Vaccine centre's first drop-in sessions for 16-year-olds as Northamptonshire's jabs total passes ONE MILLION

Vaccine centre's first drop-in sessions for 16-year-olds as Northamptonshire's jabs total passes ONE MILLION Northamptonshire’s 16-year-olds can now 'grab a jab' at the county's Covid-19 Vaccination Centre as the number of doses delivered in the county passed ONE MILLION.

The centre at Moulton Park is running its first drop-in sessions for those aged 16 and 17 from 5.30pm on Thursday (September 9). Northampton Chronicle and Echo

See also: 

• Consultation on mandatory Covid vaccination for health and care staff begins Northampton Chronicle and Echo
• Sword swallower who reached Britain's Got Talent final has a new job with Northamptonshire's Covid jab army Northamptonshire Telegraph

Revealed: The best and worst trusts to be a junior doctor

Revealed: The best and worst trusts to be a junior doctor HSJ analysis of data from the latest General Medical Council national training survey has revealed the top and bottom trusts for overall experience for junior doctors.

Northamptonshire Healthcare features in the top five best trusts to be a junior doctor. Health Service Journal 

The NHS Long Term Plan and COVID-19: Assessing progress and the pandemic’s impact

The NHS Long Term Plan and COVID-19: Assessing progress and the pandemic’s impact This analysis looks at progress on the main pledges in the NHS Long Term Plan and the impact of COVID-19 on their delivery. 

The NHS Long Term Plan remains the blueprint for the NHS’s evolution, but the pandemic has dealt a huge blow to both the NHS and social care. In this report, we provide a narrative of what was achieved before the pandemic, assemble the evidence of how the pandemic has affected progress against the plan’s major commitments, and identify implications for the future as the NHS and government plans its recovery from the pandemic. The Health Foundation

Cancer nursing on the line: why we need urgent investment across the UK

Cancer nursing on the line: why we need urgent investment across the UK UK cancer services are slowly recovering from the devastating blow caused by Covid-19. The pandemic has both laid bare and exacerbated the terrible strain the cancer workforce has been under for many years. 

When the pandemic hit, some services were forced to pause, whilst others had to quickly adapt and many have still not ‘returned to normal’. Some cancer nurses were also deployed to care around the clock for the half a million people admitted to hospital with coronavirus. The practical and emotional impact of this disruption on people living with cancer has been profound. McMillan Cancer Support

See also:

• Nurse shortage ‘delaying treatment for 21% of UK cancer patients’ The Guardian
• NHS staff shortages led to failings in my cancer treatment, says patient calling for more specialist nurses iNews
• COVID-19: Cancer and heart patients say they felt 'abandoned' and 'anxious' after NHS treatments repeatedly cancelled and disrupted by pandemic Sky News

An ever-growing NHS budget could swallow up all of this week’s tax rise, leaving little for social care

An ever-growing NHS budget could swallow up all of this week’s tax rise, leaving little for social care This week saw major announcements on health and social care funding. Outside of the usual Budget or Spending Review process, the government announced around £12 billion of additional spending for the Department of Health and Social Care for each year between 2022−23 and 2024−25, alongside a corresponding tax rise. Institute for Fiscal Studies

See also: 

• 'If NHS needs money, there's less for social care' BBC News
• NHS could ‘swallow up’ all the money raised by new tax rise, says IFS The Guardian

Innovation and new technology to help reduce NHS waiting lists

Innovation and new technology to help reduce NHS waiting lists Local surgical hubs, new technology to speed up diagnosis, and innovative ways of working will help the NHS to tackle growing waiting lists and treat around 30% more patients who need elective care by 2023/24.

Backed by a new £36 billion investment in health and social care over the next 3 years, ‘doing things differently’ and embracing innovation will be the driving force to get the NHS back on track. Department of Health and Social Care 

4 in 5 people aged 16 and over vaccinated with both doses

4 in 5 people aged 16 and over vaccinated with both doses Four in 5 people aged 16 and over in the UK have received both doses of a COVID-19 vaccine, the latest figures show.

