Health
Service not available in Northern Ireland
Channel 4’s decision not to broadcast the Marie Stopes ‘Are you late?’ TV advert in Northern Ireland raises questions about what information it is criminal to distribute here. The Chief Executive of Marie Stopes International told the Guardian that ‘the advertising of abortion facilities, their contact numbers or addresses is against the law in Northern [...] more »
Recessions – good for your health?
A couple of weeks back, writing in the Sindo, Gene Kerrigan made the not unreasonable assertion that severe recessions cause unnecessary deaths. We saw all this before. During the Eighties, savage cuts inflicted lasting pain and cost lives — someone had to pay for the crisis. Meanwhile, known to the establishment — who were up [...] more »
“have you seen The Wire?”
Bobballs’ first blog round-up for the Belfast Telegraph included a suitably sceptical post by Keith Belfast in the face of apparent local political unanimity in support of the banning of mephedrone – despite actual evidence of harm from the drug’s use being largely absent and amid concerns about political interference in the work of the [...] more »
Healthcare: “We followed the most radical voices and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat”
David Frum, George W Bush’s speech writer may have a point when he says of the Obamacare legislation: “We followed the most radical voices in the party and the movement, and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat,” Frum wrote on his blog, adding: “Conservative talkers on Fox and talk radio had whipped the [...] more »
Healthcare bill teeters towards enactment…
We were fortunate that our time in Washington at the same time the government was trying to get its healthcare bill through Congress. I say ‘government’ when in actual fact the government (ie the executive office functions overseen by the White House) when – unlike the strong arm approach of LBJ (or even the Bush [...] more »
Obama’s healthcare deal to pass with a squeak….
One thing is obvious this St Patrick’s Day: very few people in Washington are thinking about Ireland, north or south. Obama’s healthcare bill is the only thing people are talking about. The general perception (ie from both left and right is that Obama has been strangely passive. Past Presidents have be active in writing law [...] more »
“this failure to communicate the seriousness of the situation…”
At the time of the recall of Irish pork over a dioxin contamination Sinn Féin’s Pat Doherty sought to blame the UK’s Food Standards Agency for the delay in a Ministerial response in Northern Ireland. And, as RTÉ reported in January, the Irish government’s Inter-Agency Review Group [pdf file] concluded that “Communications between agencies, industry [...] more »
“Nothing shows more clearly the scientific illiteracy that prevails in the House of Commons”
As David Colquhoun’s Improbable Science blog notes, 55 MPs [and counting - Ed] have signed Early Day Motion 908, expressing “concern at the conclusions of the Science and Technology Committee’s Report, Evidence Check on Homeopathy” – previously mentioned here. Among the signatories of the EDM are the DUP MPs, Peter Robinson, Nigel Dodds, Gregory Campbell, [...] more »
“The Friendly Sons can go outside if they want to smoke”
The Irish Times notes a selective approach to anti-smoking legislation by the Friendly Sons of St Patrick on Washington DC City Council. Washington DC city councillor Jack Evans, a member of the all-male Society of the Friendly Sons of St Patrick, pushed emergency legislation through the council last week to exempt the Sons’ annual dinner [...] more »
Iris Robinson’s anti-gay adviser was, um, quite possibly homosexual…
IT has been already been noted that a former adviser to rhetorical gay-basher Iris Robinson has been reported to the General Medical Council for his unconventional practices. But – if we utilise the same logic former DUP adviser Dr Paul Miller applies to gay men to himself – we might wonder why a man who [...] more »
“the Government should not endorse the use of placebo treatments”
I’m still not aware of any response from the NI Health Minister to the report on Peter Hain’s alternative remedy clinical trial scam self-assessing pilot scheme administered by Get Well UK – that report sits frozen in time on the departmental website. Still no sign of embarrassment from the BBC about the propaganda they broadcast [...] more »
Balancing the [Executive's] Books
