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There are new warnings about a possible outbreak of measles in European countries including Czechia. Despite repeated warnings by the World Health Organization and national authorities, some Czech parents still refuse to have their children vaccinated. Our reporter Vít Pohanka spoke to both the opponents and proponents of vaccination for children and took a broader look at the issue.

Czechs are known around the world for a number of inventions, such as soft contact lenses or the Semtex plastic explosive. But not many know that they also invented the so-called síťovka or net bag, which was a predecessor of the widely used plastic bags. Czech Radio paid a visit to a Prague-based company, called Czech Net Bag, which has been trying to revive the nearly hundred-year-old product and bring it back into fashion.

Ondřej Sekora is perhaps best-known as the author of the beloved cartoon character Ferda Mravenec or Ferdy the Ant. But Sekora was more than just an illustrator and comics author. He was also a journalist, an amateur entomologist, and one of the first propagators of rugby in Czechoslovakia. The Moravian Museum in Brno will mark 120 years since Ondřej Sekora’s birth with an exhibition and a new monography.

The National Library of Israel has started digitising a long-lost batch of archival materials, belonging to Franz Kafka’s friend Max Brod. They include, among other things, Kafka’s personal diary and a notebook in which he practiced Hebrew. Israel received the missing documents from a Swiss bank in August after years of international searches and legal disputes over the author’s legacy.

The Lennon Wall, located in a secluded square in Malá Strana near the French embassy, had long been a traditional place where anybody was free to do any type of graffiti they want, though the general subject was John Lennon and world peace. This symbol of freedom, born in the communist years, later became a significant Prague landmark, connected with the dissident years and the Velvet Revolution. But the overwhelming interest in it proved too much. Things got out of hand and now the famous wall is undergoing a major transformation.

Creamy soup from leftover mashed potatoes or vinegar made from fruit and vegetable scraps - these are just some of the many recipes included in a new cook book by the Initiative Zachraň Jídlo or Save Food. Its aim is to teach Czech consumers to reduce household waste by providing tips and recipes using food scraps, leftovers and surplus seasonal ingredients.

Thursday marks the European Day of Languages, which is celebrated annually across the continent. It aims to promote the rich linguistic diversity of Europe and raise awareness of the importance of lifelong language learning. Here in the Czech Republic, the European Day of Languages will be marked at Prague’s Campus Hybernská. Visitors can attend exhibitions and lectures as well as special language courses, from Yakut and Yiddish to Faroese and Sarkese.

Few people in the Czech Republic know that a significant chapter in the history of early Czech sound recordings was written by Czech immigrants in the United States. For several years now, Filip Šír from the National Museum in Prague has been searching for the lost recordings and the stories of the people behind them. Last year, he published his findings in a book called Bohemia on Records, written together with music collector Gabriel Goessel. But he says there is still much more waiting to be discovered.

Doctors at the University Hospital in Brno are celebrating an unprecedented success. In mid-August, they delivered a healthy baby girl 117 days after her mother was declared brain dead after suffering a brain haemorrhage. It is the longest artificially sustained pregnancy in a brain-dead mother ever recorded in medical history.

Many Czechs in Australia will be familiar with the voice of Filip Koubek. This is because for many years he presented special Czech broadcasting produced by the country’s SBS radio aimed at Czech expats living in the country. Now, more than 40 years after its launch, the service has been discontinued.