ROME — For years, the anti-establishment Five Star Movement has spread confusion about vaccines.

Its co-founder raised links between vaccines and autism. Its political leader campaigned against a law making vaccines obligatory. Its myriad websites drew traffic with posts by vaccine skeptics, and its party representatives blamed vaccines for tumors and allergies. For one senator, vaccine scars were “branding for beasts.”

On Thursday, as school began this week around Italy, the Five Star Movement and its coalition partner, the League, passed a measure that allows children to stay in school as long as their parents attest that they have been vaccinated, or will be by March. No doctor’s note is required.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/20/world/europe/italy-vaccines-five-star-movement.html

British PM Theresa May has demanded that the EU bring to the negotiating table a set of new proposals to break the “impasse,” declaring she will not “overturn the result of the referendum nor will I break up my country.”

Following the summit in Salzburg, Austria, of the 27 EU member states where EC President Donald Tusk declared May’s proposed economic partnership with the EU post-Brexit would “not work,” the UK PM has hit back saying "neither side should demand the unacceptable of the other."

In her Downing Street address, she warned that EU proposals concerning the single market would lead to uncontrolled immigration and “make a mockery” of the EU referendum result. May also claimed that the EU’s Irish “backstop” proposal is unworkable, which would threaten the “integrity of the UK.”

May said: “The EU is proposing to achieve this [backstop] by effectively keeping Northern Ireland in the Customs Union. As I have already said, that is unacceptable. We will never agree to it.”

“It would mean breaking up our country. We will set out our alternative that preserves the integrity of the UK,” she added.

Bloomberg have reported Sterling taking a hit after May’s Brexit speech, dropping 1.2% against the Dollar.

Pounds falls further as Prime Minister Theresa May speaks https://t.co/XhHCdVeMnYpic.twitter.com/UcT9KT7ZSp

— Bloomberg Markets (@markets) September 21, 2018

Formal negotiations on withdrawal began between the UK and the EU in June 2017 and talks on issues such as the rights of EU citizens and the Irish border have been slow going.

On July 6, 2018, after a marathon 12-hour showdown at Chequers, May finally managed to secure a Brexit plan to present to the EU. The Chequers deal was labelled a “stinker” by Boris Johnson as the plan would see the UK remain closely tied to the EU – but after the Salzburg summit Brussels dismissed it too, with talks have now reached an impasse.

https://www.rt.com/uk/439040-uk-to-prepare-no-deal/