Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG update

Legal fees in Irish medical negligence cases are criticised by Irish Medical society

 

The Gravy train’ legal charges should be capped, says Medical Protection Society.

The Medical Protection Society, which provides indemnity cover for 16,000 Irish doctors, says “the gravy train” legal fees are driving up health costs for patients and forcing doctors to join the “brain drain” leaving Ireland.

Legal fees in most medical negligence cases should be capped to 20 per cent of the award and tough financial penalties imposed on lawyers who bring forward cases without merit, according to a new report.

The Medical Protection Society, which provides indemnity cover for 16,000 Irish doctors, says “gravy train” legal fees are driving up health costs for patients and forcing doctors to join the “brain drain” leaving Ireland. The society has called for new legislation to reform the way medical negligence cases are handled, including limits on the damages and costs that can be claimed and a shortening of the time period in which cases can be brought forward.

Increasing & rising claims:

The society says increases in the number of medical negligence claims and in the size of awards are threatening the sustainability of some areas of private medical practice. If this results in a shift in workload to the public sector, the pressure on public hospitals will grow.

Escalating legal costs have been blamed for a 90 per cent rise in the cost of providing indemnity cover for consultants in the past two years. This was one factor in the end of private obstetric practice at Mount Carmel Hospital in Dublin and its eventual closure last year.

“The cost of medical negligence claims is paid ultimately by patients, either through taxation or the cost of healthcare,” the society’s director of patient engagementJohn Tiernan said. “Society has to ask itself whether this is affordable or not.”

The society says the rise in the cost of indemnity cover is a result of large increases in the rate at which private hospital consultants are being sued and the average size of claims. In a report, it claims the economic downturn has led to a “compensation culture” in which claimants pursue more cases and lawyers have moved into medical negligence as an “alternative and more attractive source of income”.

The legal system?

“The lack of a speedy and transparent system leads to a pressure to settle claims in circumstances where we would not do so elsewhere in the world.”

The report says the Irish legal system does not do enough to discourage unmeritorious claims, for example when a plaintiff’s lawyers are unable to get solid expert support for a claim. It also allows cases to drag on for many years, and the courts are reluctant to strike out claims even when they have failed to progress.

The report says some lawyers even run cases without strong expert support until the last moment in the hope that the defendant will settle.

Property prices to continue to rise in Ireland for year ahead 2015

 

Supply and demand mismatch to drive prices in urban centres despite the mortgage challenges.

Sherry Fitzgerald said on Friday that there is “every reason to believe that prices will continue to rise at above trend levels in the short term in many locations” into 2015.

Residential property prices are expected to continue to rise into 2015, despite challenges such as the Central Bank’s proposals to restrict mortgage lending, Sherry Fitzgerald said on Friday.

Pointing to the constraints in supply allied with a recovery in demand, the estate agency group said that there is “every reason to believe that prices will continue to rise at above trend levels in the short term in many locations”, adding that the trend will be particularly evident in the urban centres where supply is most constrained. It will be “ some time” before the mismatch between demand and supply is rectified, Sherry Fitzgerald said, adding that it will therefore be some time before the market truly stabilises.

“In the interim, there is likely to be some volatility with above trend price and indeed rental inflation in urban centres.”

In 2014, house prices rose by 16.3%, with Dublin experiencing a higher growth rate at 18%. Residential property outside Dublin was up 13.9%.

And it wasn’t just property prices that rose in 2014 – activity levels increased too. With some 40,000 properties sold nationally last year, activity levels jumped by 33% according to Sherry Fitzgerald, while the growth in activity was more marked in Dublin, with a growth rate of 40%, up to about 14,000 transactions.

Marian Finnegan, chief economist Sherry FitzGerald, said that 2014 was undoubtedly “a fragmented year” for the Irish property market.

“For the Dublin market the year opened to very tight supply and pent- up demand resulting in buoyant price inflation, of 12.6% in the first six months. That said, an increase in supply and a more temperate demand outlook saw price growth rates effectively half in the latter six months with overall growth for the year coming in at 18%,” she said.

Pat Davitt, chief executive of the Institute of Professional Auctioneers & Valuers (IPAV), agreed that price growth in the latter half of the year was “more muted”.

Looing to the future, the outlook for 2015 is “challenging” Sherry Fitgerald said, pointing to the recent intervention by the Central Bank to minimise the risk of another credit driven property bubble by limiting loan to value and loan to income ratios.

