Archive for category Health

Oklahoma!

by Ross Sharp on 29 April 2010
Categories: Health, Society | Tags: ,

Once upon a time, God made a man and named him Adam and He looked down and saw that Adam was a fine piece of work so He took a day off and went to the pub for a bit.

When God came back to work on Monday, He had a squizz at how Adam was getting on and He realised that Adam was a bit out of sorts, so He thought, “I will make Adam a friend”.

So He gave Adam some pills to put him to sleep and then He ripped out one of Adam’s ribs and made a woman out of it, which is a really neat trick when you think on it.

I tried to make a woman out of a rib once and all I wound up with was Calista Flockhart.

Anyway, when Adam woke up, He looked at this woman God had made whose name was Eve and Adam got a stiffy. Adam stuck his stiffy into Eve’s front hole and wiggled it about some and that felt really good and Eve thought it felt really good too and made some moaning sounds, but God got pissed about that and yelled out to Eve, “Oi you, ya dumb bint, you’re not supposed to enjoy this y’know, you’re a fucking rib, just lay there and shut the fuck up”.

So that’s what she learnt to do, just shut the fuck up and let Adam poke her in whatever hole he wanted to and whenever he wanted to, a dozen times a day if he felt like it, and that was a fine and dandy tradition simply because it was the natural order of things as God had intended it.

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Steve’s GST burden

by @FakeFielding on 22 April 2010
Categories: Health, Politics | Tags: , , , ,

When I was a kid I always wanted to be an astronaut when I grew up. I used to sit in my bedroom at night and stare out the window at the stars, wondering what the earth would look like if I were up there in a spaceship looking down. I imagined it to be a beautiful sight, with oceans and mountains and clouds and volcanoes and airplanes criss-crossing the sky between me and the sleeping families down below. I had a lot more trouble imagining what it would look like when the spaceship went around the bottom of the planet — what does the underside of the earth look like, anyway? Would it be just lots of dirt with all the tree roots sticking out? Can you see all the oil that hasn’t been pumped up yet and the bottoms of coffins and stuff?

But my point is that never in my wildest dreams did I think that I would be an accountant when I grew up. Not many people know that I was an accountant before I was in control of the Senate; humble beginnings, I can hear you say, but from little things big things grow. As an accountant I probably have a much more intimate knowledge of economic and taxation matters than most ordinary Australians, and I often have to step in at dinner parties and in meetings with colleagues to pour some hard facts on uniformed speculation. Like this one time, Barnaby suggested that we should just print more money to pay off debt and I gently scolded him, pointing out that the cost of the extra plastic and ink would completely wipe out any benefit gained.

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The Ultimate Gayification

by Trevor McDonald on 25 March 2010
Categories: Crime, Health, Media, Society | Tags: , , , , ,

Gidday. Regular readers of this blog (if there are any) would have familiarisation with one of my social commentary themes “The Gayification of [insert topic]“. I brung you the Gayifaction of Men and the Gayifaction of Men x2. And know now my wig his flipped 360 [small zero]. Three of my favourite topics: The Comedy Festival,  Facebook and Christianity have been Gayified with the coming together of a perverse, deeply disturbing and insulting to all disenfranchised blokes “show” called “Faithbook”. A Gayification to top all other Gayifiactions.

De Vinci would roll in his grave

De Vinci would roll in his grave

Now, I have rallied against this kind of thing before with women and their right to vote. With that one I’m gaining ground but it seems I am losing ground with my Gayification topical debate. So I, Trevor McDonald, propose that we as a collective group of blokes protest against our own oppression and not turn our blind eyes to the discrimination we as blokes are facing in the gym toilets, on the Internet and in the public toilets across our street. I am sick of being treated as a second class citizen by the conspiracy to Gayify our nation and its institutes. I am Trevor here me roar.

Tickets for the protest against this suggestiveness and Gayification are available through Ticketmaster (a tool of Leftists Gays) by clicking on this —> hyperlink function. I hope to see youse there some nights and at the Glasshouse for a beer after the show.

Trevor.

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Redundant professions

by Campbell on 12 March 2010
Categories: Health, Society | Tags: , , , ,

If there is one profession going around at the moment that could be replaced by a vending machine it would be pharmacy. Not too long ago pharmacists had to use their brains. They had to know formulas and mix chemical ingredients with a mortar and pestle. Two for you, one for me. Two for me, one for you. Nowadays all they do is whack a sticker on a box of pills and make you wait 15 minutes for it. The pills come in a box like a Lite ‘n Easy meal. Do you have to see some stuck-up gourmet chef to get one of those?

