Category Archives: Health

Patients may shun new NHS data store over privacy fears, doctors warn

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BMA raises concerns with minister about planned data platform, which could be run by US firm Palantir

Patients fear that their personal information may be misused by the NHS’s new data store, especially if the US spy technology company Palantir runs it, doctors’ leaders have warned ministers.

The planned creation of the “federated data platform” (FDP) has prompted concerns about privacy and trust in the NHS and suggestions that suspicion around it will lead patients to refuse to share their data.

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Colombia passes ambitious ‘junk food law’ to tackle lifestyle diseases

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The Latin American country is one of the first in the world to introduce a health tax targeting ultra-processed foods

A new law in Colombia making it one of the first countries in the world to explicitly tax ultra-processed food has been hailed by campaigners and health experts who say it could set an example for other countries.

After years of campaigning, the “junk food law” came into force this month and a levy will be introduced gradually. An additional tax on affected foods will begin at 10% immediately, rising to 15% next year and reaching 20% in 2025.

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Prioritise quality of life over prolonging it for elderly, Chris Whitty tells medics

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England’s chief medical officer says more realistic conversations needed about some treatments’ side-effects

England’s chief medical officer, Prof Chris Whitty, has called for a cultural shift in medicine away from maximising lifespan and towards improving quality of life in old age, arguing that sometimes this means “less medicine, not more”.

Speaking before the publication of his 2023 annual report, which this year focuses on health in an ageing society, Whitty said doctors needed to have more realistic conversations with patients about the risk of some treatments extending life at the expense of quality of life and independence.

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Simple blood tests for dementia to be trialled in NHS

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£5m project launched with aim of having reliable tests within five years to provide quick diagnosis

Scientists are to begin piloting simple blood tests for dementia that could revolutionise detection of the disease and within five years lead to people being diagnosed in seconds by the NHS.

Currently, getting a formal diagnosis in the UK relies on mental ability tests, brain scans or invasive and painful lumbar punctures, where a sample of cerebrospinal fluid is drawn from the lower back.

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Most foreign doctors in NHS face ‘racist microaggressions’, survey shows

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Findings of ‘thinly veiled, everyday instances of racism at work’ raise fears medical graduates may avoid UK

Three in five foreign doctors in the NHS face “racist microaggressions” at work, such as patients refusing to be treated by them or having their abilities doubted because of their skin colour.

The widespread “thinly veiled, everyday instances of racism at work” experienced by medics trained overseas has been uncovered by a survey of more than 2,000 UK doctors and dentists.

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Townsville hospital audiology failures prompt millions in compensation and calls for national reform

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The Queensland government will pay more than $2.2m to families of 97 patients of the hospital’s audiology unit

Townsville University hospital’s audiology unit programmed cochlear implants in some children incorrectly, misdiagnosed others, and even conducted hearing tests on an infant who was asleep, a damning independent review has found.

The clinic was poorly organised, staff were overworked, and key protocols “did not appear to be followed, leading to poor outcomes, monitoring, measurement, and reporting”, the report released on Wednesday said.

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Australia’s Covid inquiry must not morph into chance to ‘retell history’, health experts warn

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‘We should remember how many lives were saved … but we need to learn and do better,’ former AMA chief says

Key medical figures at the forefront of Australia’s Covid response have urged the federal inquiry into the virus to deeply investigate how governments set policies on vaccines, border closures and hospital preparations.

Dr Nick Coatsworth, Australia’s former deputy chief medical officer, said an examination of vaccine safety reporting was important for public confidence in the future. Dr Omar Khorshid, a former president of the Australian Medical Association, said the health response to Covid should be seen as a “national triumph” and the federal government’s independent inquiry must not morph into an opportunity to “retell history”.

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Sunak and Johnson pushed repeatedly against autumn lockdown, inquiry told

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Covid investigation also told taskforce coordinating pandemic policy had no warning of ‘eat out to help out’

Rishi Sunak and Boris Johnson pushed repeatedly against lockdown measures during the second wave of Covid in autumn 2020, with the government’s chief scientist accusing the then chancellor of using “spurious” arguments against new rules, the inquiry into the pandemic has heard.

In a day of evidence that placed increasing focus on Sunak’s role, the inquiry also heard that his flagship “eat out to help out” hospitality scheme was imposed without consulting the government’s Covid taskforce, leaving officials “blindsided” by the Treasury.

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Australia rejected millions of face masks provided by PPE Medpro suppliers

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Exclusive: Suppliers for firm linked to UK peer Michelle Mone helped source Covid masks for Australian government that were found unusable

Suppliers of PPE for a company linked to the Conservative peer Michelle Mone were also involved during the Covid pandemic in supplying millions of face masks to the Australian government that were rejected over safety concerns.

Australia’s Department of Health and Aged Care told the Guardian that of 50m face masks supplied to fulfil a government contract awarded to a small online retailer, Australian Business Mobiles (ABM), the overwhelming majority – 45.7m – were deemed unusable for its health service. A department spokesperson said five of seven manufacturers that supplied the masks were “deemed non-compliant with quality regulations”.

