Mike Causey – Wrecclesham and Rowledge
Waverley Borough CouncillorArchive for Health
Legal Drugs?
This post carries the potential to have me called ‘insensitive’ and ‘out-of-touch’, and treated a bit like Maggie Atkinson. But, I do believe that in the midst of understandably emotional and distraught reactions to the tragic deaths being attributed to the use of the legal substance mephedrone, other positions on whether decriminalisation of similar substances should occur, should be heard.
What I’m not saying is that I have this unimaginably clear and unequivocal policy on it all. But I am saying that to allow knee-jerk reactions to drive public acceptance that banning anything that has the potential to kill is the right response, would be to deny a much more sensible, liberal and, measured approach.
Should we protect our children? Absolutely. Is creating laws against everything in sight which has even the remotest change of damaging our children, the way to protect them from harm? No.
Do we ban glue? No. But we know that glue-sniffing is common and damaging. Do we ban alcohol? No. But we know that alcoholism kills and that banning it has been tried and failed dramatically.
Also, the fact that something is legal, is not a very solid case for claiming that this makes people think that it won’t do them any harm. I don’t buy that. Our government can and should influence behaviour through guidance and laws, but it is not accountable per se for individuals’ actions.
The very best way to protect our children is to role model behaviour in our families. To show how to make good decisions. To be an example of modesty in actions and words and consumption. To give our children a framework of boundaries that they understand, and understand why. I know that I won’t get this perfect – far from it. And I also know that my aspiration to role model in this way will not guarantee my children’s safety at all times. But I don’t expect that it will. I acknowledge the risks inherent in every day life and, the consequences of individual decisions. Let’s keep it that way – keeping bigger government at bay – and continue to do our best in our homes.
The Rest is Silence
In my opinion, these are wise words from Dan Hannan: The NHS row: my final word
Between Ourselves
Listening to Radio 4 on Wednesday morning I was inspired by the stories of two soldiers lives since being badly injured in battle.
It personally resonated as my paternal grandfather lost his leg to a landmin in Italy in World War 2, and led a varied and successful life after that, ending as Director of Social Services in Cumbria. The kind of physical and psychological toll that severe injuries, including amputations, can take on soldiers’ lives, are severe, and the extent to which the two men interviewed on Between Ourselves are conducting valuable and important activities is a testament to the both their own determination, and the care they received on returning to the UK.
Today, in the light of the storm of support for the NHS that has arisen in opposition to the crude US caricature of the NHS being touted to scare supporters of President Obama’s reform plans, it would behove us to recognise at least a couple of things:
(1) We can support the NHS to this hilt, whilst also continuing to recognise its failings, not least it’s unsuitability to serving the best interest of some military personnel after having to leave the services due to injury. In doing so, we should not feel it necessary to leap to overgenerous statements of support that give the impression of a perfect system.
(2) For as many stories of great service, there are the same number of appalled patients, living out the painful consequences of superbugs, dirty wards, and shortage of staff. To pretend otherwise is to risk allowing these things to drift of memory, and fail to fix the problems.
By all means, let us be glad of a service that has the best of intentions, and in many cases the best of staff, but let’s not overgeneralise and believe that any but the smallest of portion of the US population will believe what we say, or even care.
Flu Update
Waverley Borough has plans for various kinds of pandemics, and, with at least one councillor a GP, my inbox has seen a couple of very informed emails in the past 24 hours. Distilled below are the key points:
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The national flu line will not be ready until August
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Pharmaceutical wholesalers have been instructed not to supply Tamiful to anyone other than the DoH
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There are no confirmed cases in Surrey
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Leaflets about swine flu from the DoH will be through people’s doors next Tuesday
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DoH has ordered special face masks for frontline NHS staff dealing constantly with affected patients
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A national swine flu helpline is now available: 0800 1 513 513
Two simple measures:
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Wash your hands regularly
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‘Catch it, bin it, kill it’ is the message: cover your mouth and nose when coughing or sneezing into a tissue and dispose of it carefully.
For further information:
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www.surreyalert.info
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www.surreyhealth.nhs.uk
Dispensing Justice
Thanks to my fellow councillor John Ward for alerting me to the challenges facing the Holly Tree Surgery on Boundstone Road. The peculiarities of licensing dispensaries is causing a major headache for them.
The surgery presently has a ‘Dispensing Licence’ which allows it to dispense medicines to its patients provided they live more than 1.6 kilometres (1 mile) from an actual Pharmacy. An application to open a pharmacy in Rowledge has been submitted by a much larger company and if granted, would mean that the Holly Tree Surgery would have to cease dispensing to virtually all its patients. Although sounding useful, this would be a serious inhibition to the surgery being able to server its patients in the most sensible and comprehensive way.
The surgery website has some great tips on how to write to the local Primary Care Support Services to oppose this application. Please consider writing soon. I will be.
Have I Got News For You…
… from guest publication “Dental Tribune“, courtesy of my mother-in-law (erstwhile Practice Manager of Weobley, Herefordshire).
Last night it was pointed out to me that the front page of the UK edition reported on the NHS Dental Services debate in the House of Lords, on 24th April. However, what was frustrating, was having reported that Lord Colwyn, listed “eight reasons not to be a National Health Service dentist”, it failed to mention them. Given that my father-in-law and one brother-in-law are NHS dentists, and that Lord Colwyn was listing these reasons as evidence of how our government has made it increasingly likely for dentists to become private, I thought I would hunt out the reasons (from the online version of Hansard) and list below:
1. The NHS does not recognise that a dental business is a business.
2. Laboratory bills are huge.
3. The UDAs, the units of dental activity payment bands, are seen as covering too wide a spectrum.
4. Dentists do not wish to take on new patients with an unknown volume of work needed, because of the risk of a large increase in expenses gainst a fixed-target income.
5. If the dentist falls short of the fixed target in his contract at the end of an NHS financial year, a proportion of his fee can be reclaimed.
6. If the dentist exceeds his target, any further work undertaken by the dentist in that financial year has to be carried out unpaid.
7. Preventive work is not carried out fully because dentists are too busy on the UDA treadmill.
8. It has become extremely difficult to realise the good-will value of the business by selling it on to a successor dentist, as the the PCTs will not provide any transfer undertaking or certification.
And the government response to these reasons that many, if not all, NHS dentists and patients would recognise?
Baroness Thornton: “our record on dentistry is strong”.
