A dinner was held this month to mark the 10th anniversary of the opening of the ME/CFS clinic at Wareham Hospital in Dorset – the first of its kind in the UK. 

The Reading area group now urgently requires volunteers to fill key role posts of: Group Contact/Coordinator, Core Group members, Treasurer, Newsletter Editor, Librarian, Rep for East Berks PCT services & help with the following tasks: answering emails, co-ordinating social events (for Bracknell, Maidenhead &  Windsor area, and for overall coordination).

UK charity Invest in ME has announced the date of their fourth international research conference . It will be held in Westminster on Thursday 29 May 2009 with – says the organisation – the support of the European ME Alliance. Details will be announced later.

This appeared in The Guardian on Friday, November 28. Profile written by ALLEGRA STRATTON.

There may be a reason why the chief secretary to the Treasury, Yvette Cooper, is bullish about the government's electoral prospects despite a downturn. Twelve years ago the then 27-year-old was a leader writer on the Independent but was clearly so taken with a particular thesis that she strayed from the leader writer's usual anonymity to make the same argument twice in less than six months before the 1997 general election.

Eric Smart, our Aberdeen-Australia cyclist, posted a new blog overnight – but still leaves a bit of a  mystery about exactly where he is.

A new website designed to give patients a greater say on healthcare in Sheffield has been launched. Sheffieldhealth.co.uk has been created by the Central Sheffield GP Consortium to provide up-to-date healthcare information and advice for patients, as well as providing hosting online surveys, allowing them to air their views about services in the city.

Bernard Speakman, treasurer of the Worcestershire ME Group, will be at Buckingham Palace tomorrow (November 27) to attend the Victim Support Volunteer of the Year Awards ceremony hosted by the Princess Royal.

... The Lightning Process!

Professor Stephen Holgate, chair of the Medical Research Council's new advisory panel on ME/CFS, has been booked by the Dorset ME Support Group to speak on the need for a national research strategy for the illness.

The letter appeared yesterday (November 20) under the headline  'I believe there is a cure for ME: I've tested it' 

From Gair Rhydd, Cardiff's Student Weekly, 17 November 2008

Emma McFarnon investigates the frequently misunderstood illness, ME

The first in an occasional series being put on The ME Association website.

For four years I've been suffering with ME and for four years I’ve been trying to describe it to non-sufferers. I’ve compared it to a permanent flu, to a never-ending marathon, to insomnia with eventual pointless sleep.

The Government said it will look again at its system for avoiding risks from crop pesticides after an environmental campaigner won a landmark ruling that the current measures contravene European law.

We're receiving a lot of inquiries about whether people with ME/CFS should be having flu vaccinations. To see our updated information leaflet on the subject, which covers all aspects of flu vaccine,  please use our downloadable order which can be found here. The leaflet is on page 3.

"I've think we've been taken prisoner,", I told Ed. "Well, there's not a lot we can do about it", he said. Just a week before, the possibility of being surrounded by armed men would have filled me with dread but I seemed to have developed Ed's "Oh, we'll worry about it in the morning" attitude.

The man who killed ME campaigner Kevin Tripp with a single blow in a London supermarket this summer is to be sentenced at the Old Bailey on December 5.

Dr Ben Goldacre's (possibly rather controversial) programme on Incapacity Benefit reform, and the tough new government policy on sickness benefits, will be transmitted at 8pm on BBC Radio 4 on Monday 10 November.

More information about the programme here.

To read or join in the discussion on the programme, click here.

The deadline for comments on the draft terms of reference for the APPG Inquiry into English NHS service provision is Friday 14 November 2008.