Use of medicines to prevent disease may not prolong or improve life in elderly people, say doctors. Drugs such as statins, prescribed to combat heart disease, may simply switch the cause of death to cancer or dementia in older people, they warn.

Conditions at Pentonville prison are “a matter of deep shame”, according to a report published by the prisons watchdog. The independent monitoring board found evidence of “endemic squalour” and rat and cockroach infestations in the north London prison, which was built in 1842 and has the capacity to house 1,127 inmates.

While many people in the UK say they are scared by people with mental health problems, many also realise the positive qualities of people who suffer from mental illness, according to research commissioned by the Priory Group.

Nearly 2,000 people with learning disabilities are to be moved into their own homes from the NHS institutions where they have lived for years. Some £175m is being made available to rehouse inhabitants – who have spent at least a decade on the so-called “campuses” – within the community.

{mosimage}The campuses, many of which are former hospitals, will be closed by 2010. The Department of Health has insisted no-one would be left on their own to fend for themselves. Each person will be individually assessed and given their own care plan. “Whatever they need help with – from dressing and shopping to 24 hour care, they’ll get it. No-one will be left alone,” a spokesperson said.

The proposal is seen as a significant challenge as so many have spent so long institutionalised. The last referrals to campuses were made in the mid-1990s, so those within them have spent at least ten years on the site.

Campaigners have long argued that the lives of campus inhabitants have been far too limited: for example, all of their needs beside food and accommodation must be funded by £20 of hospital pocket money each week, and they have not been able to take part in simple every day activities like cooking for themselves.

Local authorities and Primary Care Trusts are to bid for a tranche of the £175m being made available to provide the required housing and day care facilities. “The funding provides the incentive for Primary Care Trusts, in conjunction with local authorities, to get on with closure plans, so people with a learning disability can live their lives the way they want, within their community,” said Dame Jo Williams from Mencap. “People with a learning disability should have the opportunity to make choices about where and how they live.”

Coping well with stress can cut the risk of a stroke by almost a quarter, research shows. A University of Cambridge team based their conclusion on a seven-year study of more than 20,000 people.