steve
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Post by steve on Dec 10, 2023 9:41:13 GMT
alec " the star chamber" Chairing this illustrious body of legal masterminds is part time conveyancing solicitor Bill Cash! Presumably the " third rate chamber" had already been allocated to leanderthal.
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steve
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Post by steve on Dec 10, 2023 9:46:45 GMT
Stardate 10122023 Seasonal salutations  |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 9:57:44 GMT
Obviously Israel can usually count on the support of the US but the seemingly unqualified support that the Biden administration has offered a tyrant like Netanyahu in the face of the ongoing carnage in Gaza looks to me like a catastrophic misjudgement with serious long-term ramifications. Israeli politicians at the outset said they are embarking on a final solution to the animals in the Gazan strip. There are only two ways this could be ended, either Israel giving them all their homes and rights back, bearing in mind most are already refugees from somewhere else displaced by Israel, or get rid of them all. Israel is not going to surrender the land it already has or allow them back into Israeli land. So the only solution is to get rid of them, and presumably that is what they told Biden. Biden cannot stop them doing this. He might send in US troop to defend gaza from Israel, but that would amount to the end of Israel itself if the arabs piled in too. It would destroy what the US considers a strategic ally in the region. Presumably it would make him unpoplar amongst jews in the US, dont know how many votes that would lose him in a tight re-election race? Its not as if the US average citizen is likely to be very keen on arabs of any sort, having been at war with them on and off for years. 9/11 comes to mind, so never mind jews, just the avergae christian or agnostic may prefer some arabs get a bashing from Israel. The goal here is very likely to force arabs entirely out of the Gaza strip and integrate it into the state of Israel. Force them into a kettled and makeshift region on the Egyptian border so that international demands fall on Egypt to allow them into their territory. Failing that, just make whats left of their homeland so small and uncomfortable they emigrate. So what actually can the US president do to prevent this, against the wishes most probably of the US population too?
The US is already failing to back one strategic ally Ukraine, does it want to be seen to be failing anotehr, Israel? Oh the Russians are laughing!
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Post by crossbat11 on Dec 10, 2023 9:59:18 GMT
oldnat
Leaving aside what was, even by your standards, laid-on-with-a trowel sarcasm and condescension, I will take your post in reply to mine with as much good faith and seriousness as I can muster.
I think you are completely wrong to claim that the body of opinion that I described as centrism, has been pandered to by politicians and the media. I think the opposite has tended to be true.
The right wing press and a host of nationalist and doctrinaire politicians of both the left and right have yanked the political narrative and discourse into all sorts of divisive places. Independence la-la lands, fixations with fabricated culture divisions, grievance indulgences, obsessions with immigration, political text book allegiance avowals, EU superstate fantasies about subjugated citizenry. The list goes on.
Whereas most people right across the UK have much different priorities. I listed most of them in the post you were replying to and I still stick with my contention, that you both contested and derided, that Starmer is starting to speak to this body of opinion and pitching his flag on that terrain where, in my view, a great swathe of voters reside too.
It's where elections (2019 GE maybe a rare exception?) are nearly always won.
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 10:00:43 GMT
Interestingly Netanyahu is incredibly unpopular in Israel, with just 19% thinking he should remain prime minister in a poll just last week and thousands demonstrating in Israel for his removal within the last few days. Which however probably means he sees the only way out as a military victory. Which could only be a final solution, emptying the gazan strip of Gazans. |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 10:05:55 GMT
The article says its a centre-right think tank, so isnt that basically labour? “Lockdown policy poured petrol on the fire that had already been there in the most disadvantaged people’s lives, and so far no one has offered a plan to match the scale of the issues." If thats really centre right, then goodness knows what the left is saying about it! |
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steve
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Post by steve on Dec 10, 2023 10:08:49 GMT
In family is only for the rich news
"There was growing anger on Saturday night over the government’s “love only for the rich” plans that would force thousands of British families to choose whether to split or go into exile.
James Cleverly, the home secretary, announced last week that a British citizen who wants to sponsor their foreign spouse to live with them in the UK will need to earn at least £38,700 a year to qualify for a family visa application.
The changes are expected to cut the number of family visas by about 10,000, according to reports of government briefings, adding to the thousands of “Skype families” who have already been separated by the previous rules where the British partner needed to earn an £18,600 salary.
Campaign group Reunite Families UK said that hundreds of people joined it last week after the announcement that would mean only about a quarter of British people would earn enough to sponsor a spouse."
