Welcome to the Podcast of Another 15 Minutes, Health News from the Fade Library. Full links to the articles detailed can be found at www (dot) fade the blog 2 (dot) blogspot (dot)com
National News
New Story
NHS £6bn IT system poor value, say experts - The Guardian 22nd January 2007
Leading healthcare IT experts have warned that the NHS's troubled £6.2bn system upgrade is costing taxpayers substantially more than it should. They claim the same functions could be delivered for considerably less outsid e of the national programme for IT, dogged by delays and software setbacks. Stephen Critchlow, executive chairman of software group Ascribe, said he "could not see where value for money is coming from". There was evidence, he added, to suggest the NPfIT was installing and running systems for several times the going rate.
New Story
GP pay and private profit in the NHS - The Guardian 22nd January 2007
If Polly Toynbee had dug a little deeper she would have discovered some fundamental errors in her arguments against the new GP contract (GPs who can't manage themselves should be brought back into the NHS, January 19). It isn't "odd" that the BMA has submitted evidence to the doctors' independent pay review body on GP pay. It has always done so since the review body was set up. What's more, the government sends in evidence too. For the first years of the new contract the BMA submitted joint evidence with the Department of Health precisely on GP pay. This year the DoH has decided it doesn't want to, but it is wrong to say it is the BMA which has changed its mind.
New Story
Cancer fear as fewer women take routine smear tests - The Guardian 22nd January 2007
Doctors are predicting a surge in cervical cancer rates because younger women are abandoning smear tests, a report shows today. Last year 1,300 fewer women aged 25 to 29 in England had smear tests every week than 10 years earlier. More than 30% now ignore their invitation to take part in the national screening programme.
Additional Story
Decline in smears raises risk - The Independent 22nd January 2007
Additional Story
Women at cancer risk shunning smear test - The Times 22nd January 2007
Additional Story
Women risk cancer by skipping smear test - The Telegraph 22nd January 2007
New Story
Cameron calls for legalisation of 'medical marijuana' - The Independent 22nd January 2007
David Cameron has supported calls for cannabis to be legalised for medical use provided that clear health benefits can be shown. The Tory leader, who has refused to answer media questions about whether he used drugs before entering politics, ruled out a wider legalisation of cannabis for recreational use.
Additional Story
Cameron hint on cannabis medicine - BBC Health News 21st January 2007
New Story
Cancer scientists' gene research offers new treatment hope - The Independent 22nd January 2007
Scientists are developing a new weapon in the war on cancer by targeting the human genes that allow tumours to grow unchecked in the body. Two separate teams of researchers have found a way of switching off critical genes within a tumour cell that would otherwise stimulate the spread of the cancer. Although the research is still at an early stage, scientists are describing the approach as potentially one of the most important developments since the former US president Richard Nixon declared his "war in cancer" in 1971.
New Story
IVF doctor 'overwhelmed' by support - The Independent 22nd January 2007
A controversial fertility doctor yesterday said he felt "overwhelmed" after dozens of families gathered to back him following an official investigation and allegations in a BBC documentary over his practice. Parents and children gathered outside Mohamed Taranissi's clinic in central London to say they would not have had a family without his help.
Additional Story
Families show support for controversial fertility doctor - The Times 22nd January 2007
New Story
How a dog's life can make you happier - The Independent 22nd January 2007
If you are looking for a healthier life, get a dog. Scientists have long believed that the companionship of a pet can be good for you, but new research suggests that dog owners are physically healthier than cat owners. According to Deborah Wells from Queen's University, Belfast, dog owners tend to have lower blood pressure and cholesterol levels, possibly thanks to regular walks with their four-legged friends.
Additional Story
Improve your health, become a dog owner - The Telegraph 22nd January 2007
New Story
We will scrap targets and give GPs freedom, say Tories - The Times 22nd January 2007
Most of the Government’s centralised health targets would be scrapped and family doctors given the freedom to run their own budgets and decide where their patients are treated under Conservative plans released today. Measures such as waiting times would no longer be targeted but instead the health service would be asked to focus on the outcomes it should achieve. For breast cancer, according to the Conservatives, better care would be achieved if the NHS abandoned its target of a two-month waiting time to first treatment and concentrated on improving the five-year survival rate.
