Public Health Wales urges eligible people to come forward for Covid-19 spring vaccination
Following the advice from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), in Wales the COVID-19 spring vaccination is being offered to: people aged 75 years and over; residents in a care home for older adults; and individuals aged six months and over who have a weakened immune system because of a health condition or medical treatment
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NBC News
8 hours ago
- NBC News
How RFK Jr. is quickly changing U.S. health agencies
WASHINGTON — In just a few short months, Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has begun to transform U.S. health policy: shrinking staff at health agencies, restructuring the focus of some regulators and researchers, changing Covid vaccine regulations and reshaping the mission of his department to focus more on alternative medicine. The directives are all part of the same issue set that drove a slice of health-conscious, left-leaning Americans to eventually vote for a Republican president whose favorite meal is from McDonald's, Trump and Kennedy catered to a type of voter who has grown distrustful of America's health care establishment — but possibly fomented a new type of distrust in federal health policy along the way. Bernadine Francis, a lifelong Democrat who backed Joe Biden for president in 2020 before supporting Donald Trump in 2024, told NBC News in an interview that she approves of Kennedy's efforts so far, despite his 'hands being tied' by entrenched forces in the administration and in Congress. 'From what I have seen so far with what RFK has been trying to do,' she said, 'I am really, really proud of what he's doing.' Francis is among the voters who left the Democratic Party and voted for Trump because 'nothing else mattered' apart from public health, which they — like Kennedy — felt was going in the wrong direction. Concerns about chemicals in food and toxins in the environment, long championed by Democrats, has become a galvanizing issue to a key portion of Trump's Republican Party, complete with an oversaturation of information that in some cases hasn't been proven. It's wrapped up, as well, in concerns about the Covid vaccine, which was accelerated under Trump, administered under Biden and weaponized by anti-vaccine activists like Kennedy amid lockdowns and firings in the wake of the devastating pandemic. 'We knew in order to get RFK in there so he can help with the situation that we have in the health industry, we knew we had to do this,' said Francis, a retired Washington, D.C., public school administrator, who said she left her 'beloved' career because she had refused the vaccine. 'It seemed to me, as soon as [Biden] became president, the vaccine was mandated, and that was when I lost all hope in the Democrats,' Francis told NBC News, referring to vaccination mandates put in place by the Biden administration for a large portion of the federal workforce during the height of the pandemic. There are not currently any federal Covid vaccine mandates. There have been 1,228,393 confirmed Covid deaths in the United States since the start of the pandemic, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. How RFK Jr.'s picks are changing public health agencies Dr. Marty Makary, Kennedy's hand-picked commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration and a John Hopkins scientist and researcher, told NBC News in an interview that he wants to transform the agency, which he said faced 'corruption' over influence from the pharmaceutical and food industries. 'I mean, you look at the food pyramid, it was not based on what's best for you, it was based on what companies wanted you to buy,' he said, referring to the 1992 and later iterations of official government nutritional guidance. He said there would be 'entirely new nutrition guidance' released later this year, as soon as this summer. He praised the FDA's mission of research and regulation, saying the agency is 'incredibly well-oiled, and we've got the trains running on time.' He also highlighted the 75-page 'Make America Healthy Again' commission report — which focused on ultraprocessed foods and toxins in the environment — as having set 'the agenda for research' at the FDA, HHS and agencies overseeing social safety net programs such as Medicare and food stamps moving forward. (The MAHA report initially cited some studies that didn't exist, a mistake that Kennedy adviser Calley Means said was a 'great disservice' to their mission.) 'I think there's a lot we're going to learn. For example, the microbiome, which gets attention in the MAHA report, needs to be on the map. We don't even talk about it in our medical circles,' Makary said. 