Another 15 Minutes...Health News from Fade
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The government is failing to act on a plan to tackle tuberculosis amid evidence that cases of the disease are rising, according to medical experts. They claim that officials are failing to give priority to controlling the potentially fatal disease in spite of a promise in October 2004 from the chief medical officer that he would aim to cut the number of cases within three years. In 2005, there was an 11% rise in TB in the UK compared with 2004. In 2006 there was a further increase of 2%, with a total of 8,500 cases. In London, which has the highest number of infections each year, TB cases increased by 11.2% last year. Britain is the only country in western Europe experiencing a sustained rise in TB cases. The British Thoracic Society says nine out of 10 TB specialists believe the number of cases is likely to rise over the next five years. It is demanding that the Department of Health "takes more leadership on this issue".
Scientists today offer reassurance to women who take the breast cancer drug Herceptin that they are not facing a mounting risk of heart disease the longer they are on the drug. Heart damage is the biggest side effect of the drug and has caused up to one in five women to stop taking it early and meant that some women with existing heart problems are not able to take it.
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Breast cancer drug that cuts out surgery - Daily Mail 3rd June 2007
Both sides in the battle over abortion rights are gearing up for a test of strength in parliament to see which of them has the political muscle either to liberalise David Steel's 40-year-old legislation or to curb what opponents of abortion call "two Dunblane massacres a day". As the third backbench MP's bill in eight months proposing further limits to the 1967 act is introduced in the Commons tomorrow, pro-choice groups plan to respond with pressure for reforms to make access to abortion easier.
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Impractical preaching - The Guardian 2nd October 2007
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Abortion debate: why women must speak out - The Times 2nd May 2007
How long have you been cycling? I bought a bike a year ago. Before that I hadn't cycled since I was a child . Why do you cycle? To keep fit and to reduce my car usage.
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Backpedaller - The Sunday Times 3rd May 2007
Laura McDonald can't quite believe what is happening. Watched by her colleagues (and fellow smokers) Lorna MacInnes, Jo Eastlake, Donna Emery and manager Siobhan Payne, she is having her temples tapped by transformational therapist Louise van der Velde. As she repeats the mantra: "Even though I have the feeling that I want a cigarette, I deeply and completely accept myself," van der Velde takes Laura through a series of seven taps - before declaring her a non-smoker. It's not exactly an average Monday morning. Usually these workers start their day with a fag and a cup of coffee, but today Laura and her colleagues have signed up for a two-hour quit smoking programme - organised by their employers, watercooler suppliers Water. And since Van der Velde, a former smoker herself, reckons the best way to give up smoking is to feel your body's vitality, that's exactly what the women are doing. Even if that means doing star-jumps in front of your workmates.
The real scandal of Adam Rickwood's death in the Hassockfield secure training centre is that it revisits issues around the physical restraint and care of children in custody that have been known about for years ('What gives them the right to hit a child in the nose?', June 2). For 17 years up to 2001, I managed local-authority secure units, and saw issues with physical restraint come and go. As a freelance consultant in the care of children, I know the issues remain. In 1993 the Department of Health published a report into the use of physical restraint at the Aycliffe centre in Durham after revelations that staff using prison-service training had injured several children.
Doctors were accused of gross betrayal last night after haemophiliac patients discovered that their blood samples were being tested for the human form of 'mad cow' disease without their knowledge. They compared the move by one of Britain's leading NHS hospitals to the Alder Hey organ scandal, when samples were taken from the bodies of dead children without their parents' permission.
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Beauty experts slap health warning on lipsticks past their sell-by date - The Observer June 3rd 2007
Vintage fashion may be fabulous, but old make-up is putting women's health and beauty at risk, according to new research that has found the British tradition of collecting antiques extends to cosmetics and toiletries. Show us a woman's handbag, say experts from the College of Optometrists and we will show you a 10-year-old lipstick, a five-year-old tube of mascara and a jar of rancid moisturiser, all teeming with harmful bacteria.
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Old make-up can cause eye infections - The Telegraph 4th June 2007
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Hanging on to that favourite lipstick is a health hazard - Daily Mail 3rd June 2007
A prostate cancer drug was recalled last night after a counterfeit version was prescribed on the NHS. Investigators believe it could be part of one of the biggest fake drugs operations in the UK. The medicine regulator believes the source of the fake Casodex is the same criminal group which has supplied counterfeits of two other major drugs, Zyprexa and Plavix.
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Warning over fake high street medicines - The Times 2nd May 2007
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Massive profits tempt drug counterfeiters - The Times 2nd May 2007
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Police called in over counterfeit prostate drugs - The Telegraph 2nd June 2007
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Warning over fake batch of 'lifesaving' cancer medicine - Daily Mail 2nd May 2007
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Strike by NHS workers to hit Ulster hospitals NHS support staff will strike in Northern Ireland on Monday as the health unions prepare to ballot for more widespread industrial action across the health service. Hundreds of plumbers, electricians and maintenance staff will down tools for a day in protest at hospitals' failure to pay a recruitment premium agreed in 2004. Unite, the biggest union, formed by a merger last month between the TGWU and Amicus, said longer strikes would follow if no concessions were made. Nurses in Unison and the Royal College of Nursing are to ballot on industrial action over pay.
