Health Portal

Welcome to the Health Portal on Powerbase

Welcome to the Powerbase Health Portal. It aims to guide you around some of the companies, lobbyists and think tanks involved in healthcare in the UK. In particular, it highlights the companies and their lobbyists pushing for reform of the National Health Service (NHS). New laws presented in Parliament by the Conservative Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley in January 2011 offer unprecedented opportunities to private healthcare companies operating in the UK. Widely seen as the biggest reform of the NHS since its creation, Lansley's changes are being fiercely opposed by health professionals, opposition politicians and members of the public. Our Health Portal pages highlight which private healthcare companies, lobbyists and think tanks have been courting the Conservative Party, and lobbying for such changes. See our private healthcare network map. This portal is part of Powerbase—your guide to networks of power, lobbying and deceptive PR. Other related portals include Foodspin, Pharma and Alcohol. Powerbase has a policy of strict referencing and is overseen by a Managing editor, a Sysop and several associate Portal editors. Health Portal editor: David Miller. <video type="vimeo" id="18907486" width="350" height="250" desc="Watch SpinWatch's health lobbying tour film" size=""/> To take a tour of some of the private health companies, industry lobbying groups and think tanks that surround Parliament in central London, visit the Health Lobbying Map

Recent Articles and Videos on Spinwatch The two faces of NHS reform (7 September 2011) NHS reforms plunged into fresh turmoil (5 September 2011) Private healthcare group lobbied competition body for NHS inquiry (29 July 2011) Bubb 'in full cry' for private health providers (June 2011) “The NHS will be shown no mercy" says Cameron health adviser (May 2011) Spinwatch blog: We’ll need to shout louder for Lansley to hear us (March 2011) Revealed: Government Secretly Uses Doctors to Spin Tribal War for NHS Hearts and Minds (oh! And £80 Billion) (March 2011) England’s drinking habit is a problem for everybody, not just addicts (February 2011) Spinwatch video: The health industry lobbying tour (January 2011) Mutualisation or privatisation? (December 2010) Private health lobby out in force at Tory conference (October 2010) Corporate Front Groups and the Abuse of Science: The American Council on Science and Health (June 2010) Lobby Watch columns: British Medical Journal Lobby Watch: The Stockholm Network (November 2010) Independence of nutritional information? The British Nutrition Foundation (March 2010) Lobby Watch: Nurses for Reform (March 2010) [American Council on Science and Health American Council on Science and Health (April 2010) Lobby Watch: The Social Issues Research Centre (March 2010) Lobby Watch: The Portman Group (January 2010) Obesity Obesity has already reached epidemic proportions in many Western countries. We ask whether organisations such as Association for the Study of Obesity and National Obesity Forum are playing a constructive role in the debate on obesity, or whether they simply promote the interests of companies with a stake in obesity-related policy. We look at how obesity-related groups have often been funded by companies such as LighterLife, GlaxoSmithKline and Kelloggs. Food front groups/Alcohol/Pharma

Categories This article is part of the Health Portal project of Spinwatch. Related Powerbase categories: Healthcare_Industry Health Foodspin Pharma Priority pages Virgin Group National Association of Primary Care NHS Confederation NHS Alliance Association of British Healthcare Industries Medical Technology Group Bupa AXA PPP healthcare Aviva 2020 Public Services Trust Margot James Kaiser Permanente Assura Group

Getting Started Looking for somewhere to start? To learn how you can edit any article right now, visit Powerbase:About, Welcome, newcomers, our Help page, Frequently Asked Questions, A quick guide to editing or experiment in the sandbox. Or contribute a new article: go to Quick Guide to Getting Started. Research and Writing Tips How to research front groups | Resources for studying propaganda | Research using the web Can you help? Powerbase can be made more effective if more people join the project. If you have research or writing skills or just spare time, you can help. If you are unsure where to start, you could expand some of the recently created but currently very brief articles. (If you look at the recent changes page you will see some noted as being 'stubs' - articles that may just be a line or two and needing to be fleshed out). So if you would like to add to some of those you would be most welcome. There is an automatically updated page which includes the pages which have been signalled by Powerbase users as most wanted. In addition there is a page which includes a list of Things you can do to help. Or if you would like some other suggestions closer to your interests you could drop Powerbase editor, David Miller an email. His address is editor AT Powerbase.info Start Here View The Latest Articles View Articles By Category View The Most Popular Articles Create An Account Or Log In Change Your Preferences Write a new Article

Powerbase history Powerbase is a collaborative venture initiated by Spinwatch in collaboration with Lobbywatch, GM Watch Red Star Research and Corporate Watch, but put into effect by a wide variety of volunteers and independent researchers. Contributors are now working on 19,413 articles. Disclaimer: Powerbase is an encyclopedia of people, issues and groups shaping the public agenda. It is a project of the Spinwatch—email editor AT Powerbase.info. Antispam note: To avoid attracting spam email robots, email addresses on Powerbase are written with AT in place of the usual symbol, and we have removed "mail to" links. Replace AT with the correct symbol to get a valid address. We regret the inconvenience this entails. Campaign for more effective antispam regulations. Read the full disclaimer References