You can’t make this stuff up!

1. Back in the 1970s, I suggested that it wasn’t necessary for most people to have dental check-ups every six months. The world’s dentists leapt on my neck with drills buzzing. The truth is that the six monthly check-ups were introduced because there were too many dentists in Britain. Aussie dentists were flocking to Britain because it was possible for dentists to get rich on generous NHS fees in those days. Telling patients to have their teeth checked every six months gave dentists something to do and kept them rich, happy and off the streets – so politicians and dentists said six monthly check-ups were vital. Today, there’s a great shortage of dentists (especially within the NHS) because dentists are retiring in droves. The stupid lockdown rules and expensive PPE nonsenses have made life unbearable and dentists are downing tools and retiring or emigrating. Millions of people can’t find a dentist at all. And so the NHS now says that six monthly check-ups aren’t necessary after all. Once every two years will do nicely. Isn’t it funny how the ‘science’ can be changed when it isn’t convenient?
2. Also in the 1970s, I suggested that doctors should use computers to warn themselves about the side effects of prescription drugs – and to warn about interactions. (Believe it or not, I helped write the first algorithm based software for home computers in the early 1980s). Today, doctors use computers for everything – including keeping medical records and writing prescriptions. But they still don’t use their computers to spot prescribing errors. It would be easy to do if computers were programmed to notice that drug A will interact badly with drug B or to spot that a new symptom that has been recorded could be caused by a drug that has been prescribed. But doctors won’t do this because the medical establishment is owned by the pharmaceutical industry which doesn’t want anything to interfere with the number of drugs which are prescribed.
3. The BBC’s idea of a balanced panel to discuss any contentious subject (such as vaccination or global warming) is to fill a room with half a dozen people who all agree with the conspirators, the Government and one another. Then, at the end of their programme the nation’s propaganda unit can announce that everyone agrees that the official line is the right one. (There is something extraordinary about the fact that people in Britain are bullied into paying a special fee so that the BBC, the Propaganda Ministry, can spread misinformation and suppress the truth.)

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