The growing trend for women to take their contraceptive pill continuously to avoid having monthly periods may not be safe, a health expert warned yesterday. The pills are designed to be taken daily for three weeks out of four.

Innocent members of ethnic minority communities are almost three times more likely than white people to have their DNA samples on the national database, according to figures published yesterday.

A mother whose toddler son died after repeatedly drinking the heroin substitute methadone was jailed for two years yesterday for manslaughter by gross neglect.

Women who took an epilepsy drug during their pregnancy are at greater risk of having children with lower IQ, according to a study.

Cash made from the revamp of Camden’s elderly care homes might not be put back into caring for pensioners, according to a council chief. At a recent meeting pensioners and disabled residents quizzed Cllr Martin Davies on plans to close all four of Camden’s care homes and replace them with two new buildings.

The first of a series of public consultation meetings takes place next week to find out people’s views on plans for the Somerset’s main provider of mental health services to become an NHS Foundation Trust.

A Conduct Committee of the General Social Care Council (GSCC) has decided the case of a social worker from Gateshead who was alleged to have breached the code of practice for social care workers by physically restraining a child on two occasions.

Britain’s most senior police officer wants children who face pressure from within their own families to join gangs to be placed on the child protection register.

Britain’s most senior judge yesterday called for an end to the automatic recall to prison of released offenders who technically breach their licences. He warned that it had become a “trapdoor to prison” and was a main factor in swelling the record jail population.

Millions of women could be protected against life-threatening hip fractures by a once-a-year treatment with a new drug.

{mosimage}More than 14,000 women die every year in Britain after breaking their hips as a result of the bone-thinning disease osteoporosis, which affects up to three million people. The new treatment cuts the risk of such fractures by more than 40 per cent.

Almost half a million women, mostly aged over 50, are prescribed drugs for the disease. Well-known sufferers include Rosalind Shand, the mother of the Duchess of Cornwall, Elizabeth Taylor and Doris Lessing. the novelist.

The 15-minute treatment means that women can be protected against developing brittle bones without having to remember to take pills regularly. Poor adherence to treatment is a major problem in the development of osteoporosis. The new drug, zoledronic acid (Aclasta) has been tested on almost 8,000 women in a trial that included patients from Aberdeen, Sheffield, Liverpool and Glasgow.