An Act to establish and make provision in connection with a Care Quality Commission; to make provision about health care (including provision about the National Health Service) and about social care; to make provision about reviews and investigations under the Mental Health Act 1983; to establish and make provision in connection with an Office of the Health Professions Adjudicator and make other provision about the regulation of the health care professions; to confer power to modify the regulation of social care workers; to amend the Public Health (Control of Disease) Act 1984; to provide for the payment of a grant to women in connection with pregnancy; to amend the functions of the Health Protection Agency; and for connected purposes.
The vast sums of money ploughed into efforts to fight diseases such as Aids, TB and malaria in the last 10 years have saved many lives but have also sometimes undermined health systems in poor countries, according to a survey by the World Health Organisation and others published today. A worldwide outcry around the turn of the millennium over the plight of people in Africa dying of Aids, a disease kept in check with drugs in rich countries, triggered a rush to fund big disease-fighting programmes on the part of western governments, aid organisations and philanthropic donors such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. But until now, there has been little attempt to find out how well the money has been spent and what impact the focus on high-profile diseases has had on the everyday business of hospitals, clinics and overworked healthcare staff in the poorer countries.