'Nobody’s going to know I’m here'

Loneliness in modern Manchester, plus some new hospital numbers and a controversy in Oldham

Dear members — today’s bumper members-only edition contains the latest Covid-19 data in Greater Manchester, including some new hospital numbers; a lovely piece by Dani about loneliness, as experienced by a few people of very different ages; and a little report from Oldham, where the football club is cracking down on dissent.

We’re going to have a slightly reduced publishing schedule over the festive period, so the team can take a bit of time off. Today we’re editing and scheduling a lovely read for Boxing Day and another feature to go out just after the New Year. We will be back in the office after the New Year Bank Holiday.

Our print edition has created a great buzz in the past week. This morning Joshi spoke about our first full year of publishing on BBC Radio Manchester, and yesterday Press Gazette published a nice story about our print edition. Joshi told them: “A lot of the distribution is done by our own members… One member took 600 [copies] and distributed them around his neighbo…