Latest news with #HealthSecretary
Bloomberg
3 days ago
- General
- Bloomberg
CDC Shifts Child Covid Vaccination Guidance After RFK Jr. Post
The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention updated its childhood vaccination schedule to say that healthy children 'may receive' Covid shots — softened from its previous stance calling for them — after Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said it would no longer be recommended. When a parent wants 'their child to be vaccinated, children 6 months and older may receive Covid-19 vaccination, informed by the clinical judgment of a health-care provider,' the CDC website now says. It had previously recommended that everyone aged six months and older get vaccinated.
Telegraph
5 days ago
- Business
- Telegraph
How long will Streeting hold out against the most militant union in the land?
Militant trade union action has become far less commonplace than it used to be. But one organisation remains as hard line as ever: the British Medical Association (BMA). It sent out ballot papers this week to junior doctors urging them to back strike action in support of a 25 per cent pay demand. Now known as 'resident' medics, they are threatening months of disruption despite seeing their pay jump by 29 per cent in just three years. During a recent protracted dispute they stopped work 11 times and forced the cancellation of an estimated 1.5 million appointments. It is unconscionable that the BMA is now prepared to inflict further misery on the public, most of whom have not seen anything like the pay rises enjoyed by its members. The doctors profess to cherish the NHS, yet by their actions they cut away at its ability to cope with financial and population pressures. When appointments are cancelled or operations postponed, patients have to go back to square one, often involving another trip to a GP for their treatment to be rescheduled. How many drop out at that point? The backlog of cases remains above seven million with no chance of a significant reduction if there is another dispute. The public, who might have had some sympathy for the doctors in the past, have evidently lost patience judging by recent opinion polls. Labour has made a rod for its own back by giving inflation-busting pay rises to others in the public sector. Wes Streeting, the Health Secretary, made much of the Tory failure to settle this dispute when he was in opposition. Now the boot is on the other foot. How long will he hold out against the most militant union in the land?
Daily Mail
6 days ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
Doctors ramp up strike threats as ballot begins despite inflation-busting 5.4% pay offer from desperate Labour ministers
Junior doctors are ramping up their threat to hold fresh strikes despite being offered an inflation-busting 5.4 per cent pay rise. The British Medical Association (BMA), the union representing doctors, has slammed the pay rise as not going far enough to restore historical pay freezes. Resident doctors, formerly known as junior doctors, have started to receive ballots for industrial action. Labour ministers announced a series of public sector pay offers last week, including that most doctors would receive a 4 per cent pay rise. Resident doctors are to receive an extra £750 on top of the uplift, which Health Secretary Wes Streeting said works out to be a 5.4 per cent rise. Inflation figures published in the same week showed the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) rate rose by more than expected in April to 3.5 per cent. The BMA has branded the pay offer as 'woefully inadequate' and argued resident doctors were still not having their 'lost pay' restored. Dr Melissa Ryan, co-chair of the union's resident doctors committee, claimed the NHS had reached a 'crisis point' as she urged Mr Streeting to enter talks over pay. 'We're 23 per cent down on what doctors used to be paid in 2008,' Dr Ryan told BBC Radio 4's Today programme this morning. 'We can seeing doctors packing their bags wanting to head overseas, where they'll be better paid with better working conditions. 'So we're reaching a crisis point here, and we really do need to have a commitment from the Government to talk to us about this.' She added: 'We need our pay restored to 2008 levels because we're simply not worth less than doctors who were working in 2008. My work load is not 23 per cent easier. 'While it says it's a 5.4 per cent uplift, actually, with RPI inflation at 4.5 per cent, that's about 1 per cent. 'So it takes way more than a decade for us to even get close to restoring our pay.' In a settlement last year over their previous long-running pay dispute, a rise for resident doctors was worth 22 per cent across two years. This came at the same time as Chancellor Rachel Reeves axed winter fuel payments for millions of pensioners. When challenged over the previous bumper pay rise for resident doctors, Dr Ryan said the Government faced a 'political choice'. 'It comes down to whether the Government is willing to invest in doctors to stay in the country, to work for the NHS and give patients the world class health service that they deserve and that we did have,' she said. 'Really, it's a tough choice for them, because I understand the economic environment. 'But, if you fail to invest in doctors, then we're going to lose them overseas, and nobody's going to win.' Dr Ryan added the BMA's latest dispute with the Government 'needn't ever get to the point of strikes' as she urged Mr Streeting to 'simply have a conversation with us'. The Health Secretary has called on resident doctors to 'vote no' to industrial action and 'work with the Government', as he warned strikes could put efforts to rebuild the NHS at risk. 'I don't think strikes are in their interests, in patients' interests, and I certainly don't think it's in the interest of the NHS overall,' he told the BBC. Mr Streeting added: 'I understand the anxiety and anger that resident doctors have felt and continue to feel about their part of the profession – over 14 years, they saw the NHS that they were working in slide into crisis. 'That's why, within weeks of coming into office, I was determined to resolve the pay dispute and give resident doctors a substantial pay rise. 'That's now being followed by another above-inflation average pay award of 5.4 per cent (which includes the top up). 'The result is that resident doctors have seen their pay increase by 28.9 per cent compared to three years ago.' Resident doctor is the new term for junior doctor and refers to more than 50,000 qualified doctors working in GP practices and hospitals, from graduates to medics with a decade of experience. Resident doctor members of the BMA have taken industrial action 11 times since 2022. NHS England estimates the walkouts led to almost 1.5 million appointments being cancelled or rescheduled.
