Pocket Issue

Time to panic?...Pandemics

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 05 May 2009 02:43:08 PDT

With the recent outbreak of Swine fever / Mexican flu our title Pocket Issue, Pandemics is getting a lot of interest. Recently reviewed in The Evening Standard (London) as "the book to read when you get home", commenting that "It's packed with useful stats about flu and other nasties past and present." - Katie Law, The Evening Standard.

You can read or listen to the title and get the facts about everything from cytokine storms to virus management policies and who does and doesn't get the drugs when they are needed. And we are also planning a revised audio edition in English and in Spanish with our Mexican audio partners Librofonix...watch this space!

A snooper's charter?

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 07:51:50 PDT

In the news this week, what civil liberties groups are calling the 'snoopers's charter'. A proposal by the UK government to monitor and even store our contact information from social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace. Whilst much of this information is in the public domain, some is 'regulated' by our own right to share or not share personal information with those we don't know. And given several government department's recent track record, 'losing' sensitive personal data, most UK citizens have every right to feel worried about the Home Office 'safeguarding' our private information in a central database.

Derived from an EU directive (again) opinion will be split between those who believe such monitoring is needed to 'protect' us from crime gangs intent on fraud and would be terror attacks, and those who beleive the cost to our civil liberties is too high. And any discussion should also reference the recent a backgrop of the findings of the parliamentary committee on police heavy handedness. Police were accused of using new 'anti-terrorism' powers to intimidate, film and even 'assault' both peaceful protesters and journalists. Looking ahead to the forthcoming G20 summit, you can get a good overview of your rights and both sides of the arguement by reading or listening to Pocket Issue, Big brother: who is watching you? by Joseph O'Neil.

Got a cold? Get a pocket tissue

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 10:55:27 PST

It's icy cold, we're fat from too many mince pies, the kids have just gone back to school and we've dispatched the last of the Christmas wrapping paper to the recycling box. Picking up a paper for the first time in a couple of weeks as life gets back to normal, we notice that headlines are full of dire warnings of imminent 'flu epidemics or even pandemics.

Before we panic, let's take a look at some hard facts. Lots of us may be coughing and colding, but that's different to the 'flu.

So when is a cough and a cold not a cold? When it's the 'flu. Flu symptoms are fever, aches, chills, tiredness, all of which can come on suddenly, and can pose a serious threat, mostly to those more at risk such as the elderly, the young and those with an impaired immune system. Coughs and colds, however, are usually just that - a cough and a cold, with the cough often worse at night, lasting a few days.

Is there anything we can do to protect ourselves from the 'flu (and coughs and colds, come to that? None of us want to be snivelling into our Lemsip if we can avoid it). The answer is, yes, plenty, and the good news in these financially stretched times is it really won't cost you much more than a pocket tissue or a bar of soap. First of all, sneeze into a tissue. Colds and 'flus are airborne diseases and if you sneeze into the air, you can infect up to 150 people - that's the power of a single sneeze. Similarly, cover your mouth when you cough. Once you have mastered these simple practices, pass them onto your children, and to anyone who seems not to know about them. Finally, wash your hands. Alot. As Pocket Issue: Pandemics makes plain, this cuts your risk of succumbing to a number of infections dramatically.

Finally, some perspective: Flu pandemic prediction is an uncertain science at best - governments around the world have been stockpiling vaccines every year for decades to protect against possible outbreaks, only for most of us to make it through to Springtime unscathed when the pandemic fails to materialise. Chances are, 2009 will be no different in terms of the 'flu. An Aids pandemic, on the other hand, has been rampaging across Africa for years, while Zimbabwe, as if its citizens didn't have enough on their plate, are now in the grip of a cholera epidemic. We may moan about the UK and the NHS, but...

Tippling the balance

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 10:55:58 PST

The government is cutting down on the promotion of cheap alcohol, in a bid to curb irresponsible drinking. Promotions like 'all you can drink for £10' and 'women drink free' are to go in the Queens Speech, although supermarkets will still be allowed to sell alcohol at cheap prices as a 'loss leader'.

