Donie's all Ireland news BLOG Tuesday

Irish law change will enable consumers to buy regular internet pharmacy drugs on-line

 

Online pharmacy will operate only within the Republic and patients will not be able to legally purchase drugs on the internet from overseas suppliers

The liberalistation of internet pharmacy laws will apply only to drugs currently purchased over the counter and will not apply to prescription medicines
Consumers will shortly be able to buy common medicines online for the first time as the laws on internet pharmacy are liberalised.

However, the change will apply only to drugs currently purchased over the counter and will not apply to prescription medicines.

Online pharmacy will operate only within the Republic and patients will not be able to legally purchase drugs on the internet from overseas suppliers.

The move is likely to lead to greater price competition on over the counter drugs. Currently, the price of these drugs is not controlled, whereas ex-factory prices apply in the case of prescription medicines.

Increasing numbers of Irish consumers have responded to high medicine prices here by sourcing their needs overseas. It is legal to move medicines across borders in the EU when they are required for personal use but a ban applies to internet purchases.

Illegal medicines
New figures show illegal medicines, including sedatives, weight-loss products, erectile dysfunction drugs and anabolic steroids, are still being imported into Ireland in massive quantities.

Last year, more than 758,000 dosage units of counterfeit and illegal medicines were seized by the IMB, roughly the same as in 2011.

The board said it was particularly concerned by the high level of illegal weight-loss products found. Many when tested were found to contain sibutramine, a banned product that has caused severe reactions in some users and increase the risk of heart attack and stroke.

There was a big rise in seizure of sedatives, from 153,000 units to 247,000 units, which often end up being resold in smaller quantities on the black market.

Breaches of legislation.
More than 3,900 enforcement investigations for breaches of the legislation on medicinal products were carried out, a decrease of 16 per cent on the previous year. Nine cases were successfully prosecuted.

Most of the unauthorised substances being imported into Ireland have come from the UK, which is used as a transit point, China, the US and India.

Mr O’Mahony emphasised the dangers of buying medicines online and urged consumers not to risk their health by using unapproved or unauthorised medicines.

“We strongly recommend that members of the public never to purchase prescription medicines online as there are no guarantees as to the safety, quality or effectiveness of these products. There is absolutely no way for people to establish whether medicines available on the internet contain what they claim to or if they are in any way effective in treating the illness or condition in question.”

Other products that were detained in significant quantities last year included diazepam, melanotan, zopiclone, flurazepam and testosterone.

Cairn Energy joins search for black gold off Ireland

CHRYSAOR IRELAND SIGNS FARM-OUT AGREEMENT WITH CAIRN ENERGY

 

Capricorn Ireland, a subsidiary of Carin Energy, will acquire the right to obtain an interest in Chrysaor’s exploration licences at Spanish Point

Chrysaor Ireland has signed a farm-out agreement with Cairn Energy to allow it to explore the Spanish Point site off the west coast of Ireland.

Capricorn Ireland, a subsidiary of Cairn Energy, will acquire the rights to obtain a 38 per cent interest in Chrysaor’s two frontier exploration licences and its licensing option.

Chrysaor will retain up to a 36 per cent interest in partnership, though the deal has yet to be approved by government.

Chrysaor chief executive officer Phil Kirk said, “It is exciting that a company of their [Cairn Energy’s] reputation, financial standing and long history of material exploration success has recognised the potential of our acreage.

We look forward to working together with them, Providence and Sosina to prove the transformational potential that exists within the Spanish Point area. The Irish Atlantic Margin is a highly prospective oil and gas province and is attracting a lot of international industry interest. The strategic position we hold and our active forward program ensures we will be at the centre of that industry activity.”

Capricorn will earn its stake in the area through taking part in the drilling of up to two wells and a 3D seismic programme taking on up to 63.3 per cent of the costs.

The partners plan to drill an appraisal well at Spanish Point in the second quarter of 2014, subject to government approval. No wells have been drilled within the Quad 35 acreage since the Spanish Point discovery 30 years ago.

Galway has country’s largest population of young people

   

Galway has a population of young people which is more than twice the national average.

According to information gathered by the Central Statistics Office, Galway’s population of 20 to 24 year olds is more than twice the national average.

