UK British News Megathread - aka CWCissey's news thread

https://news.sky.com/story/row-over-new-greggs-vegan-sausage-rolls-heats-up-11597679 (https://archive.ph/5Ba6o)

A heated row has broken out over a move by Britain's largest bakery chain to launch a vegan sausage roll.

The pastry, which is filled with a meat substitute and encased in 96 pastry layers, is available in 950 Greggs stores across the country.

It was promised after 20,000 people signed a petition calling for the snack to be launched to accommodate plant-based diet eaters.


But the vegan sausage roll's launch has been greeted by a mixed reaction: Some consumers welcomed it, while others voiced their objections.

View image on Twitter


spread happiness@p4leandp1nk
https://twitter.com/p4leandp1nk/status/1080767496569974785

#VEGANsausageroll thanks Greggs

7
10:07 AM - Jan 3, 2019
See spread happiness's other Tweets
Twitter Ads info and privacy


Cook and food poverty campaigner Jack Monroe declared she was "frantically googling to see what time my nearest opens tomorrow morning because I will be outside".

While TV writer Brydie Lee-Kennedy called herself "very pro the Greggs vegan sausage roll because anything that wrenches veganism back from the 'clean eating' wellness folk is a good thing".

One Twitter user wrote that finding vegan sausage rolls missing from a store in Corby had "ruined my morning".

Another said: "My son is allergic to dairy products which means I can't really go to Greggs when he's with me. Now I can. Thank you vegans."

View image on Twitter


pg often@pgofton
https://twitter.com/pgofton/status/1080772793774624768

The hype got me like #Greggs #Veganuary

42
10:28 AM - Jan 3, 2019
See pg often's other Tweets
Twitter Ads info and privacy


TV presenter Piers Morgan led the charge of those outraged by the new roll.

"Nobody was waiting for a vegan bloody sausage, you PC-ravaged clowns," he wrote on Twitter.

Mr Morgan later complained at receiving "howling abuse from vegans", adding: "I get it, you're all hangry. I would be too if I only ate plants and gruel."

Another Twitter user said: "I really struggle to believe that 20,000 vegans are that desperate to eat in a Greggs."

"You don't paint a mustach (sic) on the Mona Lisa and you don't mess with the perfect sausage roll," one quipped.

Journalist Nooruddean Choudry suggested Greggs introduce a halal steak bake to "crank the fume levels right up to 11".

The bakery chain told concerned customers that "change is good" and that there would "always be a classic sausage roll".

It comes on the same day McDonald's launched its first vegetarian "Happy Meal", designed for children.

The new dish comes with a "veggie wrap", instead of the usual chicken or beef option.

It should be noted that Piers Morgan and Greggs share the same PR firm, so I'm thinking this is some serious faux outrage and South Park KKK gambiting here.

 

[Otterly]

A private hospital will take public patients (national health pays these hospitals to deal with public wait list clog) but all of these patients will be young, fit, with little to no comorbidities.
So a ENT surgeon and anaesthetist can do 15+ tonsillectomies in one day at a private hospital

Yeah, and we need to use them like that. High throughput easy cases.
One thing I always notice if I’m dealing with hospitals is how bloody inefficient MOST are and the contrast with places that are nailing it.
Firstly TOO MUCH goes through emergency in rhe wrong ways. We need a layer between GP taking two weeks and emergency and we have so few urgent care drop ins.
So inefficient is getting to an and E for example for a slip on ice and a possibly cracked wrist. This should be a quick triage to make sure you’ve got pulses and then next door to minor Injuries for x rays and a slab, if it’s broken come back tomorrow or later for a cast. You’re triaged, you’re out if emergency and you’re somewhere where it’s a set if double doors away if the pulse is lost etc.
Ditto stuff like a child with clear strep throat or things that need antibiotics but not A and E. Two weeks to see a GP doesn’t work for that. We need drop in clinics, and we need them to have admitting privileges.
Inefficient is triage and then a blood test and then sat there all night to have someone sign it off. Triage isn’t working well - the easy cases sit and clog the system while the same people deal with the complex ones and that is madness.
It can be done better. I was at a stroke unit for a relative and it was amazing; within the hospital. Everything done in a half day. Tests, scans, they clearly got read immediately, saw the specialist, treatment program initiated. Yes a lot of intensive time, yes a lot of walking or wheeling round the departments but it was a fucking machine. So well run. I asked then for a feedback form and they asked if it was a complaint. I said no, I want to praise your setup, it’s amazing. They actually laughed at me and said well thanks but we don’t have a system for praise!
There are little fiefdoms within the NHS that are run like well oiled machines, but the bulk is a mess.
Other euro countries have private places taking a lot of the load. When I lived abroad I saw a private gyno and omg the difference in that birth and the ones I had in the nhs makes me mad to think about. We need public private infrastructure like other countries have. All the routine stuff, the mammograms, the minor Injuries, the drop ins, the asthma clinics, the beetus clinics - it can all be done by high throughput private.

