Eileen Goodwin

As a former nurse who trained to be a doctor, Glen Blackburn is well placed to assess both professions.

His writing's focus on the positive side of life was one he could defend philosophically, prolific author Alexander McCall Smith told those at a soldout event at the Dunedin Writers and Readers Festival on Saturday.

''Sweet and approachable'' was how one fan described Booker Prize winner Eleanor Catton after she signed a copy of The Luminaries at the Dunedin Writers and Readers Festival.

Buying fair trade chocolate helps empower women to be equal with men, a West African cocoa farmer told Dunedin school pupils yesterday.

Decisions about the future of the historic Dunedin Prison will follow the completion of a conservation plan, Dunedin Prison Trust chairman Stewart Harvey says.

A Southern District Health Board member is imploring the board to be upfront about the strings attached to rebuilding Dunedin Hospital.

New Zealand must act quickly to prepare for a looming increase in the number of older people, Ottawa-based academic and consultant Satya Brink says.

A world-first study starting in Dunedin this month may greatly reduce travel times for cancer patients, principal investigator and Dunedin oncologist Christopher Jackson says.

Mosgiel residents hooked on legal highs are resorting to crime to pay for their habit, the community's top cop says.

The recent outbreak of a disease that had largely disappeared in New Zealand shows the benefits of immunisation, Public Health South public health physician Keith Reid says.

More interest in alternative remedies is likely to feature in a post-antibiotic world, a University of Otago infectious diseases authority says.

The Southern District Health Board spent more than $80,000 on consulting advice from a United States-based firm, an Official Information Act request reveals.

Labour says it has done its homework on its planned bowel cancer screening programme, and rejects criticism it will not be based on science.

Labours' promise to introduce a national bowel screening programme is a case of pandering to public opinion, and could have adverse consequences, Green Party health spokesman Kevin Hague says.

A Dunedin mother is ''over the moon'' the Government will fund her son's second cochlear implant, saying money raised for his operation will be given to a child who does not qualify for the expand programme.