There was plenty to celebrate
last week. A whole load of people came to Manchester for the Health and Care
Innovation Expo 2015. When I was there speakers included, Ian Williamson; Simon
Stevens; David Dalton, Jeremy Hunt, Devi Shetty (someone I am hoping to meet up
with in India later this year), Tami Grey Thompson and Jane Cummings. It was a
great gathering and really allowed the plans and early achievements for 'Devo
Manc' to be effectively showcased.
Connected to #Expo15NHS 2 day
event was the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding, by key partners from a
number of greater Manchester organisations, including, GM Academic Health
Science Network; the Clinical Research Network; Manchester Science
Partnerships; Manchester Academic Health Science Centre, the 4 Universities and
many others. The new partnership that was formed, Healthcare Innovations
Manchester, will initially focus on collaborative research aimed at
cardiovascular disease, cancer, diabetes, drug and alcohol misuse, and obesity
in adults and children.
Whilst there was a celebratory glass
of wine to sip at the signing evening it was yesterday that my liver really
took a bashing and I have to say that writing this week's blog I am feeling
ever so slightly under the weather. I am spending the weekend near the Lake
District National Park, actually in a small village called Warton, (Carnforth), and more precisely I am writing this in a rather quirky hotel, the
George Washington. Last night I was at the Old School Brewery, a microbrewery,
producers of some excellent beer, which if I am honest, I partook of a pint or
two.
The Old School Brewery was
established in 2012, and like many microbreweries, it came to be from a couple
guys whose home brewing hobby grew into a small business. Situated at the foot
of Warton Crag, the Old School brewers use top quality ingredients mixed with
patience and respect to produce first class hand crafted beers. I was
celebrating a friends 50th birthday, and I have to say a good time
was had by all!
However, having a good time has
left me with a slight hangover. And nobody knows what causes a hangover. In a
piece of research undertaken by University College London and presented at the
European College of Neuropsychopharmacology Conference last week, noted that
while we don’t know what causes a hangover, we also don’t know what might cure
a hangover. A research study conducted by researchers from Canada and Holland
surveyed nearly 900 students and their approaches to dealing with a hangover.
54% chose to eat fatty food and heavy breakfasts, and 70% also drank water
before going to bed.
Neither of these approaches made
any difference to the severity of the hangovers. You can see some of the
popular so called cures for a hangover
here, but essentially the message is if
you want to avoid a hangover, drink less alcohol. Members of the Scottish
Parliament are trying to do that through the introduction of a minimum unit
price for the sale of all alcohol. The Scottish government have argued that
minimum pricing is vital to address Scotland’s 'unhealthy relationship with
drink'. Way back in 2012 MSPs passed legislation which set the minimum unit
price at 50p. However implementation of this law has been delayed as the
European Court of Justice fear its implementation may infringe free trade
agreements.
Last week the Court ruled the
measure could be introduced only if no other mechanism was capable of achieving
the desired outcome of protecting public health. It is difficult to see how
such a measure could be taken forward in any event. I travel to Scotland most
weekends and can’t imagine that anyone is going to check whether I have a case
of Château Lafite in the boot of the car or not. However in the completely surreal
world that is Scottish politics Nicola Sturgeon may have other plans, but before
putting in border controls, perhaps Nicola and her health minister colleagues could
visit Manchester and see some of our health innovations…
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