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Patricia Hewitt, the health secretary, will today put an end to speculation that Gordon Brown will make the NHS independent of political control when he becomes prime minister. In a lecture at the London School of Economics, she will reject proposals for an independent board, similar to the BBC, which would run tax-funded services without allowing ministers to interfere with operational decisions. Ms Hewitt will say: "You don't solve the problems by proposing that a modern health service can be run like a 1960s nationalised industry."
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Your big idea won't work, Hewitt warns Brown - The Telegraph 14th June 2007
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Your big idea won't work, Hewitt warns Brown - The Telegraph 14th June 2007
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Doctors' and patients' groups yesterday angrily condemned a ruling by the health watchdog classing a drug to combat blindness as too costly to be used to treat more than one eye per person among the worst-affected people using the NHS. The Royal College of Ophthalmologists said that the draft ruling, from the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice), was "completely unacceptable". It meant that only patients already in effect blind in one eye because of the condition wet age-related macular degeneration would be able to get the newest and most effective drug, Lucentis.
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'Cruel' decision on drugs funding may leave 20,000 blind - The Independent 14th June 2007
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Patients are denied blindness drugs - The Times 14th June 2007
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Cruel watchdog condems 20,000 to blindness - The Telegraph 14th June 2007
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Condemned to blindness: Scots get drug that can save sight, but English don't - Daily Mail 14th June 2007
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Anger over blindness drugs ruling - BBC Health News 13th June 2007
Victims will be warned when their mentally ill attackers are to be released from custody, and will be allowed to make representations about their discharge, under plans unveiled by the government yesterday as it offered a spate of amendments to resolve a nine-year wrangle over new mental health laws. The health minister, Rosie Winterton, also made a U-turn over the treatment of children with mental health problems and strengthened the rights of patients. She said she was "looking seriously" at a compromise to answer concerns that the bill would allow the compulsory treatment of mental health patients even if they would not benefit - the issue lying at the heart of opposition to the new laws.
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Ministers retreat on law to lock up mental patients - Daily Mail 13th June 2007
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What's chemical castration? - The Guardian 14th June 2007
Surgical castration of sex offenders went out about 100 years ago, but it has been a dream of many doctors, police and prison officers - not to mention home secretaries - to find a magic pill that would stop paedophiles re-offending, particularly because some of them beg for help in controlling their sexual urges. The Home Secretary, John Reid said yesterday that he is willing to take some tentative steps down the chemical road for those paedophiles who want it. In this he is falling into line with several US states (though some have compulsory treatment for re-offenders) and a few European countries including France, Sweden and Germany.
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The Big Question: How do you deal with sex offenders, and does 'chemical castration' work? - The Independent 14th June 2007
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Michael Cross: The foundations of an NHS IT system are in place: now start building - The Guardian 14th June 2007Additional Story
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No doubt Gordon Brown's inbox is already creaking with suggestions about what he should do with the NHS national programme for IT. No doubt, too, some of these suggestions involve inserting the programme up the anatomy of certain senior civil servants. In the five years since the government published its blueprint Delivering 21st Century IT Support for the NHS, the world's largest civil IT programme has amassed an impressive array of enemies: doctors, politicians, academics and privacy groups.
Whitehall has taken a first step towards a Government 2.0 with a report that urges a greater official involvement with the grassroots web. Imagine Government 2.0. Wisdom no longer flows from officialdom to the population, but is co-created with citizens. Civil servants contribute openly to Facebook groups on controversies of the day. Government websites have wiki areas where people can exchange tips about filing tax returns or claiming benefits. Databases of restaurant inspections, tide tables and postcodes are available for all to see and re-use in mashups of geography, time or events. Before launching a new online public service, the government checks to see whether a user community is already doing it better. In short, government learns to let go of the web.
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It was meant to be the perfect village. Chosen for its picturesque setting, it was one hay wain away from being a Constable painting. But, according to a new report, a sinister atmosphere of intolerance is lurking behind the facade of English country villages. Research into an anonymous home counties village, referred to as "Stonycroft", has discovered that homosexuals, divorcees and single people are the targets of gossip and bullying, and are often ostracised.
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Hundreds of thousands of elderly people are being abused in their own homes or in privately run residential homes, according to a study published today. Although the report indicated the rates of serious physical abuse and injury are relatively low, there is widespread evidence of bullying, neglect and low-level abuse at the hands of care workers.
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Patients are paying up to £5,000 to private clinics for health checks and scans. But is there any evidence that they save lives? And do the radiation doses outweigh any potential benefits? Nigel Hawkes reports In A Day at the Races, the Marx Brothers’ 1937 classic, a generously unholstered matron, played by Margaret Dumont, threatens to leave the Standish Sanatorium because it cannot find anything wrong with her. “I’m going to someone who understands me, I’m going to Dr Hackenbush! . . . Why, I didn’t know there was a thing the matter with me until I met him!” she says. Hackenbush, played by Groucho, takes her money and feeds her pills intended for horses.