 

[Smashed & Slamed]

I want details on one of your staff members. I have one of your loved ones tied to a chair in an abandoned warehouse. I'm sending you the video feed in real time of them being bashed about with a hammer. Do you genuinely think you'd be able to resist giving me the information? Alternatively I followed you to a train with a big knife and have it pressed against your neck, do you genuinely value work information over your LIFE?

Information acquired under duress is of dubious use. The person may lie to you without them realizing they are lying. Not to mention they could just panic and shut down.
The easiest way to get information is to just get closer to the person and wait for them to slip up. Speeding it along if you can.

 

[The Crack Spiders Bitch]

@Otterly

We have walk in centres in Australia, also respiratory clinics, and other diversions from ED and it doesn't take the load off as much as you think.
Also 2 weeks to see a GP is insane and what in the actual fuck is that about?

Private isn't a fix all solution.
Private is there to make money and they will happily cut staff or pay Bomalians to do so. I was at a private hospital for a relative last week. Nursing staff 100% Indian and couldn't speak English.
Indians are some of the worst healthcare staff to deal with because they're both arrogant and subservient.
They will tell you that you don't know anything but then also refuse to make decisions and defer everything back to someone higher than them - even for inconsequential stuff.

The best way to ensure waitlists move is to make two streams.
Young healthy people shouldn't have their QOLs suffer because an overweight smoker on welfare has technically "waited longer".

It should be urgency first, and best outcome for the patient.
If it's non life threatening, then the young (not the old/infirm) should be prioritised.

At any rate, healthcare in most countries needs to be drastically reformed.

 

[Hoi Polloi]

Triage isn’t working well - the easy cases sit and clog the system while the same people deal with the complex ones and that is madness.

I don't work in public health at all but I completely agree with your observations.

Well over a decade ago I sat in A&E with an extremely broken nose (I'm talking visibly broken, like moved an inch laterally on my face). I'd never broken my nose before so assumed I was supposed to go to A&E for such an issue.

Ended up sat there for what must have been 7 or 8 hours, only to have a less than 10 minute observation in which I was told to book a consultation with an ENT in 2 weeks when the swelling subsided. They even gave me a little pre-printed card explaining this.

I waited 7 hours to be told to come back in 2 weeks, I'd have rather they just turned me away immediately. Anything potentially serious they could've been concerned about (due it being a head injury) should've been dealt with far sooner than 7 hours - but there were no concerns.

For any injury I've had since, I've simply refused to go.

 

[UselessRubberKeyboard]

The problem with a lot of private healthcare is that essentially, it’s just cancer insurance. There are a lot of other medical issues it won’t treat - specifically long-term illnesses that you need long-term treatment for. Which is a large part of healthcare, especially in the mid- to older-aged population.

What’s the point of paying for private healthcare if you’re too worried that they’ll find you have a long-term condition that they then won’t cover?

There’s a lot of inefficiency in the NHS, a large part of it caused by Blair and his insane ideas about different departments in hospitals ‘buying’ services from each other etc. It doesn’t mean a for-profit system should be allowed to just swoop in and cream off the nice, straightforward cases while leaving the long-term work to the NHS, though. Why the hell are we having to employ staff from abroad?

 

[SirCliveSinclairdabbing]

The in between for the nhs is the walk in clinics.

I go out of the city now if I need one. Clinics in medium to small towns typically only have a 30 minute wait. In the city it’s 4 hours.

 

[Eekum Bokum]

Niggel 'flip-flop' Farrage is currently back tracking on the tax cuts he previously promised.
Normal British political shenanigans have resumed.

"I know we said we would stop the illegals coming in, but there's not much we can do about it with the EU law in place".

That's how he operates, promise the world then back away when it looks like he has a real chance of winning. His grift relies on him not winning.

 

[Heinrich Maneuver]

Walk in clinics/Urgent Care are definitely the way forward to relieve some burdens on A&E, especially some kind of "if its broken come here" ward.
Agree on triage, we need to be able to turn people away pronto instead of waiting 7-8 hours- but also get rid of malingerers/people who think EVERYTHING is an emergency dr treat it now now now. Education and 'how to use the NHS, no running out of cigs is not cause to phone an ambulance' leaflets for the stupid.

Spoiler: PL: Healthcare Attitudes

Ive a very lefty friend, very "being fat isnt someones fault its societys" who recently started work for the NHS. OH how her opinions changed lmfao. She realised that 98% of her patients are people who refuse to get better (ie cut down on salt or even start walking around a bit) and expect pills to fix everything. The average attitude to the NHS and what modern medicine can/should do is fucked.

