WHYS in Glasgow in June

Here’s some advanced publicity about the WHYS week in Glasgow in June..

CIVICUS WELCOME WHYS TO GLASGOW

Kumi Naidoo the secretary general of Civicus is certain that this year’s World Assembly will be the best ever. From 18 – 21 June more than a thousand delegates representing groups and organisations from over a hundred countries will come together in Glasgow, Scotland. It is the third and final year that the Assembly is being held in the city and delegates will have a unique chance to debate and exchange ideas, offer different experiences and build strategies for a better and more just world. But more than that, there is the opportunity to interact with politicians, businesspeople and the media to get things done!

This year’s theme “Acting Together for a Just World” will look at crucial issues facing the world such as climate change, poverty, debt relief, aid, trade and gender inequality. Each of these will be developed under the focus of “People, Participation and Power.” As well as the main World Assembly, a Youth Assembly with more than 150 young people from all parts of the globe will discuss core issues affecting youth. This will feed into the World Assembly.

Many famous and influential people will be in Glasgow. They want to hear from you. We want you to come along. Find out more and register to be part of the World Assembly in Glasgow at www.civicus.org

End of the official bit, we’ll post more nearer the time and we’ll be introducing our Civicus “family” as we get their names.

In the meantime, Rich Peston has asked me to post this :

My name’s Rich, I’m a freelance BBC Journalist and someone who has previously spent time working with the WHYS team.

In June the team will be broadcasting from the BBC in Glasgow and one of the issues we may be looking at is something called “Patient Safety.”

I worked on a programme for BBC Radio Scotland a while ago which revealed statistics on how many people in the country had been victims of unintended patient harm – this includes things like x-rays getting mixed up, acquiring an infection or errors during surgery. These sorts of mistakes cost health services a fortune and obviously can have serious impacts on the patient themselves.

Scotland has recently set up a programme to try and prevent cases of patient harm, and is the first country in the world to do so. The scheme is actually operated by an American firm, however, and countries such as Denmark, Australia and Canada have also been looking at the issue.

So – what do you think? This is something we may be spending some time on if you think it’s important enough. Is this something that merits government time, attention and money? Is it a problem that we don’t know much about and really should? And is there more that needs to be done by Governments across the globe to act on this? Leave us your comments, thoughts and experiences below.

Thanks J

Rich Preston

Links that you may like to look at:

http://www.patientsafetyint.com/patient.aspx

http://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/hcs-sss/pubs/qual/2002-gov-patient-securit/index_e.html

http://www.patientsafetycongress.co.uk/

http://www.who.int/patientsafety/en/

http://www.health.org.uk/news/scotland_launches.html