With the festive season just revving up, such an announcement is timely. Because excessive drinking doesn't just affect the person doing it. Alcohol is well known as a destroyer of family lives, and as Pocket Issue Drink and Drugs reveals, some 1.4m children are in the care of a parent with a drink problem.

Christmas is traditionally a time when people with alcohol problems may drink even more than usual. So, what to do if a member of your family or a friend is drunk before the turkey is out of the oven?

The first thing is to admit to yourself that they really have a problem. Denial by the drinker - pretending the problem doesn't exist, is just a one off, or is just the result of the person pointing the finger being 'a bit square' - is a key feature in any addiction. Next, get informed. There is a raft of help out there, both for the drinker - Alcoholics Anonymous, the helpline Drink Line, 0800 917 8282 - and for friends and family, including teenagers - Al Anon. Pocket Issue's Drink and Drugs: What Can you Do section will give you much more information on the support that exists. Finally, don't forget the kids. Don't let them get in a car, or leave them alone, with someone who has drunk to excess. Christmas is primarily for children. Make their safety and enjoyment a priority.

Hunt for the Mumbai killers

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 03:07:41 PST

Paul Cruickshank - Author of Pocket Issue, Al Qaeda: the current threat - wrote yesterday in The Guardian about the likely origin of the Mumbai terrorists. Many reporters claim that some of the attackers have British roots. Cruickshank traces the links between some of India's Islamic terrorst groups and Al Qaeda, and in his book he outlines the number of recruits from the UK who have been both radicalised by Al Qaeda linked groups and received training in North West Pakistan. Paul has also been commenting on CNN this week.

Strike anywhere at Al Qaeda

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 04:33:12 PST

Will a new administration in the White House herald a change of policy in Washington re military strikes against terrorist bases outside of combat zones, as seen in both Pakistan and Syria in the last few weeks? Our author Paul Cruickshank thinks not. Read his article published in the Guardian this week. Paul Cruickshank is the author of Pocket issue, Al Qaeda: the current threat, buy a copy online now.

Threat of attack from Al Qaeda is 'huge'

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 02:45:46 PDT

Pocket Issue’s new title Al Qaeda: the current threat, is released this month at what appears to be a timely moment, with the current threat from Al Qaeda being described this week as 'huge'. The following post comes from the author, Paul Cruickshank:

This week authorities warned that there is a growing danger that Al Qaeda will attack Britain again in the coming months. “The threat is huge,” stated Lord Alan West, the Counter-terrorism Minister in a speech in the House of Lords on Tuesday, “it dipped slightly and is now rising again within the context of severe.”

In Al Qaeda: the current threat I provide readers with an up-to-date guide to the Al Qaeda threat seven years after 9/11 and explain the reasons why there is more support for Al Qaeda in Britain than any other Western country. The book explains how the comparatively high levels of radicalisation in the UK, combined with British extremists' easy access to terrorist training in Pakistan, has made Britain uniquely vulnerable to Al Qaeda terrorism.

While the threat is currently severe, the book points out that there are grounds for optimism in the medium term: Al Qaeda’s violent tactics have produced a backlash against it in the Muslim World and British Muslims have significantly stepped up efforts to root out extremism from their communities.

You can read a free extract - the One Minute Guide - here, or buy a copy of Al Qaeda: the current threat online at www.pocketissue.com.

Layer upon layer of debt - pass the parcel anyone?

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 11:35:40 PDT

Reading the business pages these days is heady stuff, and in particular today, which the BBC's Robert Peston labels the worst of all days. His list of banks and insurance businesses collapsing into financial trouble of the last few days alone is alarming. So how did we get into this mess? What started with a housing sub prime debt crisis is morphing into an international financial crisis. Our title The Credit Crunch: how safe is your money? by Simon Nixon offers some explanation of how things went wrong and a few answers to the current mess.

The recent bubble, now burst, is well illustrated by the party game, pass the parcel. In the financial markets, the 'parcel' layering was fueled by a desire to find increasing numbers of profitable investment vehicles, which in a period of very low interest rates, would satisfy the desire for more and more high yielding investments. This, twinned with the failure by ratings agencies to expose the true risk of some of the better 'wrapped' investments - resulted in the repackaging and selling on of layer upon layer of 'investments' for which no-one quite knew what the 'prize' was - the asset at the heart of the parcel. And it is this parcel of debt that governments and markets are still unwrapping.