“If the Central Bank is tempted to follow through on its original proposal insisting on 20 per cent deposits for the majority of buyers it would be an unmitigated disaster,” Mr Davitt said, adding that “joined-up thinking” was needed.

A week in my Sligo job as an anaesthetist at the General Hospital

 

Eileen Forrestal says 'My work is all about paying attention at all times to everything’

Eileen Forrestal, who works as an anaesthetist in Sligo Regional Hospital and also produced the Get Up And Go Diary.

Sleeping, waking I often say that in my “day job” as an anaesthetist, I put people to sleep, and in my other job, with Get Up and Go Publications, I wake people up. What I want is for all people to be as healthy as possible, both mentally and physically, so we can enjoy the best life possible. A healthy mind in a healthy body is truly the recipe for a wealthy life.

My interest in medicine grew partly out of a family story that was a favourite of our dinner-table conversation for many years. My dad had TB as a young man and was in hospital for three years before he enrolled in the first streptomycin drug trial.

Unlike his father and two young brothers, who sadly succumbed to the disease when my father was an infant, Dad had survived long enough for a cure to be found. My mother was his nurse in hospital, and after he recovered, they met again on a bus. The rest is history.

I qualified from University College Dublin in 1982 and have since practised medicine in the UK, Africa, Canada and Ireland. All this developed my passion for travelling, and I have managed to experience (albeit very briefly at times) life and living conditions in more than 60 countries, giving me a fairly unique perspective on the world. It is an aspect of my education for which I will be forever grateful.

Although I have been a specialist anaesthetist since 1991, I have also worked in other areas of medicine, including general practice, psychiatry, geriatrics and obstetrics, in a career of more than 30 years.

My work as an anaesthetist at Sligo Regional Hospitalbegan in 1995. I fell in love with Sligo and, after completing a two-year advanced fellowship in Toronto, I returned as a permanent consultant on a half-time contract in 2004. My weekly commitment at the hospital consists of two and a half days per week, plus an on-call commitment of 24 hours, once every 14 days.

In my practice I cover all general theatre specialities, from general surgery, orthopaedics, ear nose and throat, gynaecology and obstetrics, paediatrics, opthalmology, intensive care, A&E, and my own area of special interest, the pre-anaesthesia assessment clinic. As an anaesthetist I work closely with all the other specialities and, of course, the nursing staff. A collaborative team approach and good communication are essential to achieving the best outcome for patients.

 A Vigilance:

People often joke that an anaesthetist can take a break once the patient is asleep, but I can guarantee that the only person “sleeping” in theatre is the patient. My job is all about vigilance and paying attention at all times to everything that is happening throughout a surgical procedure. In an extended operation, this includes monitoring blood loss and replacing fluids and electrolytes.

The machinery and monitors are now very technologically advanced, and the medications we use tend to be a mixture of anaesthetic vapours, intravenous sedatives, strong painkillers, muscle relaxants and anti-nausea drugs.

Our job is to ensure that patients are safe throughout their operations, that they do not feel sick or in pain when they wake up, and we provide optimal operating conditions for the surgeon.

I have always loved my work and take great satisfaction in guiding my patients, often with multiple complicating conditions and medications, safely through their operation and immediate post-operative care, often in the intensive care unit.

I also really enjoy meeting patients in the pre-assessment clinic, where I can educate them on perioperative risk reduction, which often involves weight loss, smoking cessation, medication management, and lifestyle choices to do with nutrition and exercise, so that they come for their surgery in the best possible condition.

80% of Irish houses expected to have a brown bin within three years

  

Up to 80% of all houses are expected to have a brown bin by 2018 as Ireland becomes more environmentally friendly.

More of us than ever before are recycling our leftover Christmas turkeys with an extra 150,000 brown recycling bins being rolled out.

According to the Irish Waste Management Association, nearly half of all homes with a collection service now separate their organic waste.

“Householders in Ireland have played a big part in the success of recycling,” said IWMA Secretary, Conor Walsh.

“So it’s a joint effort – it’s driven by legislation, it’s implemented by the waste industry and we have to roll out another, probably 200,000 households over the next couple of years, the IWMA members.

“So I think 75-80% of houses in Ireland will have a brown bin within the next two or three years.”

The ordinary’ nature of mental health issues in Ireland

 

Music, poetry, theatre, art, film and dance part of the line up for First Fortnight festival. 