Thousands of British residents in Europe whose family are regarded as immigrants for visa purposes if they return to the UK are also impacted.
"The changes are expected to cut the number of family visas by about 10,000, according to reports of government briefings, adding to the thousands of “Skype families” who have already been separated by the previous rules where the British partner needed to earn an £18,600 salary.
Campaign group Reunite Families UK said that hundreds of people joined it last week after the announcement that would mean only about a quarter of British people would earn enough to sponsor a spouse.
“Everyone feels the rug has been pulled from under their feet,” said Jane Yilmaz, co-founder of the group. “They’ve dropped this bombshell just before Christmas, and it’s devastating for our families.
“We’ve got people who are separated because they couldn’t reach the £18,600 threshold. There’s no way those families are going to reach the new target,” Yilmaz said. “And we’ve got loads of members who are exiled who have always lived in hope they might be able to come back to their own country. The government harps on about family values and how important the family unit is, then they do this.”
Andreea Dumitrache, co-CEO at the3million, representing EU citizens in the UK, said the rise was “a blatant attack on families across the country”, and that ministers should scrap it. “Our British friends living in the EU will struggle to come back to the UK, with many having to choose between their own families abroad and a parent needing care in the UK.”
Pandering to xenophobic pig ignorance has no up sides
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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2023 10:22:42 GMT
Wes Streeting is rapidly morphing into a complete twat. The Singapore government spends c 4% of GDP equivalent on health care, whereas in the UK it's around 9%, but in Singapore, there is an enforced Medisave plan which requires workers to contribute between 7 - 9.5% of earnings into a medical savings plan which they can then use to part fund their own treatment. That gives far more money to spend on healthcare than we do through the NHS. Your observation about the funding model is spot on. But I have considerable doubts about whether Streeting is unaware of it. Indeed I feel pretty certain that he intends to reform rather than spend because he knows Reeves wont let him do the latter. It remains to be seen how brave and innovative he will be. But there are other differences between UK & Singapore which you didn't mention, and which he will have to face:- Its adult obesity rate is 6.6%. Ours is 29.5%. I look forward to hearing Streeting tell British voters to stop getting fat . Singapore's Government doesn't have the BMA , or Doctors Laurenson & Trivedi to cope with. I look forward Streeting's relationship with this crew. By the time his feet are under the NHS desk Laurenson & Trivedi will ( reportedly) have gained control of one or two Royal Colleges so he should put his tin hat on. THe Times report quotes Streeting in Singapore thus :-“This is a system that is designed around patients,” Well thats certainly a good base to start from when he is in charge of a system designed around Consultants and Doctors and GPs. And I for one am ready to give him the time and space to do something about it. I know its all talk, and the odds are he will fail like most other hopeful reformers of UK's Public Services. But I'm not inclined to say so yet. |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 10:29:14 GMT
My other other thought - which again, is just some personal musing - would the obvious question about how relative performance is being assessed. If the PISA scores are based more on factual abilities rather than skills, then perhaps a new approach is failing only because the testing system is geared to the old approach, but then having said that, with something like maths, you're either right or wrong, so the PISA scores should perhaps just be taken at face value. My own first thought was also that if they are teaching something different, but being tested on the old knowledge then they would be certain to score badly, whether they truly were or not. However disentangling jargon this seems to be about a distinction between teaching kids facts discovered by others, and teaching them how to discover facts for themselves. So not so much teaching them the laws of gravity, but how to go out and discover them for themselves. The problem of course is you then might spend your entire career researching gravity only to reproduce Newtons Principia. Unhelpfull. But on the other hand, assuming no one really needs to know how gravity works except elite researchers and AIs, learning to tell which of these are bulshitting might be useful. So for example, I never studied epidemiology specifically. But its interesting how far you can get applying core principles - such as how to create a mathematical model. Not so complex that it becomes impossible to understand or work with. Not so simple it leaves out key elements of the real world which utterly change the conclusions. The same issues apply in systems analysis in computer programming. The epidemiologists working on SAGE seem to have become obsessed with very simple models lumping together the entire population as all the same. Whereas juat a slightly more complex model with just two population the groups, the safe young and at risk old, leads to very different conlusions how to treat the epidemic. Inserting that distinction creates the potential for interventions to cause more deaths, not less in the modelling. This is utterly missing from any of SAGES recommendations. |
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Dec 10, 2023 10:41:09 GMT
colin re Singapore 'Its adult obesity rate is 6.6%. Ours is 29.5%. I look forward to hearing Streeting tell British voters to stop getting fat' I've long thought and said the two major health issues facing our country is an aging population and obesity Re obesity I hope Labour tackles this in much the same way as Government's of all political colours have tackled tobacco Firstly it needs a big advertising campaign (including very graphic images of the consequences) Secondly much tighter controls on packaging, including nutritional information which needs to be much bigger and prominent than currently Lastly unhealthy foods need to be taxed more Of course there will be a backlash with the nanny state gone mad types and parts of the food industry. But it needs to be done as I'm absolutely certain that doing the same thing we've been doing for decades wondered work
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Post by crossbat11 on Dec 10, 2023 10:50:43 GMT
This is an interesting article that looks at the decline in the Scottish education system over the last 20 years or so, in terms of both outcomes/pupil attainment and also its relative performance vis-à-vis the English system. "The Scottish school system was once the jewel in the British educational crown. With good standards and low levels of social inequality, it was seen as the part of the UK where working-class kids could get ahead as a result of a high-quality comprehensive education.