Organic food: Doom or boom?

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 03:44:10 PDT

It’s a well documented fact that food prices have been soaring in recent months. Latest news is that the price of pork sausages has risen by 40 per cent in the past year, and the price of bacon has almost doubled. Food inflation has been running at beyond double the general rate of inflation for the past 12 months.

Some people have claimed this has led to a drop in demand for organic food, as hard hit consumers rush from Waitrose to Lidl and Morrisons in a bid to reduce their food bills. Nevertheless, there are plenty of farmers out there who are passionate about producing food in the organic way, and have no plans to change to conventional food production to pay the bills.

Many of these will be involved in some way with Soil Association's Organic food fortnight which kicks off on 6th and 7th September in Bristol with the biggest organic food festival in Europe.

Perhaps such commitment from the producers of organic food should cause us cash strapped consumers to stop for a moment and consider what we are really doing when it is our food bills we first seek to cut when the going gets tough. Clearly being economically sensible is a priority for many of us in the ongoing credit crunch, but is food the bill to be slashing first? Given that organic food is often better for your health, can come with minimum packing, (good for the environment) and often requires some preparation resulting in a fresh nutritious dish over and above a processed one, (a good thing given that obesity in Britain is reaching epidemic proportions), there are clear benefits to be had.

Two thoughts arise from the above. First, does organic have to cost more, or is it possible with savvy shopping via the internet and the farmers market rather than high end organic outlets, to still eat well for less? And second, what bills could we be seeking to cut before food? All suggestions welcome.

Too scared to say the F-word?

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Sat, 09 Aug 2008 07:01:49 PDT

The government is planning new measures to tackle the growing crisis that is childhood obesity. With 18 per cent of UK children now overweight or obese, and a fat child generally becoming and staying a fat adult, this is surely a positive step. However, has the government reduced the potential impact of its measures by refusing to use the words ‘fat’ and ‘obese’ in its campaign, deeming them likely to ‘stigmatise’ children?

The National Obesity Forum has condemned this decision as “prissy and namby pamby” and other experts in the field back this up. Professor Gately, who has run the Carnegie Weight Management Residential Camp for children, a six week nutrition and sports heavy boot camp for obese children near Leeds, for the last 9 years with a 75 per cent success rate, faces constant accusations that the camp stigmatises overweight children. But he has this to say: “These kids get picked on every day of their lives. They are obese, it’s a fact, there’s no point trying to dress it up.”

Is it possible that our society’s ever increasing refusal to call a spade a spade is actually contributing to the obesity epidemic in the first place? As David Cameron said the other week, you don’t ‘catch’ obesity. Most overweight people are not victims of a sustained attack by cream buns they valiantly tried to fight off. While a few are overweight because of medical or psychological conditions, many of us, to put it in its simplest form, expend too little energy and eat too much, often of the wrong types of food. As individuals we have to take some responsibility for our size, and using words that accurately describe the condition makes things clearer for the 68 per cent of us UK adults considered to be overweight.

Which actually makes words like ‘fat’ and ‘obese’ empowering, not stigmatising. Pick up a copy of Pocket Issue Fat for more on fat facts and solutions, and get onto the problem today.

Bad Education

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 16:22:05 PDT

It recently emerged that six of the UK’s biggest Internet Service Providers (ISPs) have made agreements with the BPI, the UK record industry’s trade association, to monitor, warn, and possibly ban customers who fileshare illegally. A Virgin press release earlier this month described it as "a new education campaign". The ISPs involved; BSkyB, BT, Carphone Warehouse, Orange, Tiscali and Virgin, altogether provide around 90% of the UK’s broadband connections, so this is no small shift in the debate around internet privacy.

As Charles Arthur of the Guardian discusses, the BPI plan is to first find the IP addresses of users illegally filesharing. They then contact these users’ ISPs, who are in turn obliged to send written warnings to the user, suspend their account if they are caught by the BPI a second time, and cancel their contract if they are caught a third time.