'The microbiome, food is medicine, the immune response that happens when chemicals that don't appear in nature go down our GI tract.' Pressed on other areas of the administration, like the Environmental Protection Agency, making decisions that run counter to the pro-regulatory ideas presented in the MAHA report, Makary said he can 'only comment on the FDA' where they are 'committed to Secretary Kennedy's vision.' But Kennedy's public health agenda goes beyond looking at the food supply and chemicals. Recently, Kennedy said in a video posted on X last month that the Covid vaccine is no longer recommended for healthy children and pregnant women, a change in CDC guidance that skipped the normal public review period. Days later, after critics questioned the decision and raised concerns over a lack of public data behind the move, the administration updated its guidance again, urging parents to consult with their doctors instead. Pressed about the confusion and whether Americans are now trading one side of public distrust in the health system for another, Makary defended Kennedy, who has been criticized for spreading misinformation. 'My experience with Secretary Robert F. Kennedy is that he listens. He listens to myself, he listens to Jay Bhattacharya, listens to Dr. Mehmet Oz, he listens to a host of scientists that are giving him guidance,' Makary argued, referring to the director of the National Institutes of Health and the administrator for the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, respectively. 'So he may have big questions, but the questions he's asking are the questions most Americans are asking.' The intersection of medicine and healthy lifestyle choices Dr. Dawn Mussallem, a breast cancer oncologist and integrative medicine doctor — a physician who combines conventional treatments with research-based alternative therapies — has tried to help her patients wade through medical misinformation they encounter online and in their social circles. Mussallem has an incredible story of personal survival: While in medical school, she was diagnosed with Stage IV cancer and, after conventional therapies like chemo saved her life, was diagnosed with heart failure. After undergoing a heart transplant, Mussallem ran a 26-mile marathon just one year later. 'I learned a lot in medical school, but nothing compared to what I learned being a patient,' said Mussallem, who dedicates, on average, 90 minutes each in one-on-one sessions with her patients. 'This is not about any one political choice. But we know lifestyle matters.' For example, a new study from the American Society of Clinical Oncology that finds eating food that lowers inflammation in the body may help people with advanced colon cancer survive longer. Mussallem's mission, along with her colleagues, is to elevate the modern medicine that saved her life, as well as encouraging her patients to live healthy lifestyles, including regular exercise, minimally processed foods, less screen time, more social connection and better sleep. But politics do get in the way for millions of Americans who are inundated daily with social media influencers and 'nonmedical experts,' as Mussallem puts it, who stoke fear in her patients. 'Patients come in with all these questions, fears,' she said. 'I've heard this many times from patients, that their nervous system is affected by what they're seeing happening in government.' Mussallem acknowledges that 'a lot of individuals out there' have questioned traditional medicine. For her, it isn't one or the other — it's both. 'We have to trust the conventional medicine,' she said. 'With the conventional care that marches right alongside more of an integrative modality to look at the root causes of disease, as well as to help to optimize with lifestyle, is where we need to be.'
BBC News
13 hours ago
- BBC News
Gonorrhoea vaccinations to start in Northern Ireland in August
The Department of Health has said a targeted vaccination programme against gonorrhoea has been approved across Northern Ireland. Eligible patients will be offered the vaccine from August 2025, the department said. Those eligible include gay and bisexual men who have a recent history of multiple sexual partners or have recently had a sexually transmitted infection (STI). Gonorrhoea is now the most prevalent STI diagnosed in sexual health clinics in Northern Ireland, according to the Public Health Agency (PHA). England will also begin its vaccination roll out in August this vaccine roll out will also focus mainly on gay and bisexual men with a history of multiple sexual partners or an was given by the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) in November 2023, which recommended roll out of the vaccine following an upsurge in gonorrhoea Minister Mike Nesbitt said the launch of the vaccine programme is "important and very timely for Northern Ireland's public health". He added that by targeting those "most at risk", there is an "opportunity to curb the spread and reduce transmission rates". The vaccine is an existing one for meningococcal B disease, called 4CMenB. The UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) research shows that those who receive the jab could be protected from the STI by up to 40% and it could help tackle levels of antibiotic-resistant strains