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Coroners warned of mental health care failings in dozens of inquests

Shortfalls in mental health services and staffing have been flagged as concerns in dozens of inquests since 2015, the Observer has revealed, with coroners issuing repeated warnings over patients facing long waiting lists or falling through gaps in service provision.

The Observer has identified 56 mental health-related deaths in England and Wales from the start of 2015 to the end of 2020 where coroners identified a lack of staffing or service provision as a “matter of concern”, meaning they believed “there is a risk that future deaths could occur unless action is taken”.

Coroners issue Reports to Prevent Future Deaths (PFD) when they believe action should be taken to prevent deaths occurring in future, and send them to relevant individuals or organisations, who are expected to respond. In one case, a woman referred to psychotherapy services had still not received any psychotherapy by the time she died 11 months later. In another, someone had endured a seven-month wait for a psychological assessment.

Alison Cobb, senior policy and campaigns officer at the mental health charity Mind, said: “It’s shocking that so many should lose their lives because there isn’t enough capacity in mental health services to provide adequate care. These prevention of future deaths notices are meant to inform better ways of working, and it’s especially concerning that similar stories are repeating over and over again.”

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Source: The Guardian, 5 September 2021

Coroner's reports on the hub

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NHS hospitals are not ‘scaremongering’ about a winter Covid wave

David Oliver, NHS consultant physician and a columnist for the BMJ makes a plea on behalf of his colleagues as they face a surge of admissions due to the spread of the omicron variant of COVID-19 this Christmas.

"Pandemic health protection measures are not all about you and your own personal risk or appetite for it, your own ‘natural immunity’ or fitness, your own liberty or freedom. They are about protecting everyone else. 

It might be your own parent, grandparent or sibling that dies from COVID-19 or from lack of access to overwhelmed services. It might be your neighbour’s or someone in another town or from another social class or ethnic group,

This isn’t a game and we need to take it seriously and stop posturing and point-scoring, before, once again, we have left it too late to act"

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Source: Byline Times, 21 December 2021

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Covid-19: Mexico City gave ivermectin kits to people with covid in “unethical” experiment

The government of Mexico City handed out nearly 200 000 “ivermectin based kits” last year to people who had tested positive for Covid-19, without telling them they were subjects in an experiment on the drug’s effectiveness.

The results of that experiment were then written up by public officials in an article placed on popular US preprint server SocArXiv. It became one of site’s most viewed articles, claiming that ivermectin had reduced hospital admissions by 52-76%.

But those officials have been under fire at home since SocArXiv withdrew the paper earlier this month, calling it “either very poor quality or else deliberately false and misleading.”

Opposition deputies in Mexico City’s Congress demanded hearings and said they would bring legal action against the paper’s lead author, José Merino, head of the city’s Digital Agency for Public Innovation.

Explaining the decision to withdraw the article—the first to be taken down by SocArXiv—the site’s steering committee wrote that it had responded “to a community groundswell beseeching us to act” in order “to prevent the paper from causing additional harm.”

The committee wrote, “The paper is spreading misinformation, promoting an unproved medical treatment in the midst of a global pandemic. The paper is part of, and justification for, a government programme that unethically dispenses (or did dispense) unproven medication apparently without proper consent or appropriate ethical protections.”

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Source: BMJ, 22 February 2022

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‘Total IT failure’ at four hospitals sparks safety concerns

Four hospitals in Greater Manchester are struggling with a near ‘total IT failure’ which has forced staff in all key services to use handwritten lists and notes.

The problems have affected multiple IT systems across Royal Oldham, Fairfield General, Rochdale Infirmary and North Manchester General hospitals.

Staff at the sites are running theatre and emergency departments using handwritten patient lists and notes, while bloods and scan results are also being written by hand. Patient histories are largely unavailable.

HSJ spoke to staff who said there are major concerns over patient safety, as the lack of digital systems increases the risk of errors, and also slows down multiple processes. They described the problems as a “total IT failure”.

Chris Brookes, deputy CEO and chief medical officer, said: “Patient safety and maintaining essential services remains our priority. We are doing everything we can to fix the IT issues and to limit disruption to patients and our services."

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Source: HSJ, 25 May 2022

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Vapes '95% safer' than cigarettes messaging backfired

The message that vaping is 95% safer than smoking has backfired, encouraging some children to vape, says a top health expert.

