Any hopes of a reprieve for the Bank Holiday were dashed as experts warned wind, rain and bitter temperatures will dampen spirits for much of the UK...
There is even the chance of snow over the hills in the North with everywhere on alert for widespread frosts.
Britain will be hotter than Bondi Beach as families flock to the coast this Bank Holiday weekend.
Keeping active, slashing salt intake, eating a healthy diet with plenty of fruit and vegetables, cutting down on alcohol and not smoking all cut the chances of developing the deadly condition.
cutting our daily intake [of salt] does nothing to lower the risk of suffering from heart disease
a study...shows although blood pressure reduced when salt intake was cut, this had no long-term health benefits.
“We believe that we didn’t see big benefits in this study because the people in the trials we analysed only reduced their salt intake by a moderate amount, so the effect on blood pressure and heart disease was not large.”
'Now salt is safe to eat: Health fascists proved wrong after lecturing us all for years'
Earlier this year the Daily Express revealed how “nanny state” council bosses at Stockport Council banned salt shakers in fish and chip shops as part of a healthy living drive. But critics condemned the move, insisting customers should be free to make up their own minds.
patients taking higher strength pills were more at risk of suffering acute kidney injury.
Prof Peter Weissberg, British Heart Foundation medical director, said: “Most people in the UK are on low doses of statins. Further research is needed to establish whether it is the statins or the underlying blood vessel disease in people taking high doses that causes kidney problems.”
staying physically active, sticking to a healthy weight, eating a health diet, maintaining good cholesterol levels, keeping blood pressure down, controlling blood sugar levels and not smoking.
Latest research has found that following the simple steps and making small changes to daily routine are the key to a long and healthy life.
Not smoking, regular exercise, not being overweight and eating a Mediterranean-style diet could 'substantially reduce' the risk of early death.
Euro MPs want to brainwash children with “sinister” Soviet-style propaganda on a new website, it was claimed yesterday.
European Parliament chiefs are considering setting up a site to target young children with a “playful” presentation of their working methods and democratic principles.
“Research has shown the social and political perception of young people starts at a very early age. In a playful manner which is tailored to the needs of young internet users, a special Europarl website could bring democratic principles and the working of the methods of the European Parliament closer to children.”
"Political propaganda on vulnerable kids is a form of child abuse."
Welcome to the brave new world of EU reporting at the Daily Express, where information is bad, transparency is dictatorship, civic rights are forms of oppression and checking facts makes you blind.
We do not normally find it worthwhile challenging Daily Express euromyths. It would be like trying to engage UFO Magazine in scientific debate: a waste of time and dangerous for one's mental health. Moreover, we are used and resigned to the peculiar phenomenon of its journalists switching off all critical faculties when it comes to taking politically motivated anti-EU tirades as fact, then working backwards to try to fit the circumstances to the 'crime'.
But today's 'story' really does deserves a short comment. The paper, prompted by a complaint by a eurosceptic politician, published a piece arguing, entirely un-ironically, that creating a website informing young citizens and future voters of their rights is now to be considered propaganda.
You heard right. The modern, Express-sanctioned meaning of propaganda - made worse by that one-size-fits-all criticism of "paid for by tax payers' money" - is not raging against a minority, say, or distorting the truth about which side is winning in a war, or inciting the populace to violence. Modern day propaganda is for a democratically elected Parliament to make people (including young people) aware of its existence and their rights within it. And to have the audacity to do so with the aid of that sinister, new-fangled technological wizardry: a website!!!!
In fairness, an Express reporter had contacted this office and asked for a quote about how 'The Parliament' would justify its deeds.
Never mind that an eloquent explanation of the purpose of the initiative (which is still only just that, a proposal being looked at) already appears in the document she herself had raised as 'proof' of this conspiracy to inform.
Never mind that it had been written by a body of senior MEPs including a British vice president of the Parliament, whom she was at liberty to interview were she able to spare the time. (She could not, or did not see fit to publish their comments).
We also happened to mention that, with one simple Google search, we had been able to come up with the UK Parliament's equivalent of this outrageous practice. Shocking, I know. Is there to be no end to the horror?
The reporter, to be perfectly fair, displayed immense fortitude at this juncture. She absorbed the ground-shifting discovery that propaganda was indeed alive and well at the heart of the Mother of Parliaments - never mind the barbarous EU - and then delivered this killer line: we should feel free to use this example in our own comment to her.
