THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO

Teenager Whose Lung Collapsed

A teenager whose lung collapsed has claimed the chemicals inside Juul pods nearly killed him.

Chance Ammirata, from Florida, United States, used to smoke one pod every couple of days, the equivalent to about 10 cigarettes worth of nicotine and is advising people to throw their vapes away.

His warning came after he was rushed to hospital with a suspected muscle strain which turned out to be severe lung damage.

The 18-year-old said he had been struggling to sleep due to a piercing pain in his left side, but it was only when he went out bowling with a friend that he was forced to go to the hospital.

Seven surgeons came in to see him, and it was scary, especially when you see seven surgeons come in, you think they’re going to tell you that you have five days to live or something like that, but instead the doctors told him they’d found a small hole in his left lung, which had collapsed.

They inserted a tube into his lung and inflated it while they worked to repair the damage, and when they did the actual major surgery to inflate his lungs, the surgeon said that whatever he’d been smoking had left these black dots on his lungs.

And according to reports, specialists told Chance he will never be able to scuba dive again, and that he should stop cross country running, and he’s further been told it would be some time before he’ll be able to get on a plane.

The teen had never smoked cigarettes, only the Juul. He thought the Juul was safe. He’d been doing it for a year and a half and can never do it again, and people out there shouldn’t do it either. People believed that vaping was okay to do, who knew this could be the outcome?

But then inhaling smoke, vapour, drugs et cetera into your body or lungs will not end well, it doesn’t take a mastermind to know that, and with vaping one habit is simply substituting another one and people are really no better off.

And in Wisconsin, at least a dozen people have recently been hospitalized and treated for severe lung damage. The first cases were announced last month, and the number has been rising.

All of these patients are young between their teenage years and 30s and all of them seem to have been harmed by vaping.

Wisconsin’s Department of Health Services confirmed 12 cases and is examining 13 others, including older patients up to their 50s who are experiencing lung damage as a consequence of vaping, and hospitalisation of at least a dozen people raises the question. How have e-cigarettes created so much harm, when they haven’t been around for that long?

It’s mind-boggling because the large preponderance of people who smoked cigarettes started as youngsters or teenagers, but yet you don’t hear about people getting lung cancer until their 40’s, 50’s and 60’s, so consider that matched to people using vapes now, particularly teenagers, and have you ever heard of a teenagers who smoked cigarettes ending up in hospital in their teens.

Yet this teenager ended up being hospitalised after one year of using a vape, and he didn’t have symptoms that might have warned him something was amiss until something was seriously wrong. The problem is we have no concept of what e-cigarettes and vapes will cause and what the symptoms will be.

It took doctors years to completely comprehend all of the dangers associated with smoking cigarettes, including cancer, and when it comes to vapes, it’s too early on for doctors to know all the possible long-term health consequences, however, there’s mounting evidence of short-term risks and lung damage.

Lung damage is what we should be most centred on right now, but there’s so much more going on concerning the chemicals in e-cigarettes and vapes, and doctors have no idea what the consequence is going to be because they’ve not seen it before.

A study printed in the journal Pediatrics last year discovered a number of different toxic chemicals in e-cigarettes, including one linked to different kinds of cancer, and some of the chemicals turned up even when teens used non-nicotine products like fruit-flavoured vapes.

And whilst there are numerous pending issues about vaping, which I’m certain will be announced over time, one thing has become apparent, it appears that some kids are having very measurable damage in a really short period of time than what we’ve seen from smoking cigarettes.

Universal Credit Warning

Victims have reported being offered loans on their doorstep, on the telephone, or through social media, and some people who currently get government benefits or who qualify for Universal Credit have been targeted by the scam.

The fraudsters are then leaving the victims up to £1,500 out of pocket, and Action Fraud has issued a warning, advising segments of the public to be conscious of ways to defend themselves from being targeted.

People are being contacted by a fraudster, offering them a free or a low-cost Government loan or grant. The scammers are then asking private and financial information from the victim, and they’re using these details to apply for Universal Credit in the victim’s name, normally without notifying them about this.

With the details having been used to apply for Universal Credit, the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) then approves the single claim, transferring the money to the victim’s account, and the fraudster then requests that the victim transfer them a notable part of the money as a finder’s fee.

But, due to having unknowingly received a Universal Credit advance payment, victims have then received a letter from DWP about their Universal Credit application, and due to the fraudster’s actions, they’ve then had to repay the entire amount originally obtained.

One victim has said that they were introduced to the scam by a so-called friend on social media, and after reaching the free grant of more than £1,000, they were later asked to transfer the £500 to the fraudster’s account as a finder’s fee.

But it was only when they got a letter from the DWP requesting the repayments for the advance was when they realised they had been scammed, but a DWP spokesperson said they’re working to encourage people to listen to their senses, and people should be conscious that if someone offers you a low-cost loan from the Government, they may be attempting to hijack your identity.

Everyone should manage their personal information for benefits in the same way they would their bank account, and if someone does believe that they’re being targeted, that they should contact the DWP immediately.