Dr Mike McKean treats children with lung conditions and is vice-president for policy at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. He says the 2015 public messaging should have been clearer - vapes are only for adults addicted to cigarettes.

Evidence on the possible health risks of vaping is still being gathered.

In an exclusive interview with the BBC, Dr McKean said: "Vaping is not for children and young people. In fact it could be very bad for you," although he stresses that it is not making lots of children very sick, and serious complications are rare.

"Vaping is only a tool for adults who are addicted to cigarettes."

He says the 95% safe messaging was "a very unwise thing to have done and it's opened the door to significant chaos".

"There are many children, young people who have taken up vaping who never intended to smoke and are now likely addicted to vaping. And I think it's absolutely shocking that we've allowed that to happen."

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Source: BBC News, 26 September 2023

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Trust warned after CQC’s ‘serious concerns’ for patients

Safety inspectors have ordered a mental health trust to make immediate improvements after visiting two inpatient wards where three patients died inside six months.

The Care Quality Commission this week warned Devon Partnership Trust it would take “urgent action” over “serious concerns about patients” unless the trust made the required improvements swiftly.

The watchdog inspected the trust’s Delderfield and Moorland wards in June following concerns about three patient deaths in September, October and March, along with “a number of” patient safety incidents - including ligature incidents.

The CQC also highlighted poor patient observation routines and a lack of learning from previous incidents, amid delays in completing investigations into safety incidents.

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Source: HSJ, 21 August 2020

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'Superbugs' a far greater risk than Covid in Pacific, scientist warns

The emergence of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), including drug-resistant bacteria, or “superbugs”, pose far greater risks to human health than Covid-19, threatening to put modern medicine “back into the dark ages”, an Australian scientist has warned, ahead of a three-year study into drug-resistant bacteria in Fiji.

“If you thought Covid was bad, you don’t want anti-microbial resistance,” Dr Paul De Barro, biosecurity research director at Australia’s national science agency, the CSIRO, told The Guardian.

“I don’t think I’m exaggerating to say it’s the biggest human health threat, bar none. Covid is not anywhere near the potential impact of AMR. We would go back into the dark ages of health.”

WHO warns overuse of antibiotics for COVID-19 will cause more deaths

While AMR is an emerging public health threat across the globe, in the Pacific, where the risk of the problem is acute, drug-resistant bacteria could stretch the region’s fragile health systems beyond breaking point.

An article in the BMJ Global Health journal reported there was little official health data – and low levels of public knowledge - around antimicrobial resistance in the Pacific, and that high rates of infectious disease and antibiotic prescription were driving up risks.

“A challenge for Pacific island countries and territories is trying to curtail antimicrobial excess, without jeopardising antimicrobial access for those who need them,” the paper argued.

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Source: The Guardian, 10 September 2020

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Rising covid absences will have ‘significant impact’ on NHS recovery

Increasing staff absence due to COVID-19 will have a ‘significant impact’ on the ability of the NHS to deliver critical care services and routine operations, leading intensive care doctors have said.

The latest NHS England data has shown the number of COVID-19 related absences of staff, either through sickness or self-isolation, has risen from 11,952 on 1 September to 19,493 on 1 October. Staff absence has almost doubled in the North West in this time as well – from 2,664 to 5,142 during the same period.

It peaked at 17,628 in the region on 11 April and means the October total accounts for nearly a third of that amount already (29%). 

Alison Pittard, dean of the Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine, confirmed increasing numbers of NHS critical care staff were absent from work. “I suspect this is due to having to be at home with children asked to isolate and therefore the parent needing to isolate, as was the case in the first wave," she told HSJ.

 “This will have an impact on our ability to deliver critical care services. We know that staff numbers are inadequate at the best of times, with a significant vacancy rate especially for critical care nurses.”

Royal College of Anaesthetists council member Helgi Johannsson said the rising absence rate was “likely to have a significant impact”, particularly on routine operations.

Dr Johannsson, a consultant anaesthetist at Imperial College Healthcare Trust, said: “In my hospitals, I have been aware of several doctors and nurses having to isolate due to their children being asked to self-isolate. These healthcare staff were otherwise well and would have been at work."

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Source: HSJ, 14 October 2020

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Covid lockdown blamed for deaths of more than 3,000 people with diabetes

A lack of diabetes checks following the first Covid lockdown may have killed more than 3,000 people, a major NHS study suggests.