The English system was a basket case by comparison, characterised by huge variations in school quality, poor outcomes and the occasional wacky education theory. In 1997, four in 10 English pupils started secondary school without sufficient levels of literacy.
A quarter of a century later, and the situation has flipped. The latest comparative data on outcomes for 15-year-olds across OECD countries, published last week, shows a Scottish school system in steep decline, blighted by rising levels of social inequality. The drop in standards is the equivalent of today’s teenagers missing around 16 months of maths teaching compared with those in 2012, 18 months of science, and eight months of reading. Scottish educationalist Lindsay Paterson describes the situation as “catastrophic”.The link to the full article is below, and while it cites a number of potential reasons for the sharp deterioration in performance, it suggests that spending per pupil and class sizes, both statistically more favourable in Scotland than in better performing England, aren't amongst them. Education experts point to the SNP government initiated curriculum reform as one of the key reasons behind the shocking deterioration in the Scottish education system. www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/dec/10/scottish-schools-have-tumbled-from-top-of-the-class-this-is-what-went-wrong |
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Post by alec on Dec 10, 2023 10:55:46 GMT
colin - We've talked before about the NHS funding model and I suspect you're aware of my moderate ambivalence regarding the precise mechanism of funding. Our system is efficient, in that we don't waste any money on profits for insurers, but it has many other weaknesses. A primary weakness I believe is that too many people think that because 'I've paid for the NHS' I should get whatever service I want, failing to understand that they haven't paid anything like enough for those services. Likewise, NHS providers behave as if they are the client and your job is to do what you're told. I can see the merits of having some form of market based funding as part of the funding mix, as this could both educate citizens about the costs of healthcare while also reminding the NHS that the patients are the ones who need to call the shots and decide how best the system should function. There may also be some benefit to pushing citizens to appreciate health and promote the idea that life choices have health impacts which then have costs, but seeing the US, I'm not so sure about this. If that idea was valid, then we'd surely see market forces encouraging US citizens to be healthy, and that plainly doesn't happen. And yes, reform is always available. Any big system can be made to function better, but where I part company with Streeting is this daft assertion that it's not about money. When you have over 100 hospital buildings at risk of collapse because of poorly maintained concrete roof structures, yes, it's about money. Apart from the massive investment backlog, reform isn't cost free. Updated computerised systems take time and money to set up, and the benefits come some time down the track.
