Don't Get Sick - It's Summer

This is summer. Traditionally, people take their vacations in summer, including doctors. Which is an excellent excuse to save money. The regional government does so by shutting up hospital wings, not hiring temporary substitutes for vacationing doctors or nurses, and even shutting down appointments for entire departments. The government justifies its actions by saying that people don't tend to get sick in the summer as much as in the winter.

No, there aren't as many respiratory illnesses as in winter, but what about gastroenteritis? Or accidents of one kind or another? Those actually go up in summer. Chronic illnesses don't go on vacation, either. And so it goes that when my father was told in January by one of the doctors who see him, to get a follow-up appointment with him in July, he was given an appointment in October. The excuse? That the appointment books for July and August were still closed and I should ask in June to have the appointment moved up. In June I went twice, because it couldn't be done by phone, either. I went at the beginning and at the end of the month. One week before July began I was told the books were still closed. I ran into someone I knew who told me the same thing was happening in Neurology, and that I might as well desist and go with the appointment in October. 

Last week my husband had a problem with an elbow. He's a construction worker and needs to have well-functioning limbs. He went to the doctor who gave him an antibiotic and anti-inflammatory for the hot, red swelling and pain. It got only slightly better, so the doctor told him to go to the hospital through the Emergency Room. He did, and the place was swamped at nine o'clock on a Monday night. The doctor didn't take any fluid out to analyze, she just had an x-ray taken and told him that if it got worse, to return because they might have to operate. He got home at four in the morning, knowing much the same about the problem in his elbow as when he left the house. The amount of people that night kind of cancels out the politicians' claims that people just don't get as sick in summer as they do in winter.

Yesterday afternoon my father had an appointment at five o'clock with the ophthalmologist. When we arrived we saw quite a fair amount of people. But there was no receptionist. I had to knock on the doctor's door and announce my father had arrived. Then we waited. And waited. At six o'clock he was finally called in. There was only one doctor with one nurse. By the time we left it was long after seven in the evening. Vacation is sacred.

One would think that at least those with a severe nature to their illness would be immune from this cost-saving. No. Some cancer patients have complained that their treatment has been postponed. When they complained, they were told that their cancers were stable and would not get worse by waiting a month. Generally, when one has cancer, one wants to be treated as fast as possible to get over this as fast as possible and make sure it all goes away and stays away. One does not want to remain for even a week with the gnawing thought that any delay in treatment might make their illness terminal. Cancer is as much physical as psychological. But the penny pinchers seem to have never been affected by it. 

The national elections have been held twice with no clear result, except that the conservative party has garnered the most votes twice. Things are looking fine for a third election. Yet it seems that people will still vote for the party of the cut-backs. Regional elections in Galicia are to be held at the end of September. The conservative party touts its cost effective policies that "haven't" affected citizens' well-being. No, cut-backs in education, health care, and help to dependents don't affect everyone, but those whom they do affect tend to be people who have no other alternative than the state-run choice. If we were able to pay private doctors and clinics for our health problems, we wouldn't care that the public health service is slashed to ribbons. The same goes for education and everything else that has a private alternative. The state does not exist for profit, it exists for the well-being of all its citizens. Now, which political party dares to shout that out loud and put it in practice? That's who I'll vote for.


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