High numbers of staff leaving because of high pressure, lack of support, verbal abuse, long shifts and low pay, union says
NHS call handlers are quitting amid burnout at dealing with 999 calls about suicides, stabbings and shootings and the long delays before ambulances reach patients.
The pressure is so intense that 27% of control room staff in ambulance services across Britain have left their jobs over the last three years, NHS figures show.
Continue reading...Grattan Institute finds one in 10 Australians now paying $600 a year for specialist appointments
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One in 10 Australians pay almost $600 each year to see specialist doctors, with 1 million delaying or skipping appointments due to the cost, according to new analysis.
A report by the Grattan Institute, released on Monday, revealed outpatient fees have soared over the past 15 years. The average initial out-of-pocket psychiatrist fee was $671 in 2023, with some “extreme fee” specialists charging more than triple the scheduled Medicare fee. It found almost 2 million Australians are delaying or skipping specialist appointments each year – about half due to cost – adding pressure to the country’s hospital systems.
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Continue reading...Government announces £9m funding to make specialist blood machines more widely available across NHS
People living with sickle cell disease in England are to benefit from quicker and more accessible treatment due to a £9m investment, the government has announced.
Apheresis services, which are a type of treatment that removes harmful components from a patient’s blood, are to improve across England through the funding of more specialist treatment centres. The funding will ensure the wider availability of machines that remove a patient’s sickled red blood cells and replace them with healthy donor cells.
Continue reading...Among the names announced by the US health secretary are several who have expressed anti-vaccine views
Robert Kennedy Jr, the US health secretary, named new members to serve on a key panel of vaccine advisers on Wednesday after abruptly firing all 17 sitting members of the independent panel of experts, according to a post on X.
The eight new members of the advisory committee for immunization practices (ACIP) are: Joseph R Hibbeln, Martin Kulldorff, Retsef Levi, Robert W Malone, Cody Meissner, James Pagano, Vicky Pebsworth and Michael A Ross.
Continue reading...Prime minister faces Conservative party leader as chancellor to reveal how government plans to spend almost £1.4tn in 2026-27
Green party MPs and activists staged a protest outside parliament today saying the government should use the spending review to announce a wealth tax. In a post on social media, Adrian Ramsay, the party’s co-leader, said:
We expect the Chancellor to take another axe to public spending today: decline by design from a govt that refuses to tax wealth to properly fund our overstretched public services & support the most vulnerable. We need to invest in a secure & fairer future. #TaxExtremeWealth
Senior SNP figures held a secret meeting on Monday night to discuss removing John Swinney as party leader, The Herald has learned, following last week’s defeat in the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse byelection.
One of the 25 attendees said the first minister had two weeks to come up with a new strategy on independence — or risk facing a leadership challenge at the SNP conference in October.
Continue reading...Patient’s own embryo instead of partner’s was ‘incorrectly transferred’, fertility company tells ASX, months after revealing separate Queensland clinic error
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A second bungled embryo implant at Monash IVF has sparked a new investigation and the expansion of a review into the first incident, which led to a woman unknowingly giving birth to a stranger’s baby.
Monash IVF said in a statement on Tuesday that in June “a patient’s own embryo was incorrectly transferred to that patient, contrary to the treatment plan which designated the transfer of an embryo of the patient’s partner”.
Continue reading...Ontario’s chief medical officer of health says infections could have been prevented through routine vaccination
Six babies with unvaccinated mothers have been born with congenital measles in the Canadian province of Ontario since the start of the largest outbreak of the disease in the western hemisphere late last year.
Ontario’s chief medical officer of health, Kieran Moore, said the infants, who were infected with measles in the womb, had all recovered. He said the infections could have been prevented through routine vaccination.
Continue reading...Broadcaster receives hundreds of negative comments including claims it presented a potentially harmful and unscientific narrative
People living with ME or chronic fatigue syndrome who appeared on SBS’s Insight program have accused the broadcaster of betraying them in the final cut, which presented what they claim is a potentially harmful and unscientific narrative and favoured a person who said she had “cured herself” by “listening to her body”.
The SBS ombudsman is investigating their individual complaints, as well as one from Emerge Australia, the national advocacy body for patients with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS).
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Continue reading...Exclusive: Scientists also say any reduction in Foreign Office funding for vaccine alliance Gavi would harm UK’s soft power
Any cut in UK funding to a global vaccination group would damage soft power and could make British less resilient to infectious diseases, as well as causing avoidable deaths among children, leading vaccine and aid experts have warned.
Scientists including Sir Andrew Pollard, who led the development of the Oxford-AstraZeneca Covid vaccine, said a major cut in money for the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation (Gavi) could also make the UK less able to respond to a future pandemic.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Letter from six top figures says more walkouts by junior colleagues would help those who oppose the NHS
Six senior figures in England’s medical profession have criticised potential strikes by resident doctors as “a futile gesture” that will harm patients and help those who oppose the NHS.
The move is the first public evidence of the significant unease many senior doctors feel about the possibility of their junior colleagues staging a new campaign of industrial action in England.
