Drones could deliver NHS supplies under UK regulation changes

Drones could be used for NHS-related missions in remote areas, inspecting offshore wind turbines and supplying oil rigs by 2026 as part of a new regulatory regime in the UK.
David Willetts, the head of a new government unit helping to deploy new technologies in Britain, said there were obvious situations where drones could be used if the changes go ahead next year.
Ministers announced plans this month to allow drones to fly long distances without their operators seeing them. Drones cannot be flown 'beyond visual line of sight' under current regulations, making their use for lengthy journeys impossible.
In an interview with the Guardian, Lord Willetts, chair of the Regulatory Innovation Office (RIO), said the changes could come as soon as 2026, but that they would apply in 'atypical' aviation environments at first, which would mean remote areas and over open water.
Referring to the NHS, Willetts said there was potentially a huge market for drone operators. 'It's great for drone operators commercially, but it's also great for services like the NHS,' he said.
Drones could be used to deliver drugs to GPs and patients in remote locations, and to take blood samples to hospitals for testing, he said.
The Scottish Highlands and islands could be one area of the UK to benefit, as could farming as a sector, he added. Regulatory changes could enable the use of drones under the government's safer streets fund, which supports measures against neighbourhood crime and antisocial behaviour.
'You could imagine that, for the safer streets initiative, they might be used by the police in circumstances where they might be trying to ensure public safety,' he said.
Willetts also indicated that the definition of an 'atypical' air environment could be broadened, which could enable greater use of drones over long distances. The definition could 'cover a lot of airspace', he said.
For drones to operate in busier airspace, however, there would need to be progress on technology and standards that alert aircraft to their presence.
Citing deliveries to oil rigs and the maintenance of offshore wind turbines as another example of potential use by 2026, Willetts said that 'strictly speaking' using a drone to check on a turbine involved a line-of-sight requirement.
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As part of last month's announcement, the government revealed it was giving £16.5m to the Civil Aviation Authority to deliver a regulatory framework that would allow beyond-line-of-sight drone use. Willetts said regulations had become disproportionate.
The NHS already delivers urgent pathology items such as blood samples via drones as part of a trial in central London. It involves moving samples between Guy's hospital and a lab at St Thomas' hospital in partnership with the drone companies Apian – a UK startup co-founded by NHS doctors – and Wing, which is owned by Google's parent company Alphabet. A similar trial has also taken place in Northumberland.
The UK technology secretary, Peter Kyle, said the regulatory changes would help the UK 'lead the world in new technologies'.
'These are exactly the kinds of barriers we're determined to break down through the Regulatory Innovation Office,' he said. 'Cutting red tape so drones can safely deliver supplies or inspect offshore wind turbines without costly workarounds like putting someone in a boat.'

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In November last year, MPs voted in favour of the assisted dying bill but some MPs have already indicated they will changes sides on Friday. This is how they voted in the last reading of the bill. MPs have this morning voted to reject an amendment which would have prevented a person who is substantially motivated by feeling they are a burden from qualifying for assisted dying. Conservative MP Rebecca Paul's new clause 16 stated that a wish to end one's own life should not be substantially motivated by factors such as a mental disorder, disability or suicidal ideation. The Commons voted 208 to 261, majority 53 against. Naz Shah, Labour MP for Bradford West, has told Times Radio that Kim Leadbeater's private member's bill to legalise assisted dying is 'dangerous' and a public safety issue'. Calling for its rejection, she said: 'The bill is ultimately flawed. Today we're not voting on the principle of this bill, we're voting on the legislation. 'That's my job and the amendments that I have tabled to close the anorexia loophole hasn't been closed, it's not been accepted, it won't be voted on and that leaves huge loopholes and it's not safe. For me it's a public safety issue, this bill.' Please enable cookies and other technologies to view this content. You can update your cookies preferences any time using privacy manager. Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch has urged her MPs to vote against the legislation, describing it as 'a bad bill' despite being 'previously supportive of assisted suicide'. She claimed it has 'not been done properly'. On Thursday, Badenoch said that although she had previously supported the idea, 'this is not how we should do legislation like this'. She also said she does not believe the 'NHS and other services are ready'. Badenoch added, 'I will be voting no and I hope as many Conservative MPs as possible will be supporting me in that'. MPs are entitled to have a free vote on the bill, meaning they decide according to their conscience rather than along party lines. If it is passed today, it will then be scrutinised by the House of Lords. Sky News said that it is hard to predict at this stage how the upper chamber will react to it, given the unusual combination of a free vote on a private member's bill. However, it warned there was a 'small chance' of upper chamber delays 