BBC It had been the NHS’s longest-running and bitterest pay dispute – responsible for hundreds of thousands of cancelled operations and appointments. And then, suddenly, word came on Monday that the British Medical Association was recommending that its 50,000 junior doctor members accept a fresh offer from the new government. It sounded almost too good…
At least nine reports are expected, covering everything from political decision-making to vaccines. Publishing the first of these, inquiry chair Baroness Hallett said the UK was “ill-prepared for dealing with a catastrophic emergency, let alone the coronavirus pandemic”. “Never again can a disease be allowed to lead to so many deaths and so much suffering,”…
An anti-corruption charity says it has identified significant concerns in contracts worth over £15.3bn awarded by the Conservative government during the Covid pandemic, equivalent to one in every £3 spent. Transparency International UK found 135 “high-risk” contracts with at least three red flags – warning signs of a risk of corruption. Twenty-eight contracts worth £4.1bn…
BBC Mandi Masters, a community midwife, was hospitalised with Covid in the pandemic. The public inquiry into the pandemic will start 10 weeks of hearings on Monday looking at the impact on patients, healthcare workers and the wider NHS. Covid patients have been admitted to hospital more than a million times in the UK since…
BBC Sophie Blake says she is most concerned for her teenage daughter A Brighton mother with terminal cancer is calling on the government to “urgently” reform assisted dying laws. Sophie Blake, who was diagnosed with stage four secondary breast cancer in May 2022, says she wants new rules to allow people to medically end their…
Getty Images The first “citizens’ jury” on assisted dying in England has backed a change in the law to allow people who are terminally ill to end their life. A jury of 28 people concluded it should be an option for those judged to have capacity to make their own decisions. While it has no…
BBC The number of people taking ADHD medication is at a record high – and the NHS is feeling the strain as it tries to diagnose and treat the condition. Since 2015, the number of patients in England prescribed drugs to treat ADHD has nearly trebled, and BBC research suggests that it would take eight…
BBC Dame Ruth May was England’s chief nurse from 2019 until she retired in July 2024 Nurses bore the brunt of the pandemic, with low staffing levels and difficulties accessing protective equipment, according to England’s former chief nurse. Dame Ruth May told the Covid inquiry the NHS had been understaffed in 2020, in part because…
UKHSA’s Prof Susan Hopkins questioned over face masks at Covid inquiry. There is only “weak evidence” that high-grade face masks better protected health workers than surgical ones in the pandemic, the Covid inquiry has been told. Prof Susan Hopkins, chief medical adviser at the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA), said respirator masks – known as…
Getty Images The provision of PPE for healthcare workers is being explored in this part of the Covid inquiry (stock image) The chair of the Covid inquiry has refused an application from the UK Health Security Agency to keep the identities of two junior clinicians secret. Lawyers for UKHSA applied for an order preventing publication…
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