Semua Kabar

If you ask these three doctors about being GPs, their answers are remarkably similar.

“It can be the best job in the world,” one tells me. It’s “a privilege” another says. They all talk about how they love getting to know their patients and their families.

But all three have different views on assisted dying.

Right now, the law here is clear: medics cannot help patients to take their own lives. But that could change.

The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill is being debated in Parliament. And if it goes through, it will give some terminally ill patients in England and Wales the option of an assisted death.

Here, three doctors – Abdul Farooq, Susi Caesar and Gurpreet Khaira, who all have a different view on assisted dying – tell us how they feel about the proposals. The three were among more than 1,000 GPs to respond to a BBC questionnaire on assisted dying.

Dr Abdul Farooq is 28 and relatively new to his career as a GP.

We meet at his home in east London. He gives his baby daughter a bottle of milk before heading around the corner to pray in his local mosque.

His religion is absolutely key to his views on assisted dying.

“I believe in the sanctity of life. As a Muslim, I believe that life is a gift from God, and that no one has the right to take that away,” he says.

Dr Farooq feels taking your own life is wrong, and so, he says, it would be “sinful” for him to be involved in that process – even indirectly.

If this law passed – and a patient came to him asking for help to die – he would refer them to another doctor.

He says anything beyond that would be “a red line I would never cross”.

Dr Farooq’s objections are also informed by his professional experience, particularly his time working in a hospital.

He describes seeing “undignified deaths” – people passing away on busy wards – and says the health system is not getting the basics right in end-of-life care.

“There is so much we can do to make patients comfortable, if we have the right resources available,” he tells me.

“We have a whole field of medicine called palliative medicine that is there to help people towards the end of their life. So why are we not throwing all our resources and money into that and actually making the process of death less scary?”

He’s also concerned about specific parts of the proposed law. Doctors would have to assess if terminally ill patients are expected to die within six months before they are approved for an assisted death.

Dr Farooq sees this as problematic. The final day or so is easy to predict, he says, but adds that some patients he’s expected to die within six months can still be alive a year later.

Is there anything that could change his mind on assisted dying?

“No,” Dr Farooq says without hesitation. “I’m strongly against it. Personally and professionally, I think it’s the wrong thing to do for patients.”

Dr Susi Caesar has been a GP for 30 years and thinks she probably wouldn’t have previously been so vocal in her support of assisted dying.

Now, she says she is ready to “stick her head above the parapet”.

Recently she lost her beloved dad, Henning. We meet at a lake near Cirencester because being near water reminds her of him.

“My father was the most amazing person and this is so evocative of everything he loved,” she says. “The outdoors, walks, sailing, boats, kayaking, swimming.”

She thinks Henning would be proud of her for talking to us about her views because he was a long-term believer in assisted dying.

When he was diagnosed with a terminal illness, Dr Caesar says he became “terribly scared about the manner of his dying”.

“My father was a very proud man, and the thing that was unbearable to him was the idea that he would lose control at the end of his life – of his bodily functions, of his mind, of his ability to be the person that he was.”

By the end, Dr Caesar says her father’s “medication never quite kept up with his symptoms.” For her, the argument over assisted dying comes down to patient choice.

“Everybody is going to die. Every individual deserves the comfort of choice about how they die. I would want it for myself,” she tells me.

She acknowledges that many of her colleagues have “very, very reasonable concerns” about assisted dying. But she says “we have the wisdom to set up systems that will work and get over some of these hurdles.”

I ask if Dr Caesar’s support for assisted dying would translate into her working in this area.

“I will be at the front of the queue to help people to have the death that they wanted,” she says. “I think that’s the core joy of my job – being with people to the very end of their health journey.”

Dr Gurpreet Khaira doesn’t have any of the certainty of Dr Farooq and Dr Caesar.

She describes herself as “pretty conflicted about the whole subject” of assisted dying.

Dr Khaira is a GP in Birmingham but also has first-hand experience as a patient.

In 2017, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She found chemotherapy gruelling and says if the cancer ever came back, she wouldn’t want to go through it again.

“I remember feeling very passionate that I should have the choice of whether I go through this kind of treatment, or to say ‘that’s enough now’,” she says.

She says it felt very important for her to have a choice about the end of her life.

Now, she’s a picture of health, striding along a hillside with ease.

As a GP with decades of experience, she worries that vulnerable patients might opt for assisted dying rather than be a burden to their loved ones. Or that some families might coerce vulnerable patients into it.

“That is one of my biggest areas of personal conflict. I know that there are lots of plans to put safeguards in.

“You can be the best doctor or advocate in the world, but you may not pick up where someone is being controlled or manipulated.”

For her, there’s a fundamental conflict between her personal and professional experiences.

But, she adds: “As a doctor, I’d be very reluctant to be handing over a syringe for a patient to make that choice.”

Balancing up these two sides leaves her “in a very guilty place”, she says, but adds that it’s not a weakness to be open minded. For her, making this decision is an “evolving process”.

It’s striking when talking to Dr Farooq, Dr Caesar and Dr Khaira, how much their views on assisted dying reflect their core belief systems.

In that respect, GPs are possibly much like the rest of us.

If this bill does pass into law, doctors will have to consider whether they are willing to work in the area of assisted dying, or not. They could be asked to be involved in the process – whether that’s holding preliminary discussions with patients who want to die, to prescribing a substance for someone to end their own life.

If they don’t want to, no-one will force them.

They will have time to think about it. If MPs do vote in favour of this next month, it could still take years to come into effect.

Union members have called for the NHS to stop using private companies.

The interval will increase from three years due to advances in screening, public health bosses say.

The Care Reform (Scotland) Bill will introduce changes to social care procurement and new rights for unpaid carers.

A new law would see changes to social care procurement, family care home visits and a right to breaks for unpaid carers.

Dr Cian Hughes met the teenager after observing her surgical procedure at Bristol Children’s Hospital.

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“Whenever I was struggling, if it was going to be a really bad day, I could then start to chat to one of these bots, and it was like [having] a cheerleader, someone who’s going to give you some good vibes for the day.

“I’ve got this encouraging external voice going – ‘right – what are we going to do [today]?’ Like an imaginary friend, essentially.”

