The World Health Organization (WHO) has published a fact sheet, which will come as little surprise to UK GDPs. It shows that oral disease in children and adults is higher among poor and disadvantaged population groups. Risk factors for oral diseases include an unhealthy diet, tobacco use, harmful alcohol use and poor oral hygiene, and social determinants.

Martin Fallowfield, a GDP in Peterborough, has been elected to chair the BDA’s new Principal Executive Committee (PEC).  Also elected as Deputy Chair was Robert Kinloch who is also a GDP, practising near Loch Lomond in Scotland. The third senior key office holder of the PEC will be Judith Husband, who has been elected as Chair of the Education, Ethics, and Dental Team Committee. 

Deborah White, associate professor and director of education at the School of Dentistry at Birmingham, has been elected as the new Chair of the British Dental Association’s Central Committee for Dental Academic Staff (CCDAS) for the 2012/14 triennium. She was Vice Chair of CCDAS in the last triennium. The new Chair of CCDAS will be supported by Jeff Wilson, the newly-elected Vice Chair. Jeff is a senior clinical lecturer in restorative dentistry at Cardiff University Dental School.

Dr Nigel Carter has been appointed an Officer of the Order of the Brritish Empire (OBE) in the Queens Birthday Honours list. He is Chief Executive of the British Dental Health Foundation (BDHF).

Also honoured was Roger Farbey, head librarian of the British Dental Association, who becomes an MBE.

Oral bacteria that escape into the bloodstream are able to cause blood clots and trigger life-threatening endocarditis, according to recent research. If the bacteria Streptococcus gordonii enter into the blood stream through bleeding gums they can start to wreak havoc by masquerading as human proteins.

Oasis the dental corporate is reported to be trying to raise £250m-plus in order to expand. The company runs 205 dental practices, but believes that it can double this number. However, Duke Street Capital, the private equity majority owner of Oasis, needs to raise a fresh injection of funding — either by attracting a new investor, or selling the company.

A UN meeting at the end of the month in Uruguay will consider a legally binding agreement which would curb the use of dental amalgam world-wide. If agreed it could be ratified next year. Separately the UK Government led by the Department of the Environment, not Health, has been discussing how the rest of Europe could come in line with those, mainly Scandinavian, countries which have imposed severe restrictions on the use of the material.