(And GOD we need to stop hiring people who don't speak English. i'm going private to find a white lady doctor. Jeets dont gaf)
How would you tackle the issue of non UK citizens accessing healthcare? I would have a temp ban on it to let the NHS have a fucking breather, but then i dont want migrants shitting up A&E because they have a cold or an ulcer- basically how do we say fuck off GPs full go home?

 

[Overly Serious]

There's another aspect to Private healthcare that I don't think has been touched on. That is that it is far more often preventative. A private doctor will often have a scheduled assessments where you're properly looked at to catch issues early. A private dentist will likely have supplementary parts to the package like hygienist visits to keep your teeth in good nick. For insurance style private health care where you're guaranteed a certain level of costs or type of care should you need it, from a fixed membership fee, they are incentivised to keep you healthy and head that off.

The NHS does have programmes like this and credit to them for trying. But they don't have the resource or the staff to do that. So what ends up happening is people's health declines and declines until they reach crisis point and THEN they get seen.

Which from a systemic point of view, is far worse than preventative. That's costs and time and staffing. From the patient's well-being point of view, it's obviously far, far worse.

They are absolutely shit scared of reducing the threat because then if something DOES happen they'd look like fools,

I see a parallel to Fukishima in that. Originally the nuclear incident rating wasn't at the highest but the Japanese press raised Hell about that because they accused the government of not treating it seriously enough (fun fact: the only people hospitalised were four early responders who had mild radiation burns on their shins from wading around in the water all day). So the ministers raised Fukishima to the highest possible incident rating even though it didn't meet the critieria. And of course then the press started running around shouting how this was the most severe type of nuclear incident possible.

More people died from the response to Fukishima (e.g. elderly people having to go through evacuations, normal people suffering drastic social disruption from being moved from friends and family, etc.) than from radiation. Which was none. You also saw panicked headlines about how detection rates of thyroid cancer had soared post-disaster. Well, yes, you only introduced routine scanning of children for it after it. Before you just weren't looking for it.

Point is, the public don't understand the costs or consequences of demanding everything be treated maximally serious all the time. They don't understand that some things are a zero sum game, that resource given to one thing is less resource for something else. And we have a system whereby ministers are incentivised to act on these calls regardless of whether they're good or not. Passing new feel-good laws and sound-bite policies is how they stay in power.

A large Galaxy bar always works with ladies

Is that what you call it?

 

[Hoi Polloi]

but also get rid of malingerers/people who think EVERYTHING is an emergency dr treat it now now now. Education and 'how to use the NHS, no running out of cigs is not cause to phone an ambulance' leaflets for the stupid.

On this note, I saw a funny little Instagram reel from the BBC (I'm pretty sure) showing some soundbites of utterly retarded 999 calls.

First guy calling because KFC are refusing to sell him food or some sort of payment issue.

Second is a woman (clearly an immigrant) who's scared of a spider in her hallway.

Wouldn't be surprised if there's been plenty of calls to emergency services because their baby is keeping them up or their fire alarm wont stop chirping.

 

[Heinrich Maneuver]

On this note, I saw a funny little Instagram reel from the BBC (I'm pretty sure) showing some soundbites of utterly retarded 999 calls.

I saw that too! it's actually an article/recent PLEA from the Met to stop phoning for bullshit reasons. I genuinely think we need to fine people who phone for shit like that- you get a 'good faith' call of hearing screaming and calling but it turns out its some retard playing CoD, thats fine you did ur civic duty or whatever. You phone for KFC? Immediate £100 fine + whatever resources are used up to deal with your nonsense, idc how they'd do it but trace the number and make people start paying for wasting time.

 

[Made In Wales]

Some midday bits from GB News:

* Politics LIVE: Rachel Reeves to consider slashing green levies to reduce cost of energy bills as she takes fight to Reform UK.

* Reform and Liberal Democrats neck-and-neck as Nigel Farage and Ed Davey eye up Super Thursday victory with 8 seats up for grabs.

* HMRC employee ordered to pay £20k for refusing to turn up to work after Covid lockdown.

* Keir Starmer faces demands to 'come clean to British public over true cost of digital ID' amid warning over £1billion price tag.

* 'Vandalism!' Children to be given climate change lessons in Labour's 'diverse' new curriculum.

* Ex-BBC Director tells Tim Davie 'time to resign' over biased news claims: 'Failure of governance!'

* Britain 'sliding into avoidable crisis' as workplace sickness costing UK economy 7% of GDP.

* Store closures update: UK homeware retailer Fired Earth shuts down ALL SHOPS with 133 jobs axed in administration process.

* Axel Rudakubana's brother reveals how family feared 'merciless' murderer would kill them all.