So do the BPI agreements with ISPs mark a decisive step down an unappealing road that will erode individual privacy on the net, and as this piece suggests, could lead to multitudes of ‘false positives’ – people mistakenly identified and punished as illegal filesharers?

The answer would have to be a qualified ‘no’. Merely identifying IP addresses does not reveal personal data, and the BPI will not request personal customer information from ISPs. The BPI also state that they will search for copyright violations by finding files shared relating to their own clients – which should ensure prying eyes stay well away from your holiday photos.

However, these agreements open up the field for wider collaboration between ISPs and third parties. Given the possibilities for evading blame presented to determined and unwitting users alike – Wi-Fi’s insecurity, shared connections, dynamic IP addresses, it is likely that the BPI and other trade groups will push ISPs to take more effective action to target filesharers. This would open the way for more intrusive blanket procedures such as checking users’ data packets for illegal activity.

We have previously talked about the availability of the necessary technology and the UK government’s support for such measures, so these BPI-ISP agreements, tame as they are, point to more worrying trends. We’ll be taking a closer look at the impact of government, corporate interest, and ever-developing technologies of surveillance on individual privacy in our forthcoming Pocket Issue: Big Brother.

Jerusalem - keeping a fragile peace?

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 02:44:39 PDT

On the 2nd July a Palestinian man seized control of a bulldozer, killed three people and injured dozens in Jerusalem before being shot dead. Israeli police believe the attacker was acting alone – in spite of the efforts of at least three Palestinian militant groups to claim responsibility.

There are fears amongst many commentators that this will cast a shadow over the fragile truce that holds between Israel and Hamas, the Islamists who fought their more moderate rivals Fatah out of Gaza last summer. The Egyptian-brokered ceasefire between Hamas and Israel has now held for two weeks, and there are signs of wider diplomatic movement – indirect peace talks have at last been taking place between Israel and Syria.

However, the temptation, fuelled by politicians from the Israeli right, is to regard events like Wednesday's as the natural outcome of negotiating with the enemy. Arieh Eldad of the National Union said that the attack was the product of “a policy of restraint and immoral dealings with terrorist organisations”. New security measures are likely, further restricting Palestinian movement in Jerusalem at a time when thousands of Palestinians are working on construction sites across the city.

Hamas’ official response to the attack argued that it was “a natural result of the continuation of the Israeli aggression against our people”. While their refusal to condemn the murders jars, it is also to be expected. As we discuss in depth in Pocket Issue: The Middle East Conflict, Hamas’ persistent intransigence and hostility, moral blame aside, is inseparable from Israeli policy.

Hamas’ hostile rhetoric will be difficult for moderate Israeli politicians to deal with in the face of an angry Israeli public. But calls for more far-reaching retaliation would be counter-productive at a time when any encouragement to Hamas to break the truce should be avoided.

It is unlikely that the bulldozer attack alone will lead to the unraveling of recent progress. But it serves as a chilling reminder of the fragility of such gains, and how easily they can be reversed.

Holiday diar-y

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 03:22:00 PDT

Some 170 people are suing a travel company after their luxury holiday turned into a nightmare because of a stomach bug, on the Egyptian Riviera. Guests began to fall ill within days of checking in to the five star hotel on the Egyptian Riviera, with vomiting and diarrhoea lasting days. And this is far from the first time tales of a holiday turned hideous have hit the headlines. The Queen Victoria, the luxury cruise liner launched by Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, in 2007, had 80 passengers felled by a stomach bug on one of its early voyages.

The holiday season is just getting into its stride, but densely populated holiday populations such as those found on cruise ships or at resort hotels are particularly vulnerable to a rogue bug spreading like wildfire. So is there anything you can do to make sure your holiday highlights don’t include a visit to the local A and E?

As with all illnesses, the first line of defence is prevention. And this begins with washing your hands – a lot. As Pocket Issue Pandemics, which deals with everything from Bird flu to MRSA, advises ‘Think Lady Macbeth. Wash your hands a lot and especially before eating’. Other Pocket Issue advice includes carrying a handkerchief or tissue at all times and sneezing into it; if everyone did this, a primary source of germs transmission would be foiled; and look after skin wounds, however small they may seem. It’s important to keep them clean.