CNN
23-05-2025
- Health
- CNN
RFK Jr.: Food That Americans Eat Is 'Poisoned' - The Source with Kaitlan Collins - Podcast on CNN Audio
RFK Jr.: Food That Americans Eat Is 'Poisoned' The Source with Kaitlan Collins 47 mins Health Secretary RFK Jr. is painting a bleak picture of America's kids, labeling them the sickest generation in United States history. Plus, they put big money into a Trump business venture and now they are wined and dined with direct access to the President of the United States.
The Independent
19-05-2025
- Health
- The Independent
Mental health reforms ‘mark vital step' in improving care quality
The Government's attempts to modernise mental health legislation will 'not solve every problem' but mark a 'vital step' in improving quality of care, according to Wes Streeting. The Health Secretary said attitudes to mental health have 'come on leaps and bounds' since the Mental Health Act 1983 before warning that the law has been 'frozen in time'. Patients would be given a greater say over their care and treatment under the terms of the Mental Health Bill tabled in Parliament. Other changes include ensuring that detention and compulsory treatment are only undertaken when necessary, with provision for more frequent reviews and appeals, and limiting the time people with autism or a learning disability can be detained. The Bill has already been scrutinised in the House of Lords and it cleared its first hurdle in the Commons on Monday evening, when MPs approved it at second reading. Mr Streeting told MPs: 'The measure of a society is how it treats its most vulnerable citizens. When it comes to the treatment of people with serious mental illness, we are falling well short of the humane, compassionate society we aspire to be. 'Patients live 15 to 20 years shorter lives than the average. They are often accommodated far away from their family and loved ones. 'The facilities they are housed in can be completely unsuitable. Lord Darzi found during his investigation last year nearly 20 patients in a mental health facility forced to share two showers and live amongst an infestation of rats and cockroaches. 'Patients are denied the basic choice and agency that is awarded to NHS patients with physical illnesses. People from ethnic minority communities, and especially black African and Caribbean men, are more than three times as likely to be sectioned. 'Although they are very different conditions, people with a learning disability or autistic people are often lumped in with those who have mental illness – reflecting an outdated lack of medical understanding.' Mr Streeting added: 'While attitudes to mental health have come on leaps and bounds in the past four decades, the law has been frozen in time. 'As a result, the current legislation fails to give patients adequate dignity, voice and agency in their care. 'This is despite the fact that patients themselves have consistently told us that being treated humanely and making decisions about their own care plays a vital role in their recovery. 'When patients are detained and treated without any say over what is happening to them, it can have serious consequences for their ongoing health.' Mr Streeting went on: 'This Bill does not solve every problem in our mental health services, but it marks a vital step in our plans to improve the quality of care, combat long-standing inequalities and bring about a stronger focus on prevention and early intervention in mental health.' Mr Streeting said mental health professionals will 'have to consider the risk of serious harm when making decisions to detain' which will ensure 'any risks to the public and patients are considered as part of the assessment process'. He said: 'The vast majority of people with mental illness, including severe mental illness, present no risk to themselves or others and for the majority of people, treatment can be provided without compulsion. 'However, there are some people whose illness, when acutely unwell, can make them a risk to themselves and sometimes to others. 'No one knows this better than the families of Ian Coates, Barnaby Webber or Grace O'Malley Kumar, the victims of Valdo Calocane's violent rampage in Nottingham, whose campaign for justice and accountability has been truly awe inspiring, or indeed the family of Valdo Calocane, who I have also spent time with listening to their experience of feeling badly let down by health services. 'As the independent investigation into the murders found, both he and his victims were failed by the health service, and the families are left to live through the consequences in a level of pain the rest of us could scarcely imagine.' Shadow health secretary Ed Argar welcomed the Bill, saying it's 'not only important but right that our laws are updated to reflect the modern world and the knowledge we have today'. He said: 'I believe it is right that we took the time to get this right. That work updating the Mental Health Act started under the previous government, and we had a commitment in our election manifesto to update the laws in this area, and that is something that has been carried on by the new government, and we continue to believe this is the right thing to do. 'So I want to put on record our in principle, support for the Government in this legislation.' He told MPs the Conservative 'welcome efforts to improve the patient's voice involvement in their own care' through 'greater use of advanced choice documents'. The Bill will undergo further scrutiny at a later date.