But it just proves how easily the stupid and their money are parted, however, the problem has been raised in Work and Pensions questions in Parliament, and Justin Tomlinson has offered to look into it as a matter of urgency, but I wouldn’t hold your breath, there’s still nothing from DWP, they’re supposedly still investigating whilst fraudster’s are exploiting the Universal Credits benefits system, leaving defenceless families poverty-stricken.

Criminals are posing as Jobcentre workers or helpful advisers are targeting people on low incomes and getting them to hand over their personal details by promising to help them apply for the interest-free loans offered by the Government to meet the waiting period until their initial Universal Credit payment comes through.

The fraudster’s then applied online for the benefit, and then take most or all of the loan and then disappear, but then the Government’s arrogance in thinking that everyone and anyone can manage an online account, and it’s going to feed this phenomenon.

And fairly soon there will be people out there lending out money from the back room of their houses or bars who are going to have a flourishing new cottage industry, helping people to claim Universal Credit and handling their claims because there’s no other help available or people will have to wait longer to get their money.

And the people out there lending money will hold the claimant’s login details, and the victim will come back to them to ask them what to do, and they will be glad of the help, and his fees will be as modest as is the APR’s on his loans.

Facebook is now being used as a way of contacting possible victims, and one victim was scammed into claiming Universal Credit on Facebook. She was informed she could get a £1,200 loan and it wouldn’t affect her benefits.

They took all her details and without her knowledge and lodged a Universal Credit claim and generated a full months payment in advance. The money went into her bank account but she was informed they needed to access her bank details and she gave them the log in details.

The £1,200 was then removed from her account and she contacted the police and her bank. The bank refunded £600 but said she voluntarily took part in the scam, so couldn’t have the full amount reimbursed, and by whoever the fraudster was who lodged the Universal Credit claim, this lead to CTC, HB and the ESA claim being closed down.

She said that the DWP agreed that it must have been someone within the Universal Credit call centre and agreed it was a scam, but they wouldn’t put her back on legacy benefits and are making her repay the £1,200 advance at £100 a month. The interesting thing is, the police said they’ve seen it a few times now.

There has also been a case in which a defenceless claimant, who also has an appointee, but these people turned up at her home when she was alone, plied her with alcohol and made the online Universal Credit claim. The claimant has mental health difficulties and the drink interfered with her medication and she couldn’t recollect much.

These people even drove her to the bank to withdraw cash once the advance came through, then drove off and left her with £25 in her pocket, wasn’t it was kind of them to leave her the taxi fare to get home? These people prey on the defenceless and are nothing more than the lowest of low dregs of society.

45,000 Dairy Cows Could Be Culled

The Ulster Farmers’ Union (UFU) has denied allegations that 45,000 dairy cows will be culled in Northern Ireland as part of a no-deal Brexit, but it’s thought that cows could be culled in the event of a no-deal Brexit if new higher taxes are applied to British milk.

But UFU president Ivor Ferguson said it was “scare tactics”, and the Department of Agriculture said it wasn’t proposing the culling of animals, and that they certainly didn’t anticipate culling dairy cows.

It seems that the figure of 45,000 cows has been plucked out of the air.

They might not be planning to cull animals, but they are examining ways to support the industry through contingency measures and possible funding streams, and the Department of Agriculture, Environmental and Rural Affairs (DAERA) have recruited extra resources and trained current workers in the anticipation of significant demand for export health certificates.

About 800 million litres of milk are processed in the Republic of Ireland from Northern Ireland each year, but the concern amongst farmers in Northern Ireland is that, if no agreement is reached and traditional relationships with the south become complex, the country will be left with an oversupply of milk that they will not be able to process or sell.

Farmers supplies are at their weakest now because farming hasn’t been profitable in a number of sectors, and if milk had to face a tax, the only way that milk would go across the border would be if the government stepped in and paid the tariff.

Of course, our government is only interested in self-preservation, and with farmers saying that they will have to cull animals, and supermarkets warning that they will struggle to keep shelves stocked, rather than murdering harmless animals perhaps we should destroy this Government?

And as we move nearer to October 31st, we should expect all Remain news outlets, the BBC included to be delivering ever-increasingly hysterical reporting of this kind, but then they’re only misleading those who’ve already been deceived.

Yet there’s been no apology from the BBC for tweeting these terror tactics. They published a whole load of tweets all based on a maybe or if what scenarios, but no real facts because there aren’t any yet, and yet they’re assumed to be impartial.

But so much fear from the BBC has turned into white noise and sound reasoning is entirely disregarded, and we really do require an enquiry into fake reporting by the British press on Brexit, and I’m sure Labour would support this, as it’s all they babble on about, having an enquiry.

And before we have a cattle cull, we should probably have a media magnet cull, and then a legal obligation to state explicitly when articles or parts of propaganda or opinions of propaganda are addressed.

On the other hand, do you remember when 10 million sheep and cattle were culled because of foot and mouth? We didn’t seem to have a problem with our milk supply then, next they’ll be telling us that the cows have quit producing milk because of the no-deal Brexit.

So who’s the prime offender for circulating this bogus news? Well, supposedly our own free, fair and unbiased BBC, who appear to be scaremongering and giving out false narratives, and it’s disgraceful that they’re permitted to get away with it.