For months, Kelly spent up to three hours a day speaking to online “chatbots” created using artificial intelligence (AI), exchanging hundreds of messages.

At the time, Kelly was on a waiting list for traditional NHS talking therapy to discuss issues with anxiety, low self-esteem and a relationship breakdown.

She says interacting with chatbots on character.ai got her through a really dark period, as they gave her coping strategies and were available for 24 hours a day.

“I’m not from an openly emotional family – if you had a problem, you just got on with it.

“The fact that this is not a real person is so much easier to handle.”

People around the world have shared their private thoughts and experiences with AI chatbots, even though they are widely acknowledged as inferior to seeking professional advice. Character.ai itself tells its users: “This is an AI chatbot and not a real person. Treat everything it says as fiction. What is said should not be relied upon as fact or advice.”

But in extreme examples chatbots have been accused of giving harmful advice.

Character.ai is currently the subject of legal action from a mother whose 14-year-old son took his own life after reportedly becoming obsessed with one of its AI characters. According to transcripts of their chats in court filings he discussed ending his life with the chatbot. In a final conversation he told the chatbot he was “coming home” – and it allegedly encouraged him to do so “as soon as possible”.

Character.ai has denied the suit’s allegations.

And in 2023, the National Eating Disorder Association replaced its live helpline with a chatbot, but later had to suspend it over claims the bot was recommending calorie restriction.

In April 2024 alone, nearly 426,000 mental health referrals were made in England – a rise of 40% in five years. An estimated one million people are also waiting to access mental health services, and private therapy can be prohibitively expensive (costs vary greatly, but the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy reports on average people spend £40 to £50 an hour).

At the same time, AI has revolutionised healthcare in many ways, including helping to screen, diagnose and triage patients. There is a huge spectrum of chatbots, and about 30 local NHS services now use one called Wysa.

Experts express concerns about chatbots around potential biases and limitations, lack of safeguarding and the security of users’ information. But some believe that if specialist human help is not easily available, chatbots can be a help. So with NHS mental health waitlists at record highs, are chatbots a possible solution?

Character.ai and other bots such as Chat GPT are based on “large language models” of artificial intelligence. These are trained on vast amounts of data – whether that’s websites, articles, books or blog posts – to predict the next word in a sequence. From here, they predict and generate human-like text and interactions.

The way mental health chatbots are created varies, but they can be trained in practices such as cognitive behavioural therapy, which helps users to explore how to reframe their thoughts and actions. They can also adapt to the end user’s preferences and feedback.

Hamed Haddadi, professor of human-centred systems at Imperial College London, likens these chatbots to an “inexperienced therapist”, and points out that humans with decades of experience will be able to engage and “read” their patient based on many things, while bots are forced to go on text alone.

“They [therapists] look at various other clues from your clothes and your behaviour and your actions and the way you look and your body language and all of that. And it’s very difficult to embed these things in chatbots.”

Another potential problem, says Prof Haddadi, is that chatbots can be trained to keep you engaged, and to be supportive, “so even if you say harmful content, it will probably cooperate with you”. This is sometimes referred to as a ‘Yes Man’ issue, in that they are often very agreeable.

And as with other forms of AI, biases can be inherent in the model because they reflect the prejudices of the data they are trained on.

Prof Haddadi points out counsellors and psychologists don’t tend to keep transcripts from their patient interactions, so chatbots don’t have many “real-life” sessions to train from. Therefore, he says they are not likely to have enough training data, and what they do access may have biases built into it which are highly situational.

“Based on where you get your training data from, your situation will completely change.

“Even in the restricted geographic area of London, a psychiatrist who is used to dealing with patients in Chelsea might really struggle to open a new office in Peckham dealing with those issues, because he or she just doesn’t have enough training data with those users,” he says.

Philosopher Dr Paula Boddington, who has written a textbook on AI Ethics, agrees that in-built biases are a problem.

“A big issue would be any biases or underlying assumptions built into the therapy model.”

“Biases include general models of what constitutes mental health and good functioning in daily life, such as independence, autonomy, relationships with others,” she says.

Lack of cultural context is another issue – Dr Boddington cites an example of how she was living in Australia when Princess Diana died, and people did not understand why she was upset.

“These kinds of things really make me wonder about the human connection that is so often needed in counselling,” she says.

“Sometimes just being there with someone is all that is needed, but that is of course only achieved by someone who is also an embodied, living, breathing human being.”

Kelly ultimately started to find responses the chatbot gave unsatisfying.

“Sometimes you get a bit frustrated. If they don’t know how to deal with something, they’ll just sort of say the same sentence, and you realise there’s not really anywhere to go with it.” At times “it was like hitting a brick wall”.

“It would be relationship things that I’d probably previously gone into, but I guess I hadn’t used the right phrasing […] and it just didn’t want to get in depth.”

A Character.AI spokesperson said “for any Characters created by users with the words ‘psychologist’, ‘therapist,’ ‘doctor,’ or other similar terms in their names, we have language making it clear that users should not rely on these Characters for any type of professional advice”.

For some users chatbots have been invaluable when they have been at their lowest.

Nicholas has autism, anxiety, OCD, and says he has always experienced depression. He found face-to-face support dried up once he reached adulthood: “When you turn 18, it’s as if support pretty much stops, so I haven’t seen an actual human therapist in years.”

He tried to take his own life last autumn, and since then he says he has been on a NHS waitlist.

“My partner and I have been up to the doctor’s surgery a few times, to try to get it [talking therapy] quicker. The GP has put in a referral [to see a human counsellor] but I haven’t even had a letter off the mental health service where I live.”

While Nicholas is chasing in-person support, he has found using Wysa has some benefits.

“As someone with autism, I’m not particularly great with interaction in person. [I find] speaking to a computer is much better.”

The app allows patients to self-refer for mental health support, and offers tools and coping strategies such as a chat function, breathing exercises and guided meditation while they wait to be seen by a human therapist, and can also be used as a standalone self-help tool.

Wysa stresses that its service is designed for people experiencing low mood, stress or anxiety rather than abuse and severe mental health conditions. It has in-built crisis and escalation pathways whereby users are signposted to helplines or can send for help directly if they show signs of self-harm or suicidal ideation.