Those with the condition are supposed to undergo regular checks to detect cardiac problems, infections and other changes that could prove deadly.

But researchers said a move to remote forms of healthcare delivery and a reduction in routine care meant some of the most crucial physical examinations did not take place during the 12 months following the first lockdown.

Experts said the findings showed patients had suffered “absolutely devastating” consequences and were being “pushed to the back of the queue”.

The study, led by Prof Jonathan Valabhji, the national clinical director for diabetes and obesity, links the rise in deaths to a fall in care the previous year.

It showed that, during 2020/21, just 26.5% of diabetes patients received their full set of checks, compared with 48.1% the year before.

Those who got all their checks in 2019-20 but did not receive them the following year had mortality rates 66% higher than those who did not miss out, the study, published in Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology, found.

The study shows that foot checks, which rely on physical appointments, saw the sharpest drop, falling by more than 37%.

“The care process with the greatest reduction was the one that requires the most in-person contact – foot surveillance – possibly reflecting issues around social distancing, lockdown measures, and the move to remote forms of healthcare delivery,” the study found. Those in the poorest areas were most likely to miss out.

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Source: The Telegraph, 30 May 2022

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New hospital showcases 'different way of working'

When the new Royal Liverpool Hospital opens its doors in October, every patient will have a single room with an en-suite bathroom.

That set-up is unusual for acute hospitals in England, but many feel it is the future for all new buildings.

"There's the privacy and dignity from the patient's point of view," says Jacqui Stamper, the hospital's associate chief nurse. "If they're in the room and talking to the doctors or the nurses, there isn't somebody just the other side of a curtain listening."

"And then there's the infection prevention side of it as well.

"It's absolutely the state of the art way of hospital care really."

The new system will require staff to work differently, so patients can be properly monitored.

Each ward has been broken up into smaller zones of between six and eight beds, and each zone has its own base where the nurses will sit.

The trust which runs the hospital is currently running workshops to get staff used to the layout.

"Nursing staff will be used to working in a bigger team than a couple of people, so it is a different way of working," Ms Stamper says.

"We're listening to our staff and their concerns and answering those to see how we can address them going forward."

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Source: BBC News, 2 September 2022

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‘Urgent’ reviews launched by NHSE as death rates double

NHS England and NHS Improvement have ordered urgent reviews into the deaths of people with a learning disability and autism during the pandemic, HSJ has learned.

In May, the regulators said the COVID-19 death rates among this population were broadly in line with the rest of the population.

But in early June, the Care Quality Commission published data which suggested death rates of people with learning disabilities and/or autism had doubled during the pandemic.

In an announcement posted on a social media group for Royal College of Nursing members last week, NHSE/I said they were “urgently seeking clinical reviewers with experience in learning disability”.

The message to the private Facebook group, seen by HSJ, added: “The effects of coronavirus are having a far-reaching impact on all our lives. As we learn more about the virus, we are taking steps to make changes to safeguard our well-being.

“For people with a learning disability, the number of deaths has doubled during the covid pandemic. (compared to data on the number of deaths recorded during the same period last year). As a result, we have a large number of deaths of people with a learning disability who have died during the pandemic whose deaths we want to review.”

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Source: HSJ, 1 July 2020

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Nurses should look out for ‘COVID toe’ in patients

A website is helping healthcare professionals and the public recognise whether a rash could be a sign of COVID-19.

The covidskinsigns site carries more than 400 images of rashes collected via the COVID Symptom Study app, which was set up during the first wave of the pandemic to gather information from the public about the signs and symptoms of virus.

According to the British Association of Dermatologists, which developed the website, the most common skin rashes are urticaria (a hive-like rash), a ‘prickly heat’ or chickenpox-type rash, and redness that looks like chilblains on the fingers or toes.

Rash was added as a sign to the app, which has been downloaded by 4 million people in the UK – reports emerged last spring of rashes in patients admitted to hospital with COVID-19.

In August 2020, Mid Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust vascular nurse consultant Leanne Atkin warned discoloured toes could be a sign of COVID-19. She spoke out following a rise in the number of patients presenting to vascular clinics with signs that could be attributable to arterial disease. However, Dr Atkin said these patients often go on to test positive for COVID-19.

Dubbed ‘COVID toe’, the condition can have a similar appearance to chilblains, which commonly cause swelling and redness at the ends of toes and fingers, and was first identified as a sign of COVID-19 by podiatrists in Spain in April 2020.