With stomach related troubles being one of the most common mishaps abroad, usually from contact with contaminated food or water, there are a number of sensible dietary precautions travellers can take. A look at the Department of Health website will give comprehensive travel advice, including the following: Drink bottled or boiled water if the tap water is not safe; Don’t have ice in your drink unless you know it is made from treated water; Make sure food is fresh and thoroughly cooked; avoid uncooked food; avoid food that has been exposed to flies and avoid ice cream from unreliable sources.

Pandemic prevention - a solution in sight?

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Mon, 19 May 2008 07:21:13 PDT

Developments in possible pandemic prevention are currently making the news. This week, drug manufacturer Glaxo Smith-Kline became the first to be granted approval of its pre-pandemic influenza vaccine. The vaccine, called Prepandrix, uses the current H5N1 influenza virus, otherwise known as bird flu. This strain, which to date has affected birds and humans who live and work closely with birds, has caused much concern, over its possible mutation to allow human to human transmission. Health officials have repeatedly warned that if this happens, a bird flu pandemic is highly likely. The European Commission has approved Prepandrix for use in all 27 EU member states.

So how will the new vaccine work? Like a typical flu jab, it will be given as a preventative measure. The vaccine, containing a blended dose of existing H5N1 strains from Vietnam and Indonesia, will ‘teach’ the human immune system to recognise the virus and fight it off. It is apparently flexible, so should still prove effective if the virus mutates slightly. GSK has donated 50 million doses of Prepandrix to the World Health Organisation, and will be offering it at a “much reduced” price to all developing nations.

Meanwhile, MRSA, the hospital superbug, has also been in the headlines. A British company called Destiny Pharma has developed a drug, codenamed XF-73, which has proved effective against the bacteria in initial trials. The drug is placed as a gel in the nose, interacting lethally with the bacteria’s cell membrane, giving bugs less opportunity to develop and infiltrate a patient’s bloodstream. However, the latest figures from the Health protection Agency show that drops in the number of MRSA infections appear to have stalled.

You can read up on the facts and stats behind bird flu, MRSA and how pandemics spread in our pocket guide - Pocket Issue, Pandemics: Bird flu, MRSA - do we need to worry?

'Life first, cars second'

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 03:24:45 PDT

So said Bolivian president Evo Morales, speaking at the United Nations last month. He called on developed nations to accept partial responsibility for the rising food prices caused by biofuels. His call came in a month that has seen the World Bank report a worldwide surge in food prices that threatens millions of the world’s poorest with hunger.

The turning over of land previously used for food to biofuel crops, driven by increasing fuel demands, (alongside other factors, such as China’s increasing food requirements), has led to food shortages that have increased the price of food. Many environmental organisations have in fact long opposed biofuels for their environmental, social and economic impacts.

Given that they were once considered a solution to energy scarcity, world poverty and climate change, biofuels have been a major misfire. As we discuss in depth in Pocket Issue: The Energy Crisis and Pocket Issue: Global Warming, there are no easy solutions to such complex problems.

The claim that we live in an increasingly globalised world has long been a cliché. And with the credit-crunch and energy scarcity looming, and threats from climate change on the horizon, trust in future prosperity has been shaken. Nevertheless, that the global economy can preside over worsening poverty still comes as a shock.

As we discuss in the forthcoming Pocket Issue: Money (out in May 2008), though neither the developing nor the developed world are immune to such shifts, there are things governments and individuals can do to mitigate their effects.

Private lives and private eyes

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 03:24:14 PDT

As mentioned previously on this blog (and discussed in Pocket Issue: Big Brother out in Autumn 2008), the privacy of internet users is coming under increasing threat.

Last week, British scientist and inventor of the world wide web Tim Berners-Lee spoke of the need for users to be protected from having their internet activity tracked and logged. Sceptical of safeguards against such information being misused, he used the following example: “I want to know if I look up a whole lot of books about some form of cancer, that that's not going to get to my insurance company and I'm going to find my insurance premium is going to go up by 5 per cent because they've figured I'm looking at those books.”