Mental health issues are a “normal experience rather than something extraordinary”, JP Swaine says as he takes a break from the last minute preparations for this year’s First Fortnight festival.

The festival which runs through January aims to challenge mental health prejudice through the creative arts with a series of events, most of which are Dublin based.

In 2009 Mr Swaine, a mental health social work manager and cognitive psychotherapist, and arts professional David Keegan decided to “test out” an idea they had to use the arts as an aid in opening up discussion around mental health.

“We decided to take our passion and our experience of the arts and see if we could do something different,” he said.

The idea of the “ordinariness” of mental health issues is one that he, and the other organisers and volunteers who are the driving force behind the fortnight’s events, are very close to.

“For many generations there was a very heavy veil of silence that surrounded mental health and where there is a veil of silence people imagine that it’s something to be ashamed of. That’s a cocktail for a problem that will never get solved,” he said.

Mr Swaine had his own experience of mental health issues: when he was 16 his older brother David died by suicide. The idea for the festival began as a way of honouring David’s memory while also aiming to be beneficial to others.

“I think it’s valuable that when bad things happen we don’t try and undo the pain that is caused but that we integrate that experience into something that could be useful for someone else,” Mr Swaine said.

In 2010 the first event took place and has grown ever since. Now in its fifth year the festival line up encompasses music, poetry, theatre, art, film and dance and a tongue-in-cheek National Therapy project which is “compulsory on a voluntary basis” for all occupants of Ireland.

Sport is also represented in the line up with a panel discussion entitled Over the Bar which sees figures from the sports world explore mental health issues.

An event unique to the festival is Co-Motion, which takes place on Sunday January 4th in St Stephen’s Green at 2pm, where participants are asked to load their MP3 players with music which they then share with others using headphone splitters:

“It’s like a silent disco except you are walking with a stranger and listening to the music that gets them through,” Mr Swaine explains.

More information about the festival can be found at firstfortnight.ie.

Scientists describe a protein capable of modifying other proteins

  

Findings from a recent study reveal that, contrary to the previously held understanding of protein synthesis, proteins can be assembled without instruction from mRNA. In the study, published in Science, researchers describe how a protein is capable of adding amino acids to other partially formed proteins.

During protein synthesis, amino acids are linked together according to messages received by messenger RNA (mRNA) with the assistance of ribosomes– a process called translation. In the process, defective ribosomes or faulty messages can lead to translational “stalling”.

In response to the translational stalling, the incomplete proteins (polypeptides) are degraded by a ribosome-bound quality control complex (RQC) which triggers the destruction. Researchers from the University of California, San Francisco and the University of Utah first documented this complex in 2012.

RQC is a multi-protein complex, and one of those proteins, Rqc2, was found to be capable of directing the addition of amino acids. “We caught Rqc2 in the act,” said senior author Adam Frost, M.D., Ph.D., in a statement. “But the idea was so far-fetched. The onus was on us to prove it.”

In the present study, the team used cryo–electron microscopy to show Rqc2 bound to transfer RNA with either of two amino acids, alanine or threonine. Using mass spectrometry, the team also showed that the stalled proteins had chains of alanines and threonines on them.

Remarkably, the protein was playing the role of mRNA by directing the ribosome to add either alanine or threonine. “This surprising discovery reflects how incomplete our understanding of biology is,” said first author Peter Shen, Ph.D., a postdoctoral fellow in biochemistry at the University of Utah.

“Nature is capable of more than we can imagine.”

The resulting protein contained anywhere from 5 to 19 alanine or threonine residues. The authors conclude that the purpose of Rqc2 is to add “carboxy-terminal Ala and Thr extensions” or “CAT tails.”

These “CAT tails” can serve as a signal to initiate the destruction of faulty proteins, or part of a test to check how the ribosome is functioning, the authors explain.

The implications of this work are broad as recent evidence suggests that either of these functions are faulty in neurodegenerative diseases (such as Alzheimer’s).

“There are many interesting implications of this work and none of them would have been possible if we didn’t follow our curiosity,” said co-author Onn Brandman.

Proteins perform numerous functions in the body from their role as antibodies, to maintaining structural integrity to catalyzing essential reactions. This latest finding adds one more function and illustrates the beauty of scientific discovery.

“The primary driver of discovery has been exploring what you see, and that’s what we did. There will never be a substitute for that,” says Brandman.    

Donie's Ireland daily news BLOG update

Irish Government plans for one-tier health service unveiled today

 

The white paper on universal health insurance proposes access based on the needs of our people.

