Category Archives: Health

Wrist-worn trackers can detect Covid before symptoms, study finds

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Sensor tech can alert wearer to Covid early, helping to prevent onward transmission

Health trackers worn on the wrist could be used to spot Covid-19 days before any symptoms appear, according to researchers.

Growing numbers of people worldwide use the devices to monitor changes in skin temperature, heart and breathing rates. Now a new study shows that this data could be combined with artificial intelligence (AI) to diagnose Covid-19 even before the first tell-tale signs of the disease appear.

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Queensland budget’s record health spending meaningless without wages boost, unions say

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Pressure grows on state government to increase public sector salaries to meet cost of living

Record health funding promised in the Queensland budget is meaningless without a wages policy that attracts essential workers and keeps pace with cost of living increases, unions say.

Michael Clifford, the general secretary of the Queensland Council of Unions, said the 2022 budget surplus should be channelled into a fair pay increase for public sector workers after years of stagnant wages.

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Ex-Hells Angels bikie who struck police horse’s head during anti-lockdown protest jailed

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Dennis Basic, 42, had pleaded guilty to animal cruelty, assaulting police and throwing a missile following Melbourne protests in 2020 and 2021

An anti-lockdown protester has been jailed for throwing a heavy bollard at a mounted officer and hitting a police horse in the head during separate protests in Melbourne.

Ex-Hells Angels bikie Dennis Basic, 42, was sentenced to 26 months and 14 days in prison on Tuesday for a dozen offences including assaulting an emergency worker, animal cruelty and recklessly causing injury.

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Fake Twitter accounts for new senator suspended – as it happened

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Twitter suspends two fake accounts pretending to be Fatima Payman; nation records at least 59 Covid deaths. This blog is now closed

Victoria is reporting a spike in Covid related deaths, after 28 people lost their lives overnight:

Rally outside NSW parliament to protest government’s wages policy

We are losing skilled teachers, nurses, cleaners – and we’re going to have more pressure in NSW for services to be provided that we can’t retain.

It’s not much to ask and the government needs to act.

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Jeremy Hunt reveals he had cancer and all his family have had disease

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Former health secretary says he has now recovered as he prepares to take part in Race for Life charity run

The former health secretary Jeremy Hunt has revealed he had cancer and has since recovered.

The Conservative MP said he would be taking part in a 5km race to raise money for cancer charities after the disease affected some of his relatives “very dramatically” and he experienced a “minor" one” himself.

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Republican states trying to ban abortion expand health benefits for new mothers

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Bills with benefits for low-income mothers don’t counteract bans that would lead to higher risks for maternal mortality, say experts

A number of Republican-led states that are moving to ban abortion are, at the same time, extending health insurance benefits to new mothers, professing to support “women in crisis”.

As the US supreme court prepares to rule on national abortion rights, many Republican states are seeking severe abortion bans that would force many women to carry pregnancies to term, likely worsening the US maternal mortality crisis.

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Fundraiser launches to get terminally ill man to Glastonbury by helicopter

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Friends of Nigel Stonehouse, 58, who has kidney and lung cancer, seek help with costs of transporting him to his final festival

The friends of a terminally ill man have launched a fundraising campaign to help him attend the Glastonbury festival next week.

Nigel Stonehouse, 58, from Hartlepool, was recently diagnosed with kidney cancer, which has now spread to his lungs. After receiving the terminal diagnosis, his friends wanted to fulfil his “dying wish” of attending the festival for a final time.

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CDC recommends Covid vaccines for infants, toddlers and preschoolers

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Children as young as six months will be able to get shots from either Pfizer or Moderna after Friday’s FDA approval

Children as young as six months old, through age five, will be able to get the US’s first Covid-19 vaccines approved for infants, toddlers and preschoolers.

The development came after final sign-off on Saturday from Rochelle Walensky, the director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

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New strike chaos as teachers and NHS staff warn of action over pay

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Rail unions set to walk out on Tuesday, as clashes loom over public sector pay offers falling short of inflation

A wave of 1970s-style economic unrest is threatening to spread from the railways across the public services, as unions representing teachers and NHS workers warn of potential industrial action over pay.

With the country preparing for rail strikes on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday which will see half the network shut down, the biggest teaching union, the National Education Union (NEU), told the Observer that unless it receives a pay offer much closer to inflation by Wednesday, it will be informing education secretary Nadhim Zahawi of its plan to ballot its 450,000 members. The move could lead to strikes in schools in England in the autumn, the union said.

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Migrant care workers came to help the UK. Now they’re trapped in debt bondage

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Investigation: Britain called out to workers around the world to ease a staff crisis. But many have to pay thousands in illegal fees to recruitment agencies

Read exclusive story: Migrant care workers charged thousands in illegal fees

Meera Stephen came to Britain with a big suitcase and even bigger dreams. The 27-year-old had left Kerala in south India to work at a care home in Manchester, one of thousands of migrant workers to come after a government recruitment drive to fill more than 100,000 vacancies in social care.

The job would pay £10 an hour – just above minimum wage. But it came at a price. In exchange for securing her employment, she would pay a recruitment agent 1.3m rupees – about £13,700.

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Ambulance staff ‘unable to drive’ new vehicles because of height and body shape

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Documents obtained by BBC show 160 staff encountered problems with East of England ambulance service vehicles

Staff at an ambulance service have claimed they are unable to drive a new fleet of vehicles because of their height and body shape.