His comments come in the wake of news that internet service providers (ISPs) Talk Talk, BT and Virgin are planning to use technology developed by advertising company Phorm to track user activity and target ads.

Phorm says its software will personalise the internet, but many see it as part of a gradual encroachment on the privacy of web users. Berners-Lee’s comments drew an important connection between Phorm’s technology and Home Office plans (pushed by the music and film industries) to get ISPs to monitor traffic in order to catch file-sharing users involved in copyright breaches.

Phorm have set a technological precedent that might overcome the practical obstacles to these plans, allowing privacy intrusions to stem from the very source of our internet access – service providers.

Widespread hostility to Phorm’s technology and similar ‘social’ ads means ISPs will have to tread carefully. But as one commentator has noted, "Even if Phorm is stopped dead tomorrow, the business conditions and legal loopholes are still present to encourage ISPs to try this again and again." Phorm argue that they "will continue to be subject to external scrutiny by formal audit, partner due diligence, customer vigilance and media interest." Hopefully true - but we can’t take it for granted.

Marketing Misery: Antidepressants and drug companies

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 05:28:14 PDT

A recent study from Hull University has shown that antidepressants such as Prozac or Seroxat, taken by millions in the UK, only have as much effect as placebos. Together with revelations this month that major multinational GlaxoSmithKline delayed informing the authorities that Seroxat increased the likelihood of suicide among teenagers (a fact it was aware of as early as 1998), it seems that drug companies cannot be trusted to self-regulate.

With one in five people in the UK suffering from depression at some point in their lives and many millions of NHS prescriptions written for antidepressants every year, health experts have described the findings as ‘fantastically important.’ A British Medical Journal poll among doctors found that almost three-quarters of respondents agreed that anti-depressant prescribing should change in the wake of the results.

But why, when antidepressant prescribing is so widespread, have the findings come as such a surprise to doctors? The clues come from the study’s methodology. The British and American experts involved looked at the clinical trials submitted by drug companies to gain approval for four common selective serotonin uptake inhibitors (SSRIs) – Prozac, Efexor and Seroxat. They found that drug companies had selectively published data from trials to make their products look more effective.

Critics have long accused big pharmaceuticals such as GlaxoSmithKline of putting profits before people, gaining from their suffering. Drug companies respond by saying that their extravagant profits are essential - necessary to fund advances in frontier areas of medicine such as cancer and AIDS research. Who should we believe?

It’s a complex issue, and one we discuss in depth in our new title, Pocket Issue: Pandemics.

Childhood obesity: treading on eggshells

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 09:55:57 PDT

This month Selfridges put on sale a giant five-stone Easter egg - weighing the same as an average nine-year old boy, and providing enough calories to sustain him for more than two months. As the Daily Mail put it, 'it won’t win any fans at Weight Watchers’.

With a price tag of £499, none of this solid chocolate egg is likely to find its way into the mouths of many British schoolchildren. But lots of other similarly unhealthy food will. Sweet shops and fast-food outlets, often scattered across routes to schools, are presenting healthy eating initiatives with obstacles right outside the school gate.

With recent figures showing that by the age of 10-11 (or year 6), 31.6% of children are overweight or obese, is banning sweet shops and fast-food outlets from selling products to children the answer to childhood obesity? What can central and local government do to limit their impact?

Dr. David Haslam, clinical director of the National Obesity Forum suggests that such outlets should be made to close for half an hour or an hour until 4.30. And the government is not unreceptive to such interventions - in January reminding councils of their powers to prevent fast-food restaurants being built near schools and parks.

Such measures could, however, backfire. The Scottish Council Foundation has warned that punitive anti-obesity measures risk alienating the public by seeming "mean-spirited". Devoting resources to recreational areas and making people feel safer outside would be more fruitful, thereby increasing people’s willingness to let their children play and exercise outside. London-based think tank Demos has made the same point, arguing that the public realm needs to be more ‘playable’.

As Guardian education correspondent John Crace concluded earlier this month, promoting physical exercise through community initiatives and facilities is the key to combating childhood obesity.