If they look back, neither Ben, aged 51, nor Suzie, 31, ever imagined they might one day be happily married. That expectation wasn't there in childhood, or in their separate adult lives. If happiness subsists in that simplest of Freudian formulations, the ability to love and work, then the path they each took through consuming addictions, and the serial abuse of sexual partners, might have destroyed their capacity for either.
Are farms dangerous places to take children to visit or to bring up children on? What are you concerned about - your children catching infections from animals, being poisoned by pesticides and weedkillers, or being injured by machinery? Take the proper precautions to minimise the risks. Towns have their risks, too, such as road traffic accidents and air pollution. I've worked in a farming community almost all my life, and the children do very well. You can't protect children from every health risk.
An unprecedented crackdown on dirty hospitals is being launched by the Government's health care inspectorate. The Healthcare Commission said it would carry out spot checks at 120 NHS trusts over the next year in its biggest ever programme of visits aimed at cutting rates of infection with the deadly superbugs MRSA and Clostridium difficile.
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Hit squads to stamp out hospital superbugs - The Times 4th May 2007
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Superbug ultimatum to dirty hospitals - The Telegraph 4th June 2007
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Hospitals which fail superbug test will be named and shamed - Daily Mail 3rd June 2007
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Inspection blitz on NHS hygiene - BBC Health News 3rd May 2007
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Hospitals which fail superbug test will be named and shamed - Daily Mail 3rd June 2007
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Inspection blitz on NHS hygiene - BBC Health News 3rd May 2007
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Tory right-wingers step up pressure on Cameron over NHS - The Independent 4th May 2007
David Cameron's authority as leader of the Conservative Party faces a fresh challenge by Tory right wingers after the row over grammar schools - with some MPs now calling for the NHS to be abolished as a tax-funded system. Mr Cameron flew back from his holiday in Crete with a defiant message to his party that he will not be forced to drop his opposition to a new generation of grammar schools, except in areas that already have selection.
In a characteristically colourful interview, Boris Johnson has confessed to incompetently snorting cocaine, and admitted he finds Cherie Blair sexually enticing. Speaking to former Daily Mirror editor Piers Morgan in GQ magazine, Mr Johnson,42, said of the cocaine episode: "I tried it at university and I remember it vividly. It achieved no pharmacological psychotropic or any other effect on me whatsoever."
"Vintage wine from fine old kegs/ From the brim to the dregs/ And it poured sweet and clear/ It was a very good year..." Sinatra was, of course, singing about his twilight years, but he might just as well have been serenading 2007. Not in terms of the wine produced by vineyards, but rather the skincare products. Following the lead of the French company Caudalie, which has been producing skincare using grapes from the Château Smith Haut-Lafitte vineyard in Bordeaux since 1995, this spring has seen the launch of two luxury skincare products from historic vineyards.
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Worried families ditch their Wi-Fi after watchdog voices health concerns - The Independent on Sunday 3rd May 2007
Schools and families are rushing to remove Wi-Fi systems after the Government's chief health protection watchdog voiced concerns over their safety. Sir William Stewart's call for a "timely" review of the possible effects of the technology - originally reported by The Independent on Sunday in April and featured by the BBC's Panorama programme last month - has led to an unprecedented reaction from the public, according to one large dealer.
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Persistent binge drinkers could be fast-tracked into detox - The Independent on Sunday 3rd May 2007
Persistent binge drinkers who turn up at police stations and casualty departments would be fast-tracked into detox, under new government plans. Ministers are expected to unveil the proposalsthis week in a new strategy to fight alcohol abuse. It comes in response to a rise in preventable alcohol-related deaths with 22,000 dying annually from drinking.
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Girl with cerebral palsy flies to China for 'untested' treatment - The Independent 2nd May 2007
An eight-year-old British girl flew to China with her parents yesterday for an experimental treatment for cerebral palsy. Vaishnavi Tahiliani, known as Shonia, is to have stem cells injected into her spinal cord at the Tiantan Puhua Neurosurgical Hospital in Beijing which claimed a breakthrough in the treatment last month.
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Couple fly to China to get stem cell treatment for disabled daughter - Daily Mail 1st June 2007
A police child protection chief at the centre of a row about how paedophiles should be dealt with yesterday stressed that child sex abuse will not be tolerated. Jim Gamble of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre was criticised by a children's charity for arguing that paedophiles convicted of looking at child pornography should not necessarily go to prison.
My day, like that of many millions of other people, starts with a cup of hot, sweet coffee. The caffeine in it lifts the mood as it sweeps away early-morning inertia. The sugar taken with the coffee is an admirable way of correcting any hypo-glycaemia. I repeat the dose when I reach my office. Is the small luxury of drinking coffee evidence of an addiction to caffeine, popularly supposed to be a noxious chemical and regularly attacked in the health and beauty columns of magazines? Or is it, as I prefer to believe, regularly but falsely maligned, and not only harmless but, when taken in moderate amounts, beneficial to someone’s health?