Let me write this again. It was to be somehow our job to put the 'propaganda' slur in context by mentioning the existence of similar initiatives in most national parliaments including Britain's own. Providing context and balance in a story is no longer the job of the Daily Express reporter, you see. If you want balance and context you have to knit it yourself.
You'd be searching in vain for this context in today's story, reader. You will not find it. What's worse, your ignorance of the existence of sinister educational websites set up by the Houses of Parliament leaves your children vulnerable to the horror of 'Soviet-style' British propaganda right here right now, under your very nose and, needless to say, with your taxes.
"While we certainly have an attractive drug candidate both from the point of view of possible effect and the low cost, we cannot get ahead of ourselves here or over simplify things - we still have to conduct the study to generate the proper evidence before we can make any claims as to how useful the drug will be."
"Thank you, I will take that for my d...for my baby"
"Is this for us? Awww, thank you so much, it's [very] very sweet of you"
Salt is safe to eat – and cutting our daily intake does nothing to lower the risk of suffering from heart disease, research shows.
For years, doctors have been telling us that too much salt is bad and official NHS guidance aims to speed up new measures to control how much we eat.
But now a study, using more data than ever before, shows although blood pressure reduced when salt intake was cut, this had no long-term health benefits.
Reducing the amount of salt we eat could save 25,000 lives a year, health experts said last night.
Deaths from heart disease and strokes would dramatically fall if shoppers checked the ingredients of everyday foods like bread and cereals.
Doctors blame the high levels of salt-laden processed foods we eat for pushing up blood pressure levels, raising the risk of heart disease.
Brussels was...proposing to take control of Britain’s seabed.
In reality, the EU is no more seizing power over the UK’s seabed than measures to protect birds, would mean seizure of UK airspace...
It is not about the transfer of powers to the EU, or seizure of sovereignty over the UK’s seabed, or the rights to minerals, such as oil or gas. Nor is it about controlling the fish above the seabed.
The Myth: The Daily Express has reported that one of the amendments being debated by the European Parliament on the reform of the Common Fisheries Policy would allow the EU to seize control of Britain’s seabed. The piece claimed that critics have said that if passed the amendment could lead to the EU claiming rights to minerals such as oil and gas.
The Truth: This is not true. Even if agreed by the European Parliament, this amendment would not change the sovereignty of our sea bed or give the EU new powers. The proposed amendment would have no practical effect, nor would it have any bearing on mineral extraction. The reform of the Common Fisheries Policy is intended to stop overfishing, boost fish stocks and improve the health of our seas. The UK does not support this amendment as it will not help to tackle the fundamental failings of the Common Fisheries Policy.
'Lunch is for wimps' - Gordon Gekko in the seminal movie Wall Street, released in 1987.
Twenty-five years on, Gekko would make short work of the West Midlands Ambulance Service.
Incredibly, paramedics refused to interrupt their lunch break despite an emergency call for an ambulance to attend.
So what did a paramedic team in Shropshire decide was a lesser priority than feeding their faces?
You’ll never guess. No, really, you won’t. Indeed when I read about it this week I thought it was some kind of joke, albeit in poor taste.
But the grotesque truth is this.
West Midlands Ambulance Service’s finest continued to munch their lunch after a six-week-old baby boy suffered a heart attack. His family dialled 999 but had to wait 41 minutes for an ambulance to come, because a crew were on their break and couldn’t be interrupted.
"It's simply not true that this crew sat 'feeding their faces' knowing that a patient, in this case a baby, was suffering a life-threatening heart condition," said Andy Proctor, Paramedic spokesperson for College of Paramedics members in the West Midlands.
"It's absolutely outrageous to suggest that this or, indeed, any paramedic or ambulance crew would knowingly sit eating a meal whilst a child's life is at threat. We believe that this article has totally misreported the facts in this case."
"What he [Madeley] also didn't mention is that a paramedic was already at the patient's side within minutes, providing life-saving treatment.
inaccurate and poorly-researched journalism
it is extremely disappointing to read such an article which plainly has not reported all the facts clearly.
A storm broke on Twitter, with Richard Madeley being harangued to the point where, on Monday evening, he acknowledged on Twitter that the story was "widely misreported" and that he was writing a follow-up piece. However, he did not apologise and has not now been seen on Twitter for three days.
Meanwhile – despite a torrent of comments under the online version of the article – the Express issued no correction or apology.
