The Criminality of a Price on Life

In yesterday ‘s Guardian the Government is facing calls to investigate ” a deeply worrying trend in the number of deaths from cocaine use”, 432  in 2017 compared with 112 in 201. I would never dispute any needless death is sad, nor am I unsympathetic to the reasons behind drug use; but it is a choice.

Compare this to a report on Wednesday by Welfare Weekly who demonstrated “111,450 ESA claims were closed following the death of claimants between March 2014 to February 2017″. These people Died through NO fault of their own and indeed may have be as a result of Government Processes.

Desperately this is not new, back in 2014 I was writing about the number of Chronically Sick and Disabled people dying waiting for benefits where ” between January & November 2011 10,600 disabled people either in receipt of or awaiting benefits died”

I called it a Scandal then, now I can only call it Criminal and my real question is Where is the Call for this to Stop ?

I  don’t know if there is one place which has recorded all the deaths of sick and disabled people either waiting for, or after losing their Welfare Benefits;  Steve Topple at The Canary used the Welfare Weekly figures and calculates

the deaths per day were:

• Slightly more than 7 in the “unknown” group.
• 9.02 during the assessment phase.
• 10 in the Work Related Activity Group (WRAG).
• Almost 75 in the Support Group.

Further there are numerous petitions, reports and investigations undertaken by ourselves as a disabled community through to the UN; all attempting to identify – Why have so many of our most vulnerable citizens died before their time.

Despite the struggles to address this over the past seven or eight years it continues; ergo I feel compelled to ask When and by Whom will the #DWP, who as the benefits administrator must surely be the responsible party and the Ministers of State who Manages said department be held to account?

Nothing will bring back those we have lost, but surely no one will disagree, it well past time those responsible paid the price for these needless Deaths – it is Time For The TRUTH.

Trusting to Work from Home

As someone who was forced from my last job largely because my managers and employer, a Local Authority failed to understand Home Working, and particularly how it supports disabled staff, I empathise people currently in this situation due to Lockdown.

I was employed on a part time permanent contract with, the flexibility to work from home, on the days I was due to my disabilities, physically unable to get into the office. This was all discussed and signed off at the time I was taken on. Prior to my engagement, occupational Health, HR, my manager and myself all discussed both my needs and the requirements of my employer and arrived at this agreement.

Access to Work paid for all my essential equipment with the exception of a laptop which it was again agreed would be supplied by my employer, this never arrived therefore to work from home I needed to use my person pc.

On the occasions I needed to work from home I was forced to work on a system which, at that time, was not fit for purpose; I was given a small fob which you logged into via a password and theoretically gave safe access to the intranet. In reality it regularly failed, this then meant an hour on the phone with IT, allowing remote log in from them to my personal pc, before I could even begin to work. And in two years this caused three hard drives to become corrupted. And as work was the sole use of the drive, there is no other reason.

Further to this, my manager would regularly set up team meetings at times I was not working; forcing me to choose whether to participate at of working hours or not attend and cause tensions with my co-workers. I found out later that my stated hours and the agreement to work remotely due to health, was never endorsed by my manager and I was viewed as absent by colleagues.

The whole notion of working from home requires trust on both sides and a shift in thinking from managers and employers. The fact that many bosses feel that remote surveillance is acceptable is, in my opinion, due to the old “when the cat is away, the nice will play” wives tale; it is simply that management seems to view those they are responsible for as needing almost constant visual supervision.

Ironically they fail to recognise that this thinking is in reality their own shortcoming; effective managers trust they have given a clear and effective brief, ensured staff understand their roles and are skilled and comfortable with carrying out their tasks.

Remote surveillance, particularly in corporate setting is indicative of the lack of trust from employers, insecure and ineffective managers and a mistrust in other sections such as HR .

I am not naïve and believe every single employee is totally honest with their time but I contest providing the work is completed correctly and on time the when, where and how it is completed has NO bearing. Anything more than requiring tasks to be submitted to satisfaction is intrusion.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/sep/27/shirking-from-home-staff-feel-the-heat-as-bosses-ramp-up-remote-surveillance

#Housebound #ESA and Surviving #Coronavirus

I am one of an unknown number of people unable to leave their home for much or all of the time; I live with a number of Chronic conditions all of which mean I function on a High dose of Medication.