For people with suicidal thoughts, human support on the free Samaritans helpline is available 24/7.

Nicholas also experiences sleep deprivation, so finds it helpful if support is available at times when friends and family are asleep.

“There was one time in the night when I was feeling really down. I messaged the app and said ‘I don’t know if I want to be here anymore.’ It came back saying ‘Nick, you are valued. People love you’.

“It was so empathetic, it gave a response that you’d think was from a human that you’ve known for years […] And it did make me feel valued.”

His experiences chime with a recent study by Dartmouth College researchers looking at the impact of chatbots on people diagnosed with anxiety, depression or an eating disorder, versus a control group with the same conditions.

After four weeks, bot users showed significant reductions in their symptoms – including a 51% reduction in depressive symptoms – and reported a level of trust and collaboration akin to a human therapist.

Despite this, the study’s senior author commented there is no replacement for in-person care.

Aside from the debate around the value of their advice, there are also wider concerns about security and privacy, and whether the technology could be monetised.

“There’s that little niggle of doubt that says, ‘oh, what if someone takes the things that you’re saying in therapy and then tries to blackmail you with them?’,” says Kelly.

Psychologist Ian MacRae specialises in emerging technologies, and warns “some people are placing a lot of trust in these [bots] without it being necessarily earned”.

“Personally, I would never put any of my personal information, especially health, psychological information, into one of these large language models that’s just hoovering up an absolute tonne of data, and you’re not entirely sure how it’s being used, what you’re consenting to.”

“It’s not to say in the future, there couldn’t be tools like this that are private, well tested […] but I just don’t think we’re in the place yet where we have any of that evidence to show that a general purpose chatbot can be a good therapist,” Mr MacRae says.

Wysa’s managing director, John Tench, says Wysa does not collect any personally identifiable information, and users are not required to register or share personal data to use Wysa.

“Conversation data may occasionally be reviewed in anonymised form to help improve the quality of Wysa’s AI responses, but no information that could identify a user is collected or stored. In addition, Wysa has data processing agreements in place with external AI providers to ensure that no user conversations are used to train third-party large language models.”

Kelly feels chatbots cannot currently fully replace a human therapist. “It’s a wild roulette out there in AI world, you don’t really know what you’re getting.”

“AI support can be a helpful first step, but it’s not a substitute for professional care,” agrees Mr Tench.

And the public are largely unconvinced. A YouGov survey found just 12% of the public think AI chatbots would make a good therapist.

But with the right safeguards, some feel chatbots could be a useful stopgap in an overloaded mental health system.

John, who has an anxiety disorder, says he has been on the waitlist for a human therapist for nine months. He has been using Wysa two or three times a week.

“There is not a lot of help out there at the moment, so you clutch at straws.”

“[It] is a stop gap to these huge waiting lists… to get people a tool while they are waiting to talk to a healthcare professional.”

If you have been affected by any of the issues in this story you can find information and support on the BBC Actionline website here.

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The Hollywood studios allege Midjourney’s image generator is a “bottomless pit of plagiarism”.

Union members have called for the NHS to stop using private companies.

A medical tribunal has found a senior doctor’s failings amounted to gross negligence and misconduct.

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Compensation for infected blood victims needs to be delivered faster, campaigners have said on the first anniversary of a public inquiry report into what has been described as the worst treatment disaster in NHS history.

“We are dying at pace, the government needs to be working at pace, not just talking about it,” one campaigner said on Tuesday as a letter calling for action was handed in to the prime minister.

Diana Johnson, a minister who for years as a Labour MP supported victims of the scandal, said it was “disappointing” to hear how slow process had been.

But Cabinet Office minister Nick Thomas Symonds said the government was “committed to delivering compensation as swiftly as possible”.

More than 30,000 people in the UK were infected with HIV or hepatitis C or both after being given contaminated blood products in the 1970s and 1980s. Around 3,000 people have died.

In his final report released one year ago, inquiry chair Sir Brian Langstaff said the scandal had been largely avoidable and involved systemic failings.

Campaigners had expected rapid compensation, but so far only 100 people have received payouts.

They gathered at Westminster on Tuesday to hand in a letter to Sir Keir Starmer, stating their concern at the lack of progress.

“Twelve months on from the publication of the Infected Blood Inquiry’s devastating report, there remains deep concern from the contaminated blood community that politics is continuing to fail them,” the letter said.

“As the Infected Blood Inquiry heard when it reconvened hearings on 7 May 2025, the community’s voice was absent when the Infected Blood Compensation Scheme was drawn up. The resulting scheme contains fundamental flaws, which could and would have been foreseen.”

Speaking exclusively to the BBC, Diana Johnson MP, who is now a Home Office Minister, told BBC News that she appreciated the concerns of campaigners and sympathised with their argument.

“It’s disappointing to hear just how slow the process is though, and I fully appreciate the concerns that so many people who are gathered today are making about wanting to get those payments out to people,” she said.

“We know on average someone dies every couple of weeks, so this has to be paid. But the money is there.”

When asked whether she could use her position as minister to make their case she said she was speaking to the BBC as a constituency MP.

Jacqueline Wrixton, who was infected with hepatitis C as the result of a blood transfusion, said: “It’s been a year since the euphoria of the recommendations, and yet, as an infected person… the statistics that roughly two a week are dying, we’ve still not got payment.

“We are dying at pace, the government needs to be working at pace, not just talking about it. We need to see the actions.”

Cabinet Office minister Thomas–Symonds said: “The victims of this scandal have suffered unspeakably.

“After decades of delay, it has fallen to this government to act. We are acting on the inquiry’s 12 recommendations, so that this never happens again, and to get justice for victims.

“While no amount of compensation will make up for the suffering people have endured, we are committed to delivering compensation as swiftly as possible.”

Separate bills to let terminally ill people end their life are being considered at Westminster and in Scotland.

A coroner pays tribute to Katie Watson, who appeared on Channel 4’s Geordie Hospital.

But the NHS in England is still well below its target for seeing patients within 18 weeks.

The trial, involving patients in Yeovil and Taunton, is looking at reducing courses of antibiotics.

