Where did they get the data?

Iain Dale and Dizzy cover an article in the Sunday Times about Labour's very very dirty tricks in the campaign as far as cancer is concerned.

Basically they have sent out personalised cards 250,000 people who have had cancer treatment. (At least one of whom had died). These cards were very specifically addressed it seems.

Apart from the fact that they misrepresent the Conservative policy on cancer and its effects, preying on the very ill and vulnerable is a very low tactic.

From the Sunday Times article Labour deny using confidential information:

"Labour sources deny that the party has used any confidential information. However, the sources admit that, in line with other political parties, it uses socio-demographic research that is commercially and publicly available."

The question has to be how did they get the data that Mr Bob Smith has had some cancer treatment, and not his next door neighbour or his brother down the street?

Many months ago now I had an accident. I tripped up over something in the kitchen and seriously banged my knee. A few days later I had a checkup with my GP so mentioned it to him. He looked at it and said it was nothing to worry about. Shortly afterwards I received a marketing text from a claims handling agency saying that I could claim (from me presumably, so I did not take up the offer).

This all begs the question, is our confidential medical information being sold to the highest bidder and is therefore commercially available because this Labour government sold it, or are Labour just misusing special access to it? Either way it is wrong.

Could you imagine what would have happened if someone had had a cancer scare and decided not to mention it to their family? Their confidential medical information is then posted through the door on a postcard every one from the postman to partner picking up the card.

I do hope the Main stream media press on this issue. What goes on between a patient and doctor is supposed to be confidential, not sold to the highest bidder or used for political purposes.

Swine Flu: Its time to panic: Official!

Those of you who took note of my last post on the subject, and decided not to panic, well, well done!

However the World Health Organisation has now officially decreed that it is time to panic, raising the level of threat to level 5.

It is difficult to know exactly what to make of this. We in this country do have large stocks of anti virals, which in this case seem effective. That said our stockpile is worth £500 million, which means we are paying in capital costs alone between £12.5 to £25 million to keep it. Right now this looks like good value.

Apparently models have been made which indicate that a complete cut in travel will not stop the spread of the flu (well, unless we go into a real deep lock down) only delay its spread. After all we did get the Black Death.

So what do we need to do?

Firstly don't panic. Secondly follow some very basic old fashioned public health advice. Coughs and sneezes spread diseases. It would also help if you did not panic buy things. That said I may give advice on what to make sure you have stocks of after this panic is over.

The other thing to do is to not go to work if you have the flu, and make sure no one you work with does the same.

The BBC has this.

Swine Flu Panic!

Swine flu will kill everyone! ... continued to endless news paper headlines.

The fact is though, that there is no reason to panic. Outside of Mexico this virus does not seem to be fatal, and we can't therefore be sure that those who are thought to have died of it in Mexico actually did.

We also have large quantities of flu drugs, which do seem effective.

All that said, this flu outbreak is odd. Why are people dying in Mexico but nowhere else (yet)? How did it end up containing elements of swine flu from 3 continents?

My advice would be don't panic. Governments around the world, as well as health organisations are keeping an eye on this one.

The BBC has this.

Why was she not admitted to hospital?

There is a troubling story carried by the BBC. It is a tale of the deeply sad demise of 8 year old Sophie Waller.

If you read the article on the BBC here, the situation appears to have been this:

Sophie was remarkably afraid of dentists.

She had a loose tooth and so would not eat.

As this had happened before, the family GP arranged that the tooth be removed under general anaesthetic.

Not only was that tooth removed, but all her milk teeth were removed on the 9th of November 2005.

She refused to open her mouth to talk or eat.

She was kept in hospital until the 17th of November and given a feeding tube and was then sent home, on the understanding that she would have a bed if needed if things did not improve. (Some minor presumption on my part)

Despite attempts to feed her and contact with a psychologist her health deteriorated.

Four days before she died on the 2nd of December her parents asked for her to be readmitted, that was refused.

There are a number of currently unanswered questions here.

The first of which is who decided to remove all the milk teeth in one go, presumably leaving Sophie very self conscious? Was consent asked for, and if so who gave it?

Who refused re admittance to hospital and why?

The inquest continues, and I hope these questions are answered.

Whatever you do, don't catch an unfashionable disease

Please don't.

There are fashionable diseases, like AIDS or breast cancer, then there are unfashionable ones like prostate cancer, malaria or Alzheimer's.

If you look at how many people who are going get a given disease and how much is spent on research and treatment there are clearly fashionable diseases and unfashionable ones.

Money grabbing Vultures circle over Methylene Blue wonder drug

According to a comment by greygeek77 (who alas does not allow viewing of his profile and so I can't find his blog to link to it) on a previous article on the subject:

A little Googleing will show that Methylene Blue, a coal tar dye, was first synthesized in 1875, and was used by the famous French scientist, Ehrlich, in 1861, to treat pain and neuropathy because he noticed it had an affinity for neural fibers. A typical dose is 100 mg per 100Kg of body weight as a pill, or 1 to 2 mg per 100Kg as an injection.

Bulk price for MB is $42/Kg but pharm grade is now going for $285 for 250mg!! The greed has begun.

A patent was filed in 2004 for a "new" way of making the compound because MB is too old to patent itself, and hence wouldn't be profitable enough. It appears that the prescription price will be about $5/day.

This is one "drug" that the US government should nationalize in order to HELP the elderly, most of whom are on limited incomes, and to prevent their exploitation by the pharmaceuticals for unearned profit.

So the bottom line is this:

Methylene Blue has been known for 127 years to be good for neurological problems, and is cheap.