Additional Story
We'll free doctors from Whitehall, say Tories - The Telegraph 22nd January 2007
Additional Story
Conservatives to scrap NHS targets - Daily Mail 21st January 2007
Additional Story
Tories aim to scrap NHS targets - BBC Health News 21st January 2007
New Story
NHS threatened - The Times 22nd January 2007
It is time for an honest and open discussion about what kind of National Health Service the public wants. Over the past year we have seen a dramatic acceleration of reforms to put the NHS on a market footing. This has been accompanied by actual privatisations in many areas of the health service. This process is so widespread, and has happened at such a pace that we can only conclude that there is a conscious policy to fragment the NHS and favour the private sector. As research from the Keep Our NHS Public campaign shows, the NHS is experiencing “patchwork privatisation” as sections of it are being handed to private control.
New Story
Mobile phones and microwave sickness - The Times 22nd January 2007
As your report suggests, there is indeed a significant health risk posed by devices that emit non-ionising radio-frequency radiation (“Cancer study ordered into mobile phones”, report, Jan 20).
New Story
Website for patients to rate GPs and hospitals - The Telegraph 22nd January 2007
The Government is creating a website where the public can publish their views on hospitals and doctors. Patients will be able to "review" the performance of their GP or hospital to help others decide where they should go for treatment.
New Story
British cancer boy needs £375,000 for pioneering US care - The Telegraph 22nd January 2007
A detective whose family has had to move from London to New York to obtain pioneering cancer treatment for her five-year-old son blamed NHS under-funding yesterday. Yvonne Brown and her husband, Richard, both former Scotland Yard officers, have been living with their children in one room in Manhattan since Dec 1 while their youngest child, Jack, receives treatment at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Center.
New Story
How have we fallen so far behind in battle to beat MRSA? - The Telegraph 22nd January 2007
As a new and deadly strain of the superbug is identified, Victoria Lambert examines Britain's track record All across Europe, virulent bacteria are on the march, constantly mutating to resist the means that we invent to destroy them. Ironically, the better we get at creating antibiotic drugs that can wipe them out, the more inventive and resistant the bacteria must become to survive and multiply.
New Story
Care home elderly go hungry, says minister - The Telegraph 22nd January 2007
Pensioners are being left hungry and undernourished in care homes and hospitals, a Government minister has admitted. Ivan Lewis, the parliamentary under secretary of state for care services, said some elderly people were given only "a single scoop of mashed potato" for lunch while others were forced to eat with plastic cutlery.
Additional Story
Starving of the elderly - Daily Mail 21st January 2007
New Story
Cut-price breast implants to combat cowboy clinics - Daily Mail 22nd January 2007
Leading plastic surgeons have joined together to offer breast implant surgery at a cut price to spare women from potentially dangerous cheap clinics. The complete Mybreast package costs £4,250 – up to £3,000 less than in some London clinics – with a lifetime follow-up.
New Story
Half of Britons suffer headaches and bloating due to food intolerance', says charity - Daily Mail 21st January 2007
Almost half of Britons are suffering from a food intolerance, according to a new report. An estimated 45 per cent of people develop digestive problems, migraines and skin complaints because of food they eat.
New Story
Teenage pregnancy myth dismissed - BBC Health News 22nd January 2007
The perception that teenage girls with unwanted pregnancies have been less careful about contraception than older women has been dismissed by a study.
International News
New Story
'Altruistic' brain region found - BBC Health News 22nd January 2007
Scientists say they have found the part of the brain that predicts whether a person will be selfish or an altruist. Altruism - the tendency to help others without obvious benefit to oneself - appears to be linked to an area called the posterior superior temporal sulcus.
New Story
Defence cell genetics unscrambled - BBC Health News 22nd January 2007
The genetic make-up of key immune system cells has been unravelled by researchers, offering clues to diseases such as rheumatoid arthritis. Scientists at two US centres scanned the genome of T-cells - a vital part of the body's defences against infection.
Full links to the articles detailed can be found at www(dot) fade the blog 2 (dot)blogspot (dot)com, This has been a Podcast of Another 15 Minutes ... Health News from the Fade Library.
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