crescat scientia vita excolatur

There's a particularly nice thing about Sunday, even for those of us who are retirees. The "day of rest" kicks in — well, I enjoy the rest part of it. I had a break from tummy issues, and I was able to eat a slice of French toast for breakfast, and later, a small bowl of Mac- and-cheese, so that's more than I've eaten almost the whole week. Sadly, my back is still playing up, but otherwise it was good. I hope that after a good sleep, I'll be recovering.

I was torn between disgust and amusement when I heard that people were taking a horse/sheep dewormer to treat Covid. Amused because it seemed like a practical joke and I'm expecting someone to jump up and say, "Gotcha!" Disgust- well, I'd think it's obvious that it's blatant stupidity. This is made even worse by pundits and "news leaders" who are feigning outrage that the CDC is not encouraging the use of veterinary medicine by humans. These are the same people who oppose vaccinations and mask mandates, pretending that they impinge on personal freedom.  I really can't contain the disgust I feel towards the right-wing talking heads who promote division, lies and misinformation through hatred. What they’re doing is vile. And it's something that is utterly destroying the conservative movement. Consider: conservatives should be focused on managing budgets, ensuring high levels of employment and protecting the market. That should mean that they would be in favour of finding ways of encouraging people to be able to purchase homes and find ways of saving money. They should be supporting a merit- based system, and an individual mandate Instead, they are intent on dragging society backwards and promoting racist practices. They push actively to gut industries and throw thousands of people out of work, and embolden tax evasion.by permitting increased tax registration externally and moving money out of the country.

I'm also horrified that there are doctors-real, qualified doctors- who are writing prescriptions for veterinary medicines. There are doctors who have been discouraging vaccinations and pushing other unproven treatments. Because of this, I understand why some people mistrust doctors. I have always had good, caring medical professionals who have looked after me and worked to improve both my health and quality of life. So I scoffed at those who claimed that my doctors were only interested in keeping me on drugs because they are profiting. I have proof that this is not the case. Originally, my cancer was identified as a particular type, which was treated by a drug that cost $1500 a month. I was on it for about 4 months. The hospital helped me find programmes to help pay, but when we did some additional testing that found that drug was ineffective, they called me late in the evening after getting the results and stopped it. If this were a profit-driven decision, they would have waited for my next appointment a couple of weeks later. I've got other instances that disprove the concept of prescriptions-for-profit. But the very existence of those doctors who promote these unapproved medications is terrible. Add to that doctors who write scripts for narcotics to supply addicts instead of working with them to overcome addiction.  Disgusting.

Similarly, there are nurses - thankfully a minority - who seem to reject science and embrace some absolute rubbish. Again, my experience has been good, caring, competent nurses who understand science. All of my medical team are fully vaccinated and they have been from early on. I think that if we encounter people  who refuse vaccines we should limit interaction with them.

I've got some strongly negative feelings towards the people who are pushing junk science and sowing division. My feelings tell me that I can't be rational with these idiots. That being said, I think it's necessary to ensure that they do not have positions of power on influence. The people who talk about "doing their own research" are clearly not fit to make decisions. I agree that it's important to question what we're told, and to validate information. But the research conducted to do this, needs to be reliable. That immediately excludes sites that dismiss scientific research and repeat discredited information. One glaring example-the claim that MMR vaccines cause autism. It was discredited more than 20 years ago, yet people still believe it. With the pandemic, there were calls to use unproven treatment supported by "research" that claimed that they were being "suppressed" to drive profits-not that the treatments were dangerous. We should use solid, peer-reviewed materials. That at least assures the reader that the content does not contain factual errors and that the research method conforms to established standards. I think that we should ignore fad items and the celebrities who promote them. Generally, we really should learn to read scientific papers and to make critical assessment instead of jumping on bandwagons based on rubbish.

Sorry, my anger makes me a little incoherent. You'll have gathered that I dislike the idea of misleading people or sowing mistrust. There are attacks against people and organizations. It's sad that so many choose to believe negative stories. I don't understand the logic, nor do I follow the thinking of those who promote the stories. I'm not going to spend much time on trying to make sense of them. I'll try to correct errors, and I may try explaining why, but I won't spend a lot of energy-mine is already scarce! Unfortunately, I can't promise not to mock on shame those who have adopted certain viewpoints. I'm not even going to pretend, I probably just heap abuse on them. I'm going to bed now, before I get too annoyed and disturb my sleep!