Drug companies seem to have realised this and are rushing to shore up profits by applying for new patents on an old remedy.

The price has spiked, probably due to a sudden interest. I bet that as soon as things settle down generic drug producers will be producing this stuff like it is going out of fashion.

Methylene blue: The new wonder drug?

After having published this article on Methylene blue and its affects on Alzheimer's I have been doing a bit of reading about this blue dye.

It seems that according to this article on a research paper it also repairs defective memory.

The great thing is that it is already administered as a medicine and crucially is cheap.

The interesting thing about the memory repair is that it works in a different way to the way it cures Alzheimer's in that it deals with some problems in mitochondria. You do have to wonder what its affect would be on errant proteins in cancer mitochondria as well. I suspect no one has tried this though as there will not be any money in it.

This does lead to some serious questions about how medical research and drug research is funded and what results it produces. There is no money in finding out that the cure for some ailment is something that is cheap as chips already. More on that later.

Blue dye known to cure Alzheimer's cures Alzheimer's Shocker!

There is a blue dye, methylthioninium chloride, otherwise known as the common biological staining agent and chemical indicator Methylene blue which seems to kill Alzheimer's stone dead. Well perhaps that is over egging it a bit, but it tackles the root observation of Alzheimer's which is a tangle of the tau proteins in neurons.

Apparently a researcher looking at tau proteins tried to dye them with methylene blue and found they disappeared 20 years ago.

It has taken this long, that is 100 years from finding the root pathology, and 20 years from finding a clearing agent for some research to be done.

Whilst I hail this storming success, which not only promises to halt Alzheimer's but in part reverse it, you have to ask why this research has taken so long and why it has taken a drug company to fund it? Alzheimer's is already a very expensive disease economically.

Curiously though, if the "drug" is expensive and unavailable on the NHS there may well be some jobbing chemists quite prepared to make the stuff up.

It will be cheap as chips after all.

The BBC has this, whilst the Telegraph has this.

Incidentally the Telegraph nor the BBC broadcast reports mention that it is a common chemical that has been available for years, whilst the Telegraph suggest that it may cost as much as £2.50 a day, half the price of the current non prescription curative, a pack of cigarettes. I do not know what other stiff is in "Rember" but suspect we will not find out easily. If it is just Methylene Blue, then it can be make up as a solution for little and I suspect available to even the poorest in society.

Bonkers smoking ban in Holland!

I have to say that I am against the smoking ban in this country. If they want clean air then they can legislate for clean air and if someone can provide that without banning smoking that is a matter for them.

However in a surreal move Holland, famous for its "coffee houses" where people smoke marijuana legally there is to be a smoking ban also. The thing is that it only applies to tobacco and not to marijuana. So you can smoke a joint if it has no tobacco in it but not if it has.

Is this just mad or what?

The BBC has this.

Babies with MRSA Shocker!

Apparently 5 babies in a specialist unit in Glasgow have MRSA on their skin.

It would actually be shocking if 5 babies did not have MRSA somewhere as it is actually a remarkably common bug, and no the babies are not in any danger at all. They probably have it up their noses as well, as do the rest of us.

The trick is not to treat an open wound just after you have picked your nose, unless you have washed your hands first. Likewise there is no point in assuming that anyone else has washed their hands so if you have touched anyone else, wash your hands before you do anything important.

Or in short, don't deep clean hospitals, or get visitors to wash their hands, sack staff who do not wash their hands properly.

Meanwhile the BBC has this non story here.

Is this the NHS we are paying double for?

We are now paying roughly twice what we were paying for the NHS than we were 11 years ago, yet according to this article in the Mail on Sunday a pregnant woman had to give birth in a hospital corridor after being turned away from two closer hospitals.

Emma Johnson of Brighton went into Labour, so called her local hospital the Royal Sussex county, who said they did not have enough beds. She called the next nearest at Worthing and got the same story. Then she called my local hospital in Haywards Heath, the Princess Royal. After a 40 minute car journey she ended up giving birth in the corridor. It is unclear why it was in a corridor, though presumably it was because the baby had to be delivered before she could be got into a birthing suite rather than a lack of one.

A spokesman for Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals trust said:

We do everything we can to ensure women are able to give birth in a hospital of their choice.

We are sorry that this was clearly not Miss Johnson's experience.

Occasionally if a site is very busy we have to ask mums to travel but we do this as infrequently as possible because we know it is not what mums want.

Well, the cutbacks in maternity services are due to the PCT structure more than the hospital trust so maybe they can be let off that one. That it is not what mums want is bizarre statement. I can't see anyone queuing up to be sent from pillar to post for an urgent visit to a hospital.

The sad thing about all this is that the maternity unit at the Princess Royal is still under threat with its services due to be downgraded to a maternity led unit. Had that been the case then what would have happened to Emma Johnson and her baby had she had complications? Just how far would she have had to have traveled? Could she have been half way through birth at the Princess Royal and then need an urgent surgical procedure like a cesarean?

All this of course despite the amount of money being spent on the NHS whilst there are over 10,000 less beds than 1997. Where has all the money gone.

You can support the Save the Princess Royal Hospital campaign here.

The Mail on Sunday has this.

Be Thin, Be Fat, Die anyway!

News reached us a few days ago that being a bit underweight lessened your risk of cancer, now we have a study that says being a bit overweight makes you live longer.

Confused?

You will be after the next episode of Soap! (Or after reading any medical advice in the mass media).

The Independent has this.

Editors note:

Studies note that it is easier to enjoy life whilst alive, as there are few studies indicating how the afterlife is to be enjoyed and the effects of enjoying life on enjoyment of the afterlife.