Doctors are to investigate the health risks of smoking cannabis after evidence of severe lung disease in young people who use the drug. Onn Min Kon, a consultant physician of respiratory medicine at St Mary’s Hospital in London, has reported seeing many young cannibis smokers with lung diseases such as emphysema, which is normally diagnosed only in older tobacco smokers. “I’ve got a collection of young people who have lungs that look like they’re 65-year-olds,” he said.
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'My lungs are damaged beyond repair' - BBC Health News 3rd June 2007
For the month-long plan, you should follow the five-day plan and mix and match the choices for the Saturday and Sunday afterwards. Similarly, for the following three weeks, you can choose any of the breakfasts and lunches from the five-day plan and mix in with the lunch suggestions below. And in addition to the five dinner recipes in the five-day plan, we are adding ten more recipes below. These could make the basis for all your dinners for weeks 2 and 3, and then you might want to revert to the five-day recipe plan for week 4.
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The five-day plan - The Times 4th May 2007
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Want to lose weight? I do - The Times 4th May 2007
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Beach body diet - The Sunday Times 3rd May 2007
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Beach body diet - The Sunday Times 3rd May 2007
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PATIENTS should be charged £20 for the convenience of seeing their GP for a 10-minute appointment in the evening or on a Saturday morning, according to doctors’ leaders. Gordon Brown has said that one of his priorities as prime minister will be to improve access to family doctors. He believes working people should be able to consult a GP about a routine problem outside office hours. At the moment, commuters may need a half-day off work to see their GP.
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Pay £20 to see your GP in the evening - Daily Mail 4th June 2007
SMOKERS are to be asked to give up their habit before they are put on the waiting list for routine operations such as hip replacements and heart surgery. National Health Service managers say smokers take more time to recover from surgery, blocking beds for longer and costing more to treat.
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Smokers who won't quit denied surgery - The Telegraph 4th June 2007
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Smokers told to quit or surgery will be refused - Daily Mail 3rd June 2007
PATIENTS will be entitled to expensive operations and drugs regardless of how old they are under proposed new age discrimination legislation. The laws, which could cost the National Health Service millions of pounds, have the potential to open wide areas of extra treatment for the elderly. They would, for example, compel doctors to refer patients in their eighties and nineties for surgery and drug trials unless there was a sound medical case for denying them.
EARLY on Tuesday morning Kathleen Porter steeled herself and took her beloved daughter to die. They caught a taxi to Manchester airport and flew to Zurich where they enjoyed a last dinner together at a hotel. Porter was dreading what was to come, but she had made the hardest decision any parent can face: she had decided to help her seriously ill daughter Carol Kates end her life – even though Kates could still walk and talk.
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REPLICA football shirts sold to children will no longer carry the logos of alcohol-industry sponsors under rules to be unveiled today. Drinks firms sponsoring sports teams have agreed that it is inappropriate for children to wear shirts advertising alcohol brands. The announcement by the Portman Group, which represents Britain’s main drinks companies, comes just days before the government announces its new alcohol strategy.
Last week a distant 16-year-old female relation fresh out of her maths GCSE introduced herself and said, “You did that size zero programme, didn’t you?” Yes, I said, unsure of what was coming next. Since a documentary in which I explored the effects on my mind and body of sticking to some of the more ludicrous diets women subject themselves to in order to keep their body weight well below normal, I have got used to being accosted by women and girls fascinated by my experience.
THE company behind Channel 4’s Supernanny has provoked outrage with plans for a television programme that offers disfigured patients reconstructive surgery for taking part. The proposal has angered doctors and charities who say the deformities of vulnerable patients would be exploited.
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Professor Julian Elliott of Durham University isn’t popular among the parents of the UK’s 375,000 school children diagnosed with dyslexia. He claims the condition is being used as a cover up by middle-class parents who don’t want their children branded “lazy, thick or stupid”. He adds: “If they get called this medically diagnosed term, dyslexic, then it is a signal to all that it’s not to do with intelligence.” Let battle commence.
We’re now told that it is not only safe but advisable for the over 50s to eat an egg a day, after new research dismissed previous fears that their cholesterol helped clog arteries. When medical opinion keeps changing, who do I believe?
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Listen, there’s nothing worse than a freedom fighter with a fag - The Sunday Times 3rd May 2007
I remember once going to a party and seeing Sir Clement Freud walk up to a woman and grab the cigarette from her hand and hurl it to the floor. It was the first time I had seen antismoking activism in action and I remember thinking: “Please, Lord, let me never be as intolerant as that.” So why do I welcome the news that people who drop their cigarette butts in a public place will face on-the-spot fines of £80?
The changes I am leading in the Conservative party today have two vital characteristics: modernity and long-term thinking. Modernity matters because if we allow ourselves to be marooned on the wrong side of social and cultural change, the result is simply irrelevance and opposition. For too long, Tony Blair and new Labour laid claim to the future while the Conservative party seemed stuck in the past. Today the position is reversed as we lead the political agenda into new areas such as the environment and wellbeing while Labour in its deputy leadership election looks back nostalgically to the preBlair era.