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Drug that can halve breast cancer risk offered to 289,000 women in England

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Anastrozole to be made available to women who have been through the menopause and have family history of breast cancer

Almost 300,000 women at higher risk of developing breast cancer are being given access to a drug that can halve their risk in a “major step forward” in the fight against the disease.

An estimated 289,000 women in England who are at moderate or high risk of breast cancer will from Tuesday be able to take the tablet to try to prevent it from developing, NHS bosses said.

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Tory deputy chair Lee Anderson apologises to doctor over ‘misleading’ remark

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MP offers ‘sincerest apologies’ for social media post and pays compensation into BMA strike fund

The Conservative deputy chair, Lee Anderson, has apologised to a doctor after he made a “misleading” social media post about him.

The MP for Ashfield said he wanted to offer his “sincerest apologies” to Dr Tom Dolphin for “any distress caused” by his post on X, formerly known as Twitter.

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Tampon that tests for STIs created by British startup

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Daye’s product doubles as PCR test for chlamydia, gonorrhoea and other common infections

A tampon is being repurposed to screen for sexually transmitted infections, with the at-home test aiming to encourage more women to seek treatment.

The gynaecological health startup Daye has launched an STI diagnostic tampon, which uses a polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test to check for chlamydia, gonorrhoea, trichomonas, mycoplasma and ureaplasma, with the tampon used in place of a swab or speculum.

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Australian food industry ‘hijacks’ strategies designed to tackle public health crises, conference hears

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Experts in public health say that commercial interests engage in practices harmful to health and the environment

It’s a “risky business” for the government to work with the food industry to tackle health crises like obesity, an international public health conference has been told, with effective food packaging labels already jeopardised.

Dr Dori Patay, a researcher with the Menzies Centre in Sydney, said despite ample evidence of the harmful influence of the food industry on health policy, governments increasingly regard the food industry as “partners” in addressing chronic diseases.

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DRC offers free maternity care to cut death rate among mothers and babies

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Healthcare workers say clinics are being overwhelmed by women seeking help, amid lack of staff and facilities to back programme

Pregnant women across the Democratic Republic of the Congo are to be offered free healthcare in an effort to cut the country’s high rates of maternal and neonatal deaths.

Women in 13 out of 26 regions in the country will, by the end of the year, be entitled to free services during pregnancy and for one month after childbirth. Babies will receive free healthcare for their first 28 days under the scheme, which the government plans to extend to the rest of DRC – although there is no timetable for that yet.

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Private health firm Sciensus fails to fix defects that led to UK patient’s death

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Exclusive: Regulator extends part suspension of licence to July 2024 after IT blunder led to incorrect dosage of cancer treatment

A private health company paid millions by the NHS has failed to fix safety defects that led to the death of a cancer patient, the Guardian can reveal.

Three patients were hospitalised and a fourth died when they were given the wrong doses of a powerful chemotherapy drug after a catastrophic IT failure at the medicine manufacturing unit of Sciensus in April this year.

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Doctor banned for 12 months after sending racist email to Australia’s first Indigenous eye surgeon

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Yuggera, Warangoo and Wiradjuri doctor Kristopher Rallah-Baker says it’s important others ‘see they won’t be brought down if they complain about racism’

A GP has been banned from registering as a doctor for a year in Australia because of discriminatory behaviour toward an Indigenous doctor he accused of being a “fake Aboriginal” akin to “like a watered down bottle of Grange”.

The medical board described the decision as a “landmark outcome” as it is the first case to make reference to changes in the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (Ahpra) national law introduced last year to include a definition of cultural safety for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

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Ozempic overdoses: data reveals Australians sent to emergency after misuse of diabetes drug

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Exclusive: NSW poisons information centre received more than 120 calls related to the diabetes drug in a year, 83% of them about medication errors

Patients have been referred to hospital emergency departments after unintentionally taking a higher dose of Ozempic than prescribed, data obtained by Guardian Australia has revealed.

The drug semaglutide, sold under the brand name Ozempic in Australia, is subsidised under the pharmaceutical benefits scheme for the treatment of type 2 diabetes.

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Martha’s rule must be available 24/7, England’s patient safety commissioner says

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Patients and relatives must be able to request second opinion from critical care team at any time of day or night, government told

Patients and their relatives will be able to request a second opinion from senior medics around the clock when the “Martha’s rule” system starts in hospitals in England.

The government’s patient safety commissioner, asked by the health secretary, Steve Barclay, to advise on how to implement the change, has said access to a medic’s opinion must operate 24/7.

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Covid inquiry: Hancock ‘wanted to decide who should live or die’ if NHS overwhelmed

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‘Fortunately this horrible dilemma never crystallised,’ former NHS England head Simon Stevens tells inquiry

Former health secretary Matt Hancock told officials that he – rather than the medical profession – “should ultimately decide who should live or die” if the NHS was overwhelmed during the pandemic, the Covid inquiry heard.

“Fortunately this horrible dilemma never crystalised,” the former head of the NHS, Lord Simon Stevens, said in his evidence to the inquiry on Thursday.

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