The speculation about Donald Trump’s mental health that was doing the rounds earlier in the year seems to have died down a bit. That’s to be expected; like it or not, his Presidency is now part of normal life. But I’ve been lagging in my blogging here, and so it’s only now that I’ve got […]
Category: Politics
Diagnosing Trump
It doesn’t take too much time on the internet to find people talking with some measure of incredulity about Donald Trump. Some of this talk takes the tone of horrified fascination; some of it is mocking (and is accompanied by correspondingly mocking images); and some people are wondering aloud about his mental health. In this […]
Chappell on Midwives and Regulation
Richard Yetter Chappell has drawn my attention to this – a blog post in which he bemoans the Nursing and Midwifery Council’s rules about indemnity insurance, and the effects that they’ll have on independent midwives. (I’d never heard of independent midwives – but an IM – according to Independent Midwives UK – is “a fully […]
Politicians, Delusional Managers and the Future of the NHS: Have NHS Leaders Failed to “Speak Truth unto Power”?
Guest Post by David Lock QC [NB: This is a slightly longer version of a post that appeared on the BMJ blog earlier today.] Politicians, delusional managers and the future of the NHS: have NHS leaders failed to “speak truth unto power”? This blog is not a rant – well not too much of a […]
Trump’s Anti-Regulator
In the latest edition of “Dude, really?” news to come from the post-election US… Wait: let me start that again. In the latest edition-that-I’ve-had-time-to-digest-because-I-really-can’t-keep-up-with-this-stuff edition of “Dude, really?” news to come from the post-election US, it would appear that a strong candidate to head the Food and Drug Administration under Donald Trump is one Jim […]
A Eulogy for the UK Donation Ethics Committee
Guest Post by David Shaw Re: The untimely death of the UK Donation Ethics Committee Most people I know want to donate their organs after they die. Why wouldn’t they? If you have to die, you might as well do your best to save several other lives once you’re gone. But organ donation is a […]
Natal Nativism
Scene: the boardroom of a large NHS Trust, somewhere in England. “And so that brings us neatly to the last item on the agenda: passport checks for pregnant women who want a checkup. The thing is, you see, that it turns out that we’ve been providing obstetric care to some women who aren’t actually UK citizens. […]
Should Junior Doctors Still Strike?
Guest Post by Adam James Roberts In early July, the British Medical Association’s junior members voted by a 16-point margin to reject a new employment contract negotiated between the BMA’s leadership and the Government. The chair of the BMA’s junior doctors committee, Johann Malawana, stood down following the result, noting the “considerable anger and mistrust” […]
Gouging
Jumping to the defence of pharmaceutical companies over their pricing policies isn’t fashionable – and a lot of the time, it’s not going to end prettily. But it’s perfectly coherent to think that the profit motive is one of the motors of innovation, and that it’s part of the quid pro quo for spending money on […]
In Praise of Ambivalence: “Young” Feminism, Gender Identity, and Free Speech
By Brian D. Earp (@briandavidearp) * Note: this article was first published online at Quillette magazine. Introduction Alice Dreger, the historian of science, sex researcher, activist, and author of a much-discussed book of last year, has recently called attention to the loss of ambivalence as an acceptable attitude in contemporary politics and beyond. “Once upon a time,” she writes, “we […]