Category Archives: Society

Britain, Government, Islamic State, Middle East, National Security, Politics, Society, Terrorism

The reintroduction of treason laws is no solution in dealing with Islamic State terrorists…

NATIONAL SECURITY AND THE THREAT OF IS ATTACKS ON THE STREETS OF BRITAIN

 The recent disclosure by Britain’s intelligence and counter-terrorism chiefs that an ‘exceptionally high’ number of terror plots by British citizens against Britain’s people and institutions are being investigated should chill everybody.

Such reports are no-doubt alarming, but does it justify, as one senior government minister has suggested, that those who accused of planning terrorist acts are prosecuted under the laws of treason?

We should need no reminder of the type of terrorist threat we are now faced with. It is one unlike any that Britain and the rest of the western world have so far faced, with barbarous killings and beheadings staged live on social media by Islamic State, the extreme fundamentalist sect against which war is now being waged in Syria and Iraq. Some of the suspects implicated in the terror cases which have gone to court are people who have returned to Britain after being trained in merciless terror tactics by IS – people who seem clearly intent on putting into practice what they have learned at terrorist training camps and madrassas while in the Middle East.

As many as 2,000 young British Muslims, including about 60 young women, have been radicalised by what they have learned from extremist preaching over the internet. After heeding the call of IS to wage jihad many have headed to the Middle East in pursuit of establishing an Islamic caliphate. A few have been sickened by their experiences there, but far too many have not.

We should not underestimate either that many recruits to the IS cause may also have taken up their methods without ever having left Britain’s shores, as well as those who may have been recruited and indoctrinated by those Islamists returning. It seems only too real and likely that the dreadful trademark of IS, the ghastly beheadings, along with shootings and bombings, is repeated on British streets.

In responding to this challenge Britain clearly needs to be ready. Counter-terror officers are already under severe strain as they attempt to monitor every conceivable avenue in foiling an attack. If more resources need to be allocated, either by training additional staff or by acquiring better equipment and technology they need, then so be it. National security and the safety of British citizens must rank high on the government’s agenda.

But what use would it serve, as Philip Hammond, the foreign secretary has suggested, for those caught planning such offences to be charged under treason laws? These are laws which date back some 600 years and which were last used more than half a century ago to prosecute Lord Haw-Haw (William Joyce), who became notorious as a Nazi propagandist during the Second World War.

If such laws were reintroduced they would hardly serve as a deterrent. Treason is not punishable in the UK by the death penalty because that was abolished in 1965, but rather by a sentence of up to life imprisonment (the same as for murder). For any committed jihadist, a charge of treason to a state, for which they have a stated aim in destroying, is hardly likely to make them think twice.

Mr Hammond’s mere mention of reintroducing treason laws looks like a sign of panic amongst the political elite who have no clear idea of how to handle this particular threat within existing legal and moral boundaries.

A firm resolve and necessary resources are needed, which might also include the tightening of borders and entry points to the UK. For those seeking to gain access to Britain by harming us the tightening of security at air and seaport terminals should be underpinning all other aspects of national security.

Standard
Government, Health, Medical, Research, Science, Society

Why is a medical body giving accreditation to homeopathic medicine? It’s unscientific…

HOMEOPATHIC MEDICINE

Recently, it was announced that all homeopathic practitioners can now opt to be vetted by the Professional Standards Authority (PSA).

As a result practitioners on the Society of Homeopaths’ register will be able to display the Accredited Voluntary Register (AVR) quality mark, a sign that they belong to a register which meets the robust standards of the PSA.

The PSA is a governmental body with two main duties. The first is to oversee the nine regulators of legally-defined medical practitioners – organisations such as the General Dental Council, the General Medical Council and the Nursing and Midwifery Council. Its second duty, however, is to assess the bodies which oversee those professions which aren’t considered ‘real’ medicine such as the British Acupuncture Council, or the United Kingdom Council for Psychotherapy. The PSA’s role here is to ensure that these bodies are meeting their own standards in areas such as education, training, management and the process of how complaints are handled. These are ‘voluntary registers’, and are essentially a form of industry self-regulation.

This dual role on part of the PSA is controversial, as its stated goal is to ‘promote the health, safety and wellbeing of users of health and social care services and the public’. Critics point out that these objectives appear to be contradicted by the endorsement of medical treatments which have never been proven to be more effective than the placebo effect in a clinical trial.

Homeopaths that are registered with the Society of Homeopaths, and who meet its qualifications, are now allowed to use the AVR quality mark signifying that they meet the PSA’s ‘robust standards’. This could mean using the symbol in an advert, or it could mean displaying it on homeopathic products. But this might mean the public buying something which they believe is medicine, but which is actually just an expensive bottle of ordinary water with an AVR mark on it.

