:00:17. > :00:19.Hello and welcome to Newswatch with me, Samira Ahmed.
:00:20. > :00:21.After the deaths of three Israeli teenagers, and
:00:22. > :00:24.of one young Palestinian, tension flares up again in the Middle East.
:00:25. > :00:26.Has the BBC reported this highly sensitive situation
:00:27. > :00:29.As political claims about hospital waiting times are
:00:30. > :00:31.disputed, the BBC's health editor is here to discuss the challenge
:00:32. > :00:42.Of all the challenges BBC News faces, the one that produces
:00:43. > :00:45.the most controversy is perhaps the requirement to achieve balance
:00:46. > :00:47.and impartiality in its coverage of Israel and the Palestinian
:00:48. > :00:52.The issue flared up again this week after the bodies were found of three
:00:53. > :00:57.teenagers who had been abducted and murdered while hitch`hiking near
:00:58. > :01:00.the Jewish settlement of Gush Etzion in the occupied West Bank, and the
:01:01. > :01:03.subsequent murder of a Palestinian youth in Jerusalem, as well
:01:04. > :01:08.Some viewers applauded the BBC's reporting, such as
:01:09. > :01:11.Rowan Summerville, who e`mailed after a live comment from the
:01:12. > :01:28.Howard Isaacs took issue with an item on the BBC News website,
:01:29. > :01:42.Most of the hundreds of complaints received this week though have been
:01:43. > :01:49.We asked two viewers, who contacted us, to put their thoughts on camera.
:01:50. > :01:52.For days they have shared the families torment, an entire
:01:53. > :01:57.nation hoping and paying for the return of three teenage boys.
:01:58. > :02:06.The tenure of the reporting was encouraging us to have sympathy
:02:07. > :02:13.for the Israeli nation, with their sense of outrage and their grief.
:02:14. > :02:17.While the murders, I agree, are deplorable, there are grieving
:02:18. > :02:24.Really, the only mention of the Palestinians was
:02:25. > :02:31.I felt that painted a very bad picture.
:02:32. > :02:34.I didn't think the Palestinian viewpoint was being put across
:02:35. > :02:38.By that, I mean the context of the daily lives that
:02:39. > :02:44.The Israeli view on Hamas and really the political conditions in Israel
:02:45. > :02:52.seem to overlay what was really a human story around a crime.
:02:53. > :02:54.Rather than go after the criminals, Israel seemed to engage
:02:55. > :03:00.I think the media didn't really pick up on that at all.
:03:01. > :03:04.I'm pleased that in reporting since Tuesday there has been much more
:03:05. > :03:10.balance and the Palestinian teenager who was recently found murdered,
:03:11. > :03:17.I was really very pleased to see that.
:03:18. > :03:20.My hope and my prayer is that, going forward, the Palestinian
:03:21. > :03:25.people will be shown more equality and fairness, and being given
:03:26. > :03:38.Well, we asked BBC News for their response to those views,
:03:39. > :04:12.Now, BBC News has appointed its first health editor, Hugh Pym, who
:04:13. > :04:16.was formally the Corporation's chief economics correspondent, he took up
:04:17. > :04:22.Already, he will have found out it's a brief full of political
:04:23. > :04:38.With a rising population and increasing demands on the NHS,
:04:39. > :04:41.efficiency savings have had to be made to protect frontline services.
:04:42. > :04:44.Now, health chiefs are warning for the next financial year
:04:45. > :04:46.Soaring waiting lists, a funding crisis
:04:47. > :04:49.and a GP system which is imploding, that was today's bleak warning from
:04:50. > :04:51.the British Medical Association, which represents doctors.
:04:52. > :04:54.With the general election less than a year away,
:04:55. > :04:57.the temperature in the political debate over health is rising.
:04:58. > :05:01.There is now a row over claims made by David Cameron over waiting times
:05:02. > :05:05.at hospital Accident Emergency units in England.
:05:06. > :05:07.Audiences tend to respond strongly and often emotionally
:05:08. > :05:12.Newswatch viewers have always had plenty to say about this area.
:05:13. > :05:32.One recurrent observation is summed up here by Gavin Pike.
:05:33. > :05:35.Another concern is that the BBC, among other media,
:05:36. > :05:41.has alarmed people by making too much of health scares over
:05:42. > :05:44.the years, whether it is CJD, swine flu or notoriously the MMR vaccine.
:05:45. > :06:12.Well, the BBC's new health editor, Hugh Pym, is with me now.
:06:13. > :06:15.Hugh, can you start by explaining why the BBC felt the
:06:16. > :06:22.need for a health editor and how far your coverage is being rethought?
:06:23. > :06:24.Well, health is an extremely important
:06:25. > :06:28.issue to all BBC viewers, listeners and consumers of online stories.
:06:29. > :06:32.Obviously, the economy is a very big story as well.
:06:33. > :06:35.I think the view was, you have a business editor, an economics
:06:36. > :06:39.editor, political editor, a health editor, it should be a position that
:06:40. > :06:42.the BBC has given the wide range of material that is out there, the
:06:43. > :06:45.concerns that people have, as patients, the interest people
:06:46. > :06:50.I'm very honoured and privileged to have
:06:51. > :06:55.You've come from an economics background, and one might have said
:06:56. > :06:58.` well, how much do you know about the medical side of health?