My sex drive was the first thing to go. It crept out of my life, very slowly, until one day I found it was gone. Sex wasn’t fun or pleasurable any more: it was hideously painful. My vagina felt dry, uncomfortable and bruised, the flesh inside raw. Then the itching began. My GP said not to worry, it was probably thrush, and gave me an antifungal cream, which I used religiously for more than a month. The itchy discomfort soon segued into a throbbing pain in the deep hollow of my vagina, and stayed. On bad days it would feel as though my vaginal skin had been ripped away and acid poured in its place.
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WHO SAYS? Scriptwriters are guilty of promoting the idea that you can easily bonk off this mortal coil. Overprotective partners perpetuate it. HOW WRONG IS IT? Statistically speaking, sex does increase the risk of a heart attack. As soon as you crunch the numbers, though, you realise you can sleep easily, and postcoitally, in your beds.
“Come quickly doctor, she’s burning up.” In other words, a child with a fever and a parent with the jitters. We GPs file this away with all the other “get-something-done-now” patient-speak such as “I’m flooding” (a heavy period) and “He’s collapsed” (a faint). Familiarity breeds, if not contempt, then at least some complacency. After all, we GPs see hot kids every day. When temperatures soar, so do anxiety levels, so much so that fever phobia tops the parental neurosis charts. It just edges out rash dash, when a mother rushes her well child to the surgery because of some spots that might have been meningitis but which turn out to be a virus, or, marks from a red felt-tip pen.
ALCOHOL was the subject of three big stories this week: government advice that pregnant women should not drink alcohol at all; health warnings on bottles and cans by 2008; and a rise in the number of young people caught drink-driving. It struck me that these stories had got muddled. A law that said no alcohol should be consumed if driving would be welcomed by many people – we’d know exactly where we stand, and policing it would be easier.
Dr Stuttaford’s point regarding the decline in the intensity of male orgasm with ageing was pertinent. Now I’m 60, the decline in sexual pleasure has come as a nasty surprise to me over the past two years. You are ready for a reduction in the frequency of sex – but not for the quality of orgasm to fall off the cliff as well.
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Buster Martin, 100, of the band The Zimmers, is fighting fit thanks to red meat and pints of bitter
Clowing around and cowboys and Indians? Adults are discovering their inner child and the games that go along with it
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Patients with bone marrow cancer could soon be able to get a life-prolonging drug on the NHS in England after the Government's rationing watchdog reversed a ruling that prevented the health service paying for it. Marie Morton, Jacky Pickles and Janice Wrigglesworth: U-turn on cancer drug offers hope to victims Marie Morton, Jacky Pickles and Janice Wriggles- worth challenged Ms Hewitt over their medication In an about-turn welcomed by cancer charities, the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (Nice) has recommended a scheme to fund Velcade for multiple myeloma (bone marrow cancer) patients who respond well to it.
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Drug firm gives NHS a money-back guarantee - Daily Mail 3rd June 2007
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Cancer-drug refund scheme backed - BBC Health News 3rd May 2007
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Depression and stress together make up the second largest cause of workers taking time off sick, according to figures released today. A study of 30,000 workers showed that people suffering from depression took an average of 30 days off, while stress-sufferers were away for 21 days.
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Fathers should strip off their shirts before holding their newborn babies to aid the "bonding" process, says a booklet funded by the Government. Baby with father: Fathers 'should strip off to bond with baby' The pamphlet also recommends that fathers should be taught how to bathe a baby before they leave hospital The pamphlet, which has prompted accusations about interference from the nanny state, also recommends that they should gaze into their baby's eyes for short periods to develop the child's brain.
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Should the Government tell men how to be fathers? - The Telegraph 4th June 2007
Sara and David Garland lost their daughter, Daisy, to epilepsy. They tell Cassandra Jardine how their tragedy grew into a charity helping some of the UK's 59,000 epileptic children Daisy Garland was 18 months old when her mother, Sara, started her on a strange new diet. The first meal consisted of mackerel in olive oil, a little kiwi fruit and goat's cream mixed with water and vegetable oil. " 'This is awful,' I thought as I gave it to her," says Sara.
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Bed blocking in NHS hospitals got worse last year and was responsible for an estimated million lost hospital days, a survey revealed yesterday. Lost bed days rose to nearly one million last year with the cost to the NHS spiralling to £200 million.
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£200m bill for 'bed blocking' pensioners left stuck in hospital - Daily Mail 1st June 2007
A world-class unit that helps the childless is under threat, Victoria Lambert finds 'Few seem to understand how low it can bring you," says Katrin Roskelly, her voice tight with emotion at the memory of her three recent miscarriages.
The Office of Fair Trading wants a 'value-based' system of pricing medicines but the pharmaceuticals companies fear this would kill innovation. Sylvia Pfeifer reports If Patricia Hewitt is still in a job by the end of the summer, the beleaguered Health Secretary could find herself at loggerheads with the most powerful players in the medical industry: the drug companies.
A campaign of civil disobedience against next month's smoking ban will see hundreds of pubs flouting the new laws. Landlords at up to 200 pubs are planning a "day of defiance" when the legislation comes into force next month, allowing customers to light up on July 1. The number involved is expected to grow and some publicans have vowed to continue to break the law beyond July 1 if customers want them to.