And now there’s tittle-tattle about cows causing global warming. Of course, we can’t dismiss that farming has a significant influence on global warming, because farming is essentially serving the consumer’s need for food, and with raised prosperity, people are eating more meat and dairy products every year.

And it’s been implied that we eat much less meat and dairy products because this is the most effective way to conquer our personal carbon footprint and to generally lessen our personal negative impact on the environment.

Global warming is a really sensitive issue, and something that we shouldn’t disregard, but of course, we can’t simply blame all the cows or these farms for this phenomenon, humans are also responsible for this.

Every day, a person contributes extensively to global warming unconsciously by driving a vehicle or throwing a bit of plastic or paper, but then there are numerous companies out there that are developing eco-friendly commodities like natural spices, biodegradable plastics, electric cars like peapod cars and the likes.

But what is the actual probability that these acts can actually contribute to preventing global warming? And we should be ashamed of ourselves because we’re immortalising this drivel pro-EU propaganda.

They’re Simply Saying No

It now appears that the EU is refusing to negotiate with the United Kingdom, but the Prime Minister’s been explicit that he wants to negotiate a good deal with the European Union, and he will utilise all the strength of the government to ensure that in the spirit of friendliness that we can negotiate a new deal.

But one thing is obvious, the old deal that was negotiated has failed to pass the House of Commons three times now. So, the government does need a new approach, and whatever happens, while they remain ready and willing to negotiate, the EU must understand that we’re leaving on October 31st, deal or no deal.

This government has been thoroughly explicit in that we need to change the Withdrawal Agreement because it couldn’t get through parliament, and we can’t have a deal, that doesn’t command the spirit of the Government, the Parliament and the country.

And that’s why this government has been clear with the European Union, that we need a new approach, and the government is ready, to engage with the European Union, to negotiate in good faith, to make sure that we can have a friendly relationship in the future, and that the government will put all their strength into making sure that they can obtain that good deal.

But at the moment, it’s the EU that appears to be telling us that they’re not interested and they’re simply saying that they don’t want to talk, and that’s improper and disturbing, and it’s not in Europe’s interests.

This government is willing to negotiate, eager to talk, ready to ensure that we get the greatest possible deal from the European Union, but it’s also the case, that they’re sizing up preparations, so that we’re ready to leave on October 31st, with or without a deal.

And the EU needs to understand that the days of drift, that we’ve had in the past have ended. That’s it, it’s a firm deadline, and the British people expect us to leave, we will be ready to leave, come what may.

I’ve actually got to say that this guy Michael Gove sounds great, he looked the camera in the eye and exaggerated so positively to the British people, it’s extraordinary, but then he was groomed for years at the finest establishments, but that’s why they’re called politicians.

But when did we last meet an honest non-self interested politician? But then Michael Gove is fulfilling the role of an obedient, grateful poodle, and he does it so well.

This is simply classic blame-shifting and it’s outrageous and shameful.

The EU negotiated for the best part of three years in good faith, so no surprise they won’t talk to us anymore, so now the balls in our court, but then when will the ministry of silly walks realise they’ve already made other plans and the United Kingdom will suffer because our government has concluded that hara-kiri is their best choice.

But then they’re a wicked conspiracy of deceiving rogues and collaborators, and they’re driving this country to a repeat of the 1640s, and they’re either really dumb or fundamentally wicked, and it was made quite clear back in March, the United Kingdom was given a 6-month continuation which has been misused.

But it seems that if they tell a lie big enough, and keep repeating it, people will ultimately come to accept it, and if the government create enough chaos, companies start to panic buy which produces a false boost to the economy.

But then it’s tragic that the Tory government have put the whole country in danger by having the stupid, ill-conceived, utterly chaotic referendum in the first place, with no damn speck of a clue what they were doing, and they certainly didn’t think that they would actually lose the referendum.

And now this a taste of how the Tory party will justify the consequences of a no-deal, just blame it on the EU using semi-correct soundbites and half-truths, so of course, the EU is refusing to give massive concessions to a clearly unstable government at the last moment.

And because of this car plants could perhaps shut down, lorries will be backed up across the South East. There will be food and medicine deficits amongst numerous other things, and the blame game has well and truly started.

It’s called moronic politics assuming that negotiations will work the same as if they were purchasing a second-hand car, and Michael Gove has more faces than Everest, and Gove is highly recognisable because we all had a Gove at school, you know, the boy with a pocket full of pens and no friends. The one that was a really good milk monitor, and it looks like Gove has finally found his niche.

Should we be utterly offended that the EU is no longer willing to entertain our circus and testy behaviour? No, I don’t believe so, and I think they’d be delighted if we atoned for the inconvenience and negotiated to remain.

And it’s a disgrace that these Tory ministers can’t grasp the simple reality that there were precepts to joining the EU club and that when we entered we knew there were rules to departing the club, and the EU out referendum campaigners made it appear all so easy whilst knowing it wouldn’t be.