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Post by chrisc on Dec 10, 2023 11:06:58 GMT
colin re Singapore 'Its adult obesity rate is 6.6%. Ours is 29.5%. I look forward to hearing Streeting tell British voters to stop getting fat' I've long thought and said the two major health issues facing our country is an aging population and obesity Re obesity I hope Labour tackles this in much the same way as Government's of all political colours have tackled tobacco Firstly it needs a big advertising campaign (including very graphic images of the consequences) Secondly much tighter controls on packaging, including nutritional information which needs to be much bigger and prominent than currently Lastly unhealthy foods need to be taxed more Of course there will be a backlash with the nanny state gone types and parts of the food industry. But it needs to be done as I'm absolutely certain that doing the same thing we've been doing for decades wondered work Whilst I agree that many consume too many calories, this is NOT the reason for the rise in obesity in developed countries over the last 10 years. Calorie intake has remained largely unchanged. What has changed is the decrease in physical activity in the population. As as an individual you can lose weight by eating less food, so it is tempting to see this as a solution. However, at the population level this is not actually what is happening. And it starts in schools with a massive decrease in physical activity (for example hardly any “exercise” actually takes place in the decreasing number of PE lessons now). So what Streeting needs to do is to get people to exercise more. This will have all sorts of other health benefits unrelated to obesity. The beauty of increasing physical activity is that there is no dose response. It is basically a straight line correlation. Any level of increase is beneficial. Even using standing desks and walking around every hour at work is beneficial. Mind you of course practically this is not an easy thing to do. Telling people to “exercise more” doesn’t really work. Just as telling them to “eat less” also fails. But at least he could remove some of the barriers that have grown up over the years such as absence of playing fields, downgrading of PE in the curriculum. And maintain / expand access to green spaces / safe cycling and walking areas in cities. |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 11:07:54 GMT
Re obesity I hope Labour tackles this in much the same way as Government's of all political colours have tackled tobacco So thats 500% taxes on all foods? Banning food sales to minors, not allowing self service shops? |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 11:16:52 GMT
A primary weakness I believe is that too many people think that because 'I've paid for the NHS' I should get whatever service I want, failing to understand that they haven't paid anything like enough for those services. Except pf course the NHS is paid for from general taxation which everyone pays, and which is deemed by government to be falling fairly on all parts of the population. So they have paid. People on the whole make the decision that smoking, over eating, climbing mountains, are all worth it, whatever health negatives may befall. While its reasonable for authorities to ensure 'informed consent', so that people properly undrstand risks they run, it is not at all proper for medics to take the lead and start banning things. Like smoking, for example. So what if people die young, its their choice. And finanically its better for the nation they die rather than live to become pensioners. Instead of forcing people to eat less, a better solution is going to be a daily diet pill with no side effects which resets your storing fat. Its about finding the solutions people want, not forcing them to do what they dont want. |
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neilj
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Post by neilj on Dec 10, 2023 11:17:54 GMT
colin re Singapore 'Its adult obesity rate is 6.6%. Ours is 29.5%. I look forward to hearing Streeting tell British voters to stop getting fat' I've long thought and said the two major health issues facing our country is an aging population and obesity Re obesity I hope Labour tackles this in much the same way as Government's of all political colours have tackled tobacco Firstly it needs a big advertising campaign (including very graphic images of the consequences) Secondly much tighter controls on packaging, including nutritional information which needs to be much bigger and prominent than currently Lastly unhealthy foods need to be taxed more Of course there will be a backlash with the nanny state gone types and parts of the food industry. But it needs to be done as I'm absolutely certain that doing the same thing we've been doing for decades wondered work Whilst I agree that many consume too many calories, this is NOT the reason for the rise in obesity in developed countries over the last 10 years. Calorie intake has remained largely unchanged. What has changed is the decrease in physical activity in the population. As as an individual you can lose weight by eating less food, so it is tempting to see this as a solution. However, at the population level this is not actually what is happening. And it starts in schools with a massive decrease in physical activity (for example hardly any “exercise” actually takes place in the decreasing number of PE lessons now). So what Streeting needs to do is to get people to exercise more. This will have all sorts of other health benefits unrelated to obesity. The beauty of increasing physical activity is that there is no dose response. It is basically a straight line correlation. Any level of increase is beneficial. Even using standing desks and walking around every hour at work is beneficial. Mind you of course practically this is not an easy thing to do. Telling people to “exercise more” doesn’t really work. Just as telling them to “eat less” also fails. But at least he could remove some of the barriers that have grown up over the years such as absence of playing fields, downgrading of PE in the curriculum. And maintain / expand access to green spaces / safe cycling and walking areas in cities. While I think that is part of it, and a significant part, I still think diet is the biggest part The growth of highly processed foods with added sugar and other nasties have become an addiction and deliberately on the part of some of the food producers My own experience as one who us still reasonably active was the only way to reduce weight was to watch what you eat |
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domjg
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Post by domjg on Dec 10, 2023 11:30:16 GMT
domjg - I was jesting also, but appreciate the clarification. It's common to hear 'outwith' north of the border, or at least, outwith areas to the south of the border. It's one of those things about the English language I guess. It's been developed and used by so many groups and nations that it's difficult to appreciate what is and isn't 'normal' language. Just to clarify I have of course no issue with the Scots language and am greatly in favour of linguistic diversity. I'm also very fond of Scotland which I visit frequently as my best friend is there. |
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steve
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Post by steve on Dec 10, 2023 11:42:12 GMT
colinSingapore is dictatorship lite with the same party in government for 64 years, they don't have to worry about many democratic rights, including independent trade unions. Trade unions in Singapore are effectively part of government.