Thousands of patients will be able to read their GPs' notes online in a scheme pioneered by doctors who took over the surgery of serial killer Harold Shipman. More than 700,000 patients will be offered an internet service that lets them see all their notes and scans, collect test results, and even provide crucial details of their own medical history to unfamiliar doctors treating them outside their normal surgery or while on holiday.
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They are still grappling with the alphabet, learning nursery rhymes and making toys out of egg cartons. But now children as young as four will be expected to get in touch with their feelings by filling in questionnaires which ask if they are "optimistic about the future" and "dealing with problems well".
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Children as young as 4 to be given 'happiness tests' at school - Daily Mail 3rd June 2007
Shunned by neighbours, vilified by the press, the relatives of convicted murderers and rapists serve their very own 'sentence'. The criminologist Rachel Condry meets the mothers and wives of serious offenders, and asks why women in particular shoulder so much blame The day she found out her son had killed another man is etched with clarity on Pauline Taylor's mind. 'I was on my own when the news came through, and I just went to pieces,' she says.
At Easter I sprained my ankle and, despite a course of anti-inflammatory treatment, the swelling got worse. I developed a high temperature and my ankle and leg became extremely painful and swollen. My GP diagnosed cellulitis and prescribed huge amounts of antibiotics. These alleviated the symptoms but I still have swelling, especially after walking and at the end of the day. I sleep with my legs elevated on several pillows and try to put my ankle up during the day. Is there anything else I can do? I'm 62 and overweight but otherwise healthy.
Ministers are "fiddling the figures" to hide the failings of the new computerised hospital appointment booking system, the Conservatives claimed yesterday. Andrew Lansley, the shadow health secretary, said Government statistics on how many people were using the online referral system and the proportion of electronic prescriptions were artificially inflated.
Senior doctors are to propose that health care should be paid for through a compulsory NHS income tax. Hospital consultants will next week argue that the present centralised system funded through general taxation is "unsustainable and dysfunctional". A motion to be debated at a British Medical Association conference will suggest a means-tested system similar to those used in France and Germany.
Troubled UK software group iSoft says it has begun legal proceedings against its largest customer, Computer Sciences Corporation, after the US IT giant blocked a potentially life-saving takeover bid. ISoft also revealed that CSC had been in talks with iSoft and a private equity firm about a rival offer or financial arrangement.
Blackstone is in detailed talks with Australia's biggest private hospital operator about tabling a joint bid for the British hospitals arm of Bupa. The US private-equity firm is negotiating with Sydney-based Ramsay Health Care about an offer for Bupa's 26 UK hospitals that would be likely to top £1.4bn.
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Implementing the smoking ban in England will cost taxpayers, restaurateurs and pub landlords at least £100 million more than the Government originally budgeted. The Department of Health estimated that the bill for the ban, that comes into force in a month's time, would run to £1.6 billion.
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The local authority officers who will issue fixed-penalty fines for smoking in an enclosed public place have no powers (unless they are accompanied by police officers, which they will not be) to ensure that the person to whom a penalty is issued has given his real name and address. The number of penalties issued will bear little relation to the fines paid.
Diana McAdam kicks off with a hybrid of dance and martial art Brazil is famous for sunshine, samba and spectacular beach bodies, so it's no surprise to that capoeira (pronounced "cap-wearer"), a sport that combines music, dance and martial arts, was born there.
Someone told me that if you can buy a bar of chocolate and not eat it for seven minutes, then you're in control of your eating habits. What can I say? I am not. I'm more likely to demolish the entire bar just seconds after buying it.
Heavy snorers have a higher risk of developing Alzheimer's disease, scientists have found. Researchers discovered that a reduced flow of oxygen to the brain can cause Alzheimer's - and that people who snore heavily are among those most at risk.
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Although mother-to-be Emily Barton was expecting only one child, passers-by would stop her and ask if she was having triplets. Her bump grew so rapidly that she put on an astonishing seven stone during her pregnancy. The reason was a massive ovarian cyst which was wrapping itself around her unborn son.
Hundreds of brilliant surgeons and hospital specialists are being barred from taking senior jobs by dawdling, form-filling bureaucrats. Under recently introduced rules, physicians must register with a new Government body before they are able to work as consultants in British hospitals.
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Health and safety purge of the park benches that are 3 inches too low - Daily Mail 2nd May 2007
Park benches across the country will have to be replaced at a cost of hundreds of thousands of pounds - because they are too low. Under new health and safety laws, benches must be more than 17.75in high so the elderly and disabled can get off them easily.
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All through her gruelling treatment for cancer, it was the one thought which helped keep up the young patient's spirits. Paige Nuttall was overjoyed at the offer from a charity of a two-week holiday with her family in Florida to help her recover.
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Boy killed by allergic reaction to a sweet he didn't even swallow - Daily Mail 1st June 2007
A boy of nine collapsed and died after popping a single sweet into his mouth in the family shop. Mohsen Hussain, who had a nut allergy and asthma, had chosen the sweet from the pick-and-mix section.