Marine pilot Ian Lawrence and his family spent a year volunteering on a hospital ship.

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England will be the first country in the world to start vaccinating people against the sexually transmitted infection gonorrhoea.

It will not be available for everyone. The focus will mainly be on gay and bisexual men with a history of multiple sexual partners or an STI.

The vaccine is 30-40% effective, but NHS England hopes it will reverse soaring numbers of infections.

There were more than 85,000 cases in 2023 – the highest since records began in 1918.

Gonorrhoea does not always have symptoms, but they can include pain, unusual discharge, inflammation of the genitals and infertility.

How many people will choose to be immunised is uncertain.

But projections by Imperial College London show that if the jab proves popular then it could prevent 100,000 cases and save the NHS nearly £8m over the next decade.

Max, a sexual health campaigner, told BBC Newsbeat he would “100%” take the vaccine after being diagnosed with gonorrhoea twice within a year.

“I think this is great that it’s been announced”, he says, adding: “It’s going to take the pressure off the clinics, it’s just a big win all round.”

Vaccination will start in August and will be offered through sexual health services.

Public Health Scotland said it was also working on plans to launch its own programme for high-risk individuals.

Northern Ireland’s Department of Health said the issue is being considered, with an announcement expected shortly.

BBC Newsbeat has also asked health leaders in Wales whether they intend to do the same.

This vaccine wasn’t designed for gonorrhoea. It’s the meningitis B vaccine currently given to babies.

But the bacteria that cause the two diseases are so closely related that the MenB jab appears to cut gonorrhoea cases by around a third.

That will require a delicate conversation in sexual health clinics as the vaccine will not eliminate the risk of catching gonorrhoea. It is normally caught while having sex without a condom.

But Prof Andrew Pollard, the chair of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), which recommended the vaccine, said despite it only being 30% effective, it was “worth having” and could have “a huge impact” overall.

The decision is not just about the record numbers of cases. Gonorrhoea is becoming increasingly difficult to treat.

Most cases are treated with a single dose of antibiotics, but there is an 80-year history of the bacterium which causes gonorrhoea repeatedly evolving resistance to our antibiotics.

It’s happening to the current treatments too and is why some doctors are concerned gonorrhoea could one-day become untreatable.

The best way to deal with a drug-resistant infection is to never catch it in the first place.

Dr Amanda Doyle, from NHS England, said: “The launch of a world-first routine vaccination for gonorrhoea is a huge step forward for sexual health and will be crucial in protecting individuals, helping to prevent the spread of infection and reduce the rising rates of antibiotic resistant strains of the bacteria.”

The people most affected by gonorrhoea in the UK are those aged 16-to-25, gay and bisexual men, and those of black and Caribbean ancestry.

The vaccine is value for money when primarily offered to gay and bisexual men, rather than all teenagers.

However, clinicians do have the freedom to use their own judgement and offer the vaccine to people using sexual health services they think are of equally high risk.

People will be offered mpox (formerly known as monkeypox), HPV and hepatitis vaccines at the same time.

Prof Matt Phillips, president of the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV, said: “This is excellent news and a landmark moment for sexual health in England.

“Gonorrhoea diagnoses are at their highest since records began and this has the potential to help us to turn that around.”

It is not known how long the protection provided by the vaccine will last or how often booster jabs might be required.

The decision comes almost a year and a half after a vaccination programme was recommended by the UK’s JCVI.

Sexual health campaigners had criticised that long wait, but have welcomed this decision.

Katie Clark, head of policy and advocacy at the Terrence Higgins Trust, called it a “huge win”.

Listen to Newsbeat live at 12:45 and 17:45 weekdays – or listen back here.

Separate bills to let terminally ill people end their life are being considered at Westminster and in Scotland.

But the NHS in England is still well below its target for seeing patients within 18 weeks.

The trial, involving patients in Yeovil and Taunton, is looking at reducing courses of antibiotics.

Marine pilot Ian Lawrence and his family spent a year volunteering on a hospital ship.

A medical tribunal has found a senior doctor’s failings amounted to gross negligence and misconduct.

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West Nile virus, which mainly spreads between birds but can also infect people if they’re bitten by an infected mosquito, has been detected in UK mosquitoes for the first time, UK health officials say.

Although the virus can sometimes make people seriously ill, there is no evidence it is spreading in the UK and the risk to the general public is “very low”, the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) said.

The virus is found in many parts of the world, including Africa, South America and mainland Europe.

Climate change and other factors have been pushing mosquitoes – and the diseases they carry – further north in recent years.

West Nile virus causes either very minor symptoms or none at all – but around 20% of infected people can experience headaches, high fever and skin issues. In rare cases, it can kill through serious brain illnesses, including encephalitis or meningitis.

No specific treatment or vaccines exist for humans.

To date, there have been no human cases of West Nile virus acquired in the UK – although, since 2000, there have been seven cases of the disease linked to travel to other countries.

West Nile virus is usually present in several regions across the world, including parts of Africa, Asia, South America and Europe, and has expanded in recent years.

Research by the UKHSA and the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) found fragments of the virus in mosquitoes collected at ponds near Retford, Nottinghamshire in 2023.

“While this is the first detection of West Nile Virus in mosquitoes in the UK so far, it is not unexpected as the virus is already widespread in Europe,” said Dr Meera Chand, a deputy director for travel health and infections at UKHSA.

Dr Arran Folly, who led the project which found the virus, said its detection is part of a “wider changing landscape, where, in the wake of climate change mosquito-borne diseases are expanding to new areas”.

While the Aedes vexans mosquito is native to Britain, he added that warming temperatures may bring non-native species to the UK and, with them, the potential of infectious disease.

Prof James Logan, from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, said the development was “serious” but there was no need for the public to be alarmed.

He said surveillance systems were in place to monitor increased mosquito activity and shifting bird migration caused by warmer weather.

“But as conditions change, we need to stay one step ahead,” he said.

“This is a moment to recognise that the UK is no longer immune to some diseases once considered ‘tropical’.”

Prof Logan said the virus is likely to have arrived via an infected bird or mosquito, which can both travel considerable distances during seasonal migration.