The BBC reports that NI Finance Minister, the DUP’s Sammy Wilson, has outlined “how £367m is going to be cut from the NI budget next year.” Mr Wilson said water charges would continue to be deferred in 2010-11, at a cost of £213m to the executive. The Department of Health faces cuts of £113.5m and [...] more »
“the court concludes that it should order the withdrawal of the Guidance”
The Northern Ireland Health Department’s guidance to health professionals on termination of pregnancy, the law and clinical practice in Northern Ireland [pdf file], only emerged after a tortuous process. Firstly the Department, after a lengthy court battle, had to be instructed by a High Court ruling to produce the guidance. Then, after taking three years [...] more »
Suffering in silence…
BY now most of us will be familiar with the tragic tale of Bill Barbour and his wife, Alzheimers victim Ann. It appears Mr Barbour, who was Ann’s primary carer, suffocated his long-suffering wife before drowning himself. In this heartbreaking interview, the couple’s son tries to explain the family’s predicament and asks if “society should [...] more »
On the desertion of Irish politics by Irish politicians…
Stephen Collins returned yesterday to more pressing domestic problems in Irish politics, and found both the government and opposition wanting both in terms of the seriousness with which they take the issues it is facing and their willingness to weigh in and face the anger and frustration of ordinary people currently under the financial cosh. [...] more »
Lisbon Essay (31): Checks, balances and a stronger social dimension
And in the last of our Lisbon essays, Labour Party leader Eamon Gilmore rather trenchantly asserts that Lisbon is not about transfering power from Dublin to Brussels. It is he believes, in contrast to Jimmy Kelly in LE26, enhances a social Europe by setting the Charter up as a watchdog on all EU institutions when [...] more »
Reg Empey: Brown’s legacy was in Health and Education, not at the Treasury
One renegade snippet from Stormont live in which Sir Reg suggests that Brown’s contribution to the economy was less ‘robust’ than his work in the Health Service and the capital investment in the rebuilding of schools… more »
TPA get stung again over inaccurate figures….
Lest Matt or any of the guys over at the Taxpayer’s Alliance think I have some kind of agenda, let me re-assure them I don’t. The topline of their previous ‘research’ that the Government was paying lobbyists to lobby government is, if true, important work. Particularly in Northern Ireland where the public sector employment steals [...] more »
McNarry tells Wilson you cannot fill a £400 million black hole with savings you’re not making..
I argued that the crisis in Unionism is essentially a competitive one, and today David McNarry demonstrates presses on the heels of Sammy Wilson over the problems of, to borrow the words of Mr Munchau a ‘pre-crisis’ budget in a post crisis world… Months of denial under the stewardship of Nigel Dodds has left Sammy [...] more »
European First for Northern Ireland..
From pig to human to pig. Not a problem as long as the mortality rate, or the Case Fatality Ratio, stays low.. which it seems to be doing. more »
Advertise
-
Books
-
Of the Old North and other Vanished Kingdoms..
I’m currently trawling through Norman Davies’s fabulous new tome – “Vanished Kingdoms” – Five stars in the (London) Telegraph’s review from Ben Wilson: All the nations that have ever lived have left their footsteps in the sand,” writes Norman Davies. “The traces fade with every tide, the echoes grow faint, the images are fractured, the human [...] read our review » -
Titanic: was it all right when it left here?
Not according to metallurgists Tim Foecke and Jennifer Hooper McCarty whose research has suggested that dodgy Harland and Wolff rivets were at fault for allowing the Titanic’s hull to be ripped apart by the pressure of the iceberg impact. With six of the hull’s chambers exposed to the Atlantic waters, the “unsinkable” ship lasted less [...] read our review »
-
Help me with the West Wing: Essential viewing or Party Political Broadcast?
Having somehow managed to avoid watching a single episode of the widely praised West Wing TV series I was delighted to discover the entire Box set in my Christmas stocking – and with enough spare time over the holidays to give it a good lash. But with 10 episodes of the first series under my [...] read our review »
-
