More than 4.7 million people in India – nearly 10 times higher than official records suggest – are thought to have died because of Covid-19, according to a new World Health Organization (WHO) report. India’s government has rejected the figure, saying the methodology is flawed. Will we ever know how many Indians died in the pandemic?

In November 2020, researchers at the World Mortality Dataset – a global repository that provides updated data on deaths from all causes – asked authorities in India to provide information. “These are not available,” India’s main statistical office told the researchers, according to Ariel Karlinsky, a scientist who co-created the dataset and is a member of an advisory group set up by the the WHO for its estimates of excess deaths caused by Covid globally during 2020 and 2021. Excess deaths are a simple measure of how many more people are dying than expected compared with previous years. Although it is difficult to say how many of these deaths were due to Covid, they can be considered a measure of the scale and toll of the pandemic.

Amber Heard has told a court that ex-husband Johnny Depp repeatedly struck her during drug and alcohol-fuelled rages that she said turned the actor into an “awful thing”. Taking the witness stand on week four of the trial, Ms Heard alleged that a pattern of violence began in 2012.  Mr Depp is suing Ms Heard over a story she wrote in which she described herself as a domestic abuse victim. In his testimony, Mr Depp denied any wrongdoing. “I struggle to find the words to describe how painful this is… this is horrible for me to sit here for weeks and relive everything,” Ms Heard said shortly after taking the stand. Over several hours of testimony in Virginia on Wednesday, Ms Heard, 36, recalled her first interactions with the “charismatic” Mr Depp while filming The Rum Diary in Puerto Rico.(BBC)…[+]

In a wide-ranging interview with the BBC’s Today programme, Bill Gates says conspiracy theories about him are “crazy” and that being shouted at in public is “awful”. He also told the BBC’s Mishal Husain that meeting Jeffrey Epstein was a “mistake” and talks about Elon Musk’s recent public criticism of him. Bill Gates used to be the world’s richest person. That title is now held by Elon Musk. The two men, however, don’t get on. Last week Mr Musk accused Mr Gates of “shorting” Tesla stock – a way of making money by betting that a company will lose value. Mr Musk has also tweeted puerile insults towards Mr Gates on Twitter.

“There’s no need for him to be nice to me,” Mr Gates says. Mr Musk has argued that shorting Tesla, a company that makes electric cars, undermines Mr Gates’ environmental philanthropy. Asked specifically about whether he had bet against Tesla, Mr Gates replied: “That has nothing to do with climate change. I have ways of diversifying.”(BBC)…[+]