And this is simply another Tory spin at its best from Michael Gove, blaming it on everyone else, except the reality of the fact is that a no-deal Brexit will see the United Kingdom become an even more vulnerable country with no control globally to establish trade or international relationships.

We will be carrying a begging bowl to the world and accepting rubbish trade agreements in desperation, and these are really dark and disturbing times, and the impact of the no-deal will last for generations, and does Michael Gove also sell dodgy investment packages? He has that sort of sound that says I’m a nice boy trying to do my best for you, whilst lying through his fangs, attempting to persuade you that black is white and that it wasn’t him that killed your kitty. Honestly, you can believe him, he’s a politician.

And let’s not forget that three years have been bladdered away on the same old worn out, deflated flatulence.

Perhaps we should give the people another vote, Revoke Article 50 or just leave? But whatever happens, the government needs to be certain of what the people of the United Kingdom want, particularly following all the debacle that David Cameron created.

But one thing is clear, the Conservatives are becoming endangered, and now the EU is telling Britain: “Thank you, next!” And now the government needs to have the guts to revoke the referendum because there’s nothing in the EU Referendum Act that results in it being legally binding.

The European Union Referendum Act 2015 was the law that enabled the referendum to take place, it didn’t stipulate what would happen in the event of a vote to leave, and it didn’t include any specific statement to make clear that the result would be legally binding.

Because of the sovereignty of Parliament, referendums can’t be legally binding in the United Kingdom and are therefore advisory. In other words, unless Parliament actively agrees to bind itself to the result of a future referendum, it is not legally compelled to determine the outcome.

But of course, the political truth is much different, and in the same House of Lords report it said referenda were not legally binding, and the committee decided that “it would be difficult for Parliament to ignore a decisive expression of public opinion”.

And even though legally the referendum was non-binding, the government of that time had agreed to execute the result, and it initiated the official EU withdrawal process on 29 March 2017, meaning that the United Kingdom was due to leave the EU before 11 PM on 29 March 2019, UK time.

Referendums are not legally binding, so legally the Government can disregard the results, for instance, even if the result of a pre-legislative referendum were a majority of “No” for proposed legislation, Parliament could pass it anyway, because parliament is sovereign.

The EU referendum was an advisory referendum, and it wasn’t legally binding, and there’s no one source that can verify that statement true. In other countries, referendums are usually legally binding, for instance, because the vote is on whether to amend the constitution, but the United Kindom famously doesn’t have a codified constitution.

A UK referendum will only have the force of law if the Act setting it up says so. In practical terms, this would mean someone would be able to go to court to make the government implement the result, but a referendum on any issue can only be advisory for the lawmakers in Parliament.

At the end of the day, the argument comes down to many visions for democracy in the United Kingdom. The general view is that ultimate political power rests with Parliament, and the High Court came to its conclusion that the referendum was not legally binding guided by the basic representative parliamentary democracy.

The people are not sovereign!

But then we really don’t want to see any constitutional changes to make referendums binding, and if you’re here reading this, you presumably care about honesty, and you’d like to see our politicians get their facts right, and back up what they say with evidence and to fix their blunders.

Because, of course, reliable information matters!

Man Goes Into Hospital For Botox

A pensioner went into hospital to have a botox procedure and got circumcised by mistake, but has now been awarded £20,000 compensation by the NHS.

Terry Brazier was given the procedure after medics at Leicester Royal Infirmary jumbled up his notes, and he maintains he was so preoccupied chatting to the nurses that he didn’t realise he was getting a different procedure until it was too late.

And they didn’t know what to say to Terry when they discovered they’d done it, and they said they couldn’t send him back to the ward and that they needed to talk to him, and the nurse was at the side of him and they were talking so he didn’t know what was going on, and it was a real shock.

The hospital has said that they remain profoundly and genuinely sorry that the blunder happened, and that they would like to take the chance to once again apologise to Mr Brazier, and that they take events like this very seriously and they carried out a thorough investigation at the time to ensure that they learn from the incident and do all they can to avoid it happening again.

Although it could have been much worse, they could have taken off his leg, at least it’s a foreskin which he can live without, whereas a leg would have made it much more complicated, and whilst money can never undo what occurred, hopefully, the payment can provide some compensation because the hospital definitely made a right cock up there, and you couldn’t make this stuff up if you tried.

And if I was him, I certainly wouldn’t be leaving the surgeon a tip.

McDonald’s New Paper Straws Can’t Be Recycled

McDonald’s new “eco-friendly” paper straws can’t be recycled and must be binned and burned instead.

Plastic straws were banned in all UK branches as part of a green drive, even though the fast-food colossus said they were “100 per cent recyclable”, and now an internal memo reveals the paper versions which were shunned by customers must be binned and burned.

But when McDonald’s introduced paper straws they were getting a pat on the back for being environmentally efficient, but it appears like it was an act to satisfy green campaigners because the things go straight in the rubbish.

The paper straws have angered thousands of McDonald’s customers who maintain they make milkshakes difficult to drink and dissolve in cola, and the firm has admitted that its plastic straws were “100 per cent recyclable” but said it changed to paper because “more can be done”.

It appears that everyone is switched on environmental discussions but the large firms need time to understand what they’re doing.