Infected mosquitoes can transmit the virus to humans, he said, but there was “no evidence of human infection acquired in the UK”.

“However, the detection of the virus in mosquitoes marks a significant step in that direction,” he added.

Heather Ferguson, professor of infectious disease ecology at Glasgow University, said several mosquito species native the UK were “known to be capable for transmitting the virus”, but do not do so at present because the conditions, such as temperature, “are not favourable”.

But she said this could change in the future, which is why lots of monitoring, testing and surveillance is always needed.

The affected mosquito, one of many thousands of species of mosquito, is often found in wet areas. Experts recommend getting rid of standing water sources where they breed, and taking personal measures such as using mosquito repellent and bed nets.

Last year, protests were held in Seville, Spain, after the death of five people infected with the disease.

Separate bills to let terminally ill people end their life are being considered at Westminster and in Scotland.

Council tax bills in England are predicted to increase by the maximum amount every year until 2029.

But the NHS in England is still well below its target for seeing patients within 18 weeks.

The trial, involving patients in Yeovil and Taunton, is looking at reducing courses of antibiotics.

Marine pilot Ian Lawrence and his family spent a year volunteering on a hospital ship.

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Mosquitoes should be given malaria drugs to clear their infection so they can no longer spread the disease, say US researchers.

Malaria parasites, which kill nearly 600,000 people a year, mostly children, are spread by female mosquitoes when they drink blood.

Current efforts aim to kill mosquitoes with insecticide rather than curing them of malaria.

But a team at Harvard University has found a pair of drugs which can successfully rid the insects of malaria when absorbed through their legs. Coating bed nets in the drug cocktail is the long-term aim.

Sleeping under a bed net has been one of the most successful ways of preventing malaria as the main malaria-spreading mosquitoes hunt at night.

Vaccines to protect children living in high-risk malaria areas are also recommended.

Nets are both a physical barrier and also contain insecticides which kill mosquitoes that land on them.

But mosquitoes have become resistant to insecticide in many countries so the chemicals no longer kill the insects as effectively as they used to.

“We haven’t really tried to directly kill parasites in the mosquito before this, because we were just killing the mosquito,” says researcher Dr Alexandra Probst, from Harvard.

However, she says that approach is “no longer cutting it”.

The researchers analysed malaria’s DNA to find possible weak spots while it is infecting mosquitoes.

They took a large library of potential drugs and narrowed it down to a shortlist of 22. These were tested when female mosquitoes were given a blood-meal contaminated with malaria.

In their article in Nature, the scientists describe two highly effective drugs that killed 100% of the parasites.

The drugs were tested on material similar to bed nets.

“Even if that mosquito survives contact with the bed net, the parasites within are killed and so it’s still not transmitting malaria,” said Dr Probst.

“I think this is a really exciting approach, because it’s a totally new way of targeting mosquitoes themselves.”

She says the malaria parasite is less likely to become resistant to the drugs as there are billions of them in each infected person, but less than five in each mosquito.

The effect of the drugs lasts for a year on the nets, potentially making it a cheap and long-lasting alternative to insecticide, the researchers say.

This approach has been proven in the laboratory. The next stage is already planned in Ethiopia to see if the anti-malarial bed nets are effective in the real world.

It will take at least six years before all the studies are completed to know if this approach will work.

But the vision is to have bed nets treated with both anti-malaria drugs and insecticide so that if one approach doesn’t work, then the other will.

Separate bills to let terminally ill people end their life are being considered at Westminster and in Scotland.

But the NHS in England is still well below its target for seeing patients within 18 weeks.

The trial, involving patients in Yeovil and Taunton, is looking at reducing courses of antibiotics.

Marine pilot Ian Lawrence and his family spent a year volunteering on a hospital ship.

A medical tribunal has found a senior doctor’s failings amounted to gross negligence and misconduct.

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Women with very dense breasts should be offered additional scans as part of the UK’s NHS breast screening programme to help detect more cancers and save lives, researchers say.

A Cambridge University-led study of more than 9,000 women found using different scans from traditional mammograms could treble the number of cancers detected in this group of women.

Around one in 10 women have very dense breasts and they have a higher risk of developing breast cancer, however cancers are harder to spot in dense breasts because of the way mammograms (breast x-rays) work.

This is because they look whiter on the x-rays, the same colour as early-stage cancers.

The trial, co-ordinated from Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, tested different scanning methods on women with very dense breasts who had been given a mammogram and told they did not have cancer.

It is only through mammograms that women and their health professionals can identify breasts that are very dense.

Louise Duffield, 60, from Ely, Cambridgeshire, was one of the trial participants who had an early-stage breast cancer diagnosed.

She had surgery to have the tumour removed within weeks.

She says it was a “big shock” when she got the diagnosis.

“It’s been a stressful time and it’s a huge relief to have it gone. The tumour was deep in the breast so if I hadn’t been on the trial, it could have gone unnoticed for years.”

The study, published in The Lancet, found two alternative methods, an enhanced mammogram and a fast MRI scan, detected 17-19 cancers per 1,000 women screened.

Both techniques use injections to make blood vessels more visible – tumours in the breast have a lot of blood vessels.

By contrast, traditional mammograms detect eight cancers in every 1,000 women screened. This amounts to more than 20,000 cancers currently detected each year.

Women aged 50 to 71 are invited for breast screening every three years and around two thirds take up the offer.

Based on the study results and that level of uptake, using the different scanning techniques on women with very dense breasts could identify 3,500 extra cancers per year and potentially save 700 lives.

Prof Fiona Gilbert, who led the research, said she was convinced the new approach could make a difference.

“We need to change our national screening programme so we can make sure more cancers are diagnosed early, giving many more women a much better chance of survival.”

The Department of Health and Social Care said its screening advisory body had been looking at ways to improve detection rates in women with very dense breasts for a number of years.

It said it would be reviewing the findings of this trial, but it was determined to “fight cancer on all fronts” to improve survival rates.

A new national cancer plan for England is expected to be published later this year.

Separate bills to let terminally ill people end their life are being considered at Westminster and in Scotland.

But the NHS in England is still well below its target for seeing patients within 18 weeks.

