No rise in number of med students baffling
I was very concerned to see that there is to be no rise in the number of medical students (ODT, 13.2.23). I find this absolutely incomprehensible.
I am an "old" GP and a bit of a broad spectrum chameleon ... and that is the strength of a good general practitioner. The strength of general practice is to be able to deal with the huge range of subtleties in presentation, not just emergencies. To be able to deal with and work on the subtleties is what the good GP can offer.
What is needed is time to consider diagnosis and conscientious follow-up and support of patients, not rush and dismissal which is happening more and more not by intent but by default.
It is a travesty of good medical practice to neglect the importance of time spent with people dealing with complicated health issues that can be just as life threatening in the long run as many emergencies.
Part of a GP’s training is to be able to move to the very varied tango of presentations, but this is impossible if there is not time to dance.
Even now I am starting to feel I shouldn’t worry my GP about my minor symptoms, but I know deep down they need to be sorted or at least discussed and a plan made for coping with them. I have some significant health issues and I am very clear that my "survival" is very much related to my GP’s knowledge and commitment on working on the detail.
Also, but not least, giving me time to talk to him about life’s realities.
Having more GPs and well trained, will also reduce the overload of desperate referrals to specialists. The "counterintuitive" response of the Government needs to be challenged very, very strongly.
George St
Congratulations to the hard-working team of council staff and contractors revamping Dunedin’s main street and creating an attractive, modern centre city area.
This deserves recognition for this team must also be experiencing frustration regarding the lack of leadership shown by the Mayor of Dunedin.
The only voice of reason seems to be that of Cr Benson-Pope.
The group, led by their Mayor, is ignoring the obvious, that the plan for the main street was approved and signed off by the previous council. What exactly has now come to light that prompts the current council to revisit the purpose and scope of the previous design?
The Mayor’s proposal for a review of the project, given the lack of well-founded reason, and additional costs of the delay, the redesign is unwarranted.
I suggest that the council may indeed have more pressing and deserving topics on their agenda that need attention.
From the information released to the public, no modelling has apparently been done on the wider effects of reducing George St to one-way.
Without that, and while there "may" be guesstimated costs of a million dollars a month, what will be the costs be to the city when the unplanned-for, unintended consequences are felt?
Isn’t the more adult response to acknowledge the uncertainty, and retain flexibility, to avoid the later change and other costs of a flawed decision-making process, rather than commit in literal concrete to something when the effects are unknown?
Letter variety
Given an open (blacklist free) forum, some participants will agree that there are "monotonous" contributions, while others will say that persistence is what any good cause is deserved of.
Historical, geographical lessons to be learned
I was astounded to read the huge number of factual errors in your recent series of three pieces on Ukraine by Liston Meintjes.
Meintjes’ most obvious errors relate to geography. He insists on calling the country "The Ukraine", despite the definite article long since having been dropped. He calls Kaliningrad an enclave (it’s an exclave) and claims that Moldova shares a border with Belarus.
Turkey will no doubt be astounded to hear that it shares a border with Russia (it doesn’t), although not with any other Nato members, despite it clearly bordering both Greece and Bulgaria.
Likewise, Meintjes has the USA sharing no border with another Nato state, despite its nearly 9000km long frontier with Canada.
History is similarly a weak spot.
Your author has Lenin being born in Ukraine (he was born in Russia), Putin during his KGB operative days largely operating in West Germany (he was mostly in East Germany), and Albania joining Nato in 2004 (it joined in 2009).
Meintjes’s mistakes regarding geopolitics are really dangerous. He claims that Romania and Moldova are Russian allies today, despite the opposite being true.
He also claims that Ukraine received Crimea in return for abandoning nuclear weapons. In reality, Crimea became part of Ukraine in 1954 while the country agreed to give up its nuclear weapons in 1994.
Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons as part of an agreement which saw Russia guarantee to never attack its neighbour.
That this promise lasted a mere 20 years should tell us all we need to know about the value of Russian guarantees.
Your contributor is described as a business, economics and markets analyst; perhaps he should brush up on history and geography.
Damage to new fence dismays
I was amazed at how great this new fence looked once it had been finished, thinking that it would look great to visitors coming into Dunedin, but that was before some idiot vandals decided that it would be a good idea to smash some of the vertical railings and either bend them or rip them out completely.
It is a shame that the council can spend ratepayers’ money on what is a great look for Dunedin until these idiots take it upon themselves to destroy a very expensive fence.
It would be nice to put a CCTV camera somewhere to catch these idiots in the act and make them pay for the damage they have done.
DCC group manager transport Jeanine Benson replies: The new fence beside Pine Hill Rd (SH1) was jointly funded by the Dunedin City Council and Waka Kotahi; the DCC is responsible for maintenance. The damage is disappointing but will be fixed as part of our usual programme of maintenance work. We have no plans to install CCTV at the site.
