Regulations on controlled drugs that were introduced in the United Kingdom in response to the conviction of the GP Harold Shipman for the murder of 15 patients would make similar crimes harder to commit and would identify a modern day Shipman much sooner, a new report says.

Reviewing the effectiveness of the Controlled Drugs (Supervision of Management and Use) Regulations, introduced in 2007, the Care Quality Commission, the health and social care regulator for England, says that “significant progress” has been made in ensuring the safe storage, use, and disposal of controlled drugs such as diamorphine, …