Section: Health

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Is Omicron really that mild and does it spell the end of the pandemic?

Emma Monk
graphic of phrases connected with coronavirus

When the Omicron variant emerged in early December, there was a big split in the consensus between three views: “Omicron is mild”, “Omicron is just as bad as Delta” and “let’s wait and see what the data tell us over the coming weeks” Unfortunately, while the sensible scientists and commentators were erring on the side […]

“Daylight swabbery”

Mike Zollo

Starstruck? It’s not often that I derive inspiration from the front page of the Daily Star, but there we have it: this front page synthesised and articulated my feelings about the sheer bare-faced exploitation which has all too often characterised so much of the ‘economic activity’ surrounding the management of the coronavirus pandemic in the […]

Should mandatory vaccination for healthworkers have been a line in the sand?

Matt Hicks
medic holding syringe

Matt Hicks, a senior nurse, shares his personal views. There’s a lot of social media chatter about mandatory vaccines, especially in the light of the government’s U-turn on the Covid-19 vaccine for healthcare workers. My original position up until recently was that mandatory vaccines had always been accepted as being a legal requirement in healthcare and […]

Debunking the claim that only 17,371 people have died of Covid in the UK

Emma Monk
The Covid memorial wall

In my very first West Country Voices article I debunked the claim that “There have only been 388 Covid-19 deaths among the under-60s in the UK,” reported in various newspapers back in December 2020. Last week, a similar claim started doing the rounds. People were tweeting figures such as “only 17,000 people have died of […]

Long Covid – don’t look away. We all need to know

Michael Osborne

When I got Long Covid in March 2020. I was 38 and healthy. If you are anything like I was then, it is hard to understand how bad Long Covid is. I think that we all have an instinct to just… look away. But, please, it is important that you look. My own low-points: early […]

Who’s going to look after Granny? The crisis in social care

Anna Andrews
profile of older woman, cold and alone

I’m sorry to distract you from the kerfuffle over Downing St Christmas parties, and who paid for the redecoration of Boris Johnson’s flat etc, but there is something else which should concern us all. There is a massive crisis in social care in this country. We should all be aware of the possible implications for […]

“Treating taxpayers like an ATM machine”

Anthea Bareham
Meme of an ATM reads HMRX Self-servatives

Most people seem to think that Dido Harding’s test and trace programme (NHST&T but nothing to do with the NHS) is a disaster. I won’t go into the reasons why; you can read some of it in the House of Commons committee report. Instead, let’s just look at the costs. The government allocated a budget […]

Covid-19, Omicron and the anti-vax/misinformation agenda

Emma Monk
Cognitive dissonance

Emma Monk takes a look at the ease with which Covid misinformation is created and spread and at the cognitive dissonance on display. Within days of scientists discovering a new Covid-19 variant, now called ‘Omicron’, the usual anti-science/anti-vax culprits were trying to find ways to cast doubt over it on social media. I made a […]

Social care: another Conservative manifesto pledge broken

Sadie Parker

Social care may well prove to be Alexander Boris de Pfeffel’s Johnson’s Waterloo, and deservedly so. Out of the blue, less than a week before parliament was to vote on the matter, Number 10 tabled a new proposal (New Clause 49 to the Health and Care Bill) on the social care cap. It significantly watered […]

The NHS: where does all the money go?

Sally Miller

As NHS watchers are only too aware, there’s constant wrangling over NHS finances: it’s a bottomless pit; it’s mismanaged; it’s a huge amount; it’s not enough; will never be enough….Where to start with all of this? Let’s take a look… Does the UK spend on healthcare match that of comparable countries? Well, no. Neither as […]

Cancer patients have suffered enough

Dr Dianne Dowling

During a BBC interview on 1 October 2021, Boris Johnson added insult to injury by using the phrase: “Never mind life expectancy or cancer outcomes – look at wage growth.” Clearly, the only metric he was interested in was economic. This is deeply offensive to cancer patients and their families, and shows a total lack […]

Covid-19: 2 months since ‘Freedom Day’, but where are we now?

Emma Monk

Just over two months since ‘Freedom Day’ and in many places it feels like Covid-19 is a distant memory. Masks have been abandoned, schools are ‘back to normal’, people are crowding back on tubes; meanwhile you still can’t go into a vet’s consulting room with your pet. So where exactly are we with regards to […]

Japan’s prime minister resigned over 17,000 Covid deaths. Deaths in the UK now stand at 135,000. Will Johnson resign? Letter to the editor

Editor-in-chief

Dear Editor-in-chief, Nearly a fortnight ago the Prime Minister of Japan, Yoshihide Suga, resigned after taking personal responsibility for nearly 17,000 deaths from Covid-19. This, in a country of some 126 million people which has recently hosted the Olympic Games. Many in Japan thought the games should be delayed again, but they compromised by not allowing spectators […]

The £20 UC cut: the final straw?

Valerie Huggins

At the beginning of August, the headline in the Guardian stated “Johnson faces rebellion over ‘intolerable’ hunger and poverty in home counties”. Steve Baker, MP for Wycombe in Buckinghamshire (and lead Brexiter) was apparently shocked by the crisis in food insecurity after a study by Sheffield University researchers revealed that his constituency is one of […]

Marcus Fysh talking (potentially dangerous) codswallop. Part 1

Anthea Simmons

MP for Yeovil Marcus Fysh has miraculously become a medic – and an epidemiologist and virologist to boot. Perhaps he’s piloting a new government strategy aimed at filling the shortages in experienced staff across a whole range of sectors whereby an individual has only to express a nodding acquaintance with a subject or a function […]

Covid-19 vaccinations for 12-15 yr olds: a detailed look at the JCVI decision

Emma Monk

After weeks of speculation on whether or not children aged 12-15 would be offered a Covid-19 vaccination, the Joint Committee on Vaccinations and Immunisation (JCVI) finally released their report on 3 September. As is often the case, the findings widely reported in the press didn’t fully reflect what the report actually said, and this has […]