This is a person post outlining the problems I, along with doubtless many many others, are facing during the Corvid19 Crisis.

Before I begin I do want to say how very pleased I am to see self employed people and those who’s jobs are at risk, supported £ during this time.

However, I’m also Very Concerned for the number of #Sick & #Disabled people Surviving on #ESA, and maybe #PIP. Firstly lets look at Food & Household Essentials; how the Heck are we supposed to manage the Increase in aforementioned goods AND How are we Even supposed to Access the #Essentials??

The Supermarkets are talking well, with special shopping hours for Vulnerable people but; what use is that to those of us unable to get to these venues?

It has just taken me over half an hour to desperately struggle to unload my delivered shopping from the crates stacked on my doorstep, into my hall, all the while feeling the need to apologise to the delivery driver who stood watching.  I then grappled with the transfer of goods to my kitchen;  and then of course I had to put it away. Usually the drivers bring my goods into the kitchen and help me unload onto the worksurfaces meaning I do not have to bend; and with osteoarthritis of the spine, This is an Amazing help.

All the above took place without me receiving over 50% of my order, including potatoes, bread and mince; all of which were supposedly available last night?! So now I have to go over another week without basics before another delivery slot is available!

Is it too much for supermarkets to consider not only providing shopping Times for #Vulnerable people, to line up their online shopping sites with their stock and Prioritise #Basics for housebound Shoppers?

I am actually fortunate at the minute as my daughter, who is also disabled,  is braving the virus to help me and my 90 year old mum; but not everyone is as lucky.

The second issue is medication & Pain support, I have only recently been forced to wait for a week without one lot of my meds; and the withdrawal was sheer torment. The virus is causing problems with both accessing and delivering essential medication to us housebound folk and I am hearing NO support form the government for this. Further my appointment for steroid injections next week has been cancelled; I do accept this might seem petty to those who do not Exist in Chronic pain but, I assure you it is not. These injections are the ONLY respite I get; once a year,  for a while, I live without the feeling of constantly being stabbed in my neck.

I do get this is not a priority over those who are fighting to survive Coronavirus but they are one of lifelines.

Lastly for today the problem is surviving the issues my Mental Health problems are causing during isolation; like everyone else I’m inundated with often contradictory tales of what we should or should not do to manage the virus. Personally my chronic depression is really playing the ‘what is the point of life’ game; and the problems outlined above, along with the worries of financially coping are causing these thoughts to blow up expedientially.

I am turning to online learning, You Tube, and my lifesaving Kindle for ways to distract both the news and my inner voices.

If anyone is experiencing similar issues to me, and fancies setting up an online campaign about the problems of disabled, housebound people, or wants to sound off Please leave me a comment; a like minded bunch of people online is just what I need right now

Hoping you ALL Stay Safe and As Well as possible xx

More Evidence of the Prescription Medications Crisis

Following Mondays post of my personal experiences last week,  I’ve been collating some of the evidence showing just how big a problem this is; the conditions below in Bold are just some of the Health problems affected :

Chemist dispensers complain shortages of Drugs are “killing” them

That is sad BUT ‘killing THEM? Let us focus on outcome of the sudden unavailability of a drug such as Adalat which controls blood pressure and angina and, or, Furosemide used to treat high blood pressure, heart failure and oedema.

And just what will happen when  patients who rely on  Antidepressants, drugs for Chronic and Acute Pain Relief,  to control their Epilepsy,  and women taking HRT suddenly find themselves Without their Pharmaceuticals?

Hidden within another article regarding medication shortages – Medicine shortages force government to limit HRT drug exports  it was reported the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC)  are allowing pharmacists to issue Different strengths of fluoxetine, better known as Prozac, used to treat  major depressive disorder, bulimia nervosa , obsessive-compulsive disorder, panic disorder, and premenstrual dysphoric disorder patients! This is despite one of the many warnings given by the drug information included inside packages: Do not take this medicine in larger or smaller amounts

So the UK Government is advising dispensers to Issue the Wrong dosage – This could quite possibly “Kill” People.

Despite the growing amount of evidence regarding the shortages of medication,  the Healthcare Distribution Association, (HDA) recently published this-

Representatives from the largest wholesalers will visit pharmacies across the UK to “dispel some of the misconceptions” around medicine shortages

Herein we are told “Although this problem has been referred to as ‘drug shortages’, often the real nature of the problem is the delay between a patient handing over their prescription and actually getting the medicines they need” !

