Medicine and Science from The BMJ

This interview is available in video form: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-yNO47EfuEM ​ ‪ @RichardJMurphy‬ , political economist and tax campaigner, joins Kamran Abbasi, Editor in Chief of The BMJ. In the UK an ongoing dispute between resident doctors and the Labour Government saw doctors go on strike in mid-December. With Winter pressure piling on and cost-of-living on the rise, do doctors have...

The class of GLP-1 agonist drugs including Ozempic gained a wide reputation for weight loss in 2025. However, it's well established that weight regain is a common result after people stop their doses. We report on new research which aims to quantify what is happening in the here-and-now for patients who stop using these and similar drugs. Weight regain after cessation of medication for weight mana...

This episode is available in video form on YouTube: https://youtu.be/1cGrD47eZSk   American science fiction author Kim Stanley Robinson joins Kamran Abbasi to discuss climate disaster, the need for political imagination, and science fiction's vision for health. Kim Stanley Robinson is the acclaimed author of a trilogy of novels, exploring the terraforming and settlement of Mars. His most recent no...

It’s time for 2025’s festive fun! Practicing medicine can be a very visceral experience - and the English language can’t always adequately capture the sights, sounds, smells. So Matt Morgan, intensivist and BMJ columnist, is creating medical neologisms, and joins us to share a few. Madhvi Joshi, a GP in London, has written about longevity science, and we hear how the “biohacking” of internet influ...

In this episode, we hear how Generative AI is making it into the consultation room - but not through NHS endorsed routes - surveys suggest that ⅔ of doctors are using AI, for backoffice tasks - but also increasingly for information and diagnosis.   David Navarro, a research fellow in generative AI at the Australian Institute of Health Innovation, Charlotte Blease, associate professor at the Partic...

There is an enormous amount of research on treatment for ADHD - pharmaceutical and otherwise. But not all of those trials, or meta-analyses, are of high quality; and not many compare the whole literature.  Now a new umbrella review - a review of reviews - tries to give a broad overview of the whole evidence base. Corentin Gosling, associate professor at the Université Paris Nanterre, joins us to s...

  "Damning” and “unforgivable failures” is how some papers headlines reacted to criticism of former UK prime minister Boris Johnson in the second of 10 reports from the UK Covid Inquiry. Under pressure, in 2001 Boris Johnson announced a covid inquiry led by a former judge, Baroness Hallett. Each report is examining a different area of the pandemic's impact, and module 2 is about decision making an...

It’s the BMJ’s annual climate issue - and in this episode, we’ll be hearing about more ways in which climate mitigation is good for health.   Firstly, climate change is fuelling conflict, and exacerbating the impact it has on fragile healthcare systems. Andy Haines, from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, and Barbora Sedova, from Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, disc...

Far right rallies have been held across the UK, culminating in a large parade in London where Elon Musk spoke. At the same time, politicians from across the political spectrum are following the talking points of far right parties - and shifting their policies rightward, even the Labour home secretary has said she wishes to double the period migrants have to be in the UK before they can become citi...

This week on the podcast The BMJ investigates Q-COLLAR, an American device that distributors claim can reduce brain injury from contact sports. Investigators James Smoliga and Mu Yang take us through the evidence, and former NFL punter turned US bobsled team member Johnny Townsend explains what this means for sportspeople. Bin Wang from Zhejiang University School of Medicine explains what the new...

In this episode of the podcast; In July this year, the Government published their 10 year health plan for England - A new analysis just published on BMJ.com takes an in depth look at the chances of that plan succeeding, and where the government needs to focus time and resources. Bob Klaber, paediatrician and director of strategy, research and innovation at Imperial College Healthcare, and Helen Sa...

In today’s episode: Assisted Dying moves closer to becoming UK law. The proposed legislation to allow people to end their own lives has moved through a second debate in the House of Lords. What do MPs and doctors think of the Bill as it stands? And, new ways to pull research findings from observation alone makes us question whether correlation really doesn’t equal causation. We find out - what is...