The trial, involving patients in Yeovil and Taunton, is looking at reducing courses of antibiotics.

Marine pilot Ian Lawrence and his family spent a year volunteering on a hospital ship.

A medical tribunal has found a senior doctor’s failings amounted to gross negligence and misconduct.

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Health Secretary Wes Streeting, is “actively reviewing” banning or restricting the private prescription of cross-sex hormones to young people, according to evidence given to the High Court.

Government lawyers say an expert panel will report in July on the use of this type of medication by under 18s wishing to change their gender.

An application by campaigners for a full judicial review of the secretary of state’s handling of the issue was rejected on Wednesday afternoon.

Dismissing the application, Lady Justice Whipple said “the case had moved on substantially” as a result of the government setting up a review in April.

The case calling for a full judicial review was brought after the NHS announced in December last year that under-18s would no longer be prescribed puberty blockers at gender identity clinics.

Campaigners argued that the prescription of cross-sex hormones should also be addressed and criticised the government’s failure to intervene.

But Lady Justice Whipple said it was not “unreasonable or irrational” for the government to address the question of puberty blockers first and later come to cross-sex hormones.

The court in London was also told health officials are looking at “alternative legal mechanisms” to tackle issues around private and overseas providers who prescribe such drugs.

Cross-sex hormones are given to people who identify as a gender that is different to their biological sex. The medication helps someone who is transitioning to develop characteristics associated with their preferred gender.

For instance, it would help a trans man, a biological female who identifies as a man, develop a deeper voice and facial hair. Existing NHS guidance allows the hormones to be prescribed people aged 16 and over.

They differ from puberty blockers, which stop the onset of puberty by suppressing the release of hormones.

Existing NHS guidance allows the hormones to be prescribed to people aged 16 and over.

The case calling for a full judicial review was brought by Keira Bell and two others, who are remaining anonymous.

They wanted a ban on the prescription of cross-sex hormones by non-NHS organisations, such as private clinics and overseas providers.

As a teenager, Ms Bell was given cross-sex hormones after attending the now closed NHS Gender Identity Development Service (GIDS) run by the Tavistock clinic.

At the time she identified as male, but says she deeply regrets the decision to take medication that altered her body permanently.

Responding to this afternoon’s judgment she said: “I am relieved that the secretary of state is now actively considering a ban on cross-sex hormones outside of the NHS.

“These powerful drugs should not be given to children and young people.”

Her barrister, Zoe Gannon, had argued that while the health secretary banned the private prescription of puberty suppressing drugs in gender cases involving under-18s, he had “failed or refused” to take the same action in relation to cross-sex hormones, and this was “irrational”.

Iain Steele, barrister for the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), told the court Mr Streeting “is currently seeking clinical and expert advice from NHS England”.

He also said there were a wide range of medical uses for hormones, such as testosterone and oestrogen, which made decisions on whether to restrict or ban their use in different situations complex.

Delivering the judgment rejecting the application for a judicial review, Lady Justice Whipple, sitting with Mr Justice Johnson, said the secretary of state had acted rationally.

She said, “This is an immensely difficult and sensitive area of policy formation where there are strong and genuinely held views on each side of the debate and where there is no consensus.”

She added Mr Streeting was taking practical steps and was therefore entitled to more time to consider the issues.

She continued that it was appropriate that there was an active review and that was to be welcomed.

A Department for Health and Social Care spokesperson said children’s healthcare “must always be led by evidence”.

“That is why this government is implementing the recommendations from the Cass Review and acted immediately to extend the puberty blockers ban and make it permanent.”

The government continues to work with the NHS to reform gender services to young people, the spokesperson added.

Dr Aidan Kelly, a consultant clinical psychologist and director of Gender Plus Hormone Clinic, argues there is no justification for a ban on cross-sex hormones for under 18’s.

The clinic is the only private provider of transgender healthcare for young people aged 16-18 that is registered with the Care Quality Commission.

“The decision to treat is always a sensitive and complex one,” he said, “so it should remain one that is made between the young person, their family and their clinical team. There is no basis for the government to be involved in that decision.”

The health secretary said a meeting with families was the most “harrowing” he’s held in the role.

Separate bills to let terminally ill people end their life are being considered at Westminster and in Scotland.

But the NHS in England is still well below its target for seeing patients within 18 weeks.

The trial, involving patients in Yeovil and Taunton, is looking at reducing courses of antibiotics.

Marine pilot Ian Lawrence and his family spent a year volunteering on a hospital ship.

Copyright 2025 BBC. All rights reserved.  The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read about our approach to external linking.

Two men with paranoid schizophrenia stabbed members of the public in separate attacks weeks before Valdo Calocane’s killings in Nottingham – and all were under the care of the same NHS trust, the BBC has found.

Josef Easom-Cooper and Junior Dietlin injured six men in the stabbings in Nottinghamshire in 2023.

Within weeks, Calocane – who also has paranoid schizophrenia – stabbed to death Barnaby Webber, Grace O’Malley-Kumar and Ian Coates on 13 June 2023.

Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust has been criticised over its care of Calocane, and in response to the BBC’s findings, apologised to those “affected for any aspects of our care that were not of the high standard our patients deserve”.

On 9 April 2023, Easom-Cooper stabbed a worshipper who was leaving an Easter Sunday service at St Stephen’s Church in Sneinton.

The BBC has spoken to his victim, a man in his 40s, who survived. He did not wish to be interviewed.

Easom-Cooper’s mother, Shelly Easom, said that as a teenager, her son was under the care of child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) in Nottingham.

“I started to routinely go into his room and I would find knives… I found an axe, my kitchen knives would quite often be in his room,” she said.

Shelly said she would take photos of the weapons, and inform police and mental health services whenever she came across them.

According to Shelly, things massively deteriorated when Easom-Cooper turned 18.

During the grips of a psychotic episode, he left Highbury Hospital – where he was due to be sectioned – to kill a friend before he was stopped.

In July 2022, he was sectioned by the hospital – run by Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust – for three months, but Shelly says she told staff he was not ready to be discharged.

“He was not OK when he was released,” she said. “There was no way he was going to take his medication and I told them that… it was literally just a time bomb waiting to happen.”

