Once more Reporting Scotland return to their long-running campaign inflating a small number of hospital infections known to have been only contributory factors in death to produce a crisis. They have repeated, over and over, the notion that these deaths have come ‘after’ the infections leaving viewers to make a causal connection which is clearly not there.
Tonight, we hear from the reporter: ‘We know that the infection was one of a number of factors that contributed to their death’ but this does not prevent further repetition of the implied causal connection.
Dr Alan Mather, Chief of Medicine tells us, being careful to pause and to emphasise the actual cause of the deaths:
‘There was cluster of deaths of babies that were very premature and that’s the key element of this.’
Sadly, three very premature babies have died as a result of the prematurity but were also infected with this organism.’
He’s clearly saying that the extreme prematurity killed the baby and, perhaps to get the reporter out of his hair, acknowledging that it had an infection too which along with a number of other factors may have played a part but the baby died because it was very premature.
Then we heard from the reporter: ‘Staphylococcus aureus is quite a common bacteria (sic).’ It’s a bacterium!
Talking-up Scotland 
Again, completely nauseating reporting and headlining from a disappointment of a ‘national’ broadcaster.
A good estimate puts it that for every human being on earth there is a mass of around 200 tonnes of bacteria in the global environmet. They are everywhere and all around us all the time – in the air, in our water and in the soil beneath our feet – even within our own bodies. We live with them because we have no alternative and we have evolved immune systems to attempt to counter any harm some of them might do us. Very premature babies have little or no immunity to microbial attacks in addition to many other weaknesses so keeping any premature infant alive is a near miracle of medical care and attention.
For these ‘hacks’, such attempts as this to sully the reputation of our our NHS by broadcasting vicious innuendo-packed garbage are a disgrace to themselves and an insult to their, hopefully, diminishing audience.
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Well put.
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Drip drip drip and so the BBC and dead tree press and unionist politicians in Scotland paint a daily picture of a nation where everything that goes wrong is the fault of “the SNPee Government.”
Meanwhile the false news gains traction because rebuttals and responses from the SNP are virtually non-existent.
I hope to goodness this is not how the SNP plan to win an election let alone a referendum.
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Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that rebuttals and responses from the SNP are not reported and if they are it will be at the very end of the article/report when people have already stopped reading or switched off. That is the standard practice with the MSM
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I was upset to hear this reported again on BBC radio Scotland this morning – without the benefit of Dr Mather clarifying things either. This type of reporting is disgusting.
Flora and fauna – bacteria, microbes, fungi – live happily on our body as well as within it and we NEED them to function – the natural balance works as a barrier to nasty pathogenic ones (hence, go easy on anti-bacterial scrubs when simple soap will do), and they keep our guts running – ever feel ill after antibiotics? Well antibiotics kill the good bacteria as well as the bad, which is why a dose of probiotics helps get things back in order afterwards.
Staphylococcus aureus is harmless on most people and lives happily on the skin.
Why have the BBC picked on this particular bacterium to imply that infections are rife in our hospitals, when it is most likely that the only people allowed unprotected contact with a premature baby is its parents,,, think about that for a minute, about what the BBC is actually implying, when they emphasise this particular infection, over and over again, and think how bad the parents already feel, and think about who they might be blaming. When in fact there is no one to blame. This is seriously irresponsible reporting.
I was having a discussion with someone at work earlier, about how imbalanced BBC reporting is (in general). His excuses were they had to sensationalise things and always look for the negative, because that’s the most popular type of reporting. I brought up the BBC charter, but that didn’t matter to him. So I brought up this story and basically put the reasoning above to him, and he became quite thoughtful after that. Premature babies might be an emotive subject, and it may be getting them viewing figures as people gasp in horror, but at the expense of potentially more lives or at least the well being of the family? That’s the moral standing of our public broadcaster, and that’s all I hear – that it was the parents that probably passed on the infection – and potentially that’s all the parents hear, when the BBC report this. The BBC aren’t sticking it to the NHS, they are effectively blaming the parents and I can’t even imagine how they feel as it is, I just hope they haven’t seen any of this reporting. Most people (including BBC reporters it seems) won’t be making the connection, but most people don’t matter in this case.
Anyway, thank you for emphasising the actual cause of death, extreme prematurity, nothing more could have been done.
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Just a point about the presence of bacteria being reported in this story;
The human body evolved in symbiosis with bacteria, one of the earliest forms of life on the planet.
The human gut for example contains more bacteria than your body has human cells.
For something that can only be seen under the microscope you carry as much bacteria as the weight of your head, thousands of different types or strains.
Our health and wellbeing are intimately linked to the health and multiplicity of bacteria in our gut. They regulate our moods, our cognitive functions, our weight and our appetites amongst many others.
Auto immune disorders are now understood to have links to the condition of the microbiota(flora & fauna) nurtured within our body. Cancers and heart disease both linked to a poor microbiome.
A direct link has been observed between the bad breath bug
Gingivitis, which creates issues with the gums, and heart disease.
The appendix was long thought to be an organ rendered redundant through human evolution is now known to be a reserve for bacteria to restock the gut after illness wipes out the bacterias populating the gut.
One other reason why overuse of antibiotic medications can have detrimental long term effects on overall health.
A body too young to have a functioning immune system could well be killed eg by a bug transferred from the mother, as part of her own normal microbiota, in the womb, without any other outside agency being involved.
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Here we go again ,
The relentless attempt by this propaganda unit masquerading as a news organisation to undermine the freely elected government , in any other country it would be called Sedition and our government should treat it as such ,
This BBC in Scotland are acting on behalf of a foreign power , it is no wonder many fellow Scots are confused , turn on the TV News any channel what do you get News from a English perspective , with English presenters , and the recent flurry of bloody Union Jacks on our home grown produce is designed to eradicate Scotland as a Nation .
I realise you are retired John but I for one would welcome the Scottish Government employing you to keep an eye on this BBC , the SNP should be going all out to make as awkward for this English subversive unit to operate in our country .
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