McDonald’s removed its plastic straws in September and promised to use paper ones in all its 1,361 branches across UK and Ireland, but an internal memo admits: “Paper straws are not yet recyclable and should be disposed of in general waste until further notice.”

And even though they strengthened their paper straws, and their materials are recyclable, their thickness makes it difficult for them to be processed by their waste solution providers, but McDonald’s have said that their working to obtain a solution, so putting paper straws in general waste is therefore temporary.

But Friends of the Earth’s Julian Kirby called on McDonald’s to axe all straws.

McDonald’s rolled out the new straws to all 1,361 branches in the United Kingdom to try and reduce pollution to the environment, but the paper straws had a rocky start with many claiming they ruin drinks and break when they use them to drink milkshakes.

One foodie was so outraged they started a petition to bring back the plastic ones, and in the months since its creation, more than 50,000 people have added their signature.

There are numerous people who dislike the paper straws, and are still managing to obtain bulk plastic straws through the internet, but are dreading when plastic is no longer available, and in Asda, you can purchase metal reusable straws, but they can be extremely deadly.

A 60-year-old English woman died last year after falling on a metal straw in a glass, which caused the utensil to go through her left eye and into her brain. Elena Struthers-Gardner was in her Broadstone home with a mason jar drinking glass in her hand when she fell on Nov. 22.

The 10-inch metal straw was in the jar’s screw-top lid and stabbed Elena’s left eye socket, causing a traumatic brain injury. These are extremely dangerous and should be banned.

I guess she could have done this with a knife or fork, should these be banned too? But then how often do you see a knife or fork sticking out of a cup?

However, there is light at the end of the tunnel because you can purchase reusable rubber straws, and they’re made out of silicone. Silicone is not biodegradable, but it can be recycled efficiently, where facilities exist.

I’m not an enthusiast of paper straws, far from it, but the McPoint is that paper straws naturally brake down McQuicker than McPlastic straws, and they’ve usually begun the process before you’ve even finished your drink, or you could simply drink from the cup, but perish the thought!

And now we can’t even get straws right, what is the world coming to?

Tip for everyone out there, my parents actually taught me to drink from a cup without using a straw, I know, it’s great, isn’t it? It’s very simple, you just pick up the cup, and bring it to your lips, and gently pour the contents into your mouth, I know, insane, isn’t it?

Years ago newspapers would scare us with threats of the communist threats, four-minute warnings and impending nuclear disaster, now it’s paper straws in our milkshake – I’m hiding under the bed hoping it will all go away.

Of course, straws do have a purpose because there are many people out there with disabilities who have to use straws, and straws need to be made for the needs of the disabled person, but not everyone needs to use a straw.

So, let me get this right. In an age when we’re told the trees are all being cut down, McDonald’s are using millions of straws a week made of paper. How long until the eco ‘warriors’ start complaining about that too?

Hemp is probably the answer. The stuff is amazingly versatile and useful. Bottles made from hemp are biodegradable and disappear in a matter of weeks. Hemp grows prolifically, making it an extremely efficient crop for those sustainable plastics know as “bioplastics”, and they’re lightweight, biodegradable and can replace numerous petrochemical plastics (oil-based plastics).

Smoking To Be Wiped Out In England

Leaked reports have revealed a government drive to wipe out smoking altogether in England by 2030.

Tory ministers are poised to reveal the bombshell target in a Green Paper outlining new incentives to kick the habit, with tobacco giants facing a levy to pay for the public health costs of helping people to stop or change to e-cigarettes.

The identical or a comparable tax could further fund the cost of a Trading Standards crackdown on black market goods. In the meantime, pamphlets giving information on how to quit could have to be included in every cigarette packet.

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Boris Johnson had already pledged to halt all new “sin taxes”, and his campaign ties to the tobacco industry have come under huge scrutiny, but he promised a review of existing “sin taxes”, and rather than merely taxing people more, Boris Johnson said that we should look at how efficient the so-called sin taxes really are, and if they really alter behaviour.

And it’s understood that, as one possibility, officials are looking at plans for a levy that was proposed last year, and the tobacco transition fund would work like the sugar tax, forcing both consumers and the industry to change behaviour.

It was claimed that the fund could raise £1 billion over a decade, funded by tobacco firms, to pay for public health “stop smoking” services, but smoking continues to be the UK’s most prominent preventable cause of cancer, despite rates of Britons lighting up halving in the last 35 years.

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The gains in tobacco control have been hard-won, and there’s still much to do, and for the 15 per cent of adults who are not yet smoke-free, smoking is the principal author of ill health and untimely demise, and a significant cause of inequalities.

Nevertheless, people have a right to light up if they want without being harried to quit, and it’s not up to the government to dictate people’s lifestyles.

But a vision for prevention would aim to add five years to a healthy life expectancy in the United Kingdom, and there are now 1.8 million fewer adult smokers in England than seven years ago.

Meanwhile, e-cigarette use proceeds to rise, with 6.3 per cent of adults vaping in 2018, up from 5.5 per cent the previous year, and just over half 51.5 per cent of those vaping said it was helping them quit smoking.

