logo

But Beate Gminder spokeswoman for the European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Affairs said that the results do not exceed the maximum levels

Posted by admin   ·     ·   Jump to comments

But Beate Gminder, spokeswoman for the European Commissioner for Health and Consumer Affairs, said that the results "do not exceed the maximum levels" for safe consumption.Although the Commission would like to see a reduction in dioxin levels, Ms Gminder said, farmed salmon is safe. "We have a risk management strategy and clear maximum limits. It does not exceed those maximum limits," she said.Her statement echoed the advice of the UK's Food Standards Agency, which last week urged consumers to carry on eating farmed salmon.FSA chairmanSir John Krebs, said that the study showed the level of dioxins and PCBs to be within internationally recognised safety limits, adding: "Our advice is that people should consume at least two portions of fish a week, one of which should be oily like salmon."There is good evidence that eating oily fish reduces the risk of death from recurrent heart attacks and that there is a similar effect in relation to first heart attacks," he said.The contradictory advice from the US scientists and from the UK and EU authorities reflects a differing view of how to assess food safety. The European Commission rejected warnings about the safety of farmed salmon yesterday, saying that levels of harmful chemicals detected in a recent scientific study are within safe limits. It said the health service was moving from a provider of services to a funder of private agencies.

Paul Miller, the chairman of the BMA consultants' committee, said: "We are worried that the mobile treatment centres could destabilise NHS services if they perform the most straight-forward operations while the NHS is left looking after the more ill and complicated patients and left to handle services at nights and at weekends.". Under plans announced last year, seven private companies including Netcare, are due to set up and run 34 of the new treatment centres, on behalf of the health service. The first one opened in Daventry, Northamptonshire, last October and has carried out 850 cataract operations. A further 46 centres will be run by the NHS, of which half are open and the remainder are in development. The 80 treatment centres run by private agencies and the NHS plan to provide 250,000 treatments a year from 2005.Of these, 135,000 will be additional and 115,000 will be transferred from local hospitals to the privately-run centres to free up capacity within the health service.The British Medical Association (BMA) said the treatment centres were a short- term solution to long waiting lists and did not address the NHS's fundamental problems. All medical staff would be fully qualified and selected in accordance with NHS regulations.

Receptionists, call centre staff and computer operators would be recruited in the UK."We are very strictly bound by the contract not to employ anyone from the NHS or who has worked for the NHS in the previous six months. All our staff go through a very strict selection procedure and they are experienced ophthalmologists and anaesthetists." To prevent poaching of medical staff from South Africa, they would be employed on rotation, with contracts from a few weeks to six months - though in some cases that might be longer, he said.Britain has an agreement with South Africa not to poach its medical staff after an appeal from Nelson Mandela five years ago. Paul Burstow, Liberal Democrat health spokesman, said: "The test for diagnostic and treatment centres is whether they increase the health service's ability to treat more people. If the centres simply divert operations from existing NHS facilities and increase costs for the NHS then they will have failed."Richard Friedland of Netcare said the two mobile theatres, accompanied by mobile ward units and out-patient facilities, would each treat 20 patients a day and be run by 36 doctors, nurses and anaesthetists brought to Britain from South Africa.

readers comments

Comments are closed.

NBA

NBA

MLB

MLB

NFL

NFL

NHL

NHL

WWE

WWE

Your sideblock text goes here