What compounds pharmacists’ overblown sense of importance is their matron-like retail staff. You know the ones who ask you all sorts of inane questions when you buy some Panadol? Do you have any stomach ulcers? Are you taking this in conjunction with Nurofen? Is this for period pain? And why doesn’t Panadol just come in the form of Panadol Rapid? Why do you need the standard form of Panadol that takes hours to work? Further, what about toothpaste that you spend hours staring at in the supermarket isle trying to decide which one out of forty types of Macleans you need?  Why doesn’t that just come in an all-in-one tube?

I was in the chemist recently and I needed to buy some travel handwash. You know, the stuff that comes in the form of a gel to disinfect your hands? After being shadowed by the vulture-like retail assistant, I grabbed a small bottle of handwash from the shelf and walked to the counter where I was asked, “Have you used this before?”

Gobsmacked, my first instinct was to say none of your business. However, to hurry the process up and to shut her up I said yes.

She replied with another question, “Will you be using this around children? Because if you are and they swallow it all then you should ring the poison hotline number.”

Looking at the bottle, I replied, “What’s the number? It’s not on the back of the bottle.”

“Urm … I don’t know. It should be in your phonebook.”

“I don’t have a phonebook. Look, I’m in a hurry …”  and I left feeling slightly violated and pissed off.

Being a consumer is hard enough these days without having to put up with pharmacists and their assistants. They’re as redundant as candlestick makers and radio actors. All you need is a script, and if you have any questions Google it or ask another person in the line. Guaranteed they will know just as much as a pharmacist. Hopefully soon, a vending machine will give you the pills, print the label and you’ll be out of there in under a minute so you can go to the supermarket and spin your brain into circles deciding what toilet paper you need.

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Health still in a half-baked crisis

by @FakeFielding on 3 March 2010
Categories: Health, Politics | Tags: , , ,

A few months ago I had the misfortune to require the services of a hospital and the experience has ultimately had a huge impact on health policy in this country. Susan was taking the kids to the cinema but I wasn’t allowed to go because it was an M-rated film so I was staying home alone. She made me some lunch and put it on a plate in the microwave with a Post-it note arrow stuck next to the keypad, and left on the table a John Farnham, Live In Concert DVD for me to watch. I love staying home alone because I can be totally independent and do what I want.

Having successfully re-heated my food after five frustrating minutes spent realising that I had to press the button next to the Post-in note arrow, not the arrow itself, I settled down in the lounge room to watch the DVD. But all of a sudden disaster struck when I stuck the DVD into the VHS machine without even thinking! What an idiot! Panicking, I frantically pressed EJECT on the remote control and the machine itself, but the disc wouldn’t come out. I changed the batteries and tried again but still nothing! I called Susan to ask what to do but her phone was on silent inside the cinema. Breathing deep to keep the anxiety at bay I knew it was time for some creative thinking.

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The slippery slope

by Scott Bridges on 8 February 2010
Categories: Health, Politics | Tags: , ,

A couple of days ago I had a horrid case of gastro with the works – both ends plus a fever. Punctuated only by regular visits to the toilet, I spent the day laying on the bed and staring at the ceiling fan. I got to thinking about voluntary euthanasia and in particular one of the political arguments used against it, namely the “slippery slope”.

Even though it was just a bog standard stomach bug from a dirty Indian saucepan, thinking about euthanasia was natural in my circumstances. For two days I was unable to eat, unable to participate in any of the activities I had planned, and unable to do anything pleasant to kill time. Using the slippery slope argument I was just a few slips of the slope away from being in a permanent and terminal state of extreme pain and discomfort, drifting in and out of consciousness thanks to the strong medication I needed to cope with the pain, not a single shred of dignity intact, and condemned to living like this for the rest of my limited and pointless days. It was simply terrible, I tell you, and temporarily reinforced my belief that were I ever in a situation like that I would want access to a legal voluntary euthanasia option.

But then I thought about the slippery slope, and I was reminded of why we should never make anything legal that might benefit some people if an adulterated and more evil version of that thing is possible. Voluntary euthanasia, if legal, might bring to an end the suffering of people in the most horrible of circumstances at their request, but it’s possible to think of a future version of a voluntary euthanasia law that made it, perhaps, involuntary, or even that legal voluntary euthanasia encouraged involuntary euthanasia. These outcomes are clearly undesirable so good must be sacrificed to prevent evil.