But it appears that this government is whittling away our freedom of choice, and in 30 years time or less people won’t be allowed this and that, and police will be overstretched striving to deal with illegal smoking. Hopefully, within this time, we would have discovered a way of Government that doesn’t need MPs, and we won’t have to fight their ego.

But the more useful approach would be to end politicians expenses and having second homes which they rent out for enormous amounts of money, and their travel expenses and get rid of the House of Lords who get around £1,500 a week for sitting around all day doing nothing apart from sleeping, and the Victorian way has really got to end because it’s a disgrace to our elderly, sick and disabled who are regularly getting cuts made by our treasonable Tory government.

We need to stop all these backhanders from healthcare companies, particularly hedge fund baron Andrew Law, a major investor in healthcare firms and private investors who paid Jeremy Hunt £32,950 for information about the NHS.

And it does make you question what tax will replace the enormous amount the government profit from tobacco if everyone gave up smoking, and next up after the smokers will be the drinkers, the eaters, the drivers and the extreme sportspeople or anyone who puts their lives in jeopardy or risks injury just for the enjoyment because of course that would be another strain on the emergency services and NHS.

Now, we’d daren’t enjoy anything and expect the NHS to pick up the pieces – newsflash, we’re all going to die, I promise you, but we’d also like to enjoy it while we’re here, we won’t of course, but we can dream!

The smoking ban should also include those foul-smelling cigars that all those pompous dipsticks in government smoke, but of course, its all bunk because now their encouraging people to use vapes which are just as harmful to a persons health because according to the American Lung Association, using electronic cigarettes or vaping, especially the flavoured types, can cause popcorn lung.

Once the risks associated with diacetyl were found in the early 2000s, the preponderance of popcorn producers quit using the chemical. However, e-cigarette vapour has been proven to include diacetyl, and in a 2015 study of flavoured e-cigarettes discovered that 39 out of 51 tested brands contained diacetyl.

The same study concluded that most of these brands also contained toxic chemicals acetoin and 2,3 pentanedione.

Manufacturers add diacetyl to the “e-juice” that is vaporized by e-cigarettes, most usually to the strongly-flavoured varieties, and diacetyl occurs in an extensive variety of different flavoured e-cigarette products, ranging from vanilla to caramel and coconut.

A diagnosis of popcorn lung normally happens after a person has presented with the symptoms but has no other respiratory conditions, and there is lung tissue scarring caused by popcorn lung which is irreversible, also there is no cure for the condition once it’s developed and starts tightening the airways.

Of course, the best way to stop popcorn lung is to avoid lung damage, and not to use e-cigarettes or vaping products, particularly those with flavoured products. I’m not saying that vaping is less dangerous than smoking or that smoking is less dangerous than vaping, both are equally as dangerous, and e-cigarettes will ultimately put a strain on the NHS.

And even though the government has made changes to prevent people smoking, they will never put an embargo on smoking because smoking makes the government far too much money from taxes, but the government like smokescreens and they will make it look like they’re attempting to stop it but actually they enjoy the money they get from people smoking.

And do we really believe that the government gives two hoots about our health? And of course, we don’t live in a dictatorship at all, do we?

One In Three GPs Admit They Miss Symptoms

More than one in three GPs acknowledge they’ve neglected to properly diagnose patients because short appointment times have meant symptoms have been missed.

Misdiagnoses meant sick patients are forced to return for repeat appointments and further medical treatment as 10-minute consultation windows didn’t give enough time for doctors to assess them correctly, and a monstrous 94 per cent of NHS doctors said short appointment times put patients in danger, with GPs reporting that they thought the minimum “safe” timeframe would be 16 to 20 minutes.

Four in five stated they don’t always have time to properly diagnose patients, with 55 per cent worrying they have missed severe health problems and 37 per cent thinking they have prescribed the wrong course of treatment.

The survey of 200 GPs, by law firm Slater and Gordon, follows a new report from the Royal College of GPs which called the standard 10-minute appointment “unfit for purpose”. The average consultation is 9.2 minutes in the United Kingdom, but the college said increasing it would enable doctors more time to help people with complex health needs.

It also believes more extended and shorter appointments should be available to cater to people’s various conditions, and half of the GPs in the latest survey said they’re expected to keep appointment times to less than 10 minutes, while others were compelled to reduce this further depending on patient demand for attention.

We should be able to trust our family doctor to listen to our concerns and to recognise any problems, without them worrying about hurrying us through to meet hazardous deadlines, which is of course not the most suitable practice, and these doctors need to have enough time to do their jobs correctly and robustly for the health of the UK.

Individual doctors decide on the length of appointments and if a patient requires a longer consultation, they should be given it, and the recent GP Patient Survey revealed that more than nine in 10 patients trusted their GP, and more than eight in 10 people reported their experience at their GP practise as good or better.

Total health spending in England was around £129 billion in 2018/19 and is supposed to climb to approximately £134 billion by 2019/20, taking inflation into account, and it makes you question where all that money goes to because when most people go into consult with their doctor, there are long waiting lists, then longer waiting lists, and if you need to see a specialist, unless you can afford to go private, then you’re going to wait a pretty long time.