Easom-Cooper was placed in accommodation managed by a housing association, but Shelly said he was “unravelling” in the seven months he was there, and not taking his medication while under the care of the trust’s community team.

Shelly remembers her shock and frustration when she learned about her son’s knife attack.

“I just bloody knew this was going to happen,” she said.

“I’m so sorry it happened. I really am. And as a mother, he’s my son and he did that and that makes me feel quite ashamed.”

She said the stabbing could have been prevented if her son’s paranoid schizophrenia had been taken more seriously.

“It’s disgusting that it takes someone to either lose their life or be stabbed before somebody thinks ‘oh, hang on a minute, maybe we need to do something here’.

“The mental health services in Nottingham have routinely and systematically let him down and also the victim,” she added.

Easom-Cooper was sentenced to a hospital order in December 2023.

Nine weeks before Easom-Cooper’s attack, Junior Dietlin stabbed five “complete strangers” over a weekend in Nottingham and Mansfield in February 2023.

In what a prosecutor described as “a most odd and extraordinary case”, Dietlin stabbed five men once in the right bicep and then ran away in separate attacks.

One of the men stabbed was former police officer Keith Grafton, who was walking home from a pub in Mansfield.

“Suddenly, [there was] a quick thump on my right arm… I know I’ve been stabbed straight away because I felt the knife going into my skin,” the 71-year-old said.

Keith says his attacker then ran off before he could “get anywhere near him”.

He said although the attack had not left any lasting injuries, he was now “very wary” about going out late at night.

Dietlin was sentenced to a hospital order, but Keith says he was “disappointed” Dietlin had not received a prison sentence.

The BBC has seen a report conducted by the trust into its contact with Dietlin.

It said during a four-week stay at Highbury Hospital in June 2022, Dietlin had been involved in violent incidents with staff and diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia.

The report said his family “could not express the wish that he remain in hospital a while longer”.

It added that, after his discharge, he had taken his medication “very irregularly”.

The family, the report added, “felt they were in a good position to observe subtle changes” in Dietlin’s behaviour “that indicated he was unwell”, but when community staff visited, they concluded there were “no signs of psychosis”.

Dietlin stabbed his first victim on 8 February 2023, and the report said he had been visited by staff for a medication drop the next day.

On 11 and 12 February, he stabbed four more people.

Two weeks afterwards, the trust conducted an “initial management review”, from which they “did not identify any learning”, according to the report.

In a statement, the trust said these reviews were “completed straight away to establish if there is any immediate learning while the full investigation is being completed”.

Earlier this year, a review commissioned by NHS England into Calocane’s care found major failings by the trust.

Dietlin’s incident was highlighted among 15 in that report of patients “either under the current care of the trust or who had been discharged from the trust, perpetrating serious violence towards members of the community” between 2019 and 2023.

The independent review concluded the trust had an “absence of a robust approach to risk management”.

Mr Grafton said he had not known Dietlin’s history of mental health issues, nor that he had been previously sectioned.

He believes the decision to discharge his attacker into the community was “a big failing” by the trust, whom he blames for what happened to him.

“If they’d done their job properly, then it wouldn’t have happened,” he added.

Nottingham was brought to a standstill on 13 June 2023 in the wake of the attacks carried out by Calocane, who was sentenced to a hospital order in January 2024.

He had been sectioned four times in under two years before his attacks, but was discharged by the trust because he had “disengaged” from its community mental health team in September 2022.

It meant there was no contact between Calocane and mental health services, or his GP, for about nine months before the killings.

Details of Calocane’s medical records were revealed in a BBC Panorama documentary and the NHS-commissioned report, which also stated that “the system got it wrong” with the triple killer.

Shelly said she felt the missed opportunities in Calocane’s care mirrored her son’s experience.

She added: “When I became aware of the facts, I thought that could have so easily have been Josef… I just remember thinking ‘you know what? I’m glad he’s in hospital’.

“Those poor people had their lives cut short in such hideous ways for no reason, just because we’re not putting proper time and effort into making sure that people are well enough to walk the streets.”

Marjorie Wallace, chief executive of mental health charity Sane, said the BBC’s findings show that had the trust learned lessons from Dietlin and Easom-Cooper, then Calocane’s killings could have been prevented.

“Their failings were failure to listen to the families, failure to watch the person… and the failures to protect both the patient and then the public by discharging them far too early when they are too ill,” she said.

Neil Hudgell, a solicitor representing the families of Calocane’s victims, said the BBC’s findings showed “that very little ever resonates as it should with mental health trusts, and potentially had they learned effectively enough over the years, the events of 13 June 2023 would not have happened”.

“The families continue to rage at the incredibly sad and needless loss of the lives of their much-missed loved ones,” he added.

In a statement, Dr Sue Elcock, deputy chief executive and executive medical director at the NHS trust, said: “I want to reassure people that following any serious incident, we carry out an investigation in order to identify any areas for learning and improvement.

“We apologise to those affected for any aspects of our care that were not of the high standard our patients deserve.”

The statement added the trust had “a more robust patient discharge policy and a sharper focus on assessing and managing any risks patients may pose to others”.

Dr Elcock added: “We have made significant changes to improve family engagement, and the involvement of patients and their families and our family liaison team is included in all considerations.”

On Thursday, the government confirmed the public inquiry into the attacks was under way, and would report back within two years with recommendations to prevent similar incidents.

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The health secretary said a meeting with families was the most “harrowing” he’s held in the role.

A total of 60 purpose-built developments have been approved in the last decade, new figures show.

Police say the data loss was most likely the deliberate act of an individual.

The file was deleted at a Nottingham hospital trust being reviewed over maternity failings.

Hospital bosses in Nottingham say at least 430 job cuts are planned in an effort to make savings.

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Waits of more than two years for NHS specialist appointments and treatment in Scotland have grown in the past year, according to new figures.

Public Health Scotland said the waiting list for those referred to an outpatient clinic more than two years ago was at the highest level it had ever recorded, with the number more than tripling to 5,262.

Government targets to provide treatment within 12 weeks were also still not being met for thousands of patients, with 24% of waits recorded going on for more than a year.