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Cancer experts have accused the Government of dragging its heels over the introduction of a life-saving vaccine against cervical cancer. In a letter to The Times, more than 20 oncologists say that the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) is prevaricating. It says that, after a year of consideration, the JCVI has given no indication of when a decision will be made. Two vaccines have been developed. Cervarix, made by Merck, is already licensed and Gardasil, a rival product from GlaxoSmithKline, is expected to get a licence this year.The letter is designed to prompt the JCVI, which meets on June 20, to reach a decision.
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An anxious reader in Norfolk has asked about chickenpox in children. She read that a five-year-old had died in London from the disease and that this is the second death in children from chickenpox in the past few years. Should she have her young children vaccinated?
Nearly three quarters of students taking hay fever medication can expect to drop a grade in their exams this year as ingredients in the most popular remedies interfere with their ability to concentrate, research suggests. Even hay fever sufferers not taking any medication face a 40 per cent risk of achieving lower grades than expected as a result of their condition, the study by the Education for Health charity has found.
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Hay fever 'causes GCSE pupils to drop grades' - The Telegraph 14th June 2007
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Hay fever link to poorer GCSEs - BBC Health News 13th June 2007
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Stripping the skin of a protective layer and allowing allergens to penetrate the skin could be causing not only eczema but allergic conditions such as hayfever, asthma and rhinitus, the two scientists from University College London's Institute of Child Health said. The theory differs to the "hygiene hypothesis", which suggests that "too clean" homes could be causing a rise in allergies.
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Strong soaps 'strip the skin and fuel allergies' - Daily Mail 13th June 2007
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Harsh soaps blamed for allergies - BBC Health News 13th June 2007
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Men really do suffer pregnancy symptoms in sympathy with their partners, a study has shown. Fathers-to-be endure cramps, back pain, mood swings, food cravings, morning sickness, extreme tiredness, depression, irritability, fainting and toothache, researchers found. Some even develop swollen stomachs that look like a "baby bump", according to the largest study of its kind in Britain. And the longer the pregnancy goes on, the worse men's symptoms get.
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The court had to determine the form of award arising out of a claim for damages for clinical negligence brought by the claimant (C) against the defendant health authority. C had sustained brain injuries at birth that had left him with a mental age of five, and suffering from cerebral palsy, epilepsy and associated conditions. The health authority admitted liability and agreed all heads of loss except care and case management. C's care required almost constant supervision and in particular C did not regularly sleep for eight hours through the night but rather often went to bed late and woke early. Issues arose as to whether
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Told he needed a tonsil operation at the age of three, Ben Grocock was terrified. So terrified, he insisted he would never speak again if the surgery went ahead. His parents brushed off his threat (he was three, after all) and the operation took place.
NHS Direct is needlessly referring many patients to GPs and hospital casualty departments, putting real emergency cases at risk, it was claimed yesterday. Some patients are being wrongly classified as urgent referrals - with minor sprains or temperatures - and so leapfrogging others with more serious complaints, claim doctors and ambulance crews.
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She is not known for books on slimming. But if you want to lose weight, Jilly Cooper is apparently the author to turn to. Scientists claim that simply reading a racy novel can help you fight the flab. They have calculated that a few hours engrossed in a book can double your basal metabolic rate.
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A 14-year-old has baffled medical experts by turning up at hospital with a broken neck - having broken it when he was a toddler. Alfie Tyson-Brown has been playing rugby, mountain biking and surfing - all of which could have caused fatal damage to his spinal cord.
Obesity has been a factor in at least 20 child protection cases in the last year, the BBC has learned. Some doctors now believe in extreme cases overfeeding a young child should be seen as a form of abuse or neglect.
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Hundreds of GPs are gathering in London threatening to issue a vote of no confidence in the government. Delegates at the British Medical Association's GPs conference will attack a whole raft of NHS policies.
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It is Britain's most pressing health issue - how can the NHS afford all the expensive new technologies coming its way? I was given exclusive access to a panel at a Primary Care Trust which meets every month to rule on exceptional cases.
Much as she might hate to admit it, a woman's choice of partner may depend a lot on her own father. Scientists have found women who were treated well by their dad during childhood are attracted to men who resemble their father facially.
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A bowel cancer victim has won the right to challenge her local NHS trust to fund treatment with a drug which could give her a new lease of life. Victoria Otley, 56, from Dagenham, east London, raised £15,000 herself for supplies of Avastin after she was diagnosed with cancer in November 2005.