On the afternoon of Tuesday (January 15th), the College of Paramedics, which represents the professional interests of paramedics, issued its press release setting out the facts of the story and putting the paramedics' side. This release almost immediately 'went viral', receiving 12,000+ unique views in a matter of hours and becoming widely quoted on Twitter and even more quoted and 'Like'd by many thousands of Facebook users.
On Wednesday, the Express responded by not only closing the comments section under the online Richard and Judy page but removing all comments completely. Yet still the original story stood. And the storm on Facebook continued, unabated.
Then at lunchtime on Wednesday, the family of baby Thomas joined the Facebook debate in defence of paramedics. Matthew Passant, Thomas' father, posted: "I'm the childs father who the article was about and let me tell you me and my partner have nothing but gratitude to the paramedics who attended to my son Thomas and the paramedics know this as we have spoken to them and their bosses personally." He also wrote "your paramedics, along with the doctors and nurses and everyone else on the way is the reason why our son is still alive and recovering every day."
And Thomas' aunt, Kate Passant, posted: "We as a family were shocked to read this article and just want to say thankyou to the paramedics who attended. The paramedics that attended him did an amazing job and helped save his life."
The response from the Express? Repentance? A correction? An apology?
Not a bit of it. Instead, the Express removed the Richard and Judy piece altogether on Thursday (today), as if it had never existed.
A baby of eight weeks is facing possible disability for life as a result of an ambulance crew finishing its break before going on a 999 call...
when it comes to putting sandwiches before a dying baby and then defending such action as reasonable, Britain has sunk to a new depth.
This ignored the truth that, in fact, baby Thomas was receiving paramedic treatment within minutes of the 999 call being made, and the fact that no ambulance crew refused to interrupt its break: that simply did not happen.
It seemed like an open and shut case. It took 41 minutes for an ambulance to arrive at the West Midlands home where a baby had suffered a heart attack. Why? Because the crew were on an “undisturbed” meal break and couldn’t be called out until they’d finished. The rules are rigorous. Undisturbed means undisturbed. This is the policy set by the ambulance service.
The original story provoked a flurry of negative headlines and comment. I wrote about it here last week, expressing incredulity that such a state of affairs was possible and criticising the crew involved.
Seven days on, I am 100 per cent certain that I got this part of the story wrong. No mealy-mouthed apology, this. Yes, the crew had requested a break but they had no knowledge of the 999 call until they clocked back on. In the circumstances my criticism was unjust.
teaming with Paul Weller and Bruce Foxton on new single.
A source said: “It’s all incredibly exciting and has been in the pipeline for some time.
“Everything has finally been signed off though, and a date set for mid-February.”
A snowplough battles through the blizzards battering the M6 in Cumbria yesterday.
Chuckling at how many people have so much to say that they are unwilling to put their names to. Carry on chaps.
Britain is on course for a White Christmas with snow likely as far south as London, say forecasters.
Much of Britain can expect its snowiest winter for 100 years, according to James Madden, forecaster for Exacta Weather.
Hopes of a white Christmas have been washed out
Sometimes, PR is so lacking in subtlety it can be astounding.
Dad's horror as golden eagle swoops on his toddler son in park and tries to carry him away
'What do you think? Check out the video at www.dailystar.co.uk'
challenged whether the ad was irresponsible because they believed the ad implied that participating in a lottery was a solution to financial concerns or a way to achieve financial security.
in no way depicted participation in a lottery as a solution to financial concerns.
The Daily Express...said they believed the ad was suitable for publication and re-iterated the points made by The Health Lottery.
We considered that because the ad suggested that someone who had won the lottery could pay off their debts, the implication was that participation in the lottery was a way of solving financial concerns or achieving financial security. We noted that the CAP Code stated "Marketing communications must not suggest that participating in a lottery can be a solution to financial concerns ... or a way to achieve financial security. Advertisers may, however, refer to other benefits of winning a prize". We considered that other benefits of a winning a prize included purchasing new goods or experiences, rather than paying off existing debts.
For these reasons, we concluded that the ad was irresponsible because it implied that participating in a lottery was a solution to financial concerns or a way to achieve financial security.
a firm reputation for leading the way when it comes to the weather.
we are unmatched on our faithful and accurate weather updates.
oracles of the British weather.
tropical burst of summer could last late into October
temperature, rainfall and even sunshine are very close to normal....
a run of dry and fine weather, with some remarkably high temperatures. This included a new maximum May temperature for Scotland...
In all, it has been the longest warm spell in May since 1992.