Evidence suggests that homeopathy is an ineffective treatment for all health conditions and is no better than a placebo, and is a pseudoscience. It is classified as a complementary or alternative medicine, which, unlike conventional evidence-based medicine, relies on the premises that ‘like cures like’ (one where a substance that causes a specific symptom is also meant to alleviate that symptom) and that ‘ultra-dilution’ of something in water increases its potency. Both of these claims contradict fundamental aspects of modern medical science.

Homeopathic remedies are used as ‘cures’ for a wide range of conditions – such as mental health issues, asthma, diabetes and hay fever. While many patients have reported that they work, there is no evidence to show that these treatments are effective in any way beyond the established effectiveness of the placebo effect. Indeed, the Faculty of Homeopathy website even highlights itself that, up to the end of 2013, out of 188 research studies in homeopathy, nearly 60 per cent were either found to be inconclusive or presented a negative result. The PSA’s decision to give homeopathic practitioners a stamp of approval is, therefore, potentially conveying a dangerous or misleading message.

The PSA’s own stance on the issue is that it doesn’t exist to pass judgement on the effectiveness of any kind of medical treatment, be it dentistry or Freudian psychoanalysis – it’s just there to make sure that, if someone’s practicing in one of these fields, they’re meeting the standards that the body representing that field demands.

The PSA’s own standards for accreditation states:

‘The PSA recognises that not all disciplines are underpinned by evidence of proven therapeutic value. Some disciplines are subject to controlled randomised trials, others are based on qualitative evidence. Some rely on anecdotes. Nevertheless, these disciplines are legal and the public choose to use them. The Authority requires organisations to make this clear to the public so that they may make informed decisions.’

Yet this is the problem. The PSA’s task is to make sure that people are making ‘informed decisions’ about what they’re choosing when it comes to medical treatment. But the thing that gives the work of many of the voluntary register organisations, like the Society of Homeopaths, their legitimacy is the ARV quality mark. Something’s wrong with the system if a medical regulatory body is holding neurosurgeons and homeopaths to the same standard of proof, and telling the public that they’re equally trustworthy.

Standard
Britain, Climate Change, Environment, Global warming, Government, Medical, Politics, Science, Society

BMJ says global warming should be declared a public health emergency…

GLOBAL WARMING

Intro: The BMJ, a top medical journal, has been accused by critics of being ‘alarmist’ as it joins the green agenda…

A leading medical journal has warned that global warming is a ‘public health emergency’ that will cause thousands of deaths worldwide.

The BMJ claims that the ‘mayhem’ it will inflict on future generations will make deaths from the ebola outbreak ‘pale into insignificance’.

In an unusual move, the journal has set aside 11 pages of this week’s issue to warn doctors of the dire consequences of global warming – without any obvious relevance to medicine.

Critics described the article as ‘alarmist’ and ‘desperate’.

But in a separate commentary, the BMJ’s editor Dr Fiona Godlee defends the piece by saying doctors must understand the problem if they are to help tackle it. It is not the first time the publication – formerly known as the British Medical Journal – and its editor have spoken out on such a highly charged issue.

In July, it carried a piece calling for doctors to be allowed to help the terminally ill to die – prompting concern among medics.

In her most recent comments, Dr Godlee warns that seven million people die worldwide every year due to pollution and this will only increase if greenhouse gas emissions – which cause global warming – rise further. She points out that reducing these emissions by walking rather than using the car will have added benefits of reducing obesity, heart disease and diabetes.

And she calls on the World Health Organisation (WHO) to declare the issue a public health emergency – putting it on a par with the current ebola outbreak in West Africa which has claimed 3,000 lives since February.

‘Deaths from ebola infection, tragic and frightening though they are, will pale into insignificance when compared with the mayhem we can expect for our children and grandchildren if the world does nothing to check its carbon emissions.

‘And action is needed now,’ the article concludes.

Last year, experts from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that the average global temperature had risen by 0.5C in 50 years. They predicted that over the next century temperatures will increase by 3C causing a rise in sea levels, flooding, disease outbreaks and, as a result, mass migration of refugees. Politicians are striving to reach an international agreement by December next year on legally-binding targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It would aim to limit global warming to just 2C, and will replace the Kyoto Protocol which came into effect in 2005.

However the last attempt at a deal, at the Copenhagen climate conference in 2009, ended in disaster, and many politicians are worried about a similar result this time.

Dr Benny Peiser, of the Global Warming Policy Forum, a think-tank founded by the climate-change denier and former Chancellor Lord Lawson, accused the BMJ report of being needlessly alarmist.

He said: ‘The World Health Organisation would become a global laughing stock if they were to follow the ridiculously over-the-top demands of a green alarmist editor. There is a real disconnect between what they are saying and the reality.’

He added that the article was ‘just desperate’, saying: ‘The smaller the chance of an international agreement, the more desperate they get.’

Standard