Gloucestershire trust has resolved midwife shortage, boss says
In June, Health Secretary Wes Streeting announced a national investigation into maternity care in England, listing Gloucestershire as one of "the trusts of greatest concern".Women can give birth in Stroud but there is no postnatal care available there, while the entire Aveta Birth Unit in Cheltenham is shut.Mr McNamara joined the trust shortly before its maternity service failures, including maternal deaths being twice the national average, were highlighted on the BBC's investigative documentary show Panorama."Last year, we were in a very precarious position when it came to the number of midwives," Mr McNamara said."We've resolved that issue, we now have more midwives than we ever have done in the service but there's more work to do with some other staff groups."
Mr McNamara said midwives were "being spread too thinly" so had been "consolidated" at Gloucestershire Royal Hospital in Gloucester, which has the county's only fully open maternity unit."I recognise that's disappointing for the community but what I have been clear on is I don't want to compromise safety at the expense of choice," he said.He said the health needs assessment, when it is finished in the autumn, would help to find out what is required from the trust's maternity services over the next five to 10 years.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Times
2 hours ago
- Times
Patients will suffer most if doctor strikes resume, NHS bosses warn
NHS bosses have warned that patients will be the ones to 'suffer most' from another wave of doctors' strikes as they nervously await the results of a ballot. The British Medical Association is expected to announce results of its ballot of about 50,000 resident doctors, who were formerly known as junior doctors, on Tuesday. The ballot closed at 12pm on Monday and if passed, would give resident doctors a six-month mandate to call strike action until the New Year, with strikes held from July 21 at the earliest. The result is expected to be close, with NHS bosses hopeful that turnout may not pass the 50 per cent threshold required for industrial action. However, BMA leaders have said that they are confident it will pass and that doctors are 'excited to go again'.
The Independent
2 hours ago
- The Independent
RFK Jr. promoted a food company he says will make Americans healthy. Their meals are ultraprocessed
Health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on Monday praised a company that makes $7-a-pop meals that are delivered directly to the homes of Medicaid and Medicare enrollees. He even thanked Mom's Meals for sending taxpayer-funded meals 'without additives" to the homes of sick or elderly Americans. The spreads include chicken bacon ranch pasta for dinner and French toast sticks with fruit or ham patties. 'This is really one of the solutions for making our country healthy again,' Kennedy said in the video, posted to his official health secretary account, after he toured the company's Oklahoma facility last week. But an Associated Press review of Mom's Meals menu, including the ingredients and nutrition labels, shows that the company's foods are the type of heat-and-eat, ultraprocessed food that Kennedy routinely criticizes for making people sick. The meals contain chemical additives that would render them impossible to recreate at home in your kitchen, said Marion Nestle, a nutritionist at New York University and food policy expert, who reviewed the menu for The AP. Many menu items are high in sodium, and some are high in sugar or saturated fats, she said. 'It is perfectly possible to make meals like this with real foods and no ultra-processing additives but every one of the meals I looked at is loaded with such additives,' Nestle said. 'What's so sad is that they don't have to be this way. Other companies are able to produce much better products, but of course they cost more.' Mom's Meals do not have the artificial, petroleum dyes that Kennedy has pressured companies to remove from products, she noted. Mom's Meals said in an emailed response that its food products 'do not include ingredients that are commonly found in ultra-processed foods.' The company does not use synthetic food dyes, high fructose corn syrup, certain sweeteners or synthetic preservatives that are banned in Europe, said Teresa Roof, a company spokeswoman. The meals are a 'healthy alternative' to what many people would find in their grocery stores, said Andrew Nixon, U.S. Health and Human Services spokesman, in response to questions about Mom's Meals. Mom's Meals is one of several companies across the U.S. that deliver 'medically tailored' at-home meals. The meal programs are covered by Medicaid for some enrollees, including people who are sick with cancer or diabetes, as well as some older Americans who are enrolled in certain Medicare health insurance plans. Patients recently discharged from the hospital can also have the meals delivered, according to the company's website. It's unclear how much federal taxpayers spend on providing meals through Medicaid and Medicare every year. An investigation by STAT news last year found that some states were spending millions of dollars to provide medically tailored meals to Medicaid enrollees that were marketed as healthy and 'dietician approved." But many companies served up meals loaded with salt, fat or sugar — all staples of an unhealthy American's diet, the report concluded. Defining ultraprocessed foods can be tricky. Most U.S. foods are processed, whether it's by freezing, grinding, fermentation, pasteurization or other means. Foods created through industrial processes and with ingredients such as additives, colors and preservatives that you couldn't duplicate in a home kitchen are considered the most processed. Kennedy has said healthier U.S. diets are key to his vision to 'Make America Healthy Again.' His call for Americans to increase whole foods in their diets has helped Kennedy build his unique coalition of Trump loyalists and suburban moms who have branded themselves as 'MAHA." In a recent social media post where he criticized the vast amount of ultraprocessed foods in American diets, Kennedy urged Americans to make healthier choices. 'This country has lost the most basic of all freedoms — the freedom that comes from being healthy," Kennedy said. —
The Guardian
2 hours ago
- The Guardian
Pregnant doctor denied Covid-19 vaccine sues Trump administration
A pregnant physician who was denied a Covid-19 vaccine is suing the Trump administration alongside a group of leading doctors associations, charging that the administration sought to 'desensitize the public to anti-vaccine and anti-science rhetoric', according to their attorney. The lawsuit specifically takes aim at health secretary Robert F Kennedy's unilateral decision to recommend against Covid-19 vaccines for pregnant women and healthy children. Kennedy's announcement circumvented expert scientific review panels and flouted studies showing pregnant women are at heightened risk from the virus, and made it more difficult for some to get the vaccine. 'This administration is an existential threat to vaccination in America, and those in charge are only just getting started,' said Richard H Hughes IV, partner at Epstein Becker Green and lead counsel for the plaintiffs in a statement. The American Academy of Pediatrics, American College of Physicians and American Public Health Association are among a list of leading physicians associations named as plaintiffs in the lawsuit. Sign up to This Week in Trumpland A deep dive into the policies, controversies and oddities surrounding the Trump administration after newsletter promotion 'If left unchecked, Secretary Kennedy will accomplish his goal of ridding the United States of vaccines, which would unleash a wave of preventable harm on our nation's children,' said Hughes. 'The professional associations for pediatricians, internal medicine physicians, infectious disease physicians, high-risk pregnancy physicians, and public health professionals will not stand idly by as our system of prevention is dismantled. This ends now.' In late May, Kennedy announced that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) would no longer recommend Covid-19 vaccines for healthy children or pregnant women. The announcement, made on social media, contradicted a raft of evidence showing pregnant women and infants are at especially high-risk from the disease, including from the administration's own scientific leaders. In June, Kennedy went further by firing all 17 sitting members of a key vaccine advisory panel to the CDC. The advisory panel is a key link in the vaccine distribution pipeline, helping to develop recommendations insurers use when determining which vaccines to cover. That panel met for the first time in late June. Members announced they would review both the childhood vaccine schedule and any vaccines that had not been formally reviewed in seven years. They also recommended against a long vilified vaccine preservative, in spite of a lack of evidence of harm. The news comes amid the largest annual measles case count in 33 years, and amid reports of more parents seeking early vaccination for their children, fearing vaccines will go into shortage or no longer be covered by insurance.