The number of 25-34 year olds in Galway is also more than the norm nationally, with the two main colleges thought to be the main reason.

However immigration in Galway is much higher than in other areas at 19.4 percent, compared to the national average of 12 %.

WHO Hand Hygiene Day 2013

  

Dr. James Reilly, Minister for Health reaffirmed his support for the WHO’s Hand Hygiene Day, 2013 being the fifth annual event of this most important initiative; Ireland is an active partner in this global annual campaign.

Hand hygiene is the most effective way for us to protect ourselves against infection. In healthcare everyone has a responsibility to perform hand hygiene as outlined in the WHO 5 moments for hand hygiene in order to keep their patients safe and provide good quality care.

The WHO’s campaign SAVE LIVES: Clean Your Hands initiative aims to galvanise hand hygiene at the point of patient care. As part of the day’s actions, healthcare facilities worldwide demonstrate their continued commitment by signing up to the global movement and undertaking and sharing locally driven activities on hand hygiene improvements at the point of care.

The Minister again pledged Ireland’s support to continue with actions to reduce hospital acquired infection and to share results and learning internationally. The Minister commented: “Poor hygiene standards puts lives in danger. Hand hygiene is a simple way for us to show our patients that we care and wish to keep them safe.

Everybody has a personal responsibility. All healthcare staff need to ensure that they have received hand hygiene training and that they are familiar with the 5 moments. We all need to play our part in improving hygiene standards in hospitals; this requires buy in from everybody – hospital staff in all areas and visitors.

THIS YEAR’S FOCUS:

The aim of this year’s WHO Hand Hygiene Day is to build on the successful WHO Clean Care is Safer Care campaign and to continue to inform and support the general public and medical personnel about when and how to clean their hands.

The focus on 2013 in particular is for healthcare facilities to:

Continue to focus on hand hygiene education, monitoring and feedback.

The national educational train the trainers programme is now in its third year – this programme aims to train hand hygiene auditors in every acute hospital. Hospital hand hygiene audit results are now published on a biannual basis and have shown a steady improvement.

The multimodal hand hygiene programmes in our healthcare facilities need support from the top down. Evaluation and repeated monitoring as well as healthcare workers and senior managers’ knowledge of the importance of hand hygiene is a vital component of any campaign to manage and reduce healthcare associated infections.

Healthcare facilities are supported in identifying the best way to involve patients in hand hygiene promotion and improvement.

The HSE & RCPI national clinical programme for the prevention of healthcare-associated infection and antimicrobial resistance – Initiatives for 2013

THE WHO “5 MOMENTS FOR HAND HYGIENE” CONTINUES TO BE A CLEAR, SIMPLE AND EFFECTIVE WAY FOR HEALTHCARE STAFF TO PROTECT THEIR PATIENTS FROM THE SPREAD OF INFECTION. THE 5 STEPS ARE:

1) Wash hands before touching a patient

2) Wash hands before commencing a cleaning or aseptic procedure

3) Wash hands after a body fluid exposure risk

4) Wash hands after touching a patient

5) Wash hands after touching patient surroundings

The HSE will continue to promote this message by again issuing five e-mails for the 5 Moments to all healthcare staff over the month of May

New hand hygiene posters will be distribute to hospitals over the month of May

A newsletter for all HSE staff on hand hygiene will issue shortly highlighting a number of hospital initiatives, improving hand hygiene in school children and other articles including one from Margaret Murphy of WHO on patient expectations.

A new hand hygiene IT tool has been developed to facilitate hand hygiene audits

The WHO’s simple message of ‘clean hands save lives and prevent infection’ cannot be emphasised strongly enough and applies in the home as much as in the hospital setting. This message will continue to be promoted to all healthcare users and the general public throughout the year.

The Minister acknowledges the ongoing commitment and huge efforts of healthcare staff across the health sector in working to improve patient safety and welcomes local initiatives to support WHO Hand Hygiene Day.

The Minister noted that while there has been a decrease of 55% in the number of MRSA cases reported between 2006 and 2012 we cannot become complacent and CRE outbreaks in Ireland and abroad demonstrate the need for ongoing vigilance and attention to the threat posed by Antimicrobial Resistance and HCAIs.

