GP's have now agreed to work either till 8.00pm on two days or from 9.30am and 11.30am on Saturdays.
The Independent in its report wrote that the GP's have caved in. This wording suggests that it thinks they gave in too easily or went against their principles. This doesn't seem to be saying that they think the government were wrong to put pressure on GPs although the story does report the opinions of GPs which say that the Government's strong-arm tactics had been "unacceptable".
The BBC's wording looks at the story from the GPs point of view, the opening paragraph focusing on the fact that GPs have given ministers a huge vote of no confidence.
The Times in the opening paragraph uses the word bulldozed to describe how the government went about 'persuading' GP's to agree. I think this suggests that the Times disapproves of the way that the government went about working out a deal with GPs.
The Times also quotes Laurence Buckman, chairman of the BMA’s GP committee, she said "We want patients to be happy with the service they get from GPs, but it will only work if GPs feel they can trust the Government not to bully and micro-manage them all the time."
The Telegraph emphasises the degree to which GPs are angered at the way the government treated them, using the headline 'Furious GPs agree to extend surgery hours.' I think this suggests that they want to try to make trouble for the government and take advantage of anything negative which concerns the government.
Essentially all the reports comment on the fact that the government effectively forced GPs to accept this deal but they each look at it from a different angle, which usually mirrors their political positions.
Monday, March 10, 2008
Monday, March 3, 2008
Antidepressant drugs don't work
Apparently, according to a new report it has been been found that Antidepressant drugs don't work.
As seems usually to be the case, most media news websites were fairly impartial in their coverage of this story, not really giving their own opinion. They do however publish the opinions of others as part of their articles.
Most stories covering this included the opinion of Professor Kirsch of the University of Hull who led the study. He said: "Given these results, there seems to be little reason to prescribe antidepressant medication to any but the most severely depressed patients, unless alternative treatments have failed to provide a benefit."
Despite this being not a total admittance that these drugs don't work most news providers led with a headline like this. From this you could assume either they wanted to spice up the story or want to express their own opinion that depression drugs don't work.
A comment in the Independent this time by Tim Kendall, deputy director of the Royal College of Psychiatrists' research unit, said that in his opinion the findings, if proved true, would not be surprising.
The fact they publish opinions like this could lend support to the theory that the Independent at least on the whole does not believe Antidepressants are of any use.
Rather than reveal a personal aversion to the idea of Antidepressant drugs the BBC suggests simply that the results are worrying, which is more impartial. They quote, for instance Marjorie Wallace, head of the mental health charity Sane, who said that if these results were confirmed they could be "very disturbing".
They also covered a response from a manufacturer of an Antidepressant in more detail, which again shows evidence of more impartiality.
Other news providers such as the the Times, Telegraph, Guardian and Belfast Telegraph also showed more impartiality on this subject, which is perhaps surpising although know the Independent is a 'views' paper it is likely to give much of it's own opinion on things.
As seems usually to be the case, most media news websites were fairly impartial in their coverage of this story, not really giving their own opinion. They do however publish the opinions of others as part of their articles.
Most stories covering this included the opinion of Professor Kirsch of the University of Hull who led the study. He said: "Given these results, there seems to be little reason to prescribe antidepressant medication to any but the most severely depressed patients, unless alternative treatments have failed to provide a benefit."
Despite this being not a total admittance that these drugs don't work most news providers led with a headline like this. From this you could assume either they wanted to spice up the story or want to express their own opinion that depression drugs don't work.
A comment in the Independent this time by Tim Kendall, deputy director of the Royal College of Psychiatrists' research unit, said that in his opinion the findings, if proved true, would not be surprising.
The fact they publish opinions like this could lend support to the theory that the Independent at least on the whole does not believe Antidepressants are of any use.
Rather than reveal a personal aversion to the idea of Antidepressant drugs the BBC suggests simply that the results are worrying, which is more impartial. They quote, for instance Marjorie Wallace, head of the mental health charity Sane, who said that if these results were confirmed they could be "very disturbing".
They also covered a response from a manufacturer of an Antidepressant in more detail, which again shows evidence of more impartiality.
Other news providers such as the the Times, Telegraph, Guardian and Belfast Telegraph also showed more impartiality on this subject, which is perhaps surpising although know the Independent is a 'views' paper it is likely to give much of it's own opinion on things.
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