In today’s episode: Rethinking how we measure the harm caused by the  arms industry The life long, and multigenerational, impact of starvation in Gaza What is the appropriate focus on prevention in general practice?   The BMJ's international editor, Jocalyn Clark talks about a new series we've just published - examining the arms industry as a commercial determinant of health. Jocalyn also speaks t...

CRISPR technology has revolutionised biological research, and for the first time it’s out of the lab and into the NHS, as NICE has approved its use as cost effective. Kenneth Charles, senior lecturer in haematology at the University of the West Indies explains how the treatment works, and what concerns he has about it's implementation. Also this week, a new investigation on bmj.com has looked at a...

If you’ve been in a high street pharmacy or supermarket recently, chances are you’ll have seen home test kits for all sorts of indications; blood sugar level, vitamin deficiencies, thyroid function, and even some forms of cancer. A new series of article in The BMJ revealing serious concerns with the reliability of these home tests, and raises questions about their regulation. Jonathan Deeks, profe...

Professor Gillian Leng, President of the Royal Society of Medicine was asked to carry out an independent review into the role of physician and anaesthetic associates. She sits down with Kamran Abbasi, editor in chief of The BMJ, to discuss her findings. In the UK, the rollout of physician associates, NHS staff who took on some of the tasks of doctors, has been both haphazard and controversial. Ori...

This week we’re focusing on the NHS. On the 3rd of July the UK’s Prime Minister, Kier Starmer finally announced the NHS’ 10 year plan. His Labour government laid out a vision for where the healthcare service should head over the next decade. The announcement has been met with mixed responses. The plan has some good ideas - but a lack of vision combined with scarcity of detail leave many questions...

Rebecca Coombes interviews Dr. Tom Dolphin, consultant anaesthetist and newly elected chair of the BMA Council. Watch this interview on our YouTube.    

Last December, The BMJ published an investigation into the 2009 PLATO trial - exposing serious problems with that study’s data analysis and reporting.  Our follow up investigation has shown that those data problems extend to other key supporting evidence in AstraZeneca’s initial application to regulators. Peter Doshi, senior editor in the BMJ’s Investigations unit, and Rita Redberg, cardiologist a...

In this episode, we hear about ketamine addiction. It's in the news, but the rise in addiction amongst young people in the UK has caused concern for some time.  Irene Guerrini and Nicola Kalk, both addiction psychiatrists from the National Addiction Centre, join us to explain why its become a problem. In November 2024 Wes Streeting, the UK’s health and social care minister, announced that he was p...

Devi Sridhar's new book  “How Not to Die  (Too Soon) - The Lies We’ve Been Sold, and the Policies That Could Save Us” is focussing on the way wellness culture ignores the societal context in which health is really created. As a trained personal trainer and professor of global public health, Devi's straddling both of those worlds, and joins us to talk about how she would tackle our lowering life ex...

Recent escalations in the ever simmering tension between India and Pakistan brought us closer to conflict - conflict between two nuclear powers. For a long time doctors have campaigned for nuclear disarmament, and Chris Zielinski, president of the World Association of Medical Editors, makes the case for returning WHO's mandate to measure the potential impact of nuclear war. Also the militarization...

China was declared malaria free in 2021 - and we'll hear how persistence was key to their success, and what new technologies are available to help the rest of the world become malaria free, from Regina Rabinovich, director of the Malaria Elimination Initiative at the Barcelona Institute for Global Health.  Sonia Saxena, professor of primary care at Imperial College London, and Miguel O’Ryan, dean...

The UK government is debating legislation to allow assisted dying in England and Wales, which puts doctors at the forefront of deciding if their patient will be eligible for a medically assisted death - the key criteria being a 6 month prognosis. But is making a 6 month prognosis actually clinically reliable? To discuss we're joined by a panel of experts on end of life; Scott Murray, emeritus prof...

Kamran Abbasi interviews Professor Ashish Jha, Dean of Public Health at Brown University and former COVID-19 pandemic advisor to President Biden. Watch this interview on our YouTube. Trump’s second term has touched everything in the US political sphere - and health is no exception. With research funding for medicine and science weathering under Trump’s storm of cuts, how can Americans who care abo...