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Medico-Legal
US doctor accused of sexually exploiting 10 children
A Florida doctor faces life in prison after being accused of sexually exploiting minors online and in video chats, including directing them to harm...
Partner pleads guilty to role in OxyContin scandal
A former partner at the well known global consulting company McKinsey & Co pleaded guilty last week to obstructing justice by destroying records related...
Beverly Hills doctor accused of raping unconscious woman
A physician in Beverly Hills has been accused of sexually assaulting an unconscious woman in Los Angeles, and charged with eight felony counts including...
Gauteng Health MEC fails in bid for researcher to disclose patient data
The Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) has dismissed an application by the Gauteng Health MEC for University of Stellenbosch researcher Dr Regan Solomons to hand over...
Clinic cleared of blame for pregnant woman’s death
An internal investigation by the Gauteng Department of Health into the death of a 32-year-old expectant mother, who died at Westbury Clinic last month...
Nine years of chemotherapy for non-existent cancer
In a horrific story of apparent profit over humanity, a US oncologist subjected patients to years of unnecessary mental, emotional and physical anguish by...
NHS doctor struck off for ‘outlandish‘ Covid jab theories
A senior NHS psychiatrist who questioned the safety of Covid vaccines, saying they were “at the heart of a giant deception”, has been struck off the...
UK doctors, nurses with long Covid sue NHS
Hundreds of British doctors, nurses and other health workers with long Covid – many of them now housebound or unable to work – are...
Medico-legal lawyer disbarred for stealing millions from disabled children
Disgraced attorney Zuko Nonxuba – under whose watch R188m in medical negligence payouts to severely disabled children disappeared – has been declared unfit to...
SA doctor fails to overturn US prison sentence for opioid script fraud
After a six-year legal battle, Afzal Beemath, a medical doctor from South Africa, has failed to set aside a prison sentence in America, where...
US man wins $412m payout in penile jab malpractice case
In a record-setting lawsuit, jurors in New Mexico have awarded a man more than $412m in a medical malpractice case linked to penile injections...
Judge scathing of neurosurgeon's report in R10m brain damage claim
A judge has slammed expert witnesses and turned down a R10m damages claim against the Road Accident Fund (RAF) in which it was claimed...
Law firm accused of stealing millions from disabled child
A Durban legal firm has denied stealing millions of rands that were intended to be deposited into the trust account of a child born...
Health Department sued after twins swopped at birth
The Department of Health in Gauteng is being sued for millions after somehow splitting up twin girls after their birth, swopping one of them...
Ombud probes acquittal in disabled child payment hearing
An investigation is to be launched by Legal Services Ombud Judge Siraj Desai into why a disciplinary committee appointed by the Legal Practice Council...
Health Department boosts medico-legal mediation training
Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi has revealed that just a handful of officials countrywide are trained in medico-legal mediation – none of them in Limpopo – but...
US doctor gets 190 years for fatal IV bag tampering
A Texas anaesthesiologist has been sentenced to 190 years in prison for injecting a nerve-blocking agent and other drugs into bags of intravenous fluid...
Acclaimed French plastic surgeon suspended
A top plastic surgeon dubbed the “nose maestro” by the French press has been suspended from practising after patients claimed he “mutilated” them, with...
Patient sues Algerian author for allegedly using her story in novel
An Algerian woman has sued the winner of France’s biggest book prize, claiming he based his story on her, using confidential information from when...
Headache Clinic doctor faces murder charge
South African headache specialist Dr Elliot Shevel has been charged with the murder of former patient Marinella Avvakoumides, who died hours after undergoing a...
Discovery wants back R16m paid for ‘permanent disability’
Discovery Life wants to recover R16m it paid to a KwaZulu-Natal man who claimed he was permanently disabled due to depression – and unable to...
Disbarred doctor back in court, guilty of fraud, corruption
A Western Cape man, who was disbarred in 2017 but who continued treating patients and dispensing medication under the name of another doctor, has...
Medico-legal lawyer off the hook in misappropriation case
In an unexpected decision, a Legal Practice Council (LPC) disciplinary committee has acquitted a lawyer – who paid just R50 000 of a R15m medical...
Doctor prescribes Ozempic but obesity was 28kg tumour
A Norwegian man who was about to undergo gastric sleeve surgery – and who had struggled for more than a decade with his weight...
Paediatrician had no motive to kill children, defence argues
Well-known paediatric surgeon Professor Peter Beale was in the dock again this week as the state and defence presented closing arguments in his murder...
HPCSA starts probe into Premier’s rant against migrant patients
The Health Professions Council of South Africa (HPCSA) has begun its misconduct inquiry into Limpopo Premier Dr Phophi Ramathuba over her tirade directed at...
Court tussle over Medihelp’s refusal to cover costly meds
Medical aid scheme Medihelp has been entangled in a legal battle for more than two years with a Gauteng mother over treatment for her...
Cape mother wins childbirth negligence case – 14 years later
The Western Cape High Court has ruled in favour of a mother in a medical negligence case against Health MEC Mireille Wenger, linked to...
Tiger Brands in talks to pay urgent listeriosis medical bills
Although there is still no trial date on the horizon, in a major development on the listerioris saga, Tiger Brands is talking to the...
Court injunction stops Canadian woman’s scheduled euthanasia
A Canadian woman – who had scheduled an assisted suicide for 27 October – had her plan blocked when a British Columbian judge issued...
Leg amputation not due to medical negligence, rules judge
A Gauteng patient whose right leg was amputated above the knee lost her legal bid to claim damages from the Health MEC, with the...
NPA dragging its heels on Life Esidimeni
Eight years since the tragedy of Life Esidimeni, and four months after the conclusion of the inquest into the case, the National Prosecuting Authority...
Inquests probe surgeon who pitched ‘cleavage-sparing’ mastectomies
Procedures performed by a convicted British breast surgeon were not a recognised or authorised type of operation, with an inquest hearing last week that...
HPCSA dishes out Ubuntu courses and drug rehab as penalties
Inappropriate advice for treating a child, drug dependency, and unregistered acupuncture were among the cases considered by the Health Professions Council of SA between...
Convicted murderer Lauren Dickason served with deportation order
South African doctor Lauren Dickason has reportedly been served with a deportation order by Immigration New Zealand after having been found guilty of murdering...
Probe after patients get HIV from organ transplants
Brazilian health officials are scrambling to explain how six transplant patients in the country’s well-regarded public health system received organs infected with HIV –...
Cancer victim to get $15m from J&J
Johnson & Johnson has said it will fight back against last week’s findings by a jury that it should pay $15m to a Connecticut...
Family wins decade-long legal battle against Profmed
Nearly 10 years after being kicked off her medical aid and accused of not disclosing existing medical conditions, a Cape Town woman who took...
GSK pays millions for 80 000 Zantac lawsuits
British pharmaceutical company GSK has agreed to pay up to $2.2bn to settle 80 000 lawsuits in US courts claiming a discontinued version of heartburn...
Doctors win libel case against British tabloid
Britain’s Associated Newspapers Ltd has been forced to eat humble pie in a landmark case that will see it cough up for “substantial damages...