Health care-associated infection is a major issue in patient safety as it affects millions of people worldwide and complicates the delivery of patient care. Infections contribute to patient deaths and disability, promote resistance to antibiotics and generate additional expenditure to those already incurred by the patients’ underlying disease.

To fight the spread of health care-associated infections which take a high toll in human lives and affect hundreds of millions of patients worldwide each year, WHO and its partners launched the Global Patient Safety Challenge with the theme “Clean Care is Safer Care” on Thursday 13th October 2005. As part of the launch the WHO Guidelines on Hand Hygiene in Health Care (Advanced Draft) were made available.

The aim of the launch was to strengthen the commitment of interested Member States to the Global Patient Safety Challenge and the critical role of hand hygiene in controlling the spread of health care-associated infection and multiresistant pathogens.

Biomass satellite to monitor the Earth’s forests for carbon storage etc. 

    

A satellite that can “weigh” the Earth’s forests has just been given the go ahead by the European Space Agency.

Biomass, as it will be known, is expected to launch in 2020.

The spacecraft will carry a novel radar system that is able to sense the trunks and big branches of trees from orbit.

Scientists will use Biomass to calculate the amount of carbon stored in the world’s forests, and to monitor for any changes over the course of the five-year mission.

The satellite’s data should help researchers understand better the role trees play in the cycling of carbon on Earth and, by extension, the influence this has on the planet’s climate.

“Biomass will give us unprecedented knowledge on the state of the world’s forests and how they are changing,” said Prof Shaun Quegan, who was one of the key proposers of the mission.

“This will give us a firm basis for treaties that aim to help developing countries preserve their forests, such as the UN Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+) initiative.

“In addition, Biomass will return information on national forestry resources, and that’s important for things like energy and biodiversity,” the Sheffield University researcher told BBC News.

Esa’s Earth Observation Programme Board approved the 400m-euro (£340m) Biomass mission on Tuesday.

The satellite will be the seventh of the agency’s so-called Earth Explorers – a series of spacecraft that are designed to do innovative science in obtaining data on issues of pressing environmental concern.

Three missions have so far gone into orbit, returning remarkable new information on gravity, polar ice cover, soil moisture and ocean salinity.

A fourth, to study the Earth’s magnetic field, launches this year; with satellites to study the wind and fine particles in the atmosphere further back in the development schedule.

Biomass will be a 1.2-tonne satellite at launch, meaning it will probably go up on Esa’s new Vega rocket, which successfully conducted only its second flight overnight.

Its sole instrument will send down a 70cm radar pulse that will penetrate the leafy canopies of forests but scatter back off the large woody parts of trees. It will sense the volume of material at a resolution of about 200m. In essence, it will be able to weigh the amount of carbon tied up in the world’s forests.

A 12m antenna will be needed to capture the return signal from the radar pulse.

An antenna of this size requires that it be folded for launch to fit inside the Vega vehicle, and then unfurled once the satellite has reached its 650km-high orbit.

Currently, Biomass will not be permitted to operate over North America, Europe and the Arctic.

The US Department of Defense says the spacecraft’s radar would interfere with its missile early-warning and space-tracking systems.

Prof Quegan said a dialogue with the DoD to get some operational data over these regions would undoubtedly continue as the mission moved towards its launch date, but even if the Americans stood firm on the issue the loss of coverage would not severely impact the project’s science.

“First of all, it hardly affects the tropics where the really big unknowns are,” he explained.

“It doesn’t affect the whole of Eurasia where the big boreal forests are found; and it doesn’t affect the temperate forests of China where the biggest re-growth on the planet is occurring. And in terms of REDD countries, we lose just a handful.”

The UK’s Natural Environment Research Council (Nerc) has funded much of the basic science underpinning the Biomass concept.

“We’re delighted to see that Esa has selected the mission and regards it as scientifically important,” said chief executive Prof Duncan Wingham.

“Nerc is really looking forward to the marvellous science that this mission will provide and in particular the greater understanding it will give us of the carbon cycle, which is its primary goal,” he told BBC News.

Britain is a senior partner in Esa’s Earth observation programme and will be expecting a significant industrial role in the Biomass mission.