They also produced an Infograph suggesting a plethora of other possible ‘reasons’ for these shortages, which remember don’t exist, including “Acts of God” !

So either God, or we patients are to blame;  NO this is completely untrue, it is not our fault, nor that of a deity that medication is unavailable

Martin Sawyer CEO of aforementioned HDA, wrote  “Hardly a day goes by without the reported shortage of a medicine – and rightly so. For one patient to have to wait to receive their medication is one too many.”   Sawyer proposes the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) “should enforce stricter laws on wholesale businesses hoarding supplies to help prevent medicine shortages”

Hmm, the HDA goes from a denial of shortages – to blaming patients and then  independent suppliers of pharmaceuticals for the problem in less than a week?

So just Why is this happening? According to the Department of Health and Social Care (DH)  these shortages in medication is something that happens “occasionally” and  “most shortages are because of problems in production” but absolutely it is Not down to Brexit!

Regardless of these claims, most worrying is Professor Dame Sally Davies, the Government’s outgoing top adviser on health matters said yesterday “ministers could not guarantee that lives would not be lost due to a lack of resources“.

Given the evidence we have seen so far, I think it is justified to say some people are going to Die because of these shortages. And personally I strongly feel, that any life lost as a result of no, or the wrong dosage/type of medication; would be tantamount to State Manslaughter

 

 

Chronic Illness and Prescription Medication – No MEDS No LIFE

I am currently recovering, very slowly, from a period of withdrawal. Not from illegal substances but from unobtainable prescription meds! We’ve all seen the Post Brexit warnings about this but I can assure you after discussions with several independent and high street pharmacists ALL medication is difficult to get. I spent 5 days last week totally and immediately without my high dose Preganalin (an epilepsy drug also used to control nerve pain); and can honestly say I can not ever remember feeling as ill, I literally had to stop myself swallowing packets of diazapin, please ignore spelling I’m still really fuzzy.

Symptoms included Gastric flu, an acute depression attack, anxiety, uncontrollable shakes, flushes and chills and total inability to function.

Very fortunately for me on day 5, Friday, my friend after chasing around the City managed to get some tablets on Friday pm.

Within 4 Hours, the nausea, and the worst of the shakes had abated and Sat morning I felt Alive; I mean cognitively Alive, the anxiety, depression and all associated head fuck had stopped completely; I emotionally was as stable as I ever am.  Yet physically I am still very weak and having to retrain my stomach to accept food.

This is Already people, Think what is going to come over the next few weeks! Please take this as a warning, check with your GPs, pharmacists, etc, and if you discover what we did here in Leicester, and what friends in Essex did – Please let me know.

*We are passing this and similar tails onto Jon Ashworth (Shadow Health Minister & Leicester S MP) This Must be addressed Now.

I seriously do not know if I could go through that again and am working on ideas to support me not to (which I will disclose another day) BUT we regular consumers of Pharmaceutical Products Need to Protect ourselves now.

We will be the earliest casualties of this Severe Lack of Medication in UK, but it will affect Everyone – ALL Drugs are Disappearing across the UK, if the local Chemists are to be believed and I ask you Why would they Lie?

*We will also being communicating with the local NHS Trusts about this .

Take Care All and keep me posted please on this issue Nationwide

Universal Credit and its direct causal links to longer NHS waits, higher council tax and more rough sleepers …

via Joe Halewood @speyejoe

From April 2012 to March 2019 housing associations in England have closed 14 properties every working day that accommodated #older persons, #disabled persons, #women fleeing domestic abuse or #homeless persons.

https://speyejoe2.wordpress.com/2019/09/30/universal-credit-and-its-direct-causal-links-to-longer-nhs-waits-higher-council-tax-and-more-rough-sleepers/

 

We are governed by a false narrative that everything is predicated on wealth

Real LIFE in UK 2019

“Britain is among the top 10 of the wealthiest nations on earth and the big question is, what good is that doing us, the millions of ordinary people living precariously and/or in poverty [10]? The answer is none. Few of us have any access to wealth.”

Fear and Loathing in Great Britain

PHOTO BY JACK KURTZ

The accumulation of wealth for its own sake is responsible for poverty because it is unnatural and false. It is anti-life.