The East of England ambulance service (EEAST) rolled out the £54m converted Fiats to replace its deteriorating Mercedes vans, as part of an effort to standardise NHS ambulances.

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Albanese urged to intervene in Assange case; Perrottet defends Barilaro job; at least 55 Covid deaths – as it happened

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NSW premier says John Barilaro’s new role ‘no surprise’ to him; government ministers say Assange case ‘should be brought to a close’. This blog is now closed

Could an eighth world title be in the offing?

AAP reports:

Once I got past Caroline [Marks], I was super confident and I knew I could do it.

Lakey [Peterson] is an amazing surfer, so I knew it was going to be a tough Final but it doesn’t get any better. I love doing this. I love winning, I love doing this sport.

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Coeliac patient died after being fed Weetabix in hospital, inquiry hears

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Hazel Pearson’s condition not signposted by her bed as coroner deems Wrexham Maelor’s plan of response ‘amateurish’

An 80-year-old woman with coeliac disease died within days of being fed Weetabix in hospital, an inquest has heard.

Hazel Pearson, from Connah’s Quay in Flintshire, was being treated at Wrexham Maelor hospital and died four days later on 30 November from aspiration pneumonia. Although her condition was recorded on her admission documents, there was no sign beside her bed to alert healthcare assistants to her dietary requirements, BBC News reported.

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Heaven Supermarket: the Beijing bar at centre of Covid outbreak

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Self-service bar popular with locals and foreigners has been shut down after being linked to hundreds of cases

Heaven Supermarket’s ability to attract young Chinese customers and foreigners has always been viewed with envy by its competitor bars in the Chinese capital.

Located in one of the busiest nightlife districts in Beijing, the bar is modelled as a large self-service liquor store with chairs, sofas and tables. It is not the fanciest in its presentation, but on Chinese review websites, patrons highlight its affordability and down-to-earth attitude.

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Australia news live updates: Albanese extends Covid funding as nation records 51 deaths from virus; energy supply will meet weekend demand, Aemo says

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NSW premier says health funding ‘a great start’ after national cabinet meeting; electricity reserves improve across National Energy Market; ASX plunges to lowest level since November 2020; nation records 51 Covid deaths. Follow live

The PM is making the rounds this morning, appearing on Sunrise and repeating his line that almost a decade of “delay and denial” under the former Coalition government led to the current energy crisis (I feel like this will be a recurring theme today.)

People want an end to the nonsense that’s gone on for the last decade.

You can’t fix 10 years of inaction in just 10 days but we are taking immediate action through Aemo to make sure that the lights stay on. At the same time, we’re making sure that we create the investment environment to make sure we get it right.

The gas is actually the property of the people of the state, whichever state that is, and there should have always been enough for the state and the country in question. It just seems to me to be very strange that there’s no gas for local people yet.

Coal-fired power generation is very old technology and very difficult for coal plants to cope with renewables coming onto the grid, basically, new renewables every minute

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One in two young Australians experienced stressors during pandemic, data shows

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People aged 18 to 24 had to deal with mental ill health or job woes far more than older people, Australian Bureau of Statistics finds

Young people have experienced more stressors than older Australians throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, according to new data.

On Friday, the Australian Bureau of Statistics released new figures from its National Health Survey, on stressors, diet and breastfeeding. The survey collected information from 11,000 households around the country between August 2020 and June 2021.

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NHS to offer women in England drug that cuts recurrence of breast cancer

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Abemaciclib can improve chances of certain type of cancer not returning after surgery by more than 30%

Thousands of women in England with breast cancer are to benefit from a new pill on the NHS which reduces the risk of the disease coming back.

The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) has given the green light to abemaciclib, which cuts the chance of breast cancer returning after a patient has had surgery to remove a tumour.

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Australian Medical Association calls for overhaul of national cabinet secrecy rules

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Omar Khorshid says Australians ‘have a right to know’ what is discussed, ahead of Anthony Albanese’s meeting with states and territories

Secrecy rules should not “automatically” apply to national cabinet documents and deliberations, the head of the Australian Medical Association has said.

Omar Khorshid made the comments ahead of Anthony Albanese’s first meetings with the state and territory leaders on Thursday evening. Friday’s meeting is expected to deliver major changes to the intergovernmental body, including a greater productivity reform focus.

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Doctors warn against over-medicalising menopause after UK criticism

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Seeing natural event as hormone deficiency requiring treatment could increase women’s anxiety, say medics

Doctors have hit back at critics saying they are failing menopausal women, and said that treating menopause as a hormone deficiency that requires medical treatment could fuel negative expectations and make matters worse.

Writing in the British Medical Journal they said there was an urgent need for a more realistic and balanced narrative which actively challenges the idea that menopause is synonymous with an inevitable decline in women’s health and wellbeing, and called for continued efforts to improve awareness about the symptoms and how to deal with them.

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Is UK at start of new Covid wave driven by BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants?

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Virus may be evolving to refavour infecting lung tissue. We assess what this could mean for the course of the pandemic

If you thought Covid-19 was dead and gone, think again. Early signs indicate that the UK may be at the start of a new wave of Covid infections driven by BA.4 and BA.5 – while new data suggests these variants may have evolved to refavour infecting lung tissue, which could make them more dangerous.

So what can we expect in the coming weeks and months?

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