Dr Alyssa Burns-Hill PhD, a hormone and holistic health specialist with clinics in Harley Street and Jersey.
So just what are the alternatives that Dr Burns-Hill believes can assist in the treatment of cancer?
For absolute clarity – I am not a medical doctor.
Dr Alyssa Burns-Hill PhD has provided this website for information purposes only. It is not intended as a substitute for advice from your registered physician or healthcare professional.
We told DBH to ensure that she held adequate substantiation for her claims in future, and to ensure she stated that she was not a medically qualified doctor in a clear and prominent qualification positioned close to the first reference to the title Dr Alyssa Burns-Hill PhD.
This piece contains factual and scientific inaccuracies, as well as misleading information that could potentially cause harm to people with cancer.
“I was on a 21st-century version of Gerson called Plaskett Therapy. It is a very hard regime to follow and is controversial because it is alternative, not complementary. Success is difficult to quantify as many people turn to Gerson as a last resort."
Although the article states that Gerson therapy is controversial, it fails to mention that there is absolutely no solid scientific evidence to show that Gerson therapy can treat cancer, and that it can be very harmful to a patient’s health. Coffee enemas have been linked to serious infections, dehydration, constipation, colitis (inflammation of the colon), and dangerous electrolyte imbalances or even death. The information on Gerson therapy in the article is misleading, inaccurate and potentially harmful for cancer patients.
THE THEORY: A natural system for the treatment of disease by highly dilute doses of substances. It works by treating like with like.
OUR EXPERT SAYS: “This is often disregarded because it works in a different way to conventional medicine. It looks past the symptoms to consider the whole person.”
The reality is that there is no solid medical evidence to prove that homeopathy can treat cancer.
there is no good evidence to suggest that any particular foodstuff can really treat cancer.
The article claims that eating a lot of sugar is “feeding any cancer cells”. This is an unhelpful oversimplification of a highly complex area that researchers are only just starting to understand.
The article claims that “stress is a factor in cancer” that has been “scientifically substantiated”. This is a bold overstatement of the current state of research in this area. Many people believe that stress can cause cancer, particularly breast cancer. But the evidence for this is lacking.
Dear Sir,
The Daily Express article “Do cancer alternatives really work?” (Friday December 7th) contains misleading information and several inaccuracies that could cause harm to cancer patients.
We understand that people want to try everything after a cancer diagnosis, but strongly urge anyone considering complementary or alternative therapy to talk to their medical team about their safety. We go to a lot of trouble to make sure we find out what treatments really work though our research, and cancer patients deserve the best information we have, not dangerous speculation.
There is absolutely no solid evidence that Gerson therapy can treat cancer. In fact this treatment can cause very serious side effects.
Cancer patients searching for accurate, reliable information about alternative and complementary therapies can find it on our CancerHelp UK website or by calling our Cancer Information Nurses on 0808 800 4040 (9am-5pm, Monday to Friday).
Professor Peter Johnson, Cancer Research UK Chief Clinician.
In his recent report, Lord Leveson highlighted the harms to the public from inaccurate and misleading science and health reporting by the press. We are disappointed that the Express has chosen to print this article about a serious health issue without checking the scientific validity of the claims within it. By failing to do this, they have done a disservice to their readers, cancer patients and their families.
may not have suggested in so many words banning books (that might make it look very unpopular) but it has criticised them
we don't twist anything. We just present the news of the day.
I accept that from what you say.
Over the course of the past year every criticism we levelled against the EU has been justified.
Articles relating to the European Union, and Britain’s role within it, accounted for a further category of story where parts of the press appeared to prioritise the title’s agenda over factual accuracy.
there is certainly clear evidence of misreporting on European issues...
The factual errors in the examples above are, in certain respects, trivial. But the cumulative impact can have serious consequences...
there can be no objection to agenda journalism (which necessarily involves the fusion of fact and comment), but that cannot trump a requirement to report stories accurately. Clause 1 of the Editors’ Code explicitly, and in my view rightly, recognises the right of a free press to be partisan; strong, even very strong, opinions can legitimately influence the choice of story, placement of story and angle from which a story is reported. But that must not lead to fabrication, or deliberate or careless misrepresentation of facts. Particularly in the context of reporting on issues of political interest, the press have a responsibility to ensure that the public are accurately informed so that they can engage in the democratic process. The evidence of inaccurate and misleading reporting on political issues is therefore of concern. The previous approach of the PCC to entertaining complaints only where they came from an affected individual may have allowed a degree of impunity in this area.
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