Human kind are the only creatures who have this imposed false narrative of being, every other creature and, indeed, most humans, merely want enough and having enough will get on and do other things, like play, raising young, exploring, being creative, home building of whatever. Obsessing on grasping an excess of wealth is not just sick, it’s stupid and makes no sense, whereas the constant worry when beaten down by the violence of poverty is both reasonable and inevitable.

There is a reason why poverty is not some moral, ethical or genetic failure in poor people and is, in fact, violence. Poverty is the inevitable consequence of the polarisation and accumulation of obscene wealth into the hands of a very small number of people who…

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“Reversing Brexit will damage the credibility of democracy!” Folks, Brexit itself has already done that.

Damn YES – “The foaming-mouthed demands for #Brexit’s enforcement are about a selfish, ill-informed wish to leave the EU for its own sake, and the cries of, “You don’t believe in democracy” are an ugly attempt to silence honest opposition with emotional blackmail.”

TheCritique Archives

by Martin Odoni

‘Every silly bastard’

“The trouble with democracy… is every silly bastard gets a vote.”
– Rimmer, Red Dwarf: Backwards, by Rob Grant, publ. 1996.

I tire of hearing many a relentless chorus of unthinking protest from Brexit supporters.

“What part of ‘we’re leaving’ don’t you get?!?!?”

“We won! You lost! Get over it, Remoaners!”

“We want control of our borders back!”

“We want to make our own laws!”

“We hate Europeans because we’re racists and xenophobes!” (NOTE: This is not one they really say, but in a lot of cases, that is only because they have no wish to admit it.)

The one I am most fed up of hearing at the moment is that, “If we stop Brexit, it will destroy the credibility of British democracy.” I have heard many euroskeptics on…

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Neoliberalism – a terminal man-made disease

‘#Politicians Brag of being self-made YET they couldn’t do it without us BUT they utterly despise us – and that is everything that is wrong with Britain and the world today’ via @KeithCameron5

Neoliberalism – a terminal man-made disease https://fearandloathingingreatbritain.wordpress.com/2019/08/23/neoliberalism-a-terminal-man-made-disease/

Fear and Loathing in Great Britain

Over the past few years I have run a gamut of feelings about neoliberalism, anger, rage, despondency, futility, vengefulness, hatred, but lately all that has congealed and what I feel more than anything else is a virulent hatred for the appalling reality of the casual deaths neoliberalism not only takes for granted, but which is predicated on the millions of deaths of ordinary people.

Milton Friedman saw neoliberalism, unfettered markets, corporate power and a one-size-fits-all economic model, as the perfect force of economic liberation and the ultimate economic solution through the elimination of the public sector, total liberation for corporations and catastrophic cuts to social spending.

The USA has, in its global military adventures, justifiably earned a reputation for what’s known as collateral damage and killing by ‘friendly fire’. Such casualties of war are at least, even in such a derisory and cursory a way, acknowledged. Not so the victims…

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Whilst the Media Focuses on Private Renting Who Cares about #Social Tenants

 

“Between 2010 to 2018 median rent increases in England were social landlords 50% more than inflation and private landlords 12% less than inflation – facts that are undeniable yet run contrary to typical housing commentary which ignores these facts.”

Joe Halewood  @SpeyeJoe

Social rents increase 70% more than private ones … but Who Cares?

Together these Women Changed their Childrens World

This week we have witnessed a real example of the type of #Activism necessary to challenge the past decade of #Discrimination.  The group of mums who decided they were not going to tolerate their children been cut off from each other have shown us what it takes to create Change – Inclusion & Collaboration.

The story only broke this Tuesday with The Guardian’s ‘Too poor to play ‘  an article outlining how developer Henley Homes had literally isolated the children from playing in the ‘Home Owner Playground’.  In the following 4 days the mums, and I’m not assuming dads too, came together for the Rights for the children to mix and the barrier was literally opened.

These women have demonstrated in the best possible way of HOW to really make a difference; you come together forgetting all of your differences because the Goal is more important and you CAN create the Change you desire.

I am fully aware this may seem simplistic when comparing privet to Brexit,  #Disabled People Dying or ChildPoverty, or indeed any of the myriad if issues we survive today; and yet the basic principles remain the same.

I hope this example of True political engagement gives us something to hang on to when we despair and thin our Single Voice can not make a Difference – It Can and it Does