The Government has unveiled plans to create a one-tier health system, supported by universal health insurance, with access based on need rather than ability to pay.

The plans are contained in a white paper on universal health insurance which was launched today by Taoiseach Enda Kenny and senior ministers.

Mr Kenny and Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore described the document as a “once in a generation opportunity” to build a health service that was currently not fit for purpose. Minister for Health James Reilly claimed the plans will amount to the biggest reform of the health system in the history of the State.

Under the proposals, universal health insurance would be compulsory for everyone, with the State paying or subsidising the cost of premiums for most people. The white paper outlines the key elements of the new system and how it will work. It also examines the future basket of services to be included in the new system, as well as funding mechanisms.

Dr Reilly said the existing two-tier system was not working. “It’s unfair, unaffordable and inefficient. Without change, taxes will need to go up or services will have to be cut.”

The Government was determined that State spending on healthcare under UHI would not exceed existing spending, he emphasised. Specific measures would be introduced to control costs including, if necessary, capping of the profits and claims expenditure of insurers.

The public is being invited to make submission to theDepartment of Health on the proposals before the end of May, and Dr Reilly plans to speak at a series of regional meetings as part of the consultation process.

Under UHI, everyone will have equal access to a standard package of services. Health insurers will not be allowed to sell products that provide faster access to these services.

Dr Reilly said that if patients wanted “cordon blue cooking or five-star accommodation” while in hospital they would have to pay for it themselves.

UHI is not due to be finalised until 2019, so final implementation will be a matter for the next government.

Ireland’s Unemployment rate falls to 11.8% for March this year

 

Long-term unemployment still very acute with 45.8% signing on for more than a year. 

There was a 1,400 drop in the number of men claiming benefits in the State in March, while the number of women claimants fell by 300.

The unemployment rate fell to 11.8% for March this year, the lowest level in almost five years.

Figures from the Central Statistics Office show the number of people signing on the Live Register fell by 1,800 last month, marking the 21st month of successive decline in the unemployment rate.

Long-term unemployment remains a significant problem however, with 179,335 people, or 45.8 per cent of all claimants in March, signing on for 12 months or more.

The total number of people on the register, which includes casual and part-time workers as well as those on Jobseekers Allowance, is down 8 per cent or 33,900 since the same month last year.

On a seasonally adjusted basis, the number stood at 396,900 for March. This represents an unemployment rate of 11.8 per cent, down from 11.9 per cent in February.

The fall was most marked among males, with a drop of 1,400 recorded in the number of men on the register in the month, compared to 300 women.

The number of male claimants decreased by 25,807, or 9.6 per cent, to 243, 189 in the 12 months to the end of March, while female claimants fell by 8,049, or 5.2 per cent, to 148, 043 in the period.

There was a significant difference between the declines in short-term and long-term claimants, with the number of people signing on for 12 months or more falling by just 4.6 per cent in the last year, compared to a drop of 10.6 per cent for short-term claimants.

The CSO release also includes figures on the number of people enrolled in labour activation programmes, primarily the long-term unemployed, who are not included in the Live Register figures. There were 85,119 people taking part in February, up 2 per cent or 1,698 on the same month last year.

Commenting on the figures, Investec chief economist Philip O’Sullivan said that while the improvement in the headline Live Register figures was welcome, the problem of long-term unemployment remains “acute”.

“Tackling this issue remains a major priority for policymakers,” he said.

“While the Irish standardised unemployment rate is now inside the Eurozone (whose unemployment rate was 11.9 per cent in February) for the first time since late 2008, that is not much by way of consolation for those awaiting a return to work.”

Mr O’Sullivan added that there are “tell-tale signs that emigration remains a factor” in the declining numbers signing on, with the number of claimants under the age of 25 falling by 11.5 per cent in the year to the end of March, compared to a fall of 7.3 per cent in those aged over 25 in the same period.

Also commenting on the long-term unemployment figures, Isme chief executive Mark Fielding said the Government’s focus should remain on reducing business costs and increasing competitiveness if jobs were to be created.

“The drive for jobs must not be sabotaged by the demands for wage increases, which will simply stall any fragile recovery as the cost of labour is by far the most significant driver of business costs for most enterprises – particularly for micro and small businesses,” he said.

“Despite recent cost improvements, due to the recession,Ireland remains a high cost location for a range of key business inputs and pressure is mounting on a number of costs including wages, property, utilities, transport and credit.”

