Medicine and Science from The BMJ

In this podcast, we explore one of 2026's key issues - the way in which climate and conflict are interacting to endanger human health. 

Neta Crawford, professor of international relations at the University of St Andrews has been studying how war contributes to climate change, despite the difficulty in obtaining clear information - as most military emissions are exempt from reporting under Kyoto-era rules, She explains why mandatory transparency, reduced reliance on military solutions, and a change to defense doctrines are necessary.

Mohammed Aba Aji, post-doctoral research associate at Washington University argues that rising spending on the military - nearly $3 trillion and increasing for 11 years, is diverting resources from health, education, and climate adaptation. He explains why the only way to tackle this is to redefine defence away from property and infrastructure to human flourishing.

Reading list

War and military mobilisation are drivers of climate change

Increasing defence expenditure may cost us our security

Countering the arms industry as a commercial determinant of health

In this episode of podcast we explore two clinical dilemmas - unrecognised drug side effects, and the outcomes from hip and knee replacements.

When an unrecognised adverse drug effect is mistaken for a new symptom, the resulting prescribing cascade can end in polypharmacy and potentially preventable patient harm. New research on nearly 2.3 million adults in Ontario, has found 24 high-priority, potentially inappropriate prescribing cascades—including laxatives after iron, pain relievers following statins, and sedatives after cholinesterase inhibitors. Paula Rochon, Jerry Gurwitz, and Antonio Cherubini, three of the study's authors join us to discuss.

Over 100,000 hip and, 100,000 knee replacements are performed annually in the NHS, and health systems are investing hundreds of millions to rapidly scale robot-assisted surgery, but is this expensive new tech delivering better patient outcomes? Two target trial emulation papers, using the UK's National Joint registry aim to find out if robots are better at join replacement. Hassan Mohammad, one of the papers' authors shares their findings, and Teppo Järvinen joins the conversation to discuss challenging orthopaedic surgery standard practice.

Guest List
Prescribing Cascades Discussion

Paula Rochon, Geriatrician, senior scientist, and professor at Sinai Health and the University of Toronto.

Jerry Gurwitz, Geriatrician, researcher, and professor of Medicine at UMass Chan Medical School.

Antonio Cherubini, Geriatrician and clinical eesearcher at Università Politecnica delle Marche and INRCA (Istituto Nazionale di Riposo e Cura per Anziani) 

Robotic Hip & Knee Arthroplasty Discussion

Hassan Mohammad, academic clinical lecturer in orthopaedics at Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry

Teppo Järvinen, orthopaedic surgeon and professor at the University of Helsinki, and Head of the Finnish Centre for Evidence-Based Orthopaedics (FICEBO) in Finland.

BMJ.com Reading List
Research Papers

Exploring high priority potentially inappropriate prescribing cascades in older adults: population level retrospective cohort study

Early national comparison of robotic versus conventional knee replacements for arthritis using National Joint Registry data: target trial emulation study

Early national comparison of robotic versus conventional hip replacements for arthritis using National Joint Registry data: target trial emulation study

Robot assisted hip and knee arthroplasty: It is high tech, but is it better?

Referrals for ADHD and autism assessments have reached unprecedented levels, leaving NHS waiting lists stretched into years and families struggling to access support. But is the rise driven by a genuine increase in neurodevelopmental conditions, increased awareness, or systemic overdiagnosis?

This prompted the government to commission the Independent Review into Mental Health Conditions, ADHD, and Autism; and we're joined by vice Chair of that review, Professor Sir Simon Wessely, Regis chair of psychiatry at King’s College London.

In this episode, we discuss: Community prevalence vs. administrative prevalence, the roles of underdiagnosis, misdiagnosis and overdiagnosis. Why the current focus on diagnosis is a mistake, and why environmental factors are really key to the changes we're seeing. We also cover thecore recommendations of the report.

 

Read the full report:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/independent-review-into-mental-health-conditions-adhd-and-autism-final-report

Last year, in July 2025, the independent review of the physician associate and anaesthesia associate roles, carried out by professor Gillian Leng, was published.

The review followed the contentious role out of PAs in the NHS - where their scope of practice differed across trusts, and GP practices, and concerns were raised about clinical safety.

Some of the key recommendations were around seeing undifferentiated patients, training needs, and supervision - and we spoke to Gill at the time, and the government accepted her proposals.

But questions remained about exactly how some of those recommendations might work.

Today, with the publication of a draft clinical protocol - and we clarify some of those questions.

The VAERS system in the US monitors adverse events following vaccines, but a new investigation on BMJ.com has found problems with the data mining systems used to spot patterns - and more worryingly, that the agencies involved were alerted about the issues, and didn’t take steps to fix the problem.

David Willman, Pulitzer Prize winning investigative journalist, joins us to explain what he found.

 

Also this week, while the UK parliament still seems divided on assisted dying, in Switzerland it has been allowed for over 80 years - making it an normalised part of medicine. New research has asked patients why they have decided to seek help in ending their lives, and analyses those motivations.  Two authors of this work, Claudia Gamond, a palliative care physician who leads the palliative and supportive care department at the University Hospital in Lausanne, and  Solenne Blanc, a PhD student in sociology, join us to explain what they found.

 

Reading list

US officials knew covid vaccine safety system was flawed—but turned aside the FDA doctor who alerted them

 

How patients explain and make sense of their decision for assisted suicide in Switzerland (the Exit Project): qualitative exploratory study