Current and former smokers in Somerset are being offered free NHS lung checks. The death has been announced of a former long-serving Somerset councillor, Derek Yeomans. £800 has been donated to St Margaret’s Hospice by Chard United Football Club in memory of a former player. Yeovil Freewheelers blood bikes are holding a charity bike ride this weekend ...and more
Current and former smokers in Somerset are being given lung checks as part of the NHS's Targeted Lung Health Check Programme. More than three thousand-seven-hundred people used the service in the last twelve months, from which seventeen lung cancers were detected, mainly at an early stage. The programme is on offer to current and former smokers aged fifty-five to seventy-four.
The death has been announced of former long-serving Somerset councillor, Derek Yeomans. Mr Yeomans served as a member of the former South Somerset District Council and Somerset County Council representing Langport and Curry Rival for more than twenty years and was also a long-serving member of Curry Rivel Parish Council, where he lived.
A Yeovil farmer has come to the aid of a Berkshire family who had appealed for standing corn to display at their mother's funeral. She was evacuated to Long Load during the Second World War and fell in love with Somerset after living in the County for five years. Local farmer, Chris Baker, heard the appeal and says he’ll be sending standing corn grown in Yeovil to the family to include in the floral tributes at their mother’s funeral.
Yeovil Freewheelers blood bikes are holding a charity bike ride this weekend. The Freewheelers, who are based at Yeovil Hospital, transport medical items between hospitals in the South West for the NHS as a free service and need to raise around ninety thousand pounds every year to fund their activities. On Saturday they’ll be joined by around one hundred other bikers on a journey starting at Cartgate in Yeovil, travelling through Axminster, Lyme Regis, Weymouth and Dorchester before finishing in West Camel, collecting donations on the way.
£800 has been donated to St Margaret’s Hospice by Chard United Football Club. The money was raised in memory of former Chard player Alex Ives who died last year aged thirty-two and was provided with end-of-life care by St Margaret’s.
A new website has been launched to support people in Somerset with mental health issues. One of Yeovil’s oldest pubs has been sold. Artwork on the theme of aviation produced by students at Yeovil College has gone on display at Leonardo Helicopters in Yeovil.A pupil at Tatworth Primary School near Chard has won a prize in a national competition for writing a book review...and more
Work laying a gas main on the A37 Dorchester Road near the Quicksilver Mail roundabout in Yeovil is to continue for a further two months. Somerset Council says the public toilets in Yeovil bus station will close at the end of the month but the waiting room will stay open temporarily. Former Yeovil Town Captain, Josh Staunton, has set up in business as a professional gardener...and more.
Somerset Council seeking to save £40 million by cutting one thousand jobs says 201 employees have so far applied to leave the authority based on voluntary redundancy. East Somerset Railway near Shepton Mallet has been used for filming the TV adaptation of Jilly Cooper's novel Rivals. An old-style red phone box in Castle Cary is being turned into Somerset's smallest museum...and more
Somerset's Chief Medical Officer says GP surgeries using healthcare professionals alongside doctors to provide treatments has freed up GP appointments. A farmer has been fined £15,000 for polluting a household water supply. Avon and Somerset’s new Police and Crime Commissioner has officially started work in the role. Chard Post Office is closed today for the handover of the business to new owners...and more.
Health inspectors have criticised Somerset's maternity services, including those at Yeovil Hospital. Somerset Council says re-opening Yeovil’s Octagon Theatre in its original form could cost up to £200,000 if a multi-million-pound upgrade of the building falls through. A film made by a Yeovil man on a budget of just five thousand pounds was screened at the prestigious British Independent Film Festival...and more.
The Ferne Animal Sanctuary near Chard says it needs an immediate injection of £100,000 to keep going. Yeovil’s Marlie Packer has returned to Yeovil Rugby Club where she began her rugby career 20 years ago. Twenty-five Town criers from across the South will be in Ilminster tomorrow competing in the annual Ilminster Town Criers' Competition...and more.
Train services through Somerset are again being disrupted today due to continued strike action by the train driver’s union ALSEF. A campaign has been launched in Somerset aimed at stopping people overdosing on opioids. A Somerset business is raising a smile with its name.‘Top Of The Clops’, a tack shop near Taunton has won a place in the top ten of the UK’s funniest business names...and more.
A woman driver has been told she faces a prison term for causing the deaths of two people in a crash on the A303. The AA says there are more potholes than ever on Somerset’s motorway network, leading to an increase in damage to vehicles. The new cancer treatment unit at Yeovil Hospital should be open before the end of the year...and more.
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