A Telegraph investigation has found that patients were given hip replacements that were the wrong size, following a manufacturing error with metal on metal implants.
According to the paper, thousands of patients have been left in pain as a result of the problem.
Professor Tim Briggs, former president of the British Orthopaedic Association, said a mismatch ‘could cause debris to break off the implant components and enter the bloodstream’, the report says.
In other news, a revolutionary new IVF procedure could ‘dramatically’ improve the chances of women older than 30 conceiving, The Independent reports.
Apparently a British fertility clinic has applied to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority for a licence to use the ‘controversial’ procedure, which has been pioneered in the US.
It involved making older eggs young again by transferring mitochondria into them from immature stem cells in the ovary.
Lastly, MPs have warned that the UK is ‘vulnerable’ to future epidemics such as Ebola because of a ‘gaping hole’ in the country’s ability to manufacture vaccines, the BBC reports.
The Commons Science and Technology Committee also said the Government’s response to the Ebola outbreak was ‘undermined by systematic delay’.
The MPs praised ‘heroic’ efforts of volunteers who put their lives on the line to tackle the epidemic, but said: ‘We are also concerned that, in the unlikely but possible event of a domestic outbreak, the UK lacks the capability to go further and manufacture enough vaccines to vaccinate UK citizens in an emergency.
‘Existing facilities are degraded and new plants will take years to build, leaving the UK in a vulnerable position.’