This will require sustained government support – but is more likely to be useful than banning chips and sweets. We will be bringing you much more on the difficulties presented by the obesity pandemic threatening the UK with Pocket Issue: Fat, out in Summer 2008.

What's bugging the NHS?

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 03:25:14 PDT

Numbers of deaths linked to the bacteria Clostridium difficile have soared in England and Wales. Between 2005 and 2006, death certificates mentioning C. difficile, a hospital-based infection, have risen by 72%, to 6,480, according to new figures released by the Office for National Statistics.

It was hoped that stricter surveillance and the hygiene code introduced by the Health Act 2006 would reduce infection rates, but a quick fix was never likely. C. difficile is difficult to eradicate from wards. It is resistant to alcohol wipes, requiring surfaces to be cleaned with bleach and nurses to wash their hands between every contact with patients.

With a recent cleanliness survey of England's 394 NHS trusts finding that a quarter failed to comply with hygiene regulations, Conservative peer Lord Mancroft accusing nurses of being ‘grubby and promiscuous’, and general cries to ‘bring back matron’, can high infection rates be blamed on nurses?

Not really. Healthcare Commission reports have found that staff shortages and poor management, rather than nursing staff, are to blame for dirty wards. Cleaning is fundamental. Public sector union Unison estimates that the number of NHS cleaners has fallen from 100,000 twenty years ago to 55,000 in 2004, and the Patients Association says that budget deficits have led many hospitals to cut their cleaning contracts.

So increased NHS funding is all well and good, but making it conditional on efficiency and productivity is unhelpful if it encourages neglect of hygiene and patient safety. And short-term measures such as Gordon Brown's one-off deep-cleaning initiative are no substitute for funding greater numbers of daily cleaners.

Want to know more about C difficile and other health threats like MRSA and Bird Flu? Pick up Pocket Issue: Pandemics, in the shops from next week.

Privacy and Internet Piracy

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 03:27:11 PDT

The government recently published a Green Paper on the creative economy. It contained an addendum at odds with the bubbly tone of the rest of the report; a proposal for Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to monitor user activity for copyright infringement, warn them against downloading copyrighted material, and block their internet access after three warnings.

Why? Pressured by the entertainment industry, the government is moving to stem the tide of filesharing. Filesharing is an amoral distribution method. It can drain artist and company profits by allowing users to own material for free, and at its extremes, it chips away at the economic viability of artistic endeavour. But it also offers myriad opportunities for publicity and distribution - think of the iTunes store, BBC’s iPlayer and Kate Nash. Yet while many companies are adapting to new possibilities, others are pushing for restrictions.

The government’s proposals will interfere with civil liberties. While mitigating a situation in which downloaders are subject to enormous fines, they give rise to a host of new problems. Maintaining nationwide user bans would require the constant monitoring of online activity and the sharing of data on individuals between corporations and government.

On top of ethical objections (rights to privacy), there are many practical problems. These include; users encrypting data, issues of liability when internet connections are shared; and the fact that such moves would criminalise millions.

So will the proposals come into force any time soon? European Human right legislation states that such interferences with individual privacy are only justified if 'proportional' to their good effects.

Given practical, legal and ethical objections, the government's measures are unlikely to pass this test. The Internet Service Providers Association (ISPA) has already indicates its opposition. Sensitive to the unpopularity amongst consumers that stricter monitoring would bring, ISPs have been resisting the entertainment industry’s calls for some time.

Clear government support however, heralds a new development. Pocket Issue: Big Brother will bring you much more on this in Autumn 2008, discussing the balance between technology, surveillance and privacy. It will be interesting to see how the situation develops.

Shelving Change

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 03:27:55 PDT

This month, supermarket watchdog the Competition Commission released findings from its third inquiry into the role of supermarkets in the UK grocery industry.

The CC has constantly found evidence of unsavoury practices squeezing food suppliers; demands for upfront payments, changing the terms of contracts, and asking producers to bear the cost of promotions (the enticing "two for ones" that brighten up your weekly shop). One of the remedies therefore proposed is an ombudsman to investigate complaints.