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Source: Nursing Standard, 29 January 2021

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Study reveals the most common serious safety errors on hospital wards

New research examining severe harm incidents and deaths in NHS hospitals has been published today in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine. The research, looking at more than 370 incidents has highlighted the risks to patients from fragmented care on busy wards and shortages of staff.

According to the findings, “errors occurred due to a lack of clarity regarding responsibilities for patient care coordination, especially during emergency situations or out of hours. Poor documentation of long-term management plans and no reliable review system to ensure follow-up by the most appropriate teams contributed,” with researchers also saying many of the errors in medication happened more often overnight due to a lack of out-of-hours pharmacy support. 

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Source: The Independent, 5 August 2021

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Large hospital trusts still missing key crisis support in A&E

Some of the country’s leading acute hospitals are not meeting a key NHS standard for mental health support in emergency departments, HSJ research suggests, with some regions faring better than others.

Latest official estimates indicate that more than a third of EDs (36 per cent) are not yet meeting ‘core 24’ standards for psychiatric liaison – which requires a minimum of 1.5 full-time equivalent consultants and 11 mental health practitioners.

The long-term plan target is for 70 per cent of acute trust emergency departments to have the optimum ‘core 24’ standard service by 2023-24. The NHS appears to be on track to hit this, with significant progress made, despite the pandemic.

Annabel Price, chair of the Royal College of Psychiatrists’ liaison faculty, said tackling the workforce crisis with a fully funded plan would “prove instrumental in boosting recruitment across all acute trusts”.

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Source: HSJ, 23 August 2022

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A mysterious Adderall shortage reveals how America fails ADHD patients

Erik, a 26-year-old Seattle grocery clerk, who also has attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), has been unable to get his medications filled for months now – and he’s worried he’ll lose the first full-time job he’s ever had.

For people like Erik, ADHD medication is a prerequisite for basic functioning – and over the last year it’s become dramatically harder for patients like them to access care. Last October, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a shortage of Adderall, one of the most common stimulant medications for ADHD.

In recent months, patients have reported problems filling nearly every type of ADHD medication. What’s stranger is that no one seems to know why. Is it some kind of supply chain issue? A pandemic-era surge in demand? A government crackdown?

Official explanations have offered little clarity. The FDA’s announcement mentioned “intermittent manufacturing delays” at Teva, the producer of the branded version of Adderall, but few other details. The American Society of Health Pharmacists reports shortages of multiple ADHD drugs but says manufacturers have given no explanation.

The situation has left patients in turmoil.

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Source: The Guardian, 30 January 2023

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NHS trust was negligent in failing to recognise child’s serious bacterial infection, says High Court

A High Court judge has ruled that an NHS trust was negligent in failing to consider early enough that a toddler with fever, lethargy, and vomiting might have had a serious bacterial infection and to give her intramuscular antibiotics.

Mr Justice Johnson said that doctors from University Hospital Southampton NHS Foundation Trust should have ordered a lumbar puncture on the 15 month old girl on the day she was first seen or the next day.

The girl, referred to in court as SC, was sent by her GP to the hospital by ambulance on 26 January 2006 with a note describing his findings on examination and ending “?meningitis.” The GP, Mark Dennison, had given her intramuscular penicillin.

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Source: BMJ, 22 June 2020

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Severe and long Covid risk could be established ‘very early on’

New research has suggested there are specific molecular responses found in some COVID-19 patients which could be used to determine their likelihood of suffering from severe or long Covid symptoms, very early on following infection.

Researchers, supported by NIHR Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre, had set out to increase our understanding of the relationship between the immune response and COVID-19 symptoms by recruiting individuals who tested positive for the virus into a cohort of the NIHR BioResource.

Studying 207 people who had tested positive for COVID-19 over a three-month period, taking blood samples and measuring their symptoms, then comparing to samples taken from 45 healthy people, the researchers were able to uncover a number of interesting new findings.

Their research showed that people with either an asymptomatic or mild case of COVID-19 mounted a robust immune response to the virus soon after getting infected. These individuals produced a greater number of T cells, B cells and antibodies than patients with more severe COVID-19 infections and within the first week of infection - after which these numbers rapidly returned to normal.

The study also showed there was no evidence in these patients of widespread inflammation which can lead to damage in multiple organs.

