It won’t be long before they either jack up their prices or squeeze some ads into your paid subscription. Or both. Fuck em I say.

They lose their mind when you tell them the aged pension costs the taxpayer 5x what unemployment benefits do

https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/BriefingBook45p/WelfareCost

I call bullshit. Care to name the company and the union?

Now do Australia

Better, yes.

If you are wondering why it takes months to see a GP it’s because fully 50% of my consults are healthy people with self limiting viral illnesses.

Each one of those appointments makes me unavailable to see someone else who may or may not have offensive vaginal discharge.

If people just got out of the mindset of “my kid has a cold, I need to see a doctor to get checked out” or even worse " I have a cold, I need antibiotics" then maybe I can spend my day treating actual medical problems instead of telling people to go home, have some vitamin C and drink plenty of fluids.

If you’ve recovered from your cold before you can get to a doctor, then you didn’t need to see a doctor. It’s almost as if humans have some kind of immune system to deal with common viral infections

Nothing to do with your individual actions? Really? So there’s no difference between someone who works their ass off in school / uni and someone who just fucks around and drops out? I get that the children of the richest 1% can fail successfully, but for the bottom 99% you have to have some substance in order to succeed.

Lasagne is spaghetti flavoured cake.

You know that feeling you get when you’re a subject matter expert and some moron tries to argue with you by googling their own opinion and linking a news article in which one of the lead authors has declared conflict of interest by consulting for the manufacturer of the drug they wrote a paper about? Yeah, that’s why I’m done arguing with non-doctors on this topic.

You are not a communist, you are just another American white boy in a Che Guevara tshirt who blames his own failure on capitalism and a system set up against them in the same way incels blame their loneliness on women who fail to see them as they see themselves. Both a conveniently external locus of control.

Thankyou for inspiring me to block hexbear BTW

I presume you’re American because you insist wealth is a prerequisite to a medical degree. My parents were low-middle income before they retired. We ate 2 minute noodles at least twice a week and Dad grew most of the veggies. I went to a shitty public high school. I worked hard, got good grades and scored well in the entry exam. Nowhere in any of this was the question of money ever an issue. The government pays (well, loans really) the university fee and I was on welfare for the duration of my studies, which is less than minimum wage so I had a part time job as well.

Paxlovid has not been studied in the prevention of long COVID, and another closely related antiviral combination (lopinavir + ritonavir) has actially been shown to increase the odds ratio of long COVID by 92%.

I’m done arguing