Shortly before his relaunch as a lead apologist for Liz Truss, Sir Iain Duncan Smith had enough time on his hands to try on a MenoVest, a kind of heated gilet now enjoying a moment. This successor to the pregnancy simulator, with its understated hint of the “This is what a feminist looks like” T-shirt, is advertised as converting its male wearers into “menopause allies”.
Last week’s best known recruit was the BBC presenter Jeremy Vine. After moments in the gilet, he told a campaigner: “I’m now suffering what you suffered.” In fact, Vine suspected, he was already cognitively struggling, just like an actual menopausal woman having a hot flush: “I can’t even think of a question now.” Mercifully it had passed before management got to hear about it.