Will this bring about a better, more sustainable deal for producers, thereby expanding room for to lessen the environmental, social and cultural costs of supermarket practices? The Observer's Paul Levy suggests not, as the regulator will have no power to specify fines. It will name and shame without forcing the big firms (Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury's and Morrisons, which account for more than three-quarters of the grocery market) to reform.

There is only so far regulators and consumer advocacy groups can go in improving food industry practices and mediating the relationship between sheer market power and small producers. As BBC Business Editor Robert Peston discusses, stronger political will to regulate big business is needed.

If supermarkets are able to successfully dangle the carrot of lower prices before consumers on low incomes, they can then use the stick to bully producers. This perennial problem is one we discuss in Pocket Issue: Food. Finding healthy and ethical alternatives - outside their brightly-lit aisles, is not impossible. But the big chains' dominance of the UK grocery industry, in limiting choice and competition, makes it a lot harder for those on low incomes to do so conveniently and cheaply.

Climate tipping points and carbon fasting

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 08:04:31 PST

Two interesting climate change stories in the news this week: from tipping points to fasting Bishops.

A new report from University of East Anglia suggests climate change may happen faster than we thought, in that there are key tipping points which may cause dramatic rather than slow and steady changes to our environment and climate.

Tipping points are something we discuss with interest in Pocket Issue, Global Warming and it's fascinating to see how this report will be received by the international scientific community, and whether it leads to further pressure for more timely action from world leaders?

Two Anglican Bishops, the Bishops of London and Liverpool, are showing strong climate change leadership this week with their call for all Christians to hold a carbon 'fast' for lent, the annual fasting period from this week through to Easter.

The 'fast' includes checking your house for insulation and drafts to save energy as well as using fewer plastic bags. The Bishop's want to draw attention to the suffering in Africa of those displaced by floods or drought, both possible effects of climate change.

Chicken run

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 03:44:28 PST

This week has seen a spate of programmes in Britain looking at food production and in particular the poor old broiler bird. Our food heroes, Messrs Oliver and Fearnly Whittingstall are doing a great job of bringing the issues into focus. The good news is that caged birds look set to be phased out by 2012.

85% shop with healthy and environmentally engaged principles

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 05:34:25 PST

The poll has now closed in our healthy eating survey. Although the sample was not huge 85% of you registered as SHEEP - shoppers with healthy, environmentally engaged principles - good news for our collective health, for responsible food production and for the stewardship of our environment.

It's been an fast moving year for the big global issues. We've seen the continued march towards discerning food shopping and witnessed a further shift in public opinion around climate and energy saving. The Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting and the Bali conference (albeit frustrating) indicated a global acceptance that we need to act fast. It will be interesting to see how 2008 pans out - a year of consolidation after the promises?

For Pocket Issue, next year we'll be tackling issues related to food and the environment: obesity and pandemics - and one that isn't related, money. We hope you'll join the debate. A very happy holiday from Pocket Issue and we look forward to sharing an informed 2008.

Food: What are we really eating?

noreply@blogger.com (Pocket Issue) — Mon, 11 Feb 2008 05:33:24 PST

Our latest title - Food: What are we really eating? is published this week amidst the usual onslaught of conflicting advice from governments, food agencies and experts about our eating habits. Yet the majority of us do not possess the basic facts to help us choose what to eat? How healthy, ethical and environmentally friendly are the food choices we make on a daily basis?

Food offers some answers at a time when Britain is simultaneously in the grip of a new food scare and facing an epidemic of obesity, and just before the annual season of gastronomic excess. Is organic food really better for our health, the environment? Are E-numbers always bad for us? Does buying Fairtrade benefit the growers, or only our conscience? What are food miles? Should we buy food locally or from the supermarket?

The food we eat has been described as ‘the most political choice we make on a daily basis’, and has a direct impact on our health and the environment. As we look forward to the season of over eating Pocket Issue asks where you stand on food? Do you think hard about your weekly shop, choosing local, organic or Fairtrade items? Or do you go for what's filling and cheap? Take the plunge and register yourself as a PIG (Poor Ingredient Guzzler) or a SHEEP (Shopper with Healthy Environmentally Engaged Principles) in our poll opposite - and then read the book!