Most of the morning newspapers focus their health news on the Berwick report on patient safety in the NHS today, with The Telegraph leading on the news that NHS staff may come to be prosecuted for ‘reckless or wilful’ neglect of patients.
Meanwhile The Independent says that the health secretary has been warned that understaffed hospital wards ‘can no longer be ignored’. Professor Don Berwick’s report, which came in light of the Francis report, recommended that NICE sets up guidance around minimum staffing levels on wards, but Jeremy Hunt said this may create an ‘artificial target’.
Human gestation may naturally vary by up to five weeks, reports the BBC. A study of gestation periods concluded, once they had excluded six premature births, that gestation varied naturally by as much as 37 days.
One of the US researchers, Dr Anne Marie Jukic, said they were surprised by the finding: ‘Part of that variation has always been attributed to errors in the assignment of gestational age. Our measure of length of gestation does not include these sources of error, and yet there is still five weeks of variability. It’s fascinating.’
The Daily Mail reports on a Chinese study that showed that eating raw garlic may halve the risk of developing lung cancer - and that the risk was reduced by a third even if the patients smoked.
And, alongside this, the newspaper also managed to sneak in a study saying that eating a fry up in the morning may actually be good for you and reduce the risk of diabetes. Enjoy!
