[1] During his gap year in 2003, he served a short service limited commission as a second lieutenant in the British Army.
[2] Akam has written for a number of publications including The Guardian, The New York Times, Reuters, The Economist, GQ, and The Atlantic.
[3] In 2015, Akam was commissioned by Penguin Random House imprint William Heinemann to write a book on the British Army.
[4] The book's eventual publication provoked debate, with Anthony Loyd writing in the New Statesman that the book 'exposes the failures of the British army'.
[6] In 2021, Akam and Natasha Loder jointly won a Feature of the Year prize from the Medical Journalists’ Association.