First Minister John Swinney pledged to bring down NHS waiting lists earlier this year.

Tracey Meechan is one of those patients, and she says she feels “forgotten” after 100 weeks on an “urgent” NHS waiting list for surgery for an ovarian cyst so severe she cannot bend over properly.

Every day the 41-year-old wakes up and wonders if any new symptoms are going to appear.

The pain from her cyst restricts her movement so much that she relies on her children to help her put on her shoes and socks.

The latest NHS Scotland waiting times data shows her wait is one of 38,702 that have been ongoing for a year or more, an increase of 1,082 from the same date last year.

These waits accounted for 24.4% of the overall list size, as of the end of March, and of these, 7,969 had been ongoing over two years and 1,518 over three years.

Public Health Scotland pointed out that specific reports on waits of a year more were not compiled until December 2019 because there was no need to record them until the Covid-19 pandemic affected waiting lists.

Gynaecology cases like Mrs Meechan’s are now among the worst affected by delays in treatment.

Nearly 13,000 women are waiting for hospital treatment, with three quarters of them waiting more than the government’s 12-week target and over a third for more than a year.

Across Scotland, this specialism has the biggest number of patients waiting for at least three years for help.

Mrs Meechan, from West Dunbartonshire, told BBC Scotland News the wait for treatment has affected every part of her life.

She said: “I can’t live my life to the fullest. I can’t do the activities I want to do with my kids. I can’t do the job that I love.

“I was signed off work at the end of January as a home carer because of the pain and the physicality of my job – I can’t do it.

“My mental health has declined. This has been years and the symptoms have worsened. It’s impacted my life, my personal life and my family.”

She said she had to rely on her husband for household tasks.

“There is just no end point to it,” she said. “It’s a drudge.

“And there is only so much pain relief I can take and still try to be a mother to my children.”

The mother-of-five first went to her GP in 2021. She was found to have a large ovarian cyst and waited a year to see a gynaecologist after a referral from her GP.

After monitoring the cyst for six months, it had grown, so she was put onto the “urgent” list for surgery.

It is now 100 weeks later and she has not been called for an appointment.

She said: “I was under the impression it would be relatively soon as I was asked if I had any holidays planned in the immediate future.

“About a year ago I was advised by the GP to try to get in touch with the gynaecology secretary myself and I have been doing that on a regular basis letting them know I am still here and still waiting.”

She considered private health care but her surgery would cost £8,000 – something the family could not afford.

It was then she contacted the BBC through Your Voice, Your BBC News. She says the NHS has moved the goalposts each time she has called to ask about her surgery date.

“It’s another couple of months, or they are working on the routine list, or working on the long waiters,” she said.

“I was told at week 92 that they were working on women round about week 98-99, so it should be another couple of months.

“When I did get to week 99, I called up because I wanted to keep my employer up to date. I was told they couldn’t give me a date and still nothing is fixed yet.”

Before the pandemic it was rare for anybody to face a wait of a whole year to start NHS treatment, but that is not the case now.

The most recent figures show almost 25% of the entire inpatient waiting list for non-urgent care is made up of waits longer than 52 weeks.

In gynaecology, the specialty that Tracey comes under, there were 324 waits of over three years.

Waiting always has consequences – more frequent visits to the GP to manage pain, struggles to work or stay healthy in other aspects of life.

The government says tackling waits is a priority and has set a target to create 150,000 additional appointments this year.

Ministers will be hoping this is achievable given they did not fulfil a previous promise to eradicate all waits over a year by September 2024.

In January First Minister John Swinney pledged to bring down NHS waiting lists and make it easier to get GP appointments.

He set out three priorities: to reduce immediate pressures in the NHS; shift the balance from acute services to the community and to use innovation to improve access to care, promising the health service would carry out an extra 150,000 appointments and procedures in the coming year.

Then at the end of March, Health Secretary Neil Gray launched the Operational Improvement Plan, which he said would make the NHS “more accessible” and cut into backlogs for patients to be seen.

This would involve an extra £200m in funding for weekend scan appointments and tests and an expansion of hospital care at home.

The announcement came after the public spending watchdog, Audit Scotland, said NHS initiatives to improve productivity and patient outcomes have yet to have an impact.

Scottish Conservative health spokesman Dr Sandesh Gulhane said the NHS backlog had “spiralled out of control” and it was a “scandal that a record number of patients have been waiting for over two years”.

“Dedicated NHS staff are working tirelessly to clear the backlog, but Humza Yousaf’s flimsy Covid recovery plan and years of dire workforce planning has pushed them beyond breaking point and unable to meet demand,” he added.

“This inaction from the SNP is forcing desperate patients to raid their life savings to go private and put an end to these intolerable waits.”

NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde said, like health boards across the country, it facing pressure on many of its services.

A spokesperson said: “We apologise to Mrs Meechan and to anyone who has faced longer waiting times than expected. We recognise the distress this can cause.

“We are prioritising patients based on clinical urgency to ensure those with the most serious conditions are seen as quickly as possible and are taking action to improve wait times.”

The Scottish government said it had delivered around 3,300 additional gynaecology appointments and procedures in 2024-25 and that this year’s £21bn health and social care budget would include almost £200m to reduce waiting lists with gynaecology earmarked for extra funding.

Women’s Health Minister Jenni Minto said: “Women’s health is key priority for the Scottish government, and we were the first country in the UK to publish a Women’s Health Plan, which aims to reduce inequalities in health outcomes for women, in August 2021.

“Timely access to gynaecology services will be a priority in the next phase of our plan.

“Excessively long waits are not acceptable, and I sympathise with any patient whose treatment has failed to reach the standards we all expect from our health system.

“We are working intensively with NHS boards to reduce the length of time people are waiting for appointments and treatment.”

Women deserve better than to have their menstrual data treated as consumer data, say researchers.

A breastfeeding support service which has helped mums of newborn babies for a decade has closed down.

The four men conspired to defraud the health service out of huge sums during the procurement of telecoms services.

Elen Hughes, who lost her son Danial at 37-and-a-half weeks, says police guidance is “terrible”.

Mothers with serious mental health problems are separated from their babies in Northern Ireland, unlike the rest of the UK.

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