ACC

At least 160 people were so badly mauled by dogs last year that they needed additional support for lost income, home help or rehabilitation.

More than $3 million of ACC money was lost to fraud last year and culprits increasingly include widowed women ripping off the system.

Has New Zealand's health watchdog lost its bark, asks Stuart McLennan.

People who lodge Accident Compensation Corporation claims in December stay off work longer on average than at any other time of the year and it adds $3 million to the annual weekly compensation bill, ACC says.

Claims by overseas visitors injured during the Rugby World Cup have cost the Accident Compensation Corporation more than $70,000 to date.

Two important announcements by the Government last week were overshadowed by the environmental disaster unfolding in the Bay of Plenty.

A substantial decrease in ACC levies for employers and the self-employed is being welcomed with open arms by Otago-Southland Employers Association chief executive John Scandrett.

A Dunedin woman whose hearing loss resulted from a fatal car accident says a Government policy change reducing ACC financial support for hearing needs is a "kick in the guts".

ACC claimants should not have to take court action to avoid "intrusive" and unnecessary work fitness tests, a distressful experience as was highlighted in a recent Supreme Court case, Dunedin ACC campaigner Denise Powell says.

About 100 people were injured on New Zealand skifields each day last season, a figure ACC hopes to cut through education.