HomeTalking Points
Talking Points
The vaccine dilemma: Weighing benefits for many against risks for a few
Vaccines protect huge numbers of people, generally children, from serious diseases, but in rare cases, certain vaccines can tragically cause harm. How do scientists...
WHO dismay at SA's failure to enact health regulations Bills
The World Health Organisation has used 'coded diplomatic language' to express alarm at the failure of a 'misdirected and paralytic' SA Parliament to enact...
War on malaria – On the brink of a breakthrough?
Malaria is a disease almost as old as humanity itself, but now science is bringing out the big guns in a bid to destroy...
A case against ritual male circumcision in the UK
Niall McCrae, a lecturer in mental health at King’s College London, is troubled by the act of male circumcision for religious rather than clinical purposes....
Medical journalist paid a high price for ethical stand
One of South Africa’s most notorious quackery-promoting publications has closed down after 18 years. In a Groundup report George Claassen, a former head of the department...
The dire consequences of climate change on SA's health
Climatic changes place South Africa among one of the most vulnerable countries in the world, given the current high incidence of several life-threatening diseases,...
'Complicated grief' can be treated, but … it's complicated
The therapy developed by psychiatrist Katherine Shear to treat 'complicated grief' - the unusually intense and persistent form of grief - is challenging but...
Jhb clinic wins coveted international architecture award
A R23m South African health facility has won first prize in the Health Completed Buildings at the Berlin World Architecture Festival Awards. Bizcommunity reports...
Helping shatter the stigma of doctors' mental health problems
SIGECAPS is the mnemonic medical students memorise to learn the core symptoms of depression: sleep, interest, guilt, energy, concentration, appetite, psychomotor retardation, and suicidality....
Health experts divided over whether Big Tobacco's 'smoke-free world' strategy be trusted
Public health experts are divided on whether tobacco industry efforts to reduce health impacts and death through smoke-free products should be engaged with or...
Will Ramaphosa put TB back on the radar?
When one considers the TB numbers, it boggles the mind that it is not dominating the headlines, not a top priority for political parties...
Listeria outbreak prompts improvements in SA food safety standards
The huge and deadly outbreak of listeria in South Africa could alter the country’s approach to food-borne disease and prompt improvements in food safety...
Sugar Tax is just the beginning, says Motsoaledi
South Africa is less than two weeks away from implementing the hard-won tax on sugary drinks. Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi said now that “we’ve...
Trying to turn the tide on Africa's avoidable deaths
Nowhere are the battle lines between public health authorities and Big Tobacco, Big Food and Big Soda sharper than in South Africa and on...
Listeriosis outbreak 'highlights SA's food safety shortcomings'
The devastating listeriosis outbreak is a reflection of the weaknesses in the SA food system, says Professor Lise Korsten, co-director at the Centre of...
Down's syndrome takes centre stage in US abortion debate
Bills are being placed before US state legislatures that would make it a crime for a doctor to perform an abortion if sought 'solely'...
'Gender paradox' of more women taking STEM degrees in unequal countries
Countries with greater gender equality see a smaller proportion of women taking degrees in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM), a new study has...
Discovering why the 'super-agers' live long and well
'Super-agers' have long puzzled scientists, but now researchers say they are unpicking why some people live beyond 80 – and still appear to be...
Vaping restrictions 'could be a public health disaster'
SA Health minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi wants an outright ban on vaping, falsely conflating it with smoking tobacco, and equally falsely attributing its rise...
Health officials could be criminally charged over Esidimeni and KZN cancer crisis
Gauteng Health officials could be criminally charged with culpable homicide for their roles in the Life Esidimeni scandal, says Professor David McQuoid-Mason, of the...
Big strides made in push for affordable, effective anti-venom
News that Fav-Afrique - one of sub-Saharan Africa’s most effective snakebite antivenoms - was set to expire in 2016 caused dismay among public health...
Copenhagen reveals the secrets of being a healthy city
Maybe it’s the Viking heritage, says a report in The Guardian. There is an icy open-air pool in the waters of Copenhagen’s harbour, and...
Will anyone take the blame and pay the price for Esidimeni?
John Kane-Berman, a policy fellow at the Institute of Race Relations (IRR), writes on the Politicsweb site: “Every time there is a fatality in...
Spotlight on findings in the latest District Health Barometer
A Spotlight report has picked out eight interesting national-level findings in the latest District Health Barometer (DHB), released by the Health Systems Trust last...
Contraception, HIV and control over black women’s bodies
The practice of injecting women with the 'controversial' conraceptive Depo-Provera without proper informed consent – especially those who are poor, black and using the...
Mental health in Africa is 'neglected and stigmatised'
Historically, mental health has been neglected on Africa’s health and development policy agenda, writes Professor Crick Lund, professor and director of the Alan J...
SA’s ‘worst human rights failure since apartheid'
It has been called a tragedy. A calamity. A scandal. But, says a Bhekisisa report, the Life Esidimeni debacle was no accident, no rash...
Abolishing medical tax credit 'problematic' and could face court challenge
As the SA government mulls its options to reduce expenditure while funding priority programmes, experts have warned that the abolishment of the medical tax...
Appearance rather than sporting performance drives steroid use — NHS report
Up to 1m people in the UK are taking anabolic steroids and other image- and performance-enhancing drugs (IPEDs) to change the way they look,...
Lessons for SA to be learned from US/UK tobacco regulations
A shift in the way US and UK policymakers regulate tobacco, e-cigarettes and nicotine could promote public health efforts to reduce smoking and usher...
How the sushi boom is fuelling tapeworm infections
Reports this week that a US man's sushi habit ended with a hospital trip with an almost two-metre tapeworm, has sparked much revulsion and...
Is a 'union style' medical indemnity cover the answer?
A number of SA medical professionals do not have medical indemnity cover due to the rising costs of insurance premiums. Norton Rose Fulbright's Natasha...
The foodie fashion of a gluten-free diet is misplaced
Coeliac disease, an allergy to gluten that causes damage to the intestine, affects only 1% of the population but 11% of Australians follow a...
Why are there still so few women doctors?
“When my friend was in her fourth year of medical school, she and her boyfriend sat down with their dean to discuss their residency...
Doctors in India protest over decision to 'sanction quackery'
Doctors in India have accused the government of seeking to “sanction quackery” by proposing to allow homeopaths and others trained in alternative remedies to...
Algerian men rejecting 'mutilated' breast cancer victims
As if losing a breast to cancer was not traumatic enough, Algerian mother-of-three Linda was then spurned by her husband for being “mutilated” and...
SA's thorny health issues carried over into 2018
As the year begins, it’s common for individuals, companies and government departments to have a few things on their list of things to do....
Sleepless nights over inequitable funding for Gauteng — Health MEC
Gauteng Health MEC Gwen Ramokgopa assumed office in February, and she is quoted in a News24 report as saying that she believes the department’s...
Restricting public comment by psychiatrists on public figures is 'outdated'
The rationale for the Goldwater Rule – which prohibits psychiatrists from publicly commenting on the mental health of public figures they have not examined...
Technology is leaving some doctors out in the cold
The bizarre case of Dr Anna Konopka, a popular rural doctor in the US, who claims to have been barred from practice because she...