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steve
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Post by steve on Dec 10, 2023 11:43:44 GMT
domjg But language differences can cause misunderstanding. 
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Post by alec on Dec 10, 2023 11:48:13 GMT
chrisc - "Whilst I agree that many consume too many calories, this is NOT the reason for the rise in obesity in developed countries over the last 10 years. Calorie intake has remained largely unchanged. What has changed is the decrease in physical activity in the population." I don't disagree with this at all, but I would inject a strong element of complexity here. There are very many factors involved. One key element we are just starting to understand is that it isn't so much the calorific value of foods, but their chemical constitution, with many highly processed foods being linked to obesity without necessarily having more calories. The gut microbiome is critical here, and modern western diets change the composition of gut bacteria in ways that then produce a variety of responses, included obesity. I'd also throw in that obesity is an inflammatory response. It's linked to the immune system. There is already research showing that covid infection, particularly in utero and in very young children, is likely to lead to greater levels of obesity in later life because of the effects it has on the immune system. Exposure to high levels of air pollutants are also causally linked to obesity for similar reasons. Exercise is part of the problem, as is diet, along with lots of other factors.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2023 11:55:13 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2023 12:50:40 GMT
colin - We've talked before about the NHS funding model and I suspect you're aware of my moderate ambivalence regarding the precise mechanism of funding. Our system is efficient, in that we don't waste any money on profits for insurers, but it has many other weaknesses. A primary weakness I believe is that too many people think that because 'I've paid for the NHS' I should get whatever service I want, failing to understand that they haven't paid anything like enough for those services. Likewise, NHS providers behave as if they are the client and your job is to do what you're told. I can see the merits of having some form of market based funding as part of the funding mix, as this could both educate citizens about the costs of healthcare while also reminding the NHS that the patients are the ones who need to call the shots and decide how best the system should function. There may also be some benefit to pushing citizens to appreciate health and promote the idea that life choices have health impacts which then have costs, but seeing the US, I'm not so sure about this. If that idea was valid, then we'd surely see market forces encouraging US citizens to be healthy, and that plainly doesn't happen. And yes, reform is always available. Any big system can be made to function better, but where I part company with Streeting is this daft assertion that it's not about money. When you have over 100 hospital buildings at risk of collapse because of poorly maintained concrete roof structures, yes, it's about money. Apart from the massive investment backlog, reform isn't cost free. Updated computerised systems take time and money to set up, and the benefits come some time down the track. I agree that a Continental style co-funding model with compulsory health insurance brings a sense of ownership of their treatment costs , to patients, which is a good thing.. I also think it produces an income stream directly related to treatments given/performed which is a good thing. In any event , as we agree , it increases the Health System's overall funding. I think Streeting knows full well that more money is required in certain areas ( though I think he is absolutely right to be wary of waste & focus in a system which will ALWAYS want more money) . But I feel sure that Reeves has told him he will have to manage. Hence his emphasis on Reforms. But I think he has said he will not be starting any reform of fundamental structure-so I guess the funding model aint going to change. Streeting, , like Reeves is going to be key to Starmer's chances of success in government . And as I've tried to say , I really do think that Foreign Affairs is going to throw some horrendous problems at Starmer , so he will need to rely heavily on his key "Domestic Affairs" ministers to get on with things themselves. |
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Post by leftieliberal on Dec 10, 2023 13:03:19 GMT
Not sure I entirely agree with this, but it's interesting in the context of earlier discussions about continuum within parties and some Labour MPs would have fit into a Cameron type Government Forbes with her socially and economically conservative views would also seem to me to have fit into Camerons Conservative Government if it wasn't for the issue of Scottish Independence (I appreciate that's a big if) and she's not the only one I noticed that there is now a split in the Green Party of England and Wales over the gender issue. www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67546751They have kicked out their Womens Group, which holds gender-critical views. This is an issue where the splits are within parties rather than between parties. |
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steve
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Post by steve on Dec 10, 2023 13:16:15 GMT
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Post by alec on Dec 10, 2023 13:24:17 GMT
colin - yes, I agree.One other benefit of a part state funded/part social insurance model is that to a certain degree it buffers the health system from political funding decisions, as it establishes a separate revenue stream. In terms of fixing the current mess, I suspect Labour will come to realise very quickly that it's not remotely credible to attempt to fix the NHS without significant additional funding. And at the risk of being boring, I have to say - without addressing covid the NHS will go rapidly backwards. Data from Finland among many other countries is pointing towards an increase in health service demands in the order of 30% after each wave of covid, due to a myriad of new and worsening conditions apparently triggered by viral infection. We saw this data pretty early, but it's really solidifying now and it's absolutely huge. In the NHS context, we're probably looking in terms of £30 - £40bn a year just to stand still - if this keeps up.
