cyber attack on our health service and other countries

[LordKenwyne]

I think the media are holding back on how severe this attack is.

Here are some quotes going around online:

I'm a doctor in one of the affected hospitals, a major trauma center in London. Everything has gone down. No blood results, no radiology images, there's no group specific blood available. They've declared an internal major incident, the hospital is diverting major trauma and stroke patients. All elective surgery was cancelled from about 1pm. We're not doing anything in theatre that's not life or limb threatening. There will almost certainly be deaths as a result of this

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I was working on the wards this morning, currently in the hospital library. Half-tempted to see how the clinical services are coping but I know it'll be chaotic enough already.
SO MUCH is on those computer systems. Appointments, treatment plans, scan results; some hospitals have gone completely computer-based and use it for patient notes & prescriptions.
Unless this is sorted very quickly, there will be patient death and suffering across the country. The people responsible are holding thousands of vulnerable people hostage and should be treated as terrorists.

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This is severely affecting service delivery in the major trauma centre I work at. From the simplest thing like viewing a CT scan or blood results, to reading patient notes, even organising safe discharges of patients in the hospital. This is the equivalent of driving a bus up to the hospital doors and barricading the entrances. It is jeopardising the wellbeing of our patients. We are responding by working around the problem - paper notes, hand delivered requests and results, more doctors and nurses working overtime (who already work overtime).

Good luck living with yourselves lads. However much money you get. Edit - although I have just read:

a) It's not specific to the NHS - they are just victims. It is a worm and no conscious decision has been made to attack the NHS. This is just very bad luck. (and piss poor public sector IT)
b) It is spreading through a vulnerability in the Microsoft LAN file sharing protocol.



Windows 7 PC's are vulnerable apparently.