In contrast, people with severe COVID-19 who required hospitalisation showed an impaired immune response, which led to a delayed and weakened attempt to fight the virus and widespread inflammation from the time of symptom onset. In patients requiring admission to hospital, the early immune response was delayed, and profound abnormalities were present in a number of immune cells.

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Source: NHE, 22 January 2021

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Lifestyle changes saving thousands from diabetes

Thousands of Britons have avoided being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes thanks to an NHS programme aimed at early intervention.

The Diabetes Prevention Programme identifies people at risk of developing the condition and gives them a nine-month plan to change their lifestyles.

Researchers at the University of Manchester found that the programme resulted in 18,000 fewer people in England being diagnosed with type 2 diabetes between 2018 and 2019 — a 7% reduction.

It focuses on eating and exercise habits and enables participants to join peer support groups and receive instruction from health coaches.

The programme also offers a digital service that helps participants monitor their progress using wearable technology and mobile phone apps.

Emma McManus, a research fellow at the university, said that diabetes was a “growing problem” for the country. The NHS spends about 10 per cent of its annual budget on treating it.

“However, if you change your lifestyle, the risk of developing type 2 diabetes reduces,” she said. “Our research has shown that the programme has been successful in reducing the number of new cases of diabetes.”

Emma Elvin, a senior clinical adviser at Diabetes UK, said: “This research adds to the evidence that many type 2 diabetes cases can be delayed or prevented with the right support and further highlights how the NHS diabetes prevention programme can be a real turning point for people at risk of type 2 diabetes.”

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Source: The Times, 28 March 2022

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Up to 100,000 on antipsychotics with no review

A national strategy is needed to tackle health risks linked to antipsychotic drugs because current policy is letting tens of thousands of people fall through the gaps, commissioners in London are warning.

Commissioners and clinicians in City and Hackney found more than 1,000 patients in their area who were on these drugs without having regular medication reviews or health checks. They warned that, if their findings applied across England, 100,000 patients could be in the same position. 

Although NHS England funds GP practices to carry out regular health checks on patients who are on the serious mental illness register, this excludes patients who are prescribed antipsychotics without having an SMI diagnosis — which typically covers psychoses, schizophrenia or bipolar active disorder. 

An audit by City and Hackney Clinical Commissioning Group, carried out in July 2019 and shared with HSJ, found 1,200 patients in the area were taking antipsychotics but did not have a formal SMI diagnosis.

The audit found most of these patients were not receiving regular health checks and a significant number may have benefited from having their medication reduced. 

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Source: HSJ, 27 January 2020

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Six million ‘hidden’ patients could flood NHS waiting lists this year

As many as 6 million “hidden” patients could join the queue for NHS treatment in the coming months, swelling official waiting lists to records not seen for more than a decade, health chiefs have warned.

In the wake of a Budget that offered no new investment for the health service ministers must level with the public that previous guarantees on waiting times are now impossible to meet, the head of the NHS Confederation has said.

In an interview with The Independent, Danny Mortimer said some patients should expect to wait many months, or possibly even beyond a year, for their treatment.

He said: “It's going to take many years to recover the waiting list position to where we want it to be.

“We have to be realistic about the time that it will take us to address these issues, and the government have to be realistic about what it will take particularly if this week’s Budget is an indication that actually there won’t be money made available to the NHS to truly address these issues.

“The government has to take responsibility for explaining to the public what the consequences of that are.”

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Source: The Independent, 7 March 2021, 

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Private ambulance firm deregistered by CQC

A private ambulance company, KFA Medical,  which provided patient transport services for the NHS has been deregistered by the Care Quality Commission over concerns for patient safety. Concerns included lack of basic training and Disclosure and Barring Service checks on employees were not up to date or had not been carried out and when looking at four staff files none had current basic life support training.

Sarah Dronsfield, the CQC’s head of hospital inspection, said: “We have been working with the provider since their suspension in January, however when we carried out this inspection, we found the provider had been unable to implement and sustain the necessary improvements to assure us that people were receiving safe care. This action should send a very clear message to all providers of independent health and care services that while taking enforcement action of this nature is not something we take lightly, we will always take action where appropriate to protect the health and safety of patients,” 

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Source: 03 September 2021

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Record 420,000 children a month in England treated for mental health problems

More than 400,000 children and young people a month are being treated for mental health problems – the highest number on record – prompting warnings of an unprecedented crisis in the wellbeing of under-18s.

