Yesterday, the Tax Policy Center released its initial analysis of the health reform plans of the two presidential campaigns. The center is a joint initiative of the Brookings Institution and the Urban Institute, two leading Washington think tanks. […]
Anna Donald: When I wish I didn’t have cancer
I am lying in bed, propped up with a silly number of pillows. I’ve stolen my husband’s, who is spending the night in Taree, a small country town about four hours away, where he is arguing a case about termite control. I’ve always wondered how he knows so much about such an esoteric range of […]
David Pencheon on the NHS carbon reduction strategy
We have no right to steal from future generations. At the end of this month, the consultation will close on the proposed carbon reduction strategy for the NHS in England. This country is the first in the world to start legislating on climate change, the most serious and urgent health threat to current and future […]
Richard Smith: Painfully slow progress improving health care
Are we making good progress with improving health care? If not, why not and how could we do better? I tried to answer these questions as I spoke to a thousand enthusiasts for health care quality in Nijmegen at the launch of IQ Scientific Institute for Quality of Healthcare. There were probably 50 people in […]
Tessa Richards: Postoperative posting
Sarah Palin may have raised the profile of female politicians, but I’m lifting my glass to the girls who saw me through surgery last week. I did spot the odd male among the panoply of health professionals who looked after me, but they were thin on the ground. From the consultant surgeon and anaesthetist to […]
Anna Donald: What makes me feel good?
This blog is in response to a fourth question from Richard Smith: “What makes you feel good?” The question stymied me a bit. Not because there aren’t oodles of things that make me feel good. But because I don’t have a coherent way of laying them all out. A list? In the end I’ve resorted […]
Liz Wager on the Large Hadron Collider – a qualified success?
News of the Large Hadron Collider, which is due to smash its first atoms on 10 September, makes me wonder not about subatomic particles but about adjectives. When I teach researchers how to report their work, I generally advise them to be wary of qualifying adjectives as they seem out of place in scientific papers. […]
Vidhya Alakeson on the US election
After the Democratic Convention last week, when healthcare featured in almost every major speech, I had been waiting all week to see whether the Republicans would talk about it at all during their Convention in Minneapolis. Yesterday, on the last day of the Convention, healthcare reform finally got a mention when John McCain took to […]
Julian Sheather: Free NHS care for asylum seekers
It runs like an uneasy theme in the ethics of health care provision. How do we respond to the genuine health needs of individuals who do not have legal rights of residency and are unable to pay privately for their own health care? What obligations, if any, do we have to sick people who are […]
Jessie Colquhoun: Standfirsts and softball
Last Tuesday I would have been starting my first term as a fourth year medical student. Instead I started my 11th week in the BMJ office as Student BMJ editor. The position is a year long, and then I’ll go back to Manchester medical school to join a new year. So it has taken eleven weeks to write this blog. I’ve […]