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Mothers who are stressed out in pregnancy 'transmit' the effect to their unborn baby as early as 17 weeks, claim scientists. They have matched the level of stress hormones found in the mother's blood to those in fluid surrounding the fetus.
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HIV infections will rise because money intended to tackle the problem is being spent elsewhere, a leading sexual health doctor has warned. Consultant Dr Colm O'Mahony from Countess of Chester Hospital said services across the country were stretched beyond capacity.
One-in-five people in Scotland is suffering from the effects of a debilitating eye condition very few experts are aware of or trained to deal with. You can't read without getting a headache from trying to focus on the print, which seems to dance and blur before your eyes.
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NHS dentists should face quotas forcing them to do NHS work rather than private treatments, campaigners say. Patient Concern said quotas should be imposed on new dentists for several years, as figures show under 50% of NHS dentists' income is now from NHS work.
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Health professionals can motivate even the most inactive people to increase the amount they walk, say researchers. However, they found advice had to be tailored to individual needs - adopting a "one size fits all" policy would not be as effective, they suggest.
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'Toby brings a smile to all he meets' - BBC Health News 1st June 2007
When Tracey Page gave birth to her third child, Toby, she was expecting a normal delivery and healthy baby. The pregnancy had gone as planned but within minutes of the birth there were problems.
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Bob Geldof too has a part to play in the G8's broken promises to Africa - The Guardian 4th June 2007
Africa is back on the G8 agenda this week, at the exclusive resort of Heiligendamm, for the first time since Gleneagles in 2005. But no one is quite sure why, least of all the German public. Despite Bono's and Bob's best efforts, with a concert planned on Thursday and Bob guest-editing the biggest-selling German newspaper Bilt Zeitung last week, the Your Voice Against Poverty campaign has not caught the public imagination as Make Poverty History did in the UK in 2005.
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Revealed: how leaders' broken vows doom Aids babies - The Independent on Sunday 3rd May 2007
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The hidden brain drain - The Guardian 4th June 2007
Five years ago, Sylvia Ann Hewlett terrified women with her book Baby Hunger, a warning against leaving motherhood till too late. Now she's back with another shocking message: employers are writing off women once they've had children.
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One of the defining features of working life, huddles of smokers enjoying a quick fag break outside the doorway, has become the latest target in the war against cigarettes. If European officials get their way, the beleaguered smoker's last refuge - a useful source of office gossip, though decidedly chilly in winter - will be swept away under the expansion of smoking 'exclusion zones'.
A Delhi clinic is offering hope to the desperately ill. But the medical establishment is not convinced For a medical centre supposed to be at the cutting edge of medical science, Dr Geeta Shroff's Nu Tech Mediworld clinic is a modest edifice. Hidden down an alleyway in one of the seedier residential areas of south Delhi, the little building can be reached only by squeezing past rickshaws and motorbikes. The waiting-room is decorated with yellowing newspaper cuttings about Shroff's work. From time to time, there are power cuts, leaving patients facing the 43C heat.
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A lawyer infected with a contagious and deadly strain of tuberculosis claimed yesterday that he returned to the United States in defiance of a flight ban because he felt the government had abandoned him to die in an Italian hospital. Andrew Speaker, 31, said he was full of regret for putting fellow passengers in danger but believed that sneaking back into the country and reaching a specialist isolation hospital in Denver was his only chance of survival.
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TB sufferer is quarantined as US asks how he was allowed to fly - The Independent 2nd May 2007
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TB man 'sorry' over plane trips - BBC Health News 1st June 2007
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TV kidney donor show revealed as hoax to provoke debate on organ shortages - The Guardian 2nd October 2007
It was decried as the show that would break the reality TV format's back. The makers of the Dutch De Grote Donorshow (The Big Donor Show) promised a one-off programme in which a terminally ill woman would chose which of three contestants would receive her kidneys when she died. But last night the show, which sparked worldwide controversy, was revealed to be a hoax staged by Endemol Netherlands and the public broadcaster BNN to raise awareness about organ donation in the Netherlands.
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Kidney reality show is revealed as a hoax - The Times 2nd May 2007
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Trust me, I'm a junior doctor - The Telegraph 4th June 2007
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Trust me, I'm a junior doctor - The Telegraph 4th June 2007
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Competing for a kidney is not immoral - The Telegraph 2nd June 2007
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Cuddles and kind words are the way to healthy hearts - The Independent on Sunday 3rd May 2007
Affectionate physical contact is better for a woman's health than whispering sweet nothings in her ear, according to new research. Men, on the other hand, are healthier when their partner says nice things to them. The research shows that after being affectionately touched by the partners, women were far better able to deal with stress and had lower heart rates when they were stressed. The aim of this study, by researchers from the University of Zurich, and Emory University, Atlanta, was to see whether the behaviour of couples to each other affected how their bodies handled stress.
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Jack Kevorkian, the retired pathologist dubbed "Dr. Death" for claims that he participated in at least 130 assisted suicides, left prison after eight years yesterday still believing people have the right to die. A smiling Kevorkian, now 79, said it was "one of the high points in life" as he walked out with his attorney.