Davy analyst Conall Mac Coille said today’s figures should “provide reassurance that the recovery in the Irish economy continues, addressing any lingering concerns following the news that Irish GDP contracted by 0.3 per cent in 2013”.

“Jobs growth appears to have been sustained in 2014, consistent with business sentiment surveys that suggest companies expect to expand their employment,” he added.

The Rehab group refuses to reveal CEO Exuctive 'Angela Kerins' retirement package

 

The Rehab group has refused to release the details of chief executive Angela Kerins’ retirement package after her shock resignation decision today.

Angela Kerins has been under massive pressure in recent months over her lavish €240,000 salary and has faced questions about the profitability of the disabilities charity’s scratch cards.

Charity officials are due to make another appearance before the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) next week.

This morning, Children Minister Frances Fitzgerald and committee member Deputy Mary Lou McDonald of Sinn Fein, called on M/s Kerins to attend that meeting despite her retirement.

DEDICATED

Announcing her decision to retire four years early, the 56-year-old told staff at the charity: “In recent months, I have become increasingly concerned about the toll that public controversy has taken on the Rehab Group and my own family.

“While I have dedicated my energies and ability to growing and developing the Rehab Group for the last 22 years I am of the view that it is in the best interests of all concerned that I step down at this time.

“In doing so I hope the organisation can focus its entire energies on its core activity of developing and delivering services to people with disabilities and others who are disadvantaged.”

In a statement Rehab Group chairman Brian Kerr thanked M/s Kerins for her “dedication and resolve” over the last seven years and wished her “every success in the future”.

The charity said a management transition process is being put in place “to ensure that the important work of the Rehab Group continues as usual”.

A spokesman this morning refused to reveal details of M/s Kerins’ retirement package including annual pension payments or any lump sum she may be entitled to.

He said the terms of her retirement package “are in line with what her existing contract arrangements are”.

“That’s obviously confidential and something we can’t divulge without the express permission of M/s Kerins,” he said.

M/s Kerins revealed her €240,000 salary at a previous PAC meeting in February after refusing to confirm the sum for weeks beforehand.

She said that her pay was funded by Rehab’s commercial operations but faced questioning over the €80m in public money that the charity receives.

TDs were highly critical of her performance at the PAC, with its chairman John McGuinness accusing her of giving incomplete evidence.

Rehab later provided more information about staff pay, revealing 12 senior members of the management team at Rehab Group earn more than €100,000-a-year.

M/s Kerins was to appear again on April 10, along with another former chief executive Frank Flannery.

Speaking on RTE’s Morning Edition, Minister Fitzgerald said “It would be in the interests of Rehab and the interest of the charity sector for her to appear before the public accounts committee.”

She said Mr Flannery should also attend saying: “There have been questions that PAC have put that they want the people who’ve been in charge to answer.”

Mr Flannery faced criticism for not appearing at the PAC with M/s Kerins in February.

His presence had been requested by the committee, which had questions about his pension and other matters, including a coffin importation business.

Mary Lou McDonald said: “Resignation or no resignation Angela Kerins needs to fully cooperate with the Public Accounts Committee inquiry and needs to answer the questions.”

Sligo County Council faces a multi-million bill over Lissadell case?

 €7million ? 

The Walsh family, Constance (16), Elanor (20), Eddie (10), Harry (19) and Kate (19) the children of Constance Cassidy and Edward Walsh after the verdict last year

Sligo County Council are facing a bill of several million Euro’s after the Supreme Court today ordered them to pay most of the costs (some 75%) of the long and bitter legal row over public rights of way across the historic Lissadell estate in Co Sligo.

The full costs of the case, initiated in 2009,  are estimated at least €7m and the five judge court today ordered the Council to pay three quarters of the legal costs incurred by the Lissadell owners, barristers Edward Walsh and Constance Cassidy, in the High and Supreme Courts. The Council must also pay its own legal costs bill.

  In making the costs order, the Chief Justice, Ms Justice Susan Denham, noted the owners had sought declarations that there were no public rights of way over four routes in the estate.

The Supreme Court had last November ruled there were no public rights of way over three of those routes and found there was a right of way over part of the fourth route, a coastal route to the beach at Lissadell.

The owners had asked the court to order the Council to pay all of the costs while the Council argued “justice” would be met by an order direccing both sides to pay their own costs. Lawyers for both sides also insisted their clients had made efforts to settle the dispute and each blamed the other over failure to do so.