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With the count in the seat of Bradfield finalised, where the difference in the result came down to 26 votes, Paterson says he can’t confirm whether the Coalition will seek to challenge the result.
I understand that the New South Wales Liberal party is reviewing our legal options, and I really hope that we can find a way to have Gisele Kapterian in the parliament, because she’s exactly the type of person to make the Liberal party better and the parliament better. She has great insights and professional experience. She’s a person that I hope to be playing a big role in the future of the party. But it is up to the New South Wales division and ultimately, if we decide to make any application in the court of disputed returns to that.
I’m not going to publicly engage on debate about internal policy about that. I have the opportunity to do so through the shadow cabinet process. But if there is a byelection, I would back Gisele because she’s an outstanding candidate and outstanding Liberal and someone who is placed to make a big contribution to the future of our country inside one of the major parties that will ultimately form government in this country.
That’s not something that an independent can do. And if the independents were relatively inconsequential in the last parliament, they’ll be even less relevant in this one.
Continue reading...Move is part of £450m Wes Streeting plan to tackle long delays and end hospital overcrowding
Hundreds of thousands of patients needing urgent medical help will be treated in settings other than A&E as part of a drive to cut “corridor care” and avoid another NHS winter crisis.
The move is a central plank of a government plan to improve urgent and emergency care in England, tackle the long delays many patients face in A&E and banish overcrowding in hospitals.
Continue reading...Infant had ‘contracted the virus before birth from their mother’, while the country has recorded 2,755 measles cases
A Canadian infant who was born prematurely and had measles has died, officials said on Thursday without confirming a cause of death, raising heightened concern about the virus’s resurgence.
Canada has recorded 2,755 measles cases – including 2,429 confirmed and 326 probable – according to federal health data updated on 2 June.
Continue reading...Health department defends panel as chosen based on specialist expertise and says public can contribute via consultation process
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Transgender advocates have criticised the panel assembled to conduct the Queensland government’s review of puberty blockers for lacking experts in gender affirming care and people with lived experience of trans healthcare.
The state government opened its independent review of stage 1 and stage 2 hormone therapies in Queensland’s public paediatric gender services to public submissions last week, but kept the panel conducting the review secret.
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Continue reading...Exclusive: Report finds rebates not keeping up with specialist fee rises and experts say soaring number of people putting off care is easy to understand
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The cost of an initial dermatology appointment is now up to nearly $300 on average, new data shows. It reflects a broader problem: that Medicare rebates are not keeping up with the pace specialist fees are rising.
Online healthcare directory Cleanbill, which has tracked bulk billing rates among GPs, is expanding to provide data on out-of-pocket costs to see other health professionals, starting with dermatology.
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Continue reading...Exclusive: Government-ordered review concludes term in NHS should be changed because of risks to patients’ safety
Physician associates in the NHS will be renamed to stop patients mistaking them for doctors after a review found that their title caused widespread confusion.
Thousands of physician associates who work in hospitals and GP surgeries across the UK take medical histories, examine patients and diagnose illnesses but are not doctors.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Cost-saving for 2024-25 follows pledge by Wes Streeting to cut the amount going to agencies by 30%
Spending on agency staff across the NHS in England dropped by almost £1bn in the last financial year, ministers have said, after a pledge by Wes Streeting to cut the amount going to agencies by 30%.
According to the Department of Health and Social Care, the total spent by trusts on agency staff during 2024-25 was nearly £1bn lower than the previous year.
Continue reading...Sadiq Khan seeking ‘urgent review’ of decision to ban adverts from British Pregnancy Advisory Service
The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has stepped in to reverse a ban on adverts on the London transport network calling for abortion to be decriminalised.
It is understood that the mayor is seeking an “urgent review” of a Transport for London (TfL) decision to ban the adverts from the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (Bpas) charity on the grounds they may bring the Metropolitan police into disrepute.
Continue reading...Funding shortfalls and inadequate services are letting down people in psychiatric crises, the Bondi Junction stabbings inquest hears
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Joel Cauchi’s mother didn’t appear before the coronial inquest examining her son’s life and the day her son murdered six people at a popular Bondi Junction shopping centre. But her presence was often felt, taking shape in the form of notes she had written to his doctor or in a conversation with a police officer.
One of the most striking moments of the inquest was when Michele Cauchi, now in her mid-70s, was filmed via body-worn video camera on a police officer.
Continue reading...Natalie Phelps, who has stage 4 colorectal cancer, has raised the alarm over how patients in the agency’s clinical trials are facing setbacks in treatment
A 43-year-old woman and mother of two with advanced cancer says she is experiencing life-or-death delays in treatment because of the Trump administration’s cuts to the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
Natalie Phelps, who has stage 4 colorectal cancer, has spoken publicly, raising the alarm about a setback in care for herself and others who are part of clinical trials run by the agency. Her story has made it into congressional hearings and spurred a spat between a Democratic senator and the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr. Behind the scenes, she and others are advocating to get her treatment started sooner.
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