OAPS age 10 years in hospital
ELDERLY patients stuck in hospital beds are effectively ageing 10 years in 10 days, the new medical director of the NHS warns today, as he calls for sweeping reforms of the health service.
Prof Stephen Powis says the biggest task facing the NHS is to adapt to “profound shifts” in patterns of ill-health, by building community services to prevent unnecessary stays in hospital for pensioners.
In his first intervention since taking up the post in January, he suggests the current approach is jeopardising the health of the most vulnerable, by “trapping” patients in unsuitable settings, which strips too many of long-term mobility.
Writing for The Daily Telegraph, he warns: “A person over 80 who spends 10 days in hospital loses 10 per cent of muscle mass – equivalent to 10 years of ageing.”
Prof Powis says the health service
in running the company. It’s pretty impossible to start a company in your dorm room and grow to that size and not make mistakes.
Mr Zuckerberg, who founded Facebook as a Harvard student, said there would “always be a free version of Facebook” amid controversy over its business model of raising money from adverts.
And he said the company was engaged in an “arms race” over the use of its platform by Russia to interfere in elections. Mr Zuckerberg said: “They [Russia] are going to keep on getting better at this and we need to.”
Senator Dick Durbin asked Mr Zuckerberg if he would be comfortable sharing information about which hotel he stayed in and who he had messaged. The Facebook founder said he did not wish to share the information publicly.
Mr Durbin told him: “I think that’s maybe what this is all about, your rights to privacy and the limits of your privacy.”
Mr Zuckerberg embraced tighter European-style regulation where from next month, technology companies in the EU could face massive fines for misusing data.
He said: “I think they get things right [in Europe]. I’m not the type of person who thinks all regulation is bad.”
Facebook shares rose 4.5 per cent, their biggest daily gain in nearly two years, as he spoke.
Asked if there should be a “bill of rights” to protect children’s privacy he said it was an “important principle” but “I don’t know if we need a law”.
♦ Facebook is the target of two new class actions alleging it violated the trust of users whose data was shared with Cambridge Analytica. One of the cases, filed in Delaware, includes British Facebook users as plaintiffs.