By Ian Quinn
Our roundup of news headlines on Tuesday 30 March.
The NHS is spending 14% of its entire budget – a whopping £15.4bn a year – on managers and red tape, according to the top health story in today's papers.
A report by the House of Commons health committee also accuses the Department of Health of burying the figure, which it claims is down to the enormous cost of moves by both the Conservatives and then the Labour government to split purchaser and provider roles.
From fat cats to meow meow, the papers also follow up on former health secretary Alan Johnson's decision in his new guise as home secretary to ban the party drug mephedrone
Meanwhile the Daily Mail claims that one of the biggest by-products of swine flu and winter vomiting bugs is booming sales of products claiming to kill the germs- that don't work.
It's article, entitled, why hand gel is a waste of money, focuses on a study by Ottawa University showing that claims some brand claiming to kill '99 % of germs' are hugely exaggerated.
And finally, prize for misuse of NHS funding today-even above PCTs- must go to Professor Charles Butler, who the papers report has been jailed for three years for fraudulently claiming almost £115,000 on expenses in his role as a DH a pharmaceutical expert- using the money to kit out his flat with S&M gear and class A drugs.
Daily Digest
