1. The NHS is falling apart like the Home Office which is scheduled to be split effective 9th May 2007. The NHS should be split as well, but it's anyone's guess as to how this should be done. In the meantime NHS staff and doctors are disaffected as patient treatment problems arise in the face of the antibiotic resistant bacteria and other diseases. How could such a training and doctor employment debacle arise? They reflect the failures in central control and management under a government that has to be seen to be doing something every day. NHS staff must be exhausted at the shifting back and forth to game targets rather than treat patients. Ultimately, the patients suffer.
BBC News Tuesday, 24 April 2007, 11:13 GMT 12:13 UK
Minister heckled by health staff
 The government wants to stage the pay rise |
Health workers have heckled a minister as he addressed delegates at a conference amid threats by staff that they will take industrial action.
Health Minister Andy Burnham faced a wall of silence as he stood up at Unison's health conference. He was then heckled and booed during his speech.
Earlier, delegates at the Brighton meeting had rejected a staged 2.5% pay rise and agreed to ballot members.
They warned of co-ordinated action leading to a "summer of discontent".
The Society of Radiographers has also voted to consider industrial action if the government does not reverse its decision to stage the awards.
Both bodies earlier said members were "getting angrier by the day" at a below-inflation offer that they said amounted to a pay cut.
Minister heckled by health staff
BBC News Tuesday, 24 April 2007, 14:57 GMT 15:57 UK
Trainee doctors 'will go abroad'
 Doctors have protested about the application system |
More than half of trainee doctors are ready to leave the UK if they fail to get a training post, a survey suggests.
The British Medical Association, which carried out the poll of 650 doctors, has asked to meet Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt to review the findings.
There are estimated to be 10,000 more applicants than posts and the BMA wants action to prevent an exodus.
Prime Minister Tony Blair told the BBC there were more doctors chasing jobs because of increased investment.
Trainee doctors 'will go abroad'
BBC News Wednesday, 25 April 2007, 21:27 GMT 22:27 UK
Doctor training 'security lapse'
 Junior doctors have been protesting about MTAS |
The Department of Health has apologised for an apparent security lapse which allowed the personal details of junior doctors to be accessed online.
Channel 4 News reported that a breach on the NHS Medical Training Application Service website had allowed details to accessed by the public from 0900 BST.
The department said they had only been available briefly, and only to people making employment checks.
Shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley said it was shocking and unacceptable.
On Wednesday, Channel 4 News reported that a doctor had alerted them to a security breach allowing confidential details to be accessed.
'Very serious'
Phone numbers, addresses, previous convictions and sexual orientation were among details were available since at least 0900 BST, it reported.
Doctor training 'security lapse'
BBC News hursday, 26 April 2007, 20:10 GMT 21:10 UK
Doctors' job website is suspended
| Ministers have already agreed to review the online system |
A controversial job application website for junior doctors has been suspended, amid fresh concerns of security lapses.
The Department of Health said it was investigating claims that doctors were able to read each other's messages.
The new concerns come a day after revelations that applicants' personal information could be freely accessed.
The MTAS website has been the subject of protests from junior doctors. The Conservatives say the system is in "complete crisis".
Channel 4 News reported that applicants had been able to see each other's files by changing two digits in the personalised web address given to each individual.
Doctors' job website is suspended
BBC News Tuesday, 24 April 2007, 21:59 GMT 22:59 UK
Death 'lottery' in NHS hospitals
 The researchers looked at data for hospitals across England |
There is a major difference in the death rates at hospitals around England, a report has found.
Patients at the hospital with the worst rate were twice as likely to die as those at the top ranked hospital.
The work by Dr Foster Research, an independent health information company, estimated 7,400 could have been saved if mortality rates were standard.
But the Department of Health warned it was "impossible" to reflect a hospital's safety in one statistic.
Dr Foster, which carried out the study for the Daily Telegraph, looked at Hospital Standardised Mortality Ratios for 152 hospital trusts across England in 2005-2006.
Death 'lottery' in NHS hospitals
BBC News Thursday, 26 April 2007, 06:15 GMT 07:15 UK
Call for more action on NHS bugs
 C difficile rates have been on the rise |
More needs to be done to protect people from potentially lethal hospital bugs, the Patients Association says.
The group has urged more action as the Health Protection Agency (HPA) prepares to publish the latest infection rates.
Previous figures showed Clostridium difficile is on the rise in England, while MRSA is falling - but not quickly enough to meet the government's target.
The Patients Association said all patients should be screened and infection control budgets ring-fenced.
Call for more action on NHS bugs
BBC News Wednesday, 25 April 2007, 23:53 GMT 00:53 UK
Hospital warns patients over TB
 The member of staff had worked on ward 16 at York Hospital |
Officials at York Hospital have written to nearly 600 patients after a member of their healthcare staff was diagnosed with tuberculosis.
The unnamed woman has been ill since last September, but the disease has only just been diagnosed.
Managers at the hospital said the member of staff was deployed on ward 16, a surgical unit, but stopped work in March when her coughing got worse.
There are no notified cases of the disease being passed on in the region.
However, hospital officials said the woman had not recently travelled outside the UK.
Hospital warns patients over TB
2. The Archbishop of Canterbury started a campaign for "moral leadership" from politicians in the country while the Church of England found itself in a cover up scandal regarding a child abuser. Moral authority is lacking in the Church itself. No wonder the politicians are equally expedient in covering up problems and ignoring key issues. Don't do as I do. Do as I say. This doesn't work does it? The human animal is the same in every organisation. There is a standard distribution of personalities and characters.
BBC News Thursday, 26 April 2007, 01:12 GMT 02:12 UK
Williams urges political 'morals'
 Dr Williams wants to see greater morality in modern politics |
The Archbishop of Canterbury has accused today's politicians of lacking clear moral leadership.
In a BBC interview, Dr Rowan Williams said the government had become a form of management and no longer debated issues along moral grounds.
He said he expected the government to provide an "opportunity for the kind of moral discussion informed by religion".
His comments came a day after a speech in which he bemoaned the lack of a moral basis to modern politics.
In it he expressed concerns about the "draining away of any residual notion that the state itself has or should have a moral foundation".
Williams urges political 'morals'
BBC News Thursday, 26 April 2007, 14:45 GMT 15:45 UK
Anger over Church abuse cover-up
 Peter Halliday continued to work with children until his arrest |
Campaigners have called the Church of England's failure to tell police about an ex-choirmaster who sexually abused children "totally irresponsible".
Peter Halliday, 61, from Farnborough, Hants, was jailed for 30 months after admitting sex offences from the 1980s.
BBC News has learned he admitted the abuse 17 years ago, but left the Church quietly on condition he had no further contact with children.
Church officials say they now have "robust" child protection policies.
Halliday, who is married, was ordered to pay all three victims £2,000 each, after admitting to 10 counts of abuse at an earlier hearing at Winchester Crown Court.
He abused the boys who were in his church choir between 1985 and 1990.
Judge Ian Pearson banned Halliday from working with children and said he would be put on the Sex Offenders Register, both for life.