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Medico-Legal
CMS fails to place medical fund under curatorship
The Council for Medical Schemes (CMS) has suffered a major loss in the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria) where its attempt to place Sizwe Medical...
NHLS executives suspended following PwC audit
The National Health Laboratory Service has suspended its chief financial officer, supply chain head and an unspecified number of other officials after a PricewaterhouseCoopers...
Landmark UK ruling on puberty blockers for under-16s
Children under 16 with gender dysphoria are unlikely to be able to give informed consent to undergo treatment with puberty-blocking drugs, three UK High...
COVID-19: SA imposes stricter international visitor requirements
Among other things, a directive issued yesterday by Health Minister Zweli Mkhize has implications for prospective visitors to SA during the Covid-19 State of...
SIU briefs media on health sector corruption cases
The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) says it has dealt with 20 allegations of serious maladministration, fraud and corruption relating to the health sector, reports...
R173m annual SAPS healthcare tender is challenged
The tender to render police healthcare services over the next three years is being challenged one of the losing bidders, who has asked the...
HPCSA rapped over 7-year delay in accepting top Swiss surgeon's qualifications
A leading orthopaedic surgeon who emigrated to South Africa but for more than seven years couldn’t get the Health Professions Council to accept his...
Unfairly dismissed health manager wants Western Cape Health MEC charged
A Western Cape nursing manager who was unfairly dismissed wants Western Cape Health and the province's Health MEC Nomafrench Mbombo charged with contempt of...
Baby girl's death covered up for 20 years — UK inquiry
The avoidable death of a baby girl was covered up by NHS staff and oversight organisations over 20 years, a damning UK inquiry has...
Eastern Cape Health to appeal interdict against air ambulance tender
Eastern Cape Health MEC Sindiswa Gomba intends appealing a High Court interdict against the department’s air ambulance service tender award, and the successful bidder...
COVID-19: Court allows legal challenge to UK care home deaths
A UK High Court will hear a legal challenge over the “shocking death toll” from UK coronavirus in care homes, rejecting the arguments for...
Missing records at top UK hospital point to 'cover up' of toddler's death
A failure to be able to produce contemporaneous handwritten case notes by nurses and doctors have led to a world-leading children’s hospital in the...
Gauteng Health slashes medical liability claims by almost R7bn
Medico-legal liability claims against the Gauteng Health totalled R589m from July to September this year, reports Politicsweb.
But overall, the department has brought down its...
Pandemic unleashes a wave of verbal and physical abuse at healthcare professionals
Almost a third (31%) of healthcare professionals in South Africa have suffered verbal or physical abuse from patients, patients’ relatives or the public during COVID-19, according...
Doctors want immunity for prosecution over COVID decisions
Doctor organisations have called for immunity from prosecution to UK doctors forced to choose which patients to treat during the coronavirus pandemic, reports The...
Bayer: Lawsuit by 200 UK women over Essure sterilising device
Lawyers have begun legal action on behalf of 200 UK women against the makers of the Essure sterilisation device, after claims of illness and...
AA sceptical over reduction of blood alcohol limits
The Automobile Association (AA) has expressed concern over proposed amendments to the National Road Traffic Act to reduce the legal blood alcohol limits for...
Culpable homicide case agains paediatric surgeon Beale postponed
The criminal case against paediatric surgeon Professor Peter Beale, whose co-accused anaesthetist Dr Abdulhay Munshi was murdered in an apparent hit in September, has...
Alcoholic anaesthetist jailed for death of mother during caesarean birth
An alcoholic anaesthetist in France who botched an emergency caesarean operation leaving a young British mother dead has been sentenced to three years in...
KZN gynae sued for R5 million over swab in abdomen
A Richard’s Bay woman is suing her gynaecologist in the Durban High Court for R5 million after a medical swab was allegedly forgotten in...
Namibia sets tup task force to consider cannabis legalisation
Namibian Prime Minister Saara Kuugongelwa-Amadhila's office is chairing a task force committee to consult on the regulation and controlled use of cannabis in Namibia.
The...
SIU fails in bid to halt R72m of medical negligence payouts
The Special Investigating Unit (SIU) has lost, with punitive costs, a High Court bid to stop the payout of R72m of damages in four...
First US state decriminalises possession of hard drugs
Several US states have backed referendum measures to legalise cannabis for recreational or medicinal purposes, while voters in Oregon they have gone a step...
SCA rules psychologist can sue over 'malicious’ complaint to HPCSA
After 12 years of legal attrition, the Supreme Court of Appeal has ruled that KwaZulu-Natal psychologist Linda Holden can sue mining giant Assmang over...
RAF non-payments bringing practices to their knees
Medical practitioners, psychologists, occupational therapists and other medical experts who, along with lawyers, provide professional services to Road Accident Fund (RAF) victims say thousands...
Legislation will curb 'unsustainable' medical negligence claims
The government will clamp down on 'unsustainable' medical negligence claims against the state health services with legislative changes, Deputy Health Minister Joe Phaahla has...
Vaal therapy dogs project with child witnesses a 'major success'
A pilot project in the Vaal Triangle to use therapy dogs for child witnesses in court has been hailed as a major success, Beeld...
ANC decides against outsourcing of NHI submissions
MPs have voted to rescind their decision to outsource processing the tens of thousands of written submissions received in response to the National Health...
Draft Cannabis Bill is a missed opportunity — critics
Dagga can put the economy on a new high, but the draft cannabis Bill has missed this opportunity entirely. So says University of Pretoria’s...
Kenyan charities urge withdrawal from Geneva Consensus Declaration
An alliance of Kenyan charities has urged the government to withdraw from the US-led Geneva Consensus that critics say weakens global efforts to safeguard...
HPCSA and UCT investigate doctor over 'curing' of transgender children
An “almost qualified” psychiatrist has been reported to the Health Professions Council (HPCSA) over alleged comments around “curing” transgender children, reports Sunday Times . The...
New Zealand referendum: No to cannabis; Yes to euthanasia
Rejecting a campaign backed by medical experts and the New Zealand Medical Journal, a national referendum has voted against cannabis legalisation, writes MedicalBrief. They...
High Court rules that SAHPRA not to regulate alternative medicines
Pending the result of an appeal, health supplements and complementary medicines – not scheduled medicines as defined by the Medicine’s Act – may soon...
KZN ambulance services' ultimatum to Road Accident Fund
The Road Accident Fund has been given an ultimatum to pay close to R10m owed to private ambulance operators in KwaZulu-Natal – or services...
Bogus pulmonologist arrested in Springs
A woman has been arrested for contravention of parts of the Health Professions Act after she was found to have been operating medical practices...
Johnson & Johnson's appeal on $2.12bn talc verdict dismissed
Missouri's highest court has refused to consider Johnson & Johnson's appeal of a $2.12bn damages award to women who blamed their ovarian cancer on...
Informed consent is critical as elective surgery resumes — healthcare company
With medical malpractice litigation in South Africa having more than doubled over the past two years, the added complication of COVID-19 raises a large...
Axed Health MEC applies to set aside 'garbage’ SIU findings
Axed Gauteng Health MEC Dr Bandile Masuku has filed an application in the Gauteng High Court (Pretoria), asking that the findings of the Special...
R2m claim: Finger amputated after emergency centre treatment
A woman who eventually had her ring finger amputated after being attacked at her home in Centurion in 2016 has brought a R2m lawsuit...
Awaiting-trial prisoner moved to private hospital following urgent application
Avineshsing Rajbansi has been moved to a private healthcare facility after an urgent application was made at the Durban Regional Court. According to a...