A total of 43,535,098 people have received 2 doses (80.1%) and 48,292,811 people have received one dose (88.8%).

More than half of all teenagers aged 16 to 17 in England have already received their first jab, just over 4 weeks after the green light was given for this age group to be offered the vaccine. Department of Health and Social Care 

Covid: Consultation on mandatory jabs for frontline health staff

Covid: Consultation on mandatory jabs for frontline health staff Compulsory Covid and flu jabs for frontline NHS and care workers in England are being considered in a government consultation.

Plans are already in place to make it mandatory for care home workers in England to be fully vaccinated.

But some unions and care organisations have warned that making the jabs mandatory will lead to staff shortages. BBC News

See also:

• Covid: Boris Johnson concerned over unvaccinated hospital patients BBC News
• Covid England and Wales: Weekly deaths rise 17% to 668 as virus now behind one in 15 fatalities The Daily Mail
• Covid vaccines do NOT increase the risk of miscarriage in pregnant women, two new studies find The Daily Mail
• 'Frustrated' doctors reveal Covid patients STILL not being given Regeneron's antibody cocktail The Daily Mail
• PHE says it has spotted 53 cases of 'Mu' variant in UK which is feared to be resistant to vaccines The Daily Mail
• People refusing Covid jabs should not work in social care, minister suggests The Guardian
• WHO asks rich countries to delay Covid booster jabs for rest of year The Independent
• Covid-19 booster vaccines will start being given to older groups in the next fortnight under NHS plans iNews
• Doctors and nurses say NHS needs 'firebreak' as staff struggle with demand of Covid cases iNews
• Unvaccinated frontline NHS staff to be redeployed Nursing Notes

Will Boris Johnson’s plan for the NHS work?

Will Boris Johnson’s plan for the NHS work? Boris Johnson chose to visit a hospital he knows only too well to highlight the new funding package for the NHS in England.

He spent anxious days in intensive care at St Thomas' Hospital in central London in April 2020, seriously ill with Covid.

The pandemic continues to cast a long shadow over the NHS and that's because of uncertainty over how case numbers and hospital admissions will develop next year. BBC News

See also: 

• Health Secretary opinion piece in the Daily Telegraph Department of Health and Social Care
• Boris Johnson on need to address NHS wait times BBC News
• Social care tax rise: Boris Johnson wins Commons vote  BBC News
• Social care: Will people still have to sell their homes? BBC News
• Now NHS wants to hire £270k bosses: Recruitment drive fuels fears over where extra cash raised by social care reforms will be going The Daily Mail
• ‘Misleading’ social care cap does not cover care home food and accommodation costs The Daily Telegraph
• UK care homes say funding shake-up threatens their viability The Guardian
• Social care backlash grows after MPs vote through tax plan The Guardian
• Social care funding in England: your questions answered The Guardian
• UK lawmakers back tax hike to pay for health, long-term care The Independent
• MPs back National Insurance hike to tackle NHS backlog and fund PM's care changes Sky News

Transport noise linked to increased risk of dementia, study finds

Transport noise linked to increased risk of dementia, study finds Exposure to noise from road traffic and railways is associated with an increased risk of dementia, according to the largest study of its kind.

Research has consistently linked transport noise to health conditions including heart disease, diabetes and obesity, but studies on transport noise and dementia were scarce and small, and findings inconsistent. The Guardian

See also: 

• Residential exposure to transportation noise in Denmark and incidence of dementia: national cohort study (open access) The BMJ

GP surgeries in England told to provide face-to-face appointments

GP surgeries in England told to provide face-to-face appointments Sajid Javid has told nearly 1,000 GP surgeries to provide more face-to-face appointments — after they were found to be failing to meet basic patient needs.

The Health Secretary said that while online and phone consults can be convenient for some, they 'are not right for everyone'.  The Daily Mail