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I'm with you, gitto. The "hint" provided has been gazed at, pored over, thought about for well over another Solver's 20 minutes, but is as opaque as Mr E's clue. Is she merely a famous (sic) Maoist?

18 across: female name meaning "peace" is def (you've probably got that). Parsing is usual abbrev for Italy + a word that means a convert to Islam (unusual spelling). The last few letters of this word are often added to other words to denote a scandal, by analogy with a scandal that took place in an American hotel, and need to be removed.

Thanks Loge, I know understand both clues, no doubt we will see a Listener set by Ginge soon (and that is intended as a compliment!!)

Good heavens, loge! You learn something every day.

Puzzle finished including the instruction, but I don't really get what is meant to be going on. However, I have done exactly what I was told.

I had a sinking feeling when I saw the pandemic in the grid, but thankfully I believe this is an accident.

Is it an accident? Curious that the word starts in 19 dn ...

Just logged on to say we've been infected, but I see that others have seen it already. Very strange, though, isn't it?

That was fun! I see that early on there was some debate about the final letter of 18 as entered. I must be missing something because I could only find one spelling of the to be truncated word in the wordplay and had no doubt about the spelling as entered. But also now no doubt I’ve gone agley!

After a very long week I wasn't quite "with it" on Friday and on first inspection was concerned that this was going to be a toughie. However it turned out to be a steady solve with some nice cluing and an enjoyable end game. I too am curious about the appearance of the topical word but I suppose it's just coincidence. Thank you, Mr E!

I'm with foinavon. Have completed and think I have the endgame in that I have joined some omission points and got something that looks relevant, but haven't the faintest idea what p and q are or what on earth is going on. Enjoyed it though.

Thankful that it was relatively quick as I had three listeners on the go at 4.30 on Friday. Fortunately finished kea's excellent effort on friday night so now have a few days to try and make some more progress with my half-completed oxymoron from 2 weeks ago...