Tim Worstall

Hmm.
These serious health inequalities do not arise
by chance, and they cannot be attributed simply to
genetic makeup, ‘bad’, unhealthy behaviour, or difficulties
in access to medical care, important as those
factors may be. Social and economic differences in
health status reflect, and are caused by, social and
economic inequalities in society.
I agree, I’ve only skimmed the summary, but I see [...]

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The figures obtained by the Conservatives showed that 185,446 people were discharged from hospital in England in 2008/9 with a diagnosis of malnourishment, compared with 175,003 who were admitted malnourished.
It is true that some illnesses and treatments reduce appetite.
Me personally (on the grounds of little more than innate prejudice [...]

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Well, yes, this is indeed a good thing.
The chief executive of the world’s second biggest pharmaceutical company will today announce that he is putting into the public domain thousands of potential drugs that might cure malaria.
Andrew Witty, the British boss of Glaxo-SmithKline, will say in a major speech that multinational drug companies have to balance [...]

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OK, so there’s been a kerfluffle about Jonathan Gruber. World class health economist was being paid by the Obama admin while he was writing Op/Eds supporting Obamacare and not revealing such payments.
Over here of course that’s entirely normal: in US style journalism it’s considered one of the great sins, not declaring interests.
OK, well, Brad DeLong [...]

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David Cameron meets some radicals!
It says a hugely slimmed down NHS should remain only as a “last resort” provider for those who cannot afford private health care. The vast majority of people would get care through insurance schemes or simply pay themselves.
It also calls for controversial “top-up” care to [...]

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From a US blogger. Given the changes that are about to happen in US health care, what do we think about the NHS?
1. What do you like about the government ran health care system?
2. What don’t you like about the government ran health care system?
3. What would you change about the government ran health care [...]

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British health care is little better than that of former Communist countries, which spend a fraction of the billions poured into the NHS.
A survey published yesterday by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development sees Britain languishing with the Czech Republic and Poland in international league tables on health.
But it’s not all bad news!
On the [...]

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Legalised euthanasia has led to a severe decline in the quality of care for terminally-ill patients in Holland, it has been claimed.
What did anyone think would happen?
Why invest in hospices, in palliative care, if there’s an injection which will solve the problem once and for all?

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What are these people on?
The Albany group, which works in Peckham, south London, where deprivation levels are high, has long been held up as a shining example of what is possible in NHS midwifery. It supports women to give birth wherever they choose – almost half give birth at home – and medical intervention rates [...]

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Or perhaps they’re just in a different century.
Traditional Lamaze breathing classes are out,
Eh?
Aren’t “Lamaze breathing classes” still regarded as outre, on the edge and extremely hip over here?
How in $%&$ did they get to be “traditional” over there?

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One in five HIV sufferers in Africa was infected by medical staff using dirty needles and clinical equipment, new research has found.

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No, please, read it carefully.
Nursing is a profession for which demand is only going to increase. With an ageing population and more people suffering from long-term conditions, caring for patients is set to become as important to the health service as technological advances. With 200,000 nurses due to retire within the next [...]

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Nurses will ‘need a degree in four years’
Look, I’m sorry, but hospitals do in fact have jobs that simply have to be done. Cleaning up a patient, dealing with bedpans and changing dressings etc.
A degree is certainly not needed to do these jobs and could in fact be a barrier to doing them: who [...]

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Treatment centres run by the private sector are profiting from NHS funding by taking on less risky patients while being paid the same rate as publicly funded hospitals, a study suggests.
Do the routine, almost industrialised, stuff in one place, put the complicated ones under the care of experts.
The problem with this is?

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Poor care ‘could be killing patients’
Poor health care could be contributing to hundreds of deaths a year in British hospitals, a new report suggests.
And
NHS ‘better than American health care’
NHS care in Britain is better than private health provision in the United States for quick and effective treatment, according to an American think tank.
They’re not mutually [...]

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Declared in the US:
The emergency rules effectively cut through official red tape and free up resources to respond much faster in the event of a serious outbreak.
Here’s an idea. Why not not reimpose that red tape after it’s all over? After all, the US is trying to make its health care system cheaper without lowering [...]

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The number of hospital staff who are receiving private healthcare treatment paid for by the NHS has prompted accusations that the health service is paying for its staff to queue-jump and raised questions about its ability to provide adequate treatment.
Freedom of information requests sent out to all NHS trusts and hospitals in England reveal that [...]

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But, but, using the market to provide health care means that we cannot plan the provision of health care!
One problem is that market reforms have been accompanied by a hollowing out of the intelligent public health information that is required for healthcare planning and ensuring fairness of distribution of resources. What the public, politicians, clinicians [...]

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AN 80-year-old grandmother who doctors identified as terminally ill and left to starve to death has recovered after her outraged daughter intervened.
Hazel Fenton, from East Sussex, is alive nine months after medics ruled she had only days to live, withdrew her antibiotics and denied her artificial feeding. The former school matron had [...]

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But….
Miss Wooltorton, 26, who was suffering depression over her inability to have a child, drank poison at home and called an ambulance. However, she remained conscious and handed doctors a letter saying she wanted medical staff only to make her comfortable and not to try to [...]

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