And now the expansion of the dubious ‘GP by Skype’ service is to be extended to every patient by 2021, and the GP at hand app is now well established in London and set to be rolled out, but there are concerns it will take money away from conventional practices.

And plans to replace traditional GP appointments with virtual online doctors could fatally undermine care for elderly patients, and Health Secretary Matt Hancock has promised to roll out the controversial scheme across the NHS, and there are concerns it could cream off young patients and increase the digital divide in healthcare.

The GP at Hand smartphone app uses an algorithm to assess symptoms through a ‘chatbot’ and gives ten-minute video appointments with a doctor. It’s now accessible to millions of patients in London and Birmingham, and Matt Hancock is amongst the 55,000 people to have deregistered from their GP to use the service.

But most of those who have signed up are young and rich and only 0.1 per cent suffers from chronic conditions, and this could affect traditional GP practices because they get a set amount of money for each patient on their books, suggesting they will lose money when patients leave to join the online scheme.

And since it’s essentially the young and fit who sign up, operations are left with a greater proportion of costly patients, such as the elderly, weak and chronically sick, and the app risks creaming off young patients and does not address the broader requirements of the population.

And some will worry that the new service will fatally threaten traditional general practice, leaving GPs with sick and complex patients to look after as fit young patients move, and it’s basically taking money away from practices.

It comes as Britain faces a spiralling GP crisis, as a recorded 138 surgeries shut down last year and millions struggled to secure appointments with a doctor, but Mr Hancock thinks technology could offer a solution, and he said that GP at Hand, works brilliantly for so many patients and goes with the grain of how people access modern services.

But GP leaders are concerned virtual consultations could miss less obvious symptoms that doctors pick up through their gut instincts, and they’re concerned the app will threaten the doctor-patient relationship and antagonise those without smartphones.

The Hand app risks destabilising traditional NHS general practice services and it’s really not suitable for those with complicated health needs and patients who value continuity of care, and there hasn’t been a completely independent evaluation of how safe the service is for patients.

And those who don’t have access to a suitable smartphone are not able to start using the new models on offer, therefore extending the digital divide in healthcare, but an NHS spokesman said that GP funding arrangements had been changed to account for new digital services.

An NHS spokesman said GP funding arrangements had been changed to account for new digital services, and added: ‘The NHS is committed to supporting GPs to increase the use of digital technology, with every patient in England having access to online and video consultation by 2021.’

Babylon, the firm behind the app, said the NHS had to decide whether to protect ‘old-school GP practices or to do the right thing by patients and taxpayers’.

Patients get a ten-minute appointment with their doctor, but during that appointment sometimes symptoms are missed, and the Royal College of GPs wants a more extended 15-minute appointment, and one in three NHS GPs admitted that appointment times are restricted to ten minutes that has led them to miss symptoms.

Incorrect diagnoses mean patients have to return for extra appointments and may become more severely unwell, indicating greater use of NHS time than a longer consultation in the first place, and the 200 doctors that were surveyed about their work pressure, 94 per cent said that appointments should be between 16 and 20 minutes at least.

Four in five said they don’t always have the opportunity to properly diagnose patients, with 55 per cent worrying that they’ve missed serious health problems, and usually don’t have enough time to spend with one patient to make a proper diagnosis, and one doctor said that

‘Recently it took three weeks and repeat appointments to get to the bottom of a patient’s medical condition and offer the correct solution’.

And if these doctors had more time in the first place it would enable them to get to the root of their patient’s complaint right away, and doctors are treated like expendable robots under relenting demand.

Most GPs want to do their very best for their patients, but the system will not let them, and because of this doctors usually burn out, experience significant mental health problems, or simply leave the job.

People put faith in their family doctors to listen to their concerns and to recognise any problems, without having to fret about them racing us through to reach hazardous deadlines which are not the best practice.

They need to have enough time to do their jobs correctly and robustly for the well-being of the United Kingdom, but then it’s characteristic of this government to bring in this kind of system because they don’t care for the sick and vulnerable, and we should all be concerned about this if we value our NHS.

These online companies only dispense with the most salubrious of patients, leaving NHS practices to deal with the sicker amongst us.

The problem is that each gets the equivalent volume of per capita funding. This means that the online companies are rolling in profits as they’re dealing with the healthiest and most affordable patients whilst conventional surgeries have a funding shortfall as they’re dealing with the sickest, and most costly patients.

And now people are going to pay to Skype a random locum doctor at home who can’t examine you whilst bankrupting GP surgeries, so it’s no surprise they’re all closing down, and those who don’t have Skype or don’t wish to use it for such a personal or private matter won’t stand a chance of ever seeing a doctor in person because all their time will be taken up with telephone and Skype consultations.

And what happens when you’re in the midst of a Skype consultation and your connection drops or get cut off? Will that person have to go through all the formalities of getting another appointment?

British Boy Given Detention

Last year on the Nick Ferrari programme, someone called in to say that their teenage son had been given detention, along with classmates for saying they’d vote UKIP during an election. The teacher reacted to the pupils by saying “All UKIP voters were racists” and then handed out detention for their remarks.