A new generation of drugs could revolutionise treatment for people with rheumatoid arthritis, experts believe. Austrian researchers said trials show MabThera, Tocilizumab and Orencia slowed progression of the disease and reduced symptoms, the Lancet reported.
Surgeons say a complex operation on a five-year-old girl who lost skin and hair in a burns accident is a success. Sidra Afzal, from Fleur-de-Lys, near Caerphilly, underwent the surgery at Swansea's Morriston Hospital.
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It may make the stomach turn, but scientists in Norway suggest that taking a spoonful of cod liver oil each day could stave off depression. In a study of almost 22,000 people aged over 40, those who regularly took the oil were less likely to suffer depression than those who did not.
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International News
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Sleep may hold the key to success in sport, researchers said yesterday. They found that athletes performed better, ran faster and had higher energy levels after several weeks of extended sleep. Researchers from Stanford University, California, published their findings after monitoring the performance of university basketball players for eight weeks.
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Eye flickers key for fine detail - BBC Health News 13th June 2007
Tiny, involuntary movements made by our eyes when we focus on something could be more useful than we might think, scientists have found. We may not be aware that our eyes are making these movements, but without them our vision fades.
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Cheshire and Merseyside News
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WIRRAL Hospital Trust has unveiled plans to reduce its ‘carbon footprint’ and gene-rate millions of pounds in savings to be ploughed back into patient services. The Trust has committed almost £2.5m to implementing its environmentally efficient schemes, which will continue to generate energy savings of more than £1m each year.
DOZENS of Liverpool babies may have to have their jabs again because vaccines were stored at the wrong temperature. The vaccines, which protect tots from illnesses such as diphtheria, tetanus, whooping cough and polio, were supposed to be kept at between 2 and 4 degrees centigrade.
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HEALTH chiefs are supporting the smoking ban due to come in across England from July 1. It will prevent smokers from lighting up in virtually all enclosed and substantially enclosed work and public places, and in pubs and clubs.
HEALTH bosses say the increasing number of patients testing positive for a potentially killer hospital bug at Leighton Hospital is not a cause for concern. Figures released under the Freedom of Information Act reveal 102 patients were diagnosed with Clostridium Difficile (C. diff) in the first four months of 2007, more than two-thirds the number of cases recorded in the whole of last year.
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New superbug on increase at hospital - Crewe Chronicle 13th June 2007
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MIDDLEWICH MP Ann Winterton has hit out at legislation which she claims is responsible for 'reversing the abortion law to the days of back-street abortions'. Her bill to introduce compulsory abortion counselling and a week-long 'cooling off ' period for pregnant women seeking abortions was defeated last Tuesday by 182 votes to 107.
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Cumbria and Lancashire News
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We helped Hannibal Lecter and the Man in Black quit smoking - Carlisle News & Star 13th June 2007
A CLINIC that has helped some of the world’s best-known celebrities quit smoking is set to open a branch in Cumbria. The Allen Carr Organisation has helped stars such as Richard Branson, Sir Anthony Hopkins – who played serial killer Hannibal Lecter in Silence of the Lambs – and Johnny Cash stub out their cigarette habit.
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Greater Manchester News
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MIXED sex wards are a national disgrace and should be scrapped. Now, health chiefs at the Royal Bolton Hospital are investigating allegations that two elderly women were sexually assaulted on a mixed ward there, and a man has appeared in court.
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Diabetic mum saved by son, aged three - The Bolton News 13th June 2007
THREE-year-old Kane Richards proved he was a little hero when his mother suffered a diabetic attack. The youngster was with his mum, Suzanne Ainsworth, at their home in Beachcroft Avenue, Darcy Lever, yesterday when she passed out.
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THREE-year-old Kane Richards proved he was a little hero when his mother suffered a diabetic attack. The youngster was with his mum, Suzanne Ainsworth, at their home in Beachcroft Avenue, Darcy Lever, yesterday when she passed out.
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Company bosses are giving staff time off work to stub it out. Managing directors of Leighs Paints have invited Bolton's Stop Smoking Service to visit employees during work time to offer counselling and practical help when quitting. With just 17 days to go until smoking in all enclosed public places is outlawed throughout England, a dozen people at the Kestor Street company have taken advantage of the scheme.
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ALTRINCHAM and Sale West MP Graham Brady is calling on Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt to tackle closed GP lists. He wrote to her following the release of figures that reveal that many Trafford GPs have closed their lists to new patients.
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MEPs back legal cannabis - Manchester Evening News 13th June 2007
A THIRD of Britain's Euro MPs support the decriminalisation of cannabis, according to a study. They were second only to the Dutch in their support for a change in the law. Research by Manchester University shows a significant proportion of British MEPs who answered a survey believe the drug should be made legal despite growing health fears over its use.
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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