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Post by crossbat11 on Dec 10, 2023 13:51:02 GMT
Rawnsley's column in the Observer is quite good today. He's devised a potential game to play around the dinner table this Christmas whereby the participants have to try and list the most disastrous and calamitous cock-ups, disasters and pratfalls that have occurred in the last fourteen years of this Tory Government. The list is almost endless and it's a useful reminder that their serial incompetence and ineptitude predates the arrival of Mr Calamity himself in 2019, but goes way back to Cameron and May. It's a sobering and shocking list of misgovernance and failure. Which underlines how great the electorate's yearning is for the return of a semblance of governmental competence and integrity. They are not expecting quick fixes or miracles, or the complete absence of mistakes, just something that has the appearance of a government on their side trying to put things right and doing so diligently and competently It seems to me, assuming we regard UKPR stalwarts Colin and Trevor as typical right of centre Tory supporters, that the story is already being told, with relish too, of a myriad of impending disasters awaiting to quickly derail and demolish a Starmer government. I think a lot of this is consolation searching and wishful thinking, maybe even some desire to pour cold water over happy and hopeful Labour supporters (whose happiness probably secretly infuriates the life out of them both!), but even if their predicted apocalypse comes only half true, if Starmer leads a competent and trustworthy government that is shown to be making some modest improvements to people's lives, it may well be that he gets a lot more voter forbearance and political slack than they both hope and expect. This forbearance might derive from low expectation, a revulsion at what had gone before and a relief that it has gone and an acceptance that his inheritance was so poisonous that he deserves time to turn the country around. And if Starmer and his communications team have got any sense, and have learned from Cameron's box of tricks, they will be reminding the public of just how poisonous that inheritance was. Every day and in every way. Never forgive nor forget. Rawnsley's Christmas game points the way. www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/dec/09/need-a-christmas-party-game-try-ranking-13-years-of-tory-screwups-in-order-of-severity |
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Post by Deleted on Dec 10, 2023 13:59:39 GMT
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 14:52:26 GMT
Whilst I agree that many consume too many calories, this is NOT the reason for the rise in obesity in developed countries over the last 10 years. Calorie intake has remained largely unchanged. What has changed is the decrease in physical activity in the population. As as an individual you can lose weight by eating less food, so it is tempting to see this as a solution. However, at the population level this is not actually what is happening. And it starts in schools with a massive decrease in physical activity (for example hardly any “exercise” actually takes place in the decreasing number of PE lessons now). Hmm. I heard a documentary recently talking to a doctor about this, who said that it is very difficult to lose weight by exercising. Whatever studies they had done showed that instead what tends to happen is your body automatically slows down its use of energy when you stop exercising, it auto compensates by saving energy after your bit of exercise. Thats not to say, of course, that sitting in an office all day with an hour reserved for exercise, is the same as some manual job as a hunter chasing through the forest all day, or as a navvy digging a canal. The expert did however say that the hours exercise would improve your health in other ways aside from losing weight. |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 14:57:32 GMT
There is already research showing that covid infection, particularly in utero and in very young children, is likely to lead to greater levels of obesity in later life because of the effects it has on the immune system. Ah, then perhaps the problem is communal living. Living closely together as we do we have far more colds of all sorts including corona viruses. So maybe thats why as cities have grown, we have become fatter? |
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Danny
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Post by Danny on Dec 10, 2023 15:12:46 GMT
In any event , as we agree , it increases the Health System's overall funding. It really doesnt. I agree with you that if people have to pay something at the point of use it will put off people with illness they believe is minor, or the worried well. That might not be the desired effect, if it results in serious illness being dismissed. Or it might have a beneficial effect in freeing up appointments, hard to say. It is possible though it wont make much difference at all. But in terms of overall funding, that is always going to be a political decision and will be determined by the level of care it has been decided to provide and the cost for that level of care. |
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