The court today gave its reserved decision on costs and other issues raised by both sides arising from the court’s judgment allowing the owners’ appeal against the High Court finding of public rights of way across all four routes at Lissadell.

Following that judgment, the Council raised issues concerning particular findings of the court and effectively sought a review of those. The court refused that application in its ruling today.

The Chief Justice also noted the owners had withdrawn their application to remit for hearing by the High Court their claim for damages arising from alleged slander by the Council if their title to Lissadell.

During the costs applications last month, the Council had claimed the owners were determined to proceed with litigation despite its offer to settle the case on the basis of acceptance of a public right of way to the beach at Lissadell. The owners countered that the Council had, both in the High and Supreme Courts, maintained its claim all routes of way through the estate were public.

The owners said they initiated their case in January 2009 in response to the Council passing a resolution in December 2008 aimed at protecting public rights of way at Lissadell. Before that resolution, the Council wrote to the owners warning litigation was inevitable if they persisted in closing off routes at Lissadell.

The Council argued the owners were told that resolution had no legal effect and it also submitted it, as a public body, has a duty to protect public rights of way.

Potential remedy emerges for most common cause of blindness

 

‘We probably have skipped over years of drug development. This is very exciting news’

Treatment is for age related macular degeneration, a disease that makes blood vessels beneath the retina grow abnormally.

Patients affected by the most common cause of blindness in Ireland may enjoy a brighter future after an important discovery by scientists in Dublin.

They have identified a potential treatment to slow or halt vision loss that relies on a drug that has already been used safely in human trials.

“We probably have skipped over years of drug development. It is very exciting that the translation of this basic research will move very quickly now,” said Matthew Campbell, professor of genetics at Trinity College Dublin.

It is a treatment for age related macular degeneration, a disease that makes blood vessels beneath the retina grow abnormally. This causes the loss of central vision, used for example for reading, driving or looking at a computer screen.

In 2012 Prof Campbell and colleagues discovered that a component of the immune system, known as Il-18, could protect sight by retarding growth of damaging blood vessels.

Coincidentally, he heard that drug company Glaxo Smith Kline was running human trials on Il-18 for the treatment of cancer. “We asked could we use some of their Il-18 in our labs to test whether it was toxic for the eye. And we wanted to see if it could prevent onset of [vision loss]. He joined with lead author Prof Sarah Doyle, an assistant professor in immunology at Trinity, and other colleagues to test Il-18.

They published their findings yesterday in the journal Science Translational Medicine .

POTENT TREATMENT

There were early concerns that Il-18 would harm the retina, said Prof Doyle

“But surprisingly we found that low doses had no adverse effects on the retina and yet still suppressed abnormal blood vessel growth,” she said.

“We found it was very potent in preventing blood vessel development,” said Prof Campbell said. “The next goal is to show this can work in humans.”

It could replace the current best treatment which involves direct injections into the eyeball costing €1,000 per injection, he said.

The drug is being trialled and has not yet received approval. “It is still tiny steps,” said Prof Campbell. But if it is proven to work the treatment could reach the market relatively quickly.

Scientists Solve the Mystery of the Zebra B & W Stripes

  

Ever wonder why zebras look so darn fashionable with those white and black stripes?

No, they’re not making a statement about prison uniforms. Their chic yet customary outfit is actually used to help ward off insects, including horseflies and tsetse flies.

As previous studies have shown that such flies tend to avoid black-and-white striped surfaces, many hypothesized that the same holds true for these guys.

A recent study conducted by researchers from the University of California led an investigation into the purpose of these zebra markings. The team found that many striped animals were found in common areas that are heavily populated by large numbers of tabanids, otherwise known as horse flies.

Lead study author and biologist of the university Tim Caro notes that these markings help prevent fly bites, which could cause blood loss and even spread disease.

“Biting flies are attracted to hosts by odor, temperature, vision and movement that may act at different stages during host seeking, but vision is thought to be important in the landing response,” researchers said, via a press release.

Caro and his team studied patterns and locations of seven species and 20 subspecies of equines. They also mapped the native locations of these animals and plotted them against areas populated by large numbers of horse flies.

“Conversely, there is no consistent support for camouflage, predator avoidance, heat management or social interaction hypotheses,” researchers note.

Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallance were the first to study the issue back in 1870 over the role stripes played in the animal’s evolution.