Why is work bad for you?
Work forms a major part of our lives. It provides so much and simultaneously so little. It pays the bills, provides some form of structure to the day or night depending on the type of work, and can form a...
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Britain’s abortion laws are still in the Victorian era, and women are the collateral damage
A vote on ending prosecutions for abortion appears to have been delayed again. MPs have been expecting to vote on this issue via an amendment to the criminal justice bill, which is currently making its way through Parliament. The change...
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“Mental health culture” has not gone far enough – long term failures in mental health policy
A long-standing notion in UK policy has been that increased public awareness can improve national mental health. Notable campaigns include the Mental Health Foundation Mental Health Awareness Week launched in 2001; England’s Time to Change campaign (2007-2021); and Heads Together...
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We’ve researched transgender inclusion for nearly a decade – how we do our work has changed
We’ve researched the experiences of transgender and non-binary people, particularly in the workplace, for much of the last ten years. Our original motivations remain: generate robust evidence. However, the environment is unrecognisable from when we started. Politicised media stories and...
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Cutting their teeth in government- why the Labour Party will fail on tooth decay
Whilst it may be some way from being the most glamorous debate in political economy, the issue of tooth decay is instructive of a larger systemic problem in the relationship between pre-general election party policy and the future of the...
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Mental Health Culture
“Mental health culture has gone too far, says Mel Stride”. This was the title of an article published in The Telegraph towards the end of March, that certainly generated a fair amount of attention on my Twitter feed, at least....
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Will a controversial new data platform change how the NHS “thinks”?
It was announced last year that the controversial tech firm Palantir had won a huge new contract with the NHS to provide a digital platform for the management of health data. The company will provide the NHS with a new...
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The NHS in Late Soviet Britain
We are now at the unprecedented point where private hospitals are doing one in ten planned NHS operations in England. This marks a 50% increase in elective procedures outsourced to private providers since 2019 (before COVID), leading some to claim...
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Hospital privatisation is linked with worse quality care for patients – new research
The NHS is in a critical state. The continued consequences of the pandemic and long waits for treatment mean that people are facing more difficulties than ever accessing the care they need. A growing number of people are even paying...
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Public Fears Of Getting Old: Is society making us scared of ageing?
We live in times of heightened societal fears of ageing. Ageing is seen as both a process and a state that we must vigilantly monitor and slow down, however, we cannot avoid it. Youthfulness, and its perceived vigour, are to...
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Physician Associates: why the controversy?
Primary care workloads are a perennial concern in the NHS. With problems recruiting and retaining GPs, policies to expand the skill mix are a usual mainstay of calls for improvement. Plans to expand the Physician Associates (PA) workforce are one...
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Are we paying attention?