It wasn’t all bad

Campaigners against plastic pollution celebrated a small victory last week, when JD Wetherspoon announced that it would stop automatically putting plastic straws in customers’ drinks. From January, the pub chain will only use biodegradable paper straws – a move it claims will cut the number of plastic straws discarded each year by some 70 million. JD Wetherspoon is the second big chain to cut back on plastic waste: All Bar One unveiled similar plans in June.

The fortunes of a village cricket team in Kent have been transformed by the arrival of six new members – from Afghanistan. Two years ago, Langton Green Cricket Club was so short of players that it had to call off matches. But that changed when Noor Mohammad (pictured) discovered the club, and got his friends to join too. Originally from a town near the border with Pakistan, he fled war and poverty in his teens, and spent three years trekking across Asia and Europe. Granted leave to remain in Britain, he found work as a cab driver in Tunbridge Wells. Playing cricket made him feel at home. “They can do it all – bat, bowl, field,” said club stalwart Martin Russell. “It’s as if they have been playing English village cricket all their lives.”

Measles has been eliminated in the UK, the World Health Organisation (WHO) announced last week. The disease hasn’t circulated freely in the country for three years, meeting the WHO’S criteria for elimination – although there are still isolated cases. Often these are brought in from abroad. The organisation also said the UK is on the verge of eliminating rubella. A week earlier, it was announced that England has met its target of getting 95% of children to have the first dose of the MMR vaccine before their fifth birthday.