It’s just like how they started limited overs cricket and from there it was a slippery slope to Twenty20. Or how the Internet was invented and down the slope we slipped to Twitter. The world has suffered, and will continue to suffer, thanks to these short-sighted initial acts.

However, wrapping myself in a blanket to ward of a feverish chill, and grappling with these heavy issues, I was struck by a sudden thought that the whole slippery slope thing is the biggest pile of intellectually-lazy shit ever to be shat out into reasoned debate. Maybe it was the gastro talking, but I couldn’t see why any rational human should ever have to listen to the words “slippery slope” again.

So, with a few solid meals now in my gut, and my thinking being a lot less sloppy, I see no need for any more talk about slippery slopes or other out-of-your-arse arguments. We’re all adults here.

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Mental health and markets: two kinds of failure

by David F on 31 January 2010
Categories: Health, Science, Society, Technology |

It’s nice that the Federal Government has given a gong to Pat McGorry, but our country’s commitment to psychiatric treatment remains at the level of mere lip service. I read with interest a recent newspaper article reporting on the Federal Government’s scheme for giving subsidies to private psychologists. This program began in 2006, in response to widespread evidence of a ‘crisis’ in mental health. Psychiatric problems constituted a vast percentage of overall health burden in Australia, yet were systematically under-funded (in proportional terms). The then-Howard Government arranged for psychologists operating in private practice to be subject to Medicare rebates for the first time. The aim here was to allow the private system to pick up the slack for an over-burdened public system. These are the results:

MEDICARE spending on psychological therapy will blow out to $1.5 billion by 2011, twice its budget allocation, according to a new analysis.

Despite the huge investment – three times the original five-year estimates when the scheme began in 2006 – the Federal Government has not released any evidence that the consultations are improving mental health…

Long consultations with psychologists grew fastest – by 32 per cent. But they were used disproportionately by city dwellers, with country people only about 60 per cent as likely to attend them.

The analysis also shows patients are being hit by out-of-pocket expenses likely to be prohibitive for those on lower incomes – an average $35 for 50 minutes with a psychologist.

This result is not surprising, and I’d like to touch on two related points to elucidate the origins of this costly failure:

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Jack off

by Ross Sharp on 25 November 2009
Categories: Health, Society | Tags: , ,

In what has been described by experts as “reckless, irresponsible, highly disappointing, ridiculous and shocking”, a potentially fatal toxin was recently released to the Australian public and may have been unwittingly consumed by possibly tens of thousands of hapless victims.

It is understood that consumption of this toxin can lead to any or all of the following symptoms -

Chronic high blood pressure, heart attack, kidney failure, stroke, obesity, asthma, serious heart disease.

Leading Australian toxicologists have urged the public not to panic in the wake of the poison’s emergence but are advising caution be exercised in areas where the toxin has been located so far and is most likely to present itself, i.e. food halls and shopping malls.

Bruce Neal, acting Commander of The Sydney World Action on Bio-Genetic and Bio-Terrorist Terminal Toxins Unit demanded the Federal Government take immediate action to eliminate this threat to the health of the nation’s populace by taking such drastic measures as “restricting the ability of people to move freely in or through areas where the toxin is known to exist. We have had reports of people who have consciously chosen to consume this poisonous substance, of their own free will, and we call on the Prime Minister as a matter of utmost urgency to take whatever action may be needed to put a halt to this behaviour immediately and to stop any further spread of this deadly material throughout the wider community. If the military need be bought in, so be it.”

Tony Thirlwell, chief executive of the Poking Our Fingers In Your Chest And Wagging Them In Your Face And Nagging You Till You Die Foundation added that “we run the risk here of cultivating a culture of death if we continue to allow this type of thing to happen. I call on the Prime Minister and the Federal Government to launch an immediate Senate inquiry into how this situation has been allowed to arise.”

Family First Senator Steve Fielding told a media pack last night that he had consumed the substance in question during play lunch the day before, but that it would not prevent him from carrying out his day-to-day parliamentary duties. When asked what effect the poison had had on him, Senator Fielding replied “My pants hurt and I blew a hole in my favourite Snoopy doona”.

Pastor Danny Nahlia of Catch The Fire Ministries also said a few things, none of which made the slightest bit of sense, and a large number of people simply wondered why all these other people couldn’t simply shut the fuck up and mind their own fucking business for once in their miserable fucking lives and stop making out that some shitty bloody hamburger is going bring down civilisation as we know it.

Pass the chips.

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