dictum, which seeks to block states from regulating AI of their own accord, advances “grift and corruption” instead of innovation.

“President Trump and David Sacks aren’t making policy – they’re running a con,” Newsom said, referencing Trump’s AI adviser and crypto “czar”. “Every day, they push the limits to see how far they can take it.”

Published: December 13, 2025, 3:00 pm

‘If we build it, they will come’: Skövde, the tiny town powering up Sweden’s video game boom

It started with a goat. Now – via a degree for developers and an incubator for startups – the tiny city is churning out world-famous video game hits. What is the secret of its success?

On 26 March 2014, a trailer for a video game appeared on YouTube. The first thing the viewer sees is a closeup of a goat lying on the ground, its tongue out, its eyes open. Behind it is a man on fire, running backwards in slow motion towards a house. Interspersed with these images is footage of the goat being repeatedly run over by a car. In the main shot, the goat, now appearing backwards as well, flies up into the first-floor window of a house, repairing the glass it smashed on its way down. It hurtles through another window and back to an exploding petrol station, where we assume its journey must have started.

This wordless, strangely moving video – a knowing parody of the trailer for a zombie survival game called Dead Island – was for a curious game called Goat Simulator. The game was, unsurprisingly, the first to ever put the player into the hooves of a goat, who must enact as much wanton destruction as possible. It was also the first massive hit to come out of a small city in Sweden by the name of Skövde.

Published: December 12, 2025, 1:00 pm

The Game Awards 2025: the full list of winners

Every prize at the The Game Awards from the Peacock theater in Los Angeles

• Star Wars, Tomb Raider and a big night for Expedition 33 – what you need to know from The Game Awards

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 – WINNER
Death Stranding 2: On the Beach
Donkey Kong Bananza
Hades II
Hollow Knight: Silksong
Kingdom Come: Deliverance II

Published: December 12, 2025, 9:00 am

Star Wars, Tomb Raider and a big night for Expedition 33 – what you need to know from The Game Awards

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 won nine awards, including game of the year, while newly announced games at the show include the next project from Baldur’s Gate 3 developer Larian Studios

• The Game Awards 2025: the full list of winners

At the Los Angeles’ Peacock theater last night, The Game Awards broadcast its annual mix of prize presentations and expensive video game advertisements. New titles were announced, celebrities appeared, and at one point, screaming people were suspended from the ceiling in an extravagant promotion for a new role-playing game.

Acclaimed French adventure Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 began the night with 12 nominations – the most in the event’s history – and ended it with nine awards. The Gallic favourite took game of the year, as well as awards for best game direction, best art direction, best narrative and best performance (for actor Jennifer English).

Published: December 12, 2025, 8:56 am

‘Charismatic, self-assured, formidable’: Lara Croft returns with two new Tomb Raider games

An all-new Croft adventure, Tomb Raider Catalyst, will be released in 2027 – and a remake of the action heroine’s first adventure arrives next year

After a long break for Lara Croft, a couple of fresh Tomb Raider adventures are on their way. They will be the first new games in the series since 2018, and both will be published by Amazon.

Announced at the Game Awards in LA, Tomb Raider Catalyst stars the “charismatic, self-assured, formidable Lara Croft” from the original 1990s games, says game director Will Kerslake. It’s set in the markets, mountains, and naturally the ancient buildings of northern India, where Lara is racing with other treasure hunters to track down potentially cataclysmic artefacts. It will be out in 2027.

Published: December 12, 2025, 2:45 am

Changes to polar bear DNA could help them adapt to global heating, study finds

Scientists say bears in southern Greenland differ genetically to those in the north, suggesting they could adjust

Changes in polar bear DNA that could help the animals adapt to warmer climates have been detected by researchers, in a study thought to be the first time a statistically significant link has been found between rising temperatures and changing DNA in a wild mammal species.

Climate breakdown is threatening the survival of polar bears. Two-thirds of them are expected to have disappeared by 2050 as their icy habitat melts and the weather becomes hotter.

Published: December 12, 2025, 1:00 am

Psychedelic treatments show promise for OCD while cannabis doesn’t, review finds

Psychiatry professor theorizes that the difference is related to how the substances interact with areas of the brain

A recent review of alternative treatments for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) indicates that psychedelic treatments show promise for the disorder while cannabis does not.

Dr Michael Van Ameringen, a psychiatry professor at McMaster University in Ontario, Canada and lead author of the review published in the Journal of Psychiatric Research, said that 40-60 % of OCD patients get either partial or no relief with available treatments, including SSRIs and exposure and response prevention therapy.

Published: December 13, 2025, 4:00 pm

Wes Streeting calls for ‘cross-party consensus’ on gender identity ahead of puberty blocker trial

Health secretary wrote to Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch, urging her to ‘take heat and ideology’ out of debate

The health secretary, Wes Streeting, has called on the Conservatives to maintain the cross-party consensus on gender identity services built before the last election in a letter to Kemi Badenoch.

Streeting wrote to opposition leader on Friday urging her to “take the heat and the ideology” out of debate amid controversy over a puberty blocker trial for children.

Published: December 13, 2025, 2:23 pm