:06:59. > :07:09.I've had a grounding, if you like, from a very young age.
:07:10. > :07:12.I've seen the extraordinary professionalism of
:07:13. > :07:15.people working in all areas of the NHS and watching my father at work.
:07:16. > :07:19.Yes, I come from a non`health reporting
:07:20. > :07:23.background, I think an economics background, I covered politics as
:07:24. > :07:27.well, many of the political debates about the NHS over the last 20
:07:28. > :07:31.years, I've been covering various different news organisations.
:07:32. > :07:35.I think there is a certain layer of coverage which I will be looking
:07:36. > :07:38.at, among other things, over the funding of the NHS.
:07:39. > :07:43.How we can expect the NHS to develop in future years
:07:44. > :07:46.with likely continued austerity, in terms of Government policy
:07:47. > :07:52.What sort of services we can expect, to how we pay for it.
:07:53. > :07:56.And, if you like, the whole debate about what the NHS
:07:57. > :07:58.can do, faced with a rising population and rising demands.
:07:59. > :08:01.There is a perceived media tendency to hype up health scares.
:08:02. > :08:07.People do feel they look at BBC coverage and when there is a scare,
:08:08. > :08:11.whether it's about avian flu, CJD or the MMR vaccine, a lot
:08:12. > :08:15.of this coverage seems to actually add to perhaps a sense of panic?
:08:16. > :08:19.The specialist health coverage provided by the BBC has always been
:08:20. > :08:22.very careful, and in the medical world as well,
:08:23. > :08:30.to cut through the different claims and counter claims of health scare
:08:31. > :08:35.Not to do stories sometimes which are not based on really rigorous
:08:36. > :08:37.scientific and peer reviewed research and not to major on things,
:08:38. > :08:40.even if some other media are doing it, to try and give viewers
:08:41. > :08:45.It's a difficult one, but I think the BBC has done pretty
:08:46. > :08:48.It seems like it's getting more difficult.
:08:49. > :08:50.In a way, your background in economics and politics seems
:08:51. > :08:53.quite relevant because coverage of health is perhaps more politicised
:08:54. > :08:56.Particularly, this idea that negative stories, whether about
:08:57. > :08:59.health scares or about scandals of poor care at hospitals, these
:09:00. > :09:03.are political in the way they are reported and that they might serve
:09:04. > :09:12.I think, with nine or ten months to go to the general election, it is
:09:13. > :09:17.What happens to health after the election?
:09:18. > :09:21.Different claims and counter claims about this Government's record.
:09:22. > :09:25.I'm totally aware there will be people who feel very strongly about
:09:26. > :09:30.What would you say to reassure them, those who feel there is a bias,
:09:31. > :09:33.They feel there is a BBC bias, or a lack of awareness
:09:34. > :09:36.of how this coverage cumulatively undermines the NHS?
:09:37. > :09:40.Well, I would take issue with the fact that BBC coverage
:09:41. > :09:45.The BBC has highlighted some very positive initiatives.
:09:46. > :09:51.There was a report, just out recently from a US think`tank,
:09:52. > :09:54.the Commonwealth Fund, showing the NHS was one of the most efficient
:09:55. > :10:01.I think the BBC does pick up stories like that and is keen
:10:02. > :10:06.I did a story about GPs very recently.
:10:07. > :10:09.The BMA saying that GPs were very worried about funding and Government
:10:10. > :10:13.Equally, some initiatives, like one in north`West London where
:10:14. > :10:16.GPs are working together to widen access to their patients.
:10:17. > :10:18.That is showing the very best of the NHS.
:10:19. > :10:24.Finally, there were wails of disappointment among tennis fans
:10:25. > :10:27.on Wednesday as Andy Murray was knocked out of Wimbledon.
:10:28. > :10:30.Bryan Hock was following reports of the tournament on the BBC News
:10:31. > :10:35.He sent us screen grabs of two contrasting articles:
:10:36. > :10:42.On Monday, when everything was going well for the reigning Champion,
:10:43. > :10:44.the site crowed, "the Briton has yet to drop a set."
:10:45. > :10:47.Two days later, the defeated Murray was referred to as, "the Scot."
:10:48. > :10:57.Mr Hock was bemused by the discrepancy writing:
:10:58. > :11:00.Thanks very much to all those who got in touch with us this week.
:11:01. > :11:04.You too can share your opinions on BBC News and current affairs
:11:05. > :11:11.and perhaps appear on the programme, just call us, e`mail:
:11:12. > :11:20.If you ever miss a programme, you can catch up with the previous
:11:21. > :11:27.We will be back to hear your thoughts about BBC News
:11:28. > :11:47.what a day contrasting weather conditions out there. Highest
:11:48. > :11:51.temperatures 29 degrees. More cloud and rain to the west. That will
:11:52. > :11:55.continue to track eastwards over night tonight. Some of it turning
:11:56. > :11:57.heavy as well as