of the disease. Record number of gonorrhoea cases PHA figures for Northern Ireland show that between 2021 and 2022 the number of cases jumped from 652 to 1,606 - the highest number recorded by the were 951 cases in 2019, but that dropped to 455 in 2020, likely due to changes in behaviour and healthcare associated with the Covid 2023, there were 1,561 new cases, accounting for almost a third (28%) of all new STI diagnoses in Northern Ireland. Of those diagnosed, 75% were males and of those 67% were gay, bisexual and men who have sex with does not always have symptoms, but they can include pain, unusual discharge, inflammation of the genitals and infertility. The chief medical officer said the vaccine roll-out will have "significant public health benefits for both those who receive the vaccine, and the wider population".Sir Michael McBride said the programme has "the potential to result in less patients presenting with more complex cases and clusters of gonorrhoea".He encouraged all those eligible to take up the vaccine when offered. What is gonorrhoea? Gonorrhoea is easily passed from person to person through unprotected one in 10 infected men and almost half of infected women do not experience any infection can be passed from a pregnant woman to her baby, and without treatment, can cause permanent blindness for a newborn is not spread by non-sexual contact like is not transmitted through surfaces and materials like toilet seats, towels, cups or you have had successful treatment for gonorrhoea before, you can still catch it NHS.
Daily Mirror
13 hours ago
- Daily Mirror
Covid Nimbus variant in UK 'causes hospital surge' in some countries
Health experts have issued 'stay at home' advice and officials said in countries where it is rampant a big increase in serious infections has happened Top health officials have said people should 'stay indoors' if they feel they have Covid symptoms after a new strain was detected in the UK. Worryingly, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) highlighted that in other countries where the new 'Nimbus' variant is widespread, it has led to a big rise in hospitalisations. In a new blog the UKHSA said the fresh NB.1.8.1 variant spread, is being monitored by the World Health Organisation. Dr Gayatri Amirthalingam, the Deputy Director at UKHSA, said: "NB.1.8.1 has been detected in small numbers in the UK to date, but international data suggests that it is growing as a proportion of all Covid-19 cases." 'Based on the available information so far however, there is no evidence to suggest that this variant causes more severe disease than previous variants, or that the vaccines in current use will be less effective against it.' The UKHSA added: "NB.1.8.1 has been detected in small numbers in the UK to date, and international data suggests that it is growing as a proportion of all COVID-19 cases. Although cases and hospitalisations are increasing in some countries where NB.1.8.1 is widespread, current data does not indicate that this variant leads to more severe illness than other variants in circulation. "The most important thing to do is to get your vaccination when it is due if you're eligible. It's normal for viruses to mutate and change, and as more data becomes available on this variant we'll have a better understanding of how it interacts with our immune systems and how to optimise our protection, as well as actions we can take to keep the most vulnerable safe and live our lives as normally as possible." With the rise of the Nimbus variant, the UKHSA has issued advice on what people should do if they catch it - including wearing a mask if they go out. They stated: "If you have symptoms of a respiratory infection, such as COVID-19, and you have a high temperature or do not feel well enough to go to work or carry out normal activities, you should avoid contact with vulnerable people and stay at home if possible." The UKHSA further advised that if a person leaves their home while they have symptoms of a respiratory infection, and you have a high temperature or feel unwell, they should "avoid close contact with anyone who you know is at higher risk of becoming seriously unwell, especially those whose immune system means that they are at higher risk of serious illness, despite vaccination." UKHSA advice on reducing chance of passing on infection to others: Wear a well-fitting face covering made with multiple layers or a surgical face mask Avoid crowded places such as public transport, large social gatherings, or anywhere that is enclosed or poorly ventilated Taking any exercise outdoors in places where you will not have close contact with other people Covering your mouth and nose when you cough or sneeze; wash your hands frequently with soap and water for 20 seconds or use hand sanitiser after coughing, sneezing and blowing your nose and before you eat or handle food; avoid touching your face. For more information and advice, click here. Symptoms include: severe sore throat fatigue mild cough fever muscle aches congestion
