News Bites

Unhappy about anatomy

Nearly three quarters of Australian medical students say that they are taught too little anatomy during their degree course, a survey of more than 600 medical students by the Australian Medical Students' Association has found.

The association's president, Rob Mitchell, a fifth year medical student at Monash University, said the survey shows that medical education was still of high quality. Overall, 71.3% of surveyed students said that their course would turn them into competent doctors. “There's a perception, and I emphasise it's a perception, that students don't receive enough anatomy teaching,” Mr Mitchell said.

Paul Gatenby, a member of the Committee of Deans of Australian Medical Schools, said time for anatomy and some other subjects had been cut back but added this was inevitable given the “explosion of medical knowledge in the past 50 years… Is there so little anatomy taught that students are dangerous? I don't accept that at all,” he said (http://theaustralian.news.com.au).

Drawing donations

Donors pledged nearly $476m (£241m; €368m) in additional funds for the global fight against bird flu, for surveillance and response strategies to halt its advance, especially in Africa. The amount was less than some had hoped for. A donor meeting had aimed to secure $500m-750m …