Avoiding the doctor

I see that an eminent medical journal in the UK reported that it was not possible to demonstrate any decrease in the statistics on the mortality of elderly people from flu, despite a massive uptake of flu vaccinations among the elderly - from 15 to 65% since 1980.

I won't tell mum, as she will say 'I told you so'. Mum takes a very hardline view of the medical profession, whether the local medical centre or the local hospital.

Vaccines are to be avoided at all costs because 'they make you ill'. Drugs are to be avoided at all costs because 'their side effects are worse than the disease' they are supposed to cure.

'I'm past my sell-by date' says mum regularly, 'and at least I can decide if I am going to damage the quality of my life with unwanted drugs.'

She should know. She spends a lot of time phoning her elderly friends and they tell her about problems with their medication and their blood pressure and their cholesterol levels and she's fed up with it. She doesn't know what her cholesterol level or blood pressure level is, and she doesn't care. If it was up she wouldn't take anything for it, as a matter of prinicple.

Well, you have to admire that standpoint. She's had some bad experiences with the medical profession and she says she can do without any more.

As for me, well I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for the interventions of the medical profession on several occasions, so i keep my opinions to myself. Each to her own.

But if you ring my mum, do not tell her about your cholesterol or blood pressure or you might just have the phone put down on you.

Mind you, her mutiny is not very substantial. She will agree with the GP when he says 'you will take these, won't you?'. But of course once out of the surgery she refuses point blank, and that's her business, she says.