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The people of four Andean nations are in revolt, and this time it has nothing to do with poverty, American imperialism or workers’ rights. Bolivia, Colombia and Ecuador have been told by Fifa, football’s governing body, that they can no longer stage international matches in their capitals. It has imposed a ban on international games being played at venues above altitudes of 2,500 metres (8,200ft), claiming that it is dangerous for footballers unaccustomed to the shortage of oxygen. Peru will also be forced to abandon plans to hold World Cup qualifiers in mountain cities.
A group of Indian Airlines air stewardesses who were grounded for being overweight have lost a year-long legal battle to be allowed back to work. The Delhi High Court rejected the women’s argument that their employer’s decision was “unreasonable and demeaning” – and even suggested that they should try to lose some weight.
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It was quite a vision of our genetic future. Shortly before the first drafts of the human genome were unveiled in 2001, Francis Collins spelt out in bold terms what the project he had pioneered would ultimately mean for medicine. By 2010, scientists would understand how genes contribute to at least a dozen common illnesses such as diabetes and heart disease, the director of the US National Human Genome Research Institute said. Preventive therapies would soon be developed to match.
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Supermarkets say they will not sell chicken fed on pork if ban is lifted - The Times 2nd May 2007
Two supermarket chains have ruled out selling meat from animals fed on animal byproducts despite proposals put before the EU to relax the current ban on the practice. Asda and Sainsbury’s distanced themselves from an EU research programme by stating that they would not sell meat from animals that had been fed meat and bone meal.
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Scientists are to investigate how vaccinations given to pregnant women might affect the health of their unborn child, after research suggested that babies’ immune systems develop much earlier than thought. A study published in the US Journal of Clinical Investigation yesterday found that the children of mothers who were given vaccinations against influenza started producing immune cells to combat the illness while still in the womb.
James Le Fanu on helping hypochondriacs, curbing the 'curse', and noisy nightmares The curious paradox of our time must be that the more successful medicine has become, the greater the proportion of the population claiming to be ''concerned about their health'' - up from 10 per cent to an astonishing 50 per cent over the past 30 years, if recent surveys are to be believed.
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The strapping blokes of the Australian bush are men of few words when it comes to feelings. However desperate their circumstances may become, their likely response is a laconic: "She'll be right." But the worst drought in 100 years is bankrupting farms daily and health agencies say increasing numbers of farmers are falling into depression and committing suicide. Now, a national push is under way to persuade men that it's time to talk.
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US scientists say they are closer to creating a gene therapy treatment for erectile dysfunction. Human and animal trials suggest this could offer an alternative to current treatments for some patients, the American Society of Gene Therapy heard.
The Chinese herb ginseng could give exhausted cancer patients a physical and emotional boost, research suggests. A US team at Rochester's Mayo Clinic found daily doses improved energy levels and emotional well-being, in a study of 282 patients.
Scientists are working on ways to cut the risk of blood clots following treatment to unblock clogged arteries. Stents, which are tiny tubes used to hold open the diseased blood vessels of heart patients, can themselves become blocked following treatment.
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Legislation requiring the safety testing of tens of thousands of chemicals - many in everyday use - has come into effect across the EU. For the first time, it will be up to industry, rather than the regulatory authorities, to prove that chemicals are safe.
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Misery: the secret to happiness - BBC Health News 1st June 2007
The key to a happy relationship could be accepting that some miserable times are unavoidable, experts say. Therapists from California State University, Northridge and Virginia Tech say accepting these problems is better than striving for perfection.
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Cheshire and Merseyside News
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HIV infections will rise because money intended to tackle the problem is being spent elsewhere, a leading sexual health doctor has warned. Consultant Dr Colm O'Mahony from Countess of Chester Hospital said services across the country were stretched beyond capacity.
SMOKERS as young as 12 are signing up to get help quitting cigarettes and cannabis. Thirty Liverpool children have so far used the new under-18s stop smoking service, which can prescribe them with nicotine patches and inhalers.
LIVERPOOL’S specialist fertility unit last night hit back at criticism by IVF expert Lord Winston, that the industry was “exploitative” of childless couples. Lord Winston’s remarks at the Hay book festival have angered specialists at the country’s largest NHS provider of IVF treatment, the Hewitt Centre for Reproductive Medicine at Liverpool Women’s Hospital.
A DOCTOR who helped save the life of former Liverpool FC manager Gerard Houllier has been accused of turning off electricity to anaesthetics machinery during operating theatre sessions. Dr James Murphy, a clinical tutor and rota master within the Anaesthetic Department at the Liverpool’s Cardio-thoracic Centre, is due to face a General Medical Council (GMC) hearing next week to answer a string of allegations that he may have put patients’ health in danger.
CHILDHOOD obesity experts from around Europe will visit Merseyside to see how the problem is being tackled here. The health workers from France and Slovenia, where children are getting fatter, will tour the region to get tips on what action to take - and share some ideas of their own. They will tour schools and meet public health officials next week.
HEALTH trusts across Merseyside will have underspent their annual budget by more than £8m, government figures reveal. Liverpool Primary Care Trust will be responsible for nearly half of the underspend with £3.8m still in the coffers, while Knowsley and West Cheshire had a combined overspend of £4.25m. But PCT managers last night insisted the money would not be wasted, and will roll over into their budgets for next year.
