According to comments from Lord Young of Graffham, who is heading a review of health and safety regulations for David Cameron, rules imposed on police officers, ambulance workers and firefighters are endangering the public and could be abolished.

“There have been three instances of police officers standing by watching children drown and not doing anything because of health and safety concerns,” said Lord Young. “We’ve got children dying because of health and safety. Well, I’m sorry, that is just wrong and we are going to change it.”

Lord Young said emergency services workers should no longer be covered by a law designed to protect people working in totally different situations. “If you are a policeman then you get paid for doing a job which involves risk,” he said.

via 999 crews to lose ‘health and safety’ – Scotsman.com News.

Perhaps first aid will be taught in schools one day.

“Globally, millions of people die each year as a result of accidents or serious injury. Unfortunately, many of those deaths could have been prevented had first aid been administered at the scene immediately, before the emergency services arrived.

“First aid, or emergency first aid is the care that is given to an injured or sick person prior to treatment by medically trained personnel.”

Read full article: Medical News Today.

It means the swine flu virus is spreading in at least two regions of the world with rising cases being seen in the UK, Australia, Japan and Chile.

WHO chief Dr Margaret Chan said the move does not mean the virus is causing more severe illness or more deaths.

The swine flu (H1N1) virus first emerged in Mexico in April and has since spread to 74 countries.

Read full article: BBC NEWS

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But a Columbus surgeon and longtime opponent of capital punishment contends that these technicians are not allowed to administer the drugs.

Read full article: DispatchPolitics

Thanks to Harwetopa via Twitter

Maternity Motorcycle

Mothers-to-be in South Sudan will soon be shipped to hospital by motorbike ambulance in a radical move to cut infant mortality. It’s not just the lack of clinics in the area that makes having a baby so dangerous, but also the lack of ways to reach health services, reports United Nations news service IRIN. Now five motorcycles with an attached sidecar bed, donated by the U. children’s fund, will ferry patients in the remote Eastern Equatoria region to health facilities in a pilot project that could be rolled out to other parts of the country. Bike ambulances are cheap and easy to run and, they’re also niftier than standard vehicles in places where roads are poor or non-existent.

It’s a method that’s already been tried and tested in Uganda and Malawi, where UNICEF says the bikes helped raise the proportion of women giving birth at health facilities from a quarter to half. “We have a problem bringing critically sick people to the few referral facilities available,” said Atem Nathan Riek, director-general of primary healthcare for Southern Sudan, which has among the worst rates of maternal mortality in the world.

A woman in the South has a one in six chance of dying during the course of her lifetime from complications during pregnancy or delivery, according to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF). Sudan’s overall maternal mortality ratio is 1,107 deaths per 100,000 live births, but rates are far higher in the South, rising to 2,243 deaths per 100,000 live births, according to UNICEF.

Lack of services is one reason – but so too is lack of transport to reach the few services available.“We have in our budget this year at least one ambulance per county, but even that one ambulance will not be enough,” Riek added. “So there is room for any other innovative activities like these motorbikes.”

The motorcycles, donated by UNICEF, cost about US$6,000 each, with space for the patient to sit or lie down on the cushioned bed on wheels, and seat belts for legs and waist.There is also space for a health worker to sit behind the patient to provide care and support. Two mechanics are being employed, and they will train local mechanics in the bike’s unique features.Life for a woman here is very hard,” said Mary Emmanuel, who had three children in her village without professional help. “The clinic was too far to get to, so perhaps these motorbikes could help change that.”

Read full article: SOS Childrens Villages.