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Medico-Legal
Durban hospital’s R4m claim over post-discharge death
A Durban hospital is on the hook for a R4m damages claim after an ill patient who was allegedly prematurely discharged – and with...
Blood Service whistle-blower victimisation complaint falls
The company secretary of the SA National Blood Service headquarters in Roodepoort, has lost a Labour Court (Johannesburg) bid for...
LHR crowdfunds for refugee denied dialysis
Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR) has started an urgent three-day fundraising campaign for Alem Bazabe Ereselo, an Ethiopian asylum seeker who is being denied...
Judge stays Trump health insurance visa guarantee
A federal judge in Portland, Oregon, has put on hold a Trump administration rule requiring immigrants to prove they will have health insurance or...
Anti-abortion doctor's hearing adjourned as committee ponders charges
The disciplinary hearing of anti-abortion doctor Jacques de Vos by the Health Professions Council of SA (HPCSA) has been adjourned until 9 December. According...
Family want surgeon and anaesthetist suspended pending inquiry
The family of 10-year-old Zayyaan Sayed, who died shortly after surgery, plans to lay criminal charges against paediatric surgeon Dr Peter Beale and anaesthetist...
Portuguese obstetrician suspended after baby born without a face
A Portuguese obstetrician has been suspended after a baby was born without a nose, eyes or part of his skull, reports BBC News. The...
Kenyan doctor calls for decriminalisation of FGM
A female doctor in Kenya wants female genital mutilation (FGM) to be decriminalised. Tatu Kamau is asking the courts to allow women above the...
MRC slams newspaper over 'victimisation' damages claim before Labour Court
A Weekend Argus report claiming that the SA Medical Research Council (MRC) was before the Labour Court, following allegations of "victimisation, intimidation and...
Court denies asylum seeker's medical care request in important test case
An urgent application brought by an Ethiopian asylum seeker who wanted to force a Johannesburg hospital to give her medical care has been dismissed,...
Surgeon's and anaesthetist's privileges withdrawn by following child's death
A Johannesburg paediatrician — already under peer review by Netcare, having earlier been suspended by Mediclinic and fined by the Health Professions Council for...
SAHRC denies Gauteng Health claim of settlement with shackled pensioner
The South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) in Gauteng has denied claims by the Gauteng Health that a settlement was reached with the family...
Four US companies reach deal in opioid crisis law suit
Four drugs companies have reached a $260m deal with two Ohio counties over their role in fuelling the US opioid crisis, reports BBC News....
Being a doctor is a mug’s game in SA
Inconsistently applied and poorly managed disciplinary proceedings are putting strain on South Africa’s doctors, argues columnist William Saunderson-Meyer on Politicsweb. The also have to...
UKZN challenged to release Med School investigation information
Durban businessman Visham Panday has turned to the city's High Court to compel the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN) to release information about its multi-million-rand...
Zimbabwe doctors ignore court ruling to return to work
Government-employed doctors have ignored a Labour Court ultimatum to return to work, saying they remain incapacitated by poor wages and inadequate health facilities. According...
HPCSA vs anti-abortion doctor: Defence wants charges dropped
Anti-abortionist Dr Jaques de Vos’s medical career has been stalled for more than two years because of a repeatedly delayed disciplinary action by the...
Ministers claim courts used to thwart private healthcare oversight
The ministers of Health and Economic Development hit back at Health Market Inquiry findings blaming the government for “inadequate stewardship” of the private sector...
Genesis will pay — for now — in dispute over rehab as a PMB
The Genesis Medical Scheme has agreed to authorise and pay the rehabilitation costs of burn survivor Kelvin van Baalen pending the outcome of a...
$8bn punitive damages award for man's enlarged breasts
US drug firm Johnson & Johnson has been told to pay $8bn in punitive damages to a man over claims he was not warned...
US judge rules in favour of supervised injection sites
A US federal judge has ruled that a non-profit group’s bid to open a site in Philadelphia where people can inject drugs under medical...
US Supreme Court to decide on major abortion case
The US Supreme Court has agreed to take up a major abortion case that could lead to new curbs on access to the procedure...
Fertility clinic challenges proposed reproductive law changes
The Pietermaritzburg Fertility Clinic and three of its doctors have tried to stop specific definitions in a draft regulation by Health Minister Dr Zweli...
Ramaphosa's 'wake-up' to R22bn in health corruption
President Cyril Ramaphosa said he got a “wake-up call” during the recent election campaigning when he discovered how many of the billions of rands...
Attacker of University of Free State female doctor committed
A 30-year-old man who lost a piece of his tongue – allegedly when attacking a young female University of Free State medical intern at...
Nurse's 'misconduct' written warning following baby's death
A nurse involved in what Limpopo Health described as the 'truly unacceptable' death of a baby, who fell on his head while the mother...
HPCSA fails to meet the document deadline in De Vos case
The Health Professions Council of SA (HPCSA) has been accused of failing to meet the deadline to provide documentation to the legal team of...
R3m suit over botched gender reassignment op at JHB hospital
The transgender manager of a hardware store is claiming R3m from Gauteng Health after a complication of a gender reassignment operation meant to...
Determining damages in medical malpractice claims
A recent medico-legal claim against a Gauteng hospital and one of its doctors delivered the unusual result of the plaintiff being awarded higher damages...
US opioid crisis: Doctor faces life in prison for over-prescribing
US physician Dr Joel Smithers, a 36-year-old married father of five, is facing the possibility of life in prison after being convicted in May...
'No evidence' for prosecution but NPA refers Life Esidimeni dockets for inquest
Three years after the Life Esidimeni tragedy, the families of the victims will now have to wait even longer to get any closure, following...
Delayed discipline for workers who trashed Joburg Hospital
A shortage of labour relations officers has been blamed for the long delay in disciplining workers who trashed the Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Hospital in...
Landmark weight-loss pill scandal trial starts in France
A landmark trial over one of France’s biggest healthcare scandals has begun after a weight-loss pill was believed to have killed up to 2,000...
German court rules hangovers are an 'illness'
A firm claimed to have an anti-hangover concoction, but a German court says this is unlawful, food supplements cannot claim to treat a sickness.
A...
Western Cape takes 13-year battle over doctors' allowances to ConCourt
Western Cape Health has appealed to the Constitutional Court to overturn a Labour Court victory of 50 doctors that forced the department to pay...
Gauteng court action over foetus burial vs medical waste
At what point should a foetus be legally considered human? That issue will come before the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria) in November when an...
PE doctor to court over social media sexual assault claims
Allegations of patients being fondled in a doctor’s rooms, sexually charged remarks and unwanted kissing have been made on social media against a Port...
Ethically complex case potentially links children's autism to sperm donor
Danielle Rizzo’s young children are at the centre of one of the most ethically complex legal cases in the modern-day fertility industry, writes ...
Demands for change to UK laws on restaurant labelling of allergens
The family of a UK teenager who died after eating a birthday meal at a burger chain have demanded a change in the law...
US teen sues e-cigarette makers for severe lung damage
A recently hospitalised Chicago teen is suing the makers of an e-cigarette he used as well as the place where he got it from,...