Do We Need A National Health Service?
You might say that’s what we’ve got, but what we really have is a National Illness Service
But it is not making best use of resources to make sure we don’t need it.
Consider some of the things that have happened to me in the last couple of days.
I ran out of statins yesterday, which indicated to me that I’d got to get a repeat prescription from Boots. But where was the message to say it was time to pick them up?
It doesn’t matter to me, as the Boots I use, as did my grandmother before the First World War, is only a bus ride away.
Whilst waiting for my prescription, I got talking to a young lady from Cancer Research UK, who was also waiting for her prescription. I teased her about not smoking and I was glad to see she didn’t. I wish my son George had been so sensible.
I then got talking to a lady, who must have been around eighty and we discussed how I tested my own INR. She was familiar with the device and had wanted one for her mother, who had had a stroke. But the cost was just too much, so the surgery used to send a nurse round.
I feel very strongly, that in the right hands self-testing is a real life improver, as any diabetic will tell you. After all, most of us can now use a well-designed device.
We also talked about my coeliac disease, as her two great-daughters had both been diagnosed, but she didn’t know, it can be a cause of not getting pregnant.
When I was diagnosed as a coeliac, a lot of the information I received from Addenbrookes was far too comprehensive and not very practical. But, gradually with the help of various trusted web sites and a previous GP, I’ve found a regime that works for me.
Perhaps, what is needed is a network of local mentors for diseases like coeliac disease, as what you can find differs very much as you go around the country.One regime definitely doesn’t fit all!
For instance, Cambridge, Glasgow and Liverpool are much easier than say Blackpool, Ipswich or Middlesborough.
Incidentally, on Sunday, a young lady and her boyfriend had been a bit confused as to what bread to buy in Marks at Waterloo station, so as I do when asked an opinion, I guided her through the gluten-free section. To be fair to Marks, their staff are usually helpful.
Over the last few months, I’ve been involved in the testing of a new anti-cholesterol drug, at the William Harvey Research Institute.
On a selfish note, it has allayed a lot of fears about my health.
I would certainly recommend that if you have a medical or psychological condition, that you check out the research around your local area and see if you can help by joining a suitable research project.
From my experience with Liverpool University, I know they are looking for people to assist with research, much of which is psychological and just involves answering a few questions.
Over the years, I’ve been involved in research at Moorfields Hospital, Liverpool University, Oxford University and the University of East London, none of which involved any more than looking at a computer screen or filling in a form.
The Moorfields research was in some ways the most interesting, where I had my eyes tested on a series of new machines and was then asked to say which ones I preferred. The project was attempting to find the best machines for the NHS.
So if your local University is looking for research volunteers, in something that might be to your advantage, why not volunteer.
After all, it is our National Health Service and we should bend it to our needs.
With the anti-cholesterol drug, I’ve seen some of the best doctors in the field and I’ve learned to inject myself. Hopefully, it’s a skill I won’t need again.
How Do You Get Round This One, Donald?
This article from Global Rail News is entitled Request for California high-speed train parts to be exempt from domestic content rules.
This is said.
The California High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA) has requested several key components of its trains be exempt from the USA’s strict local content requirements because there is nowhere in the country that can currently manufacture them.
So what parts are involved?
It appears to be body shells, braking systems and bogies.
Aren’t they fairly crucial?
It’s Time To Look On The Bright Side Of Trump
This was the title of a comment by Matt Ridley in The Times yesterday.
He may not be everyone’s cup of tea, but I have read a couple of his books; Genome and Nature via Nurture and found they added to my knowledge.
This is a precis of his comment.
He starts like this.
So here, after a few days of talking to people in America’s two biggest economies, California and Texas, are ten reasons why I think a Trump residency may not be as awful as many think, even if, like me, you heard of the news of his victory with a sinking feeling.
The article has ten main sections.
- Just as after Brexit, the markets went up, not down. Despite the predictions of analysts.
- He is already watering down his more outlandish threats.
- The Presidency is nothing like as powerful a job as it seems.
- The Democratic Party will soon be back and hounding Mr. Trump, if only in the Courts.
- Mr. Trump is already surrounding himself with reasonably sensible people.
- Some of his policies are not so bad.
- His adviser on climate and energy, Myron Ebell, is right that climate change policy has become a gravy train for the rich that hurts the poor.
- The promised “swamp draining” – in the unlikely event Mr. Trump pulls it off – will be cathartic.
- His reprehensible attitude to women, minorities and the disabled, though setting a terrible example, is fortunately unlikely to result in actual persecution by the government.
- The idea that this is the end of democracy or the start of fascism, as some hyperventilating luvvies are saying, is nonsense.
Ridley finishes with.
If he really does kill the North American Free Trade Agreement, as well as the transpacific and transatlantic trade treaties, he will assuredly cause a recession that hurts blue-collar workers in the rust belt more than free trade ever did. And he might craqsh the world economy.
I can see few silver linings there.
Here are some quotes from the article I can agree with.
- Mr. Pence is a creationist and religious conservative, which is not my cup of tea.
- The House Speaker, Paul Ryan, is a formidable figure who will effectively decide how much of Trump’s programme will happen.
- Steven Mnuchin, the likely Treasury Secretary, is from Goldman Sachs, for goodness sake.
- If Mr. Trump unleashes more gas production, that will cut emissions and drive out coal faster than renewable energy ever could.
- Compared with many Republicans, Mr. Trump is positively liberal on matters such as abortion and religion.
- If Mr. Trump makes a mess of things, he will be gone in four years – or sooner.
If you get a chance to read the whole article, you should.
Mobile Signals
When I was on the excursion on Gran Canaria, that I wrote about in A Tour Of Gran Canaria, I was getting an excellent mobile signal all the way, despite at times being amongst mountains that were nearly two thousand metres high.
Yesterday, I was in Victoria station and I was trying to use the Internet to find out, where my train left. The Internet signal was like one of Donald Trump’s speeches – utter tripe!
I think for reasons of safety, that all train stations and bus stops, should have a top-rated mobile signal.
Some years ago, the office at my stud in Newmarket had a dreadful signal. So I pointed a parabolic aerial at the nearest mast and rebroadcast it in the office.
Problem solved!
If I was an MP, who won the right to put a Private Members Bill through Parliament, I would make it the law, that all bus stops and train stations had a mobile signal, of the same quality, I was receiving high up in the mountains of Gran Canaria.
Or are the Elite waiting until a fourteen-year-old girl is raped and murdered because she couldn’t phone her parents for a lift, after getting lost on her bicycle?
The Anonymous Widower 