* 'Vandalism!' Children to be given climate change lessons in Labour's 'diverse' new curriculum.

* 'GB News would have been strung up by Ofcom!' Bev Turner erupts at ex-BBC producer over 'distorted' Donald Trump edit.

 

[teriyakiburns]

Walk in clinics/Urgent Care are definitely the way forward to relieve some burdens on A&E, especially some kind of "if its broken come here" ward.

There used to be way more of them than there are today. A lot were closed down to "centralise" services into big centres, because some manager wanted a bigger budget to pay for a nicer office, and because it's just easier to manage resources for one larger centre rather than multiple smaller ones. Half the problems with the NHS are the result of this sort of empire-building by administrators.

 

[Heinrich Maneuver]

THEY CAN'T KEEP GETTING AWAY WITH IT

(god bless the sneeder for the auto thumbnail may all your cheese be cheesey and your women fat)

 

[Otterly]

It doesn’t mean a for-profit system should be allowed to just swoop in and cream off the nice, straightforward cases while leaving the long-term work to the NHS, though.

The profits allowed are capped as far as I remember from euro systems. Whatever Finland does works. And frankly, if the easy stuff can be taken care of efficiently for not banditry level profit I’m ok with that. I wonder if you did a cost analysis of how A and E would run with genuine emergencies vs the usual mix what it would show? We’ve got very skilled and stressed emergency staff burning out dealing with too much, maybe the easy stuff being at the minor injuries would be a godsend.
I don’t think there’s a single magic bullet for the nhs but not having everything unplanned go through emergency would help.
Elderly care is a massive bed blocker and a lot of that goes through A and E too when it really shouldn’t. You could resolve most bed blocking by the elderly by re opening the cottage hospitals that were where we used to put oldies who needed basic rehab but weren’t drastically sick.

There used to be way more of them than there are today. A lot were closed down to "centralise" services into big centres, because some manager wanted a bigger budget to pay for a nicer office, and because it's just easier to manage resources for one larger centre rather than multiple smaller ones. Half the problems with the NHS are the result of this sort of empire-building by administrators.

And I think in some cases that centralisation is saving lives - the real hardcore specialist stuff needs focused centres where the expertise is all in one place. Cancer, some peadiatric stuff etc. Some cardio as well. Maternity too - nice in theory to have little local places but the reality is you need a nice quiet unit that’s a set of double doors away from the theatre/NICU end of things.
Where it falls down is rhe everyday stuff. Slips, trips, injury that’s minor, all that clogs up emergency and it should be dealt with away from there. Some things are better centralised and some localised.
the nhs is pockets of brilliance in a sea of mismanagement

 

[Morethanabitfoolish]

Is that what you call it?

Time was a Toblerone would have been a decent measurement but the way shrinkflation is going nothing is going to remain flattering anymore.

 

[teriyakiburns]

THEY CAN'T KEEP GETTING AWAY WITH IT

Makes you wonder just how many they've "accidentally" let out over the years and how many are still officially counted as incarcerated.

 

[Duane Dibbley]

I'll tell you who is secure and absolutely won't be mistakenly released early; those who posted mean tweets.
I can't see how these mistakes can happen unintentionally. The process of letting a prisoner out of a cell, giving him his clothes, belongings and letting him walk out is beyond comprehension for me.

 

[BongoMongo]

The big issue we're not talking about with A&E is morons going there "just to get checked out". And the retards who think waiting for an ambulance will get them treated faster.

And then there's the arseholes who take a gaggle of pals and treat it as a social do. Likewise both parents who take ALL their kids when only one has a minor injury and is conscious and walking.

A&E is for serious life threatening shit and the government needs to come under an insane amount of pressure to provide walk in clinics for anything minor where you're still walking, Cognizant and not spurting blood.

Also people need to look after themselves. I sliced my thumb real bad other week (I had a sticky bottle of olive oil and thought a filleting knife would work. Spoiler; it was a bad idea).

The A&E is along the road and the chemist was shut. So I wrapped a hair tie round base of my thumb , put some blue roll round the whole thing, wait til it dried, decided it wasn't that bad and went to the butchers near me. They had an excellent first aid kit, and some sterisrips later, all was well.

It's now nearly healed and I didn't waste time or resource going to A&E. But we all know a spastic or two who would, "just to get it checked".

Oh and we need to use existing legislation to fine people who make themselves insensate with drink and end up in A&E. There's laws there. Fine them.

 

[Duane Dibbley]

They had an excellent first aid kit, and some sterisrips later, all was well.

Every home should have two first aid kits. Please go buy one and support St John's Ambulance. They're £20 a pop and come with everything you need.

If you ever get a bad gash, use superglue to close the wound, it's what it was invented for. Or, if you're outdoors or in the shed, smash as many cobwebs in there as you can.