Experts say Covid-19 has seriously exacerbated problems such as anxiety, depression and self-harm among school-age children and that the “relentless and unsustainable” ongoing rise in their need for help could overwhelm already stretched NHS services.

The latest NHS figures show “open referrals” – troubled children and young people in England undergoing treatment or waiting to start care – reached 420,314 in February, the highest number since records began in 2016.

The total has risen by 147,853 since February 2020, a 54% increase, and by 80,096 over the last year alone, a jump of 24%. January’s tally of 411,132 cases was the first time the figure had topped 400,000.

Mental health charities welcomed the fact that an all-time high number of young people are receiving psychological support. But they fear the figures are the tip of the iceberg of the true number of people who need care, and that many more under-18s in distress are being denied help by arbitrary eligibility criteria.

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Source: The Guardian, 22 May 2022

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Intensive care staffing ratios dramatically diluted

The staff-to-patient ratios for intensive care are being dramatically reduced as the NHS seeks to rapidly expand its capacity to treat severely ill covid-19 patients, HSJ has learned.

Acute trusts in London have been told to base their staffing models for ICU on having one critical care nurse for every six patients, supported by two non-specialist nurses and two healthcare assistants. 

Trusts have also been told by NHS England and NHS Improvement’s regional directorate to plan for one critical care consultant per 30 patients, supported by two middle grade doctors. The normal guidance is the consultant-to-patient ratio “should not exceed a range between 1:8-1:15”.

Nicki Credland, chair of the British Association of Critical Care Nurses, confirmed the plans had been agreed today nationally.

She told HSJ: “There will absolutely be a lot of concern about this in the profession, but it’s the only option we’ve got available. We simply don’t have the capacity to increase our staffing levels quickly enough."

“It will dilute the standard of care but that’s absolutely better than not having enough critical care staff. There’s also a massive issue around the ability of critical care nurses not only to care for their patients but also monitor what the non-specialists in their teams are doing.”

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Source: HSJ, 24 March 2020

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UH partners with Masimo to pilot remote patient monitoring tool to aid COVID-19 response efforts

University Hospitals has partnered with medical technology company Masimo to pilot a telehealth solution, Masimo SafetyNet, that is designed to help clinicians care for patients remotely with a finger sensor and phone app.

The demand for remote monitoring and patient engagement in different settings has "significantly increased" during the COVID-19 pandemic. To help prepare for a surge in COVID-19 patients and protect other patients and providers, the tool allows University Hospitals and other hospitals to expand patient monitoring to the home or other locations (for instance, a skilled nursing facility or an under-utilised med-surg floor) that are temporarily set up to address increased demand.

Guidelines from the World Health Organization suggest monitoring the oxygen saturation, respiration rate and temperature of suspected or confirmed COVID-19 patients. Adapting this existing technology aims to offer a secure remote solution.

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Source: Crain's Cleveland Business, 23 March 2020

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Ukraine’s hospitals ‘desperate’ for medical supplies as oxygen runs out

Hospitals across Ukraine are “desperate” for medical supplies, doctors have warned, as oxygen stores are hit and other vital health supplies run low amid bombardment from Russian forces.

UK-based Ukrainian doctors have issued an urgent appeal for donations of supplies as they travel to eastern Europe in response to reports of shortages of medical equipment and medicines.

The World Health Organisation warned on Sunday evening that oxygen supplies in Ukraine were “dangerously low” as trucks were unable to transport oxygen supplies from plants to hospitals across the country.

Dr Volodymyr Suskyi, an intensive care doctor at Feofaniya Clinical Hospital in Kyiv, told The Independent he had been forced to use an emergency back-up system to supply oxygen to a patient on life support after the area near plant which supplies his hospital was bombed.

Dr Dennis Olugun, a UK-based doctor who is leading the group of medics from the Ukrainian Medical Association of the United Kingdom (UMAUK) to deliver medical supplies, said the situation was “desperate” in some areas. He said some hospitals did not have basic necessities such as rubber gloves.

He told The Independent: “What they need in the hospitals is portable ultrasound machines, portable x-ray machines because they have so many patients they much rather walk around the wards and do whatever diagnostic work rather than transporting patients."

The Association of the British Pharmaceutical Industry and European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations have called for medicines, pharmaceutical ingredients and raw materials to be excluded from the scope of sanctions being levied against Russian trade.

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Source: The Independent, 1 March 2022

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