I don't like to keep venting my spleen about how the the economic system that dictates our daily lives seems to be rotten to the core, i want to be writing posts poking fun at Australia or wagging my finger at Americans for actually wanting a country full of gun owners but when it's a constant stream of multinational corporations getting away with tax dodging to the tune of billions or bankers awarding themselves billions in bonuses as people all over the world plunge into poverty and unemployment it's hard to resist.
As i have said countless times here, the system is terminally flawed so that the only conclusion is the capitalist system is no longer serving the human species well and we need a better way of organising ourselves where the interests of more people become relevant and greed is of lower importance.
Before you sigh and say the communist hippy is off on one of her unsubstantiated anti-capitalism rants again, the implant furore makes my point for me.
French firm Poly Implant Prothesis have admitted filling their implants with industrial silicone to cuts costs and then hid what they were doing from inspectors.
Jean-Claude Mas, founder of PIP, told police: 'From 1997 onwards we hid the products used to make the PIP gel. I wasn't allowed to buy these products because they were not authorised. We organised everything to escape being monitored'.
The PIP gel cost £4 a litre while the authorised American gel Nusil was £35 a litre although the implants cost remained the same.
When the deceit was uncovered and Mas was asked about the women who claimed to have suffered health problems after being fitted with the sub-standard implants, he replied: 'The victims are only suing to get money … I have nothing to say to them'.
Investigations have found there is a possible association with leaking PIP implants and a rare form of cancer which have affected 11 French women who had these implants fitted and an investigation has been launched in France into charges of manslaughter and unintentional injury against PIP who are already facing charges of aggravated deception.
The French government have announced they would foot the bill for tens of thousands of breast implant removals, amid cancer fears while the British Government have said that women who are concerned about breast implants made by PIP will be able to have them removed for free by the NHS if they were put in by the NHS due to reconstruction surgery but if the implants were due to cosmetic surgery, the women will have to return to the private clinic where they had the initial operation to arrange for them to be removed or replaced.
The reply from the private clinics? A number of private clinics are resisting removing the implants for free, saying they will go under if they have to fund surgery, while others are charging women thousands of pounds to have the substandard implants taken out or replaced.
Proof once again that profit making is king and any health concerns, from the cynical gross negligence of PIP to the exploitative opportunism of the private clinics, is a secondary concern.
As for the Conservative idea of privatisation of the NHS, this should kill that stone dead because it is proof that the NHS may not be perfect, but it is a hell of a lot better than the money grabbing private sector where the ability to pay is the only factor in deciding if you get any treatment.
4 comments:
lucy,
first of all, i don't think a NHS should provide breast augmentation, or face lifts, or lipo suction, etc. so if you want it you must go to a private provider. i'm not paying for someone with a low self esteem to get bigger boobs).
second, why should doctors/clinics that used what they tought were safe impants have to foot the bill? they didn't commit the crime. some folks at PIP, starting with Jean-Claude Mas, are the criminals.
thirdly, and for the 7 millionth time, nothing done by the or any government is efficient - including tax collection. further, government employees commit as mnay misdeeds as non-government employees - just less efficiently (ha ha ha).
lastly, having the government oversee something does NOT remove the uber-evil profit motive. it just creates another layer of ineficiency known as lobbying...
q
Second topic.
when you focus only on the negatives (and ignore the positives) of any person or thing, they can only be inadequate.
when you focus only on the positives (and ignore the negatives) they can only be excellent.
you tend to only see the negatives of capitalism then you turn around around only look at the positives of pond sucm like chavez and castro.
i say this because you go on non-stop about the problems but offer no solutions - short of "stop it" or "tax it".
be careful how you evaluate the world and what you ask for.
q
The only options are going back to the private clincs where the work was done or the taxpayers pay for it. Why should i, as a taxpayer, pay for the private clinics mistakes?
It should not fall to us to bail them out when things go wrong. They must have insurance to cover them for events like this.
The women should sue the arse off the private clinics if they refuse to put right their mistake.
It isn't easy to concentrate on the positives because all we hear is people being shafted by banks, insurance companies, private clinics, utility providers, train companies etc etc so where are the positives?
What has Chavez done to deserve the label pond scum? To my reckoning he has been a hero to the poorest of his country. Is it just because he doesn't play the game the way you like it and is a successful Socialist?
I have offered lots of solutions here for many of our problems. Some you have ripped apart and some you have agreed with.
i agree tax payers should not have to pay for it. i also agree about the insurance and lawsuits
all you hear is negative because it generates emotion and that sells more press than positives
my view is that chavez is a fraud that takes from the rich and gives to the poor so he can stay in power
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