The boy’s father couldn’t believe this had happened at his son’s school, and Nick Ferrari described the episode as outrageous and absurd, and politics should be kept out of the classroom, and it doesn’t matter what party this teenager supports because like adults, children have diverse views too which they’re entitled to have, and this singular teacher needs to do the detention himself for being such an idiot.

Telling people who they can and can’t support is similar to a dictatorship, and the teacher should have been dismissed and the head should have been punished, this is the United Kingdom, not North Korea.

Children should be free to explore their own political interests as they grow into adults, and it’s no different from a student in a class idolising Donald Trump, bet they wouldn’t get detention for that, and like the USA, hysterics appears to have infiltrated our education system.

Perhaps we should award these boys with MBE medals for displaying courage for their fair and honest beliefs, it’s called free speech, and teachers should be encouraging open and free discussion, not closing it down.

So, a couple of children have a discussion, and then when one person objects to their beliefs, the teacher, in this case, the kids are excluded. This is was a discussion, but then it became authoritarian when the teacher didn’t agree. “At the end of the day, you can believe whatever you want, as long as I believe it!” Of course, the teacher didn’t say this, but he may as well have.

The problem is, our education system has become an indoctrination platform, and it’s a national disgrace that teachers are persecuting their students for their political beliefs.

At the end of the day, teachers should be doing what they’re paid for, teaching, and they shouldn’t be getting involved in politics, the same as celebrities meddling in politics, and if these teachers can’t teach without intervening, then they shouldn’t teach at all.

On the other hand, if these children want to get politically involved, then they have to understand that sometimes this is the consequence of their beliefs and that not everyone is going to agree.

The problem with numerous schools, kids appear to be taught what to think, rather than how to think, but schools should be supportive of debate and respect democratic freedom of expression to their students, along with their political beliefs.

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And if these boys are getting detention for defending UKIP, then those who promote Labour, should they be publicly whipped?

Once teaching was seen as a vocation, now they’ve turned it into a profession, and they don’t teach children these days, they instruct them, without any freedom of speech, and teachers shouldn’t be telling these children what to believe, they should be teaching them how to think for themselves, it’s not only freedom of speech, but it’s problem-solving as well.

And if the teacher wasn’t at fault, why did the school apologise?

Basildon Hospital Neglect

A one-day-old baby who died in Basildon Hospital was neglected. Ennis Pecaku died in the hospital at 2 am on September 28 last year, having been born at 7.39pm the previous day.

He had been born in the breech position, meaning his legs came out first, and the cause of death was confirmed to be asphyxiation during a vaginal breech birth, and the inquest, held at Essex Coroner’s Court in Chelmsford, learned that Ennis Pecaku had also sustained asphyxiation for at least 25 minutes before his delivery.

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Senior coroner Caroline Beasley-Murray entered a narrative conclusion to Ennis Pecaku’s death.

In the later stages of pregnancy, baby Ennis was in the breech position, and on September 17 an attempted external cephalic version to move him was unsuccessful.

On September 26 baby Ennis’ mother attended Basildon Hospital for a caesarean section, but this was postponed until October 2, and his mother was sent home.

On September 27, Ennis’s mother attended the hospital following a spontaneous rupture of membranes.

Baby Ennis was delivered by breech delivery at 7.39pm but he died at 2 am the following morning.

There were grave shortcomings in the care given to baby Ennis and his mother by Basildon Hospital, and a more timely intervention would seemingly have ended in a more favourable outcome.

Baby Ennis would have seemingly have survived had he been born before 7.16pm, and his death was contributed to by negligence by Basildon Hospital.

The case is really bad, but a hospital spokesperson said that measures had been taken to improve their care in the future, but it’s a tad too late for Baby Ennis because care should have been given, it’s no good saying you’re sorry after the barn door is shut and the horse has bolted!

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But in a statement issued following the conclusion, the parents of Ennis, Edmir Pecaku and Emma-Louise Davies, from Grays, welcomed the verdict, and they said they were satisfied over the conclusion that the coroner gave, and the list of shortcomings identified of administering basic medical care to Louise and baby Ennis amounted to neglect.

But even though the hospital may have made adjustments, nothing will ever alter the outcome for this family, and the overwhelming loss of their son Ennis.

Yet, even though Basildon Hospital, Essex were guilty of negligence, it’s no wonder… it’s the those governing the country that is truly at fault by not tapping enough money into the NHS, instead, they pump into their own pockets.

Of course, mistakes happen all the time, because people are only human and not perfect, and countless people slip through the system, and not only that, doctors and nurses are in short supply, with agency nurses being brought in to cover.

Doctors and nurses aren’t dumb, they will go abroad where there are fewer hours and more money, and over the years we’ve lost many skilled doctors and nurses because of this, but that doesn’t mean we should privatise our NHS, positively not!

And I’m sure the parents of baby Ennis don’t feel comforted that some manager at the hospital said “That lessons have been learnt”, this unfortunate family have to live with this for the rest of their lives, and it’s an outright disgrace.

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