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Talking Points
Sean Davison: 'A victim of a failure of SA's legal process'
Professor Sean Davison, charged on three counts of premeditated murder for allegedly assisting three people with debilitating physical conditions but mentally competent, and at...
The 'unprofessional conduct' implications of poor administration
Law partner Raizel Davidow, writing for Medicalbrief, asks whether the poor handling of the administrative side of the practice lead a medical practitioner to...
The thorny issue of pregnancy and medical scheme waiting periods
The practice of medical schemes excluding pre-existing conditions like pregnancy comes under fire from Fatima Hassan, executive director of the Open Society Foundation SA,...
'I’m afraid I have some bad news…'
Both researchers and medical schools have tried to figure out how doctors should communicate with patients to deliver hard-to-swallow information. There is little evidence that...
Anti-vaxxers target doctors on social media and rating websites
More doctors are being attacked online for recommending parents vaccinate their children as part of a coordinated effort by anti-vaccine groups. Fictitious patient reviews...
Africa's donkeys being slaughtered for traditional Chinese medicine
Ejiao is the name of a traditional Chinese medicine that supposedly treats anaemia, reproductive issues and insomnia – though the alleged medicinal properties are...
Once taboo questions about the impacts of gender transition examined
The European Network for the Investigation of Gender Incongruence (ENIGI) is the largest study of people who have gone through the transgendering process, providing data...
'Trading on hope’ — Fertility clinics exploit older women
Older women are being exploited by IVF clinics “trading on hope”, the UK’s fertility watchdog has warned.
The Daily Telegraph quotes Sally Cheshire, chair of...
What it's like waking up during surgery
There is now evidence that around 5% of people may wake up on the operating table, according to a report on Wellcome's Mosaic site....
Doctors and nurses abandon Romania for better paid EU jobs
Despite doubling salaries, Romania has lost 43,000 doctors and more than a fifth of its population since joining the European Union in 2007, reports...
Insurance industry scrambles to respond to rise in medical malpractice claims
The growth in medical malpractice litigation has seen an array of new insurance products come onto the market, writes Stephen Coan for MedicalBrief.
“An explosion”...
NGOs want drug pricing transparency, slate govt over 'pharma friendly’ policies
Delegates from governments and civil society organisations, attending a global forum on fair pricing and access to medicines, have called for greater transparency around...
SA one of unhealthiest countries on earth because of primary healthcare failure
By some measures – healthy life expectancy, obesity and depression, among others – South Africa is the unhealthiest country on earth, writes Bob Mash,...
WHO criticised over not declaring public health emergency in DRC
The Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo does not constitute a public health emergency of international concern. CNN reports that this is...
May 8: Heavenly promises but the devil is in the details
Health-e News unpacks the health care promises of the major parties in the run-up to May 8's general election.
The ANC’s much-contested National Health Insurance (NHI)...
Fast and deadly spread of C.auris hits SA also
A drug-resistant fungus called Candida auris, which preys on people with weakened immune systems, is quietly spreading across the globe, reports The New York...
Venezuela health system in a state of 'utter collapse’ — Human Rights Watch
The UN is being urged to declare a full-scale humanitarian emergency in Venezuela in the light of the “utter collapse” of its health system...
R197m private healthcare inquiry has been a 'red herring’ — FMF
The government's private health market inquiry was a red herring intended to create a veneer of legitimacy for further regulation, in preparation of introducing its...
Sugar industry shouldn't blame woes on sugar tax — Treasury
It is premature for the sugar industry to claim that the sugary drinks tax is causing job losses, according to the Treasury, writes Health-e News. The South...
Zuma era corruption continues in provincial health
Many of SA's provincial departments of health are still overrun with people appointed with little purpose other than to nod through corrupt deals. Spotlight...
SA's liberal abortion laws thwarted by social stigma
The SA health service offers free, legal abortions. So why, asks Voice of America, are more than half of abortions in the country illegal,...
Top scientists clash over mooted CRISPR moratorium
A group of ethicists and scientists – including some of the inventors of CRISPR – have called for a moratorium on all clinical uses...
SA constitution ‘a basis’ for euthanasia — Human Rights Commission head
Rights to dignity and ‘security in and control over their body’, both entrenched in the Bill of Rights, clearly provide a basis for the...
SA's sugar tax pits jobs against lifestyle diseases
As part of the Health Department's strategy to reduce obesity, SA in 2018 became the first country in Africa to introduce a sugar tax....
Pre-diabetes: A boon for pharma but is it good medicine?
Labelling people as having pre-diabetes could do more harm than good, experts have said, as research reveals that even some of those involved in...
The rights of foreign nationals in accessing SA healthcare
Directives recently issued by the national Health Department and Gauteng Health requiring foreign nationals to pay in full for healthcare at public facilities weren’t only...
Academic medicine must step up with LGBTQ patients
Medical schools have failed to include in their standard medical curricula training on hormone therapy, gender-affirming surgeries, or even the basics of sexual orientation...
Psychotherapist talks about suppression of his ‘politically incorrect' research
Psychotherapist James Caspian attempted to undertake a research project into ‘detransitioning’, where those who have transitioned to another gender come to regret their decision...
Vaccination advocates face vicious campaigns of online abuse
When the naturopath Elias Kass testified before a Washington state senate committee on 20 February with a baby on his chest and a pacifier...
The war over faecal microbiota transplants
Will corporate greed get in the way of patient access to non-profit stool for faecal transplants? The New York Times reports that there are...
Eskom crisis may be dwarfed by the looming NHI disaster
As much as the country is currently focused on the crisis in Eskom, the nation seems to have lost sight of the looming National...
The Lancet Commission on Obesity recommendations 'deeply problematic'
The Lancet Commission on Obesity, three years in the making, has just been released. It is an infringement of personal freedoms and based on...
Ticking boxes instead of actually doing something to save SA's ailing health system
This is an illness we have as a country: we convene summits, appoint task teams, create war rooms, and hold press conferences, but very...
FDA warns against the vampire fad
Unscrupulous parties are touting blood plasma infusion from young donors to fight ageing or serious illnesses. This week the US Food and Drug Administration warned against...
Medical journals slated for ethics failure on Chinese organ donor articles
A world-first study has called for the mass retraction of more than 400 scientific papers on organ transplantation, amid fears the organs were obtained...
Mapping gender inequality in the scientific community
A special issue of The Lancet reports that gender inequality in the scientific community starts right at the beginning of the scientific process –...
Delay in release of private health sector report 'bad news'
The release of a final report about the state of competition in South Africa’s private health sector has been delayed again, writes Wezile Chitha,...
'Urgent need' for antiretroviral pregnancy registry in SA
South Africa has an "appalling record" on pregnancy registries but one is urgently needed to answer questions about the new antiretroviral dolutegravir, which is being...
Gene therapy: A game changer for those with sickle-cell disease
With advances in gene therapy, scientists have begun to talk of a cure for sickle-cell disease, an inherited condition that mainly afflicts people of...
Are the Dutch euthanasia laws a 'slippery slope'?
The idea that we humans have a variety of deaths to choose from is more familiar in the Netherlands than anywhere else. But the...