ANTI-SMOKING campaigners last night urged Liverpool businesses, residents and visitors to get behind preparations for the UK-wide smoking ban. Today marks the start of the month-long countdown to the ban, which - from July 1 - will see smoking outlawed in pubs, restaurants, football grounds and offices.
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Smoking ban fear for bars - Liverpool Echo June 1st 2007
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Shaping up for a smoke-free Wirral - Wirral Globe 1st June 2007
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A JUDGE who denied Merseyside MMR campaigners legal aid was the brother of a pharmaceutical company director. Families shelved plans for court action against drug giant GlaxoSmithKline four years ago after Mr Justice Davis denied them financial support.
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'I have a life ahead of me - before, it was just an existence' - Chester Chronicle 1st June 2007
After five years in a wheelchair, taking up to 30 tablets a day, Julie Littler went under the knife. 24 hours later, she was back on her feet - but she had to pay £20,000 for it. LIZA WILLIAMS reports LOOKING radiant, Julie Littler is a picture of health as she sits in her Huntington home. The 36-year-old mother can now walk around without wincing in pain.
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A DOCTOR who practises medicine in a portable cabin on a pub car park has had her planning permission extended for another year. After Dr Halina Obuchowicz’s landlord asked her to leave in 2002, patients Phil Rayment and Michael Evans were happy to offer their pub’s car park as temporary surgery space.
CAB drivers across Wirral are being offered free health checks as part of Men's Health Week this month. Hackney and private hire drivers are being invited to a drive-in health assessment on Thursday, June 14, at Birkenhead Fire Station in Exmouth Street between 10am and noon, and also between 6pm and 7.30pm.
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Cumbria and Lancashire News
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DETAILED work is starting on an £150mill-ion project which will revolutionise mental health care in East Lancashire. The scheme will replace hospital buildings declared not fit for purpose'.
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Siting of new mental hospitals - Chorley Citizen 1st June 2007
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MAJOR improvements will be made to health services in Rossendale if a multi-million pound bid for government cash is successful. Bosses at the East Lancashire Primary Care Trust are drawing up the bid for the funding, which would provide a new "hub" centre, as well as a series of enhanced community-based facilities out of existing sites.
CONGRATULATIONS to Dr D J Fielding for his outspoken condemnation of the financial fiasco that has been perpetrated in East Lancashire, probably along with similar fiascoes in other parts of the country. I refer to his damnation of the obscene interest that will have to be paid to the Private Finance Initiative in payment for the medical facilities recently constructed locally.
THIRTY-four extra medics and four new emergency vehicles are to hit the streets of East Lancashire. The expansion, which will begin in the autumn, was made possible after the North West Ambulance Service (NWAS) secured additional funding from Lancashire's Primary Care Trusts.
CAMPAIGNERS have enlisted the help of Blackburn MP Jack Straw and Coronation Street star Julie Hesmondhalgh as they launch an 11th-hour fight to save a mental health advocacy programme. Funding has finally run out for the Penwortham-based Giving Experience Meaning (GEM), which provides trainers who can detail the struggles of coping with mental illness.
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Have you got an NHS dentist? - Chorley Citizen 1st June 2007
Folk in Chorley are being invited to get their teeth into a controversial subject. Lancashire County Council health scrutiny members are keen to hear residents' views on finding an NHS dentist.
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Greater Manchester News
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Early use of breast cancer drug Herceptin could spare thousands of women the trauma of surgery, doctors believe. Already used to keep the cancer at bay after surgeons remove a tumour, the drug now shows promise in treating the disease earlier.
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Shipman surgery let patients see notes online - The Sunday Telegraph 3rd May 2007
Thousands of patients will be able to read their GPs' notes online in a scheme pioneered by doctors who took over the surgery of serial killer Harold Shipman. More than 700,000 patients will be offered an internet service that lets them see all their notes and scans, collect test results, and even provide crucial details of their own medical history to unfamiliar doctors treating them outside their normal surgery or while on holiday.
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DOZENS of Bolton pharmacists are joining the battle against smoking by providing advice to customers who want to stub out the habit. Health bosses have trained 60 pharmacists from 39 outlets across the borough to offer stop-smoking support along with nicotine replacement therapy at prescription prices.
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HEALTH trainers have gone into action in Bolton to help people live longer and healthier lives. The 16 trainers have been appointed by Bolton Primary Care Trust and are based in GP surgeries.
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TEN year survival rates for all types of cancer have reached almost 50 per cent. The figures - calculated by the London School of Hygiene of Tropical Medicine for Cancer Research UK - show that while survival rates vary between different types of cancer, on average a patient with the disease now has a 46.2 per cent chance of being alive ten years after diagnosis.
DOCTORS have come to the defence of an online medical records scheme being piloted in Bolton after a group of GPs expressed concerns about it. Four family doctors told The Bolton News yesterday of their fears about the security of the system, which allows private patient records to be accessed by dozens of health professionals rather than one individual GP practice.
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