We have all been living La Vida Lockdown, but let’s face it, we have never seen more of our co-workers’ homes. Those who might never invite us in now have […]
Year: 2020
The covid vaccination programme is an achievement, but must not lead to more health inequalities
The UK and other countries are now facing the logistics of rolling out the largest, most complex vaccination programme in history. The potential gains for individual and community safety are […]
Alistair Wardrope: Putting health and climate justice at the heart of COP 26
Climate breakdown, “the greatest threat to global health of the 21st century” is driven by the same political and economic systems that are exacerbating health inequities, so starkly amplified by […]
Ernil Hansen: Soothing words and music during surgery might reduce postoperative pain
In a study where we played a recorded text with positive suggestions to patients under general anaesthesia, the results were astonishing. They experienced less pain and need for analgesics, less […]
Jeffrey Aronson: When I Use a Word . . . Massage and malaria
Three words reflecting two types of Chinese therapies can be found among the biomedical words first cited from 1979 in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) (Table 1)—tui na, a form […]
Martin McKee: “NHS” Test and Trace under fire—a system flawed by design
Test and trace has been hampered by a failure to draw on international experience and a lack of engagement with public health professionals says Martin McKee […]
Covid-19 has turned the spotlight on the uneven provision of oxygen—a stark health inequity
This pandemic is also an opportunity to close an oxygen divide that ranks among the greatest health injustices of our time, say Kevin Watkins and Adamu Isah […]
Nick Hopkinson: Man’s 4th Best Hospital—a powerful reminder of the moral hazards that await if we don’t look out for each other
My copy of The House of God, Samuel Shem’s 1978 novel of medical training, disillusion, and resistance, has a quote from Cosmopolitan on the cover; a “bawdy cult classic—Catch-22 with […]
Our not-so-new normal: what covid-19 reveals about how physicians cope with extreme circumstances
“It’s funny, but our lives are pretty normal,” Brian, my overnight shift-mate, said as he donned his hair net, mask, gown and gloves before seeing a covid-19 patient. Of course, […]
The voice of people living with COPD: what I learned from doing qualitative research
As a general respiratory physician, schooled in the clinical world of evidence-based medicine (EBM), I shared a common view that qualitative research was, well, flaky. Where was the science? The […]