Archive for April, 2009
Fool’s Gold
Posted by Claire Daley in European Union on 21/04/2009
The EU will host a conference this week to discuss plans to tackle piracy in the waters off the East Coast of Africa.
Pirate attacks in the area have recently hit the International headlines because the desired booty is no fool’s gold – it is vast and valuable cargoes, and often crew.
An addendum: ‘Quality’ Often Flawed
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 17/04/2009
Just to support the point being made on this blog yesterday, today the British Medical Journal runs this in their editorial:
‘One problem with implementing evidence based medicine is, of course, that the evidence keeps changing. An important recent example is the mounting evidence that ever tighter glucose control in people with type 2 diabetes may actually be harmful. As Richard Lehman and Harlan Krumholz point out in their editorial (doi:10.1136/bmj.b800), the evidence that tighter control might not be better was emerging just as the targets for the 2009 quality and outcomes framework (QOF) were being re-negotiated. The framework sets evidence based clinical targets for British general practices to reach (and pays them for doing so), and it has helped improve the implementation of evidence based interventions. But the 2009 version now includes a tighter target for glycated haemoglobin—just as that looks to be the wrong thing to be doing.’
Oh dear.
Exception reporting… again
Posted by James Gubb in Health on 16/04/2009
A few weeks ago the DH released the conclusions of its consultation on the Quality and Outcomes Framework in general practice – a series of clinical guidelines GPs are expected to meet that is linked to c.20 per cent of their income. Predictably, the responsibility for its evidence-base is being turned over to NICE: a risk.
Read the rest of this entry »
Why Next Week’s Budget Is Unlikely To Be All Doom and Gloom
Posted by David Conway in Education, Politics on 14/04/2009
In just over a week’s time, Alistair Darling announces his budget. The Institute for Fiscal Studies estimates there is currently a £39 billion hole in public finances fixable only by massive tax rises or equally big public-spending cuts. Since the Government faces a general election in the next year or so, it can safely be anticipated that neither measure will be announced next week.
Clearly, however, the Chancellor has little room for manoeuvre, and since a general election need not be held until June 2010, next week’s budget is unlikely to contain much by way of tax cuts or other sweeteners with which to soften up the electorate. For that, they will have to wait until the 2010 budget.
However, next week’s budget is unlikely to be all doom and gloom.
Is the Overly Examined School-Life Worth Living?
Posted by David Conway in Education on 07/04/2009
The start of this year’s Easter school holidays has been accompanied by an outbreak of mass hysteria in the press concerning impending GCSE examinations. Nothing better illustrates the sorry state to which so much schooling in England has been reduced by the current obsession with them than the advice to candidates quoted in today’s Times. It comes from a professor at London University’s Institute of Education who reportedly said to them:
‘What is really important is that you do something actively with your knowledge. You need to boil it down to bullet points on index cards, because in an exam room you must have all that knowledge in concentrated forms.’
Ineffective efficiency
Posted by Anastasia de Waal in Education on 03/04/2009
At the end of last year Civitas published a book on the state of Ofsted’s school inspections; drawing on a range of – to use that technocrat term – ‘stakeholders’’ views, it includes those of a head, a parent and an inspector. One thing iss very clear: the time and resources allocated to school inspections are inadequate. Perhaps surprising to some that any current quango is under-funded, budget inspections are considered to be at the heart of perniciously superficial inspections and unsatisfactorily trained inspectors. Let’s be clear: Ofsted’s very premise is highly flawed and the inspectorate has never been regarded as a good model by educationalists. Nevertheless, the bid to shave off 30 per cent of its budget has exacerbated some of Ofsted’s key weaknesses to the point of rendering it difficult for even its staunchest supporters to justify.