'to stop it by keeping it in limbo until the king's speech to parliament later this year'. Decca Aitkenhead was nine when a GP risked jail to help her mother to die. Years later she watched her best friend succumb to the slow torture of Huntington's disease, and for a few days she found herself confronting her own death. She tells Jane Mulkerrins how those experiences have shaped her views on assisted dying. Public support for the bill remains high, according to the latest YouGov poll. The proportion of people who feel assisted dying should be legal in principle has risen slightly, to 75 per cent from 73 per cent in November. Its survey of 2,003 adults in Great Britain took place last month and the findings were published yesterday. Kim Leadbeater, the Labour MP behind the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill, has warned that defeat for the bill would end hopes of changing the law for another decade as she rejected claims of rushing through reform. She insisted her bill is 'the most robust piece of legislation in the world' and has argued dying people must be given choice at the end of their lives in a conversation which has seen support from high-profile figures including Dame Esther Rantzen. Leadbeater said it had 'gone through hours and hours and hours of scrutiny', adding: 'This is not being rushed through, this is not a quick thing that's happened overnight.' Four Labour MPs confirmed on the eve of today's vote that they will switch sides to oppose the proposed new law. Paul Foster, Jonathan Hinder, Markus Campbell-Savours and Kanishka Narayan wrote to fellow MPs to voice concerns about the safety of the proposed legislation. They branded it as being 'drastically weakened', citing the scrapping of the High Court Judge safeguard as a key reason. However, Bill sponsor Kim Leadbeater has insisted that replacing the judge's approval with multidisciplinary panels strengthens the legislation, as it will incorporate wider expert knowledge to assess assisted dying applications. Protesters and campaigners have been gathering this morning in Westminster before the vote on the assisted dying bill. Photos from the scene show supporters from campaign group Dignity in Dying holding pink placards with white letters urging 'legalise assisted dying, vote yes today.' Opponents of the bill are wearing white masks with the word 'euthanise' on the forehead, and they are holding white signs saying 'don't make doctors killers' and 'protect our NHS from becoming a national suicide service'. In 1937, Switzerland legalised assisted suicide provided those doing the assisting were not motivated by 'any selfish intent'. Six decades later, the US state of Oregon legalised physician-assisted suicide for people with less than six months to live. In 2001, the Netherlands became the first country in the world to decriminalise assisted dying. As MPs vote on the bill today, this is how other countries in the world compare. Read in full: Where is assisted dying legal? How the rules worldwide compare More than 7,500 terminally ill people a year could seek state support to end their life within a decade of the practice being legalised, the government estimates. Officials believe about 60 per cent of requests for assisted dying would be approved, equating to approximately 4,500 or 0.68 per cent of all deaths from 2039 onwards. The findings came in an impact assessment drawn up by the Department for Health and Social Care. Officials also estimated that legalising the practice in the UK could cost the NHS tens of millions of pounds. Staff time costs ranged from £412,000 to £1.98 million in year one, to between £2.6 million and £11.5 million in year ten. MPs will today take part in the final Commons vote on whether to back a bill to help terminally ill adults end their lives in England and Wales. Politicians supported legalising assisted dying when they first debated the issue in November by 330 votes to 275. However, since then the outcome has become too close to call, after analysis by The Times showed that margin eroding. The Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill has undergone months of scrutiny leading to some changes in the proposed legislation. One change is to replace the role of a High Court judge in signing off an application for an assisted death with a panel of experts. This panel would contain a senior lawyer, a psychiatrist, and a social worker. Advocates of assisted dying believe their bill will pass its final Commons vote on Friday, despite a shift among MPs against it. Kim Leadbeater, the MP who proposed the law change, denied the bill has been rushed and remained confident MPs would vote in favour of it. Read in full: Assisted dying vote 'too close to call' as MPs turn against bill Sir Keir Starmer has yet to decide whether he will take part in today's landmark vote on assisted dying as he deals with the Middle East crisis. The prime minister, who is in favour of assisted dying, is working from Downing Street today but could end up missing the vote depending on his commitments as he seeks to deescalate the conflict between Iran and Israel. A government source said no decision as been made He backed assisted dying in 2015 and has signalled that his view has not changed. The issue is deeply divisive and has split the Labour Party. Starmer said this week: 'It is a matter for individual parliamentarians, which is why I've not waded in with a view on this publicly, and I'm not going to now it's coming to a conclusion. 'There has been a lot of time discussing it, both in Parliament and beyond Parliament, and quite right too. It's a really serious issue. 'My own position is long-standing and well-known in relation to it, based on my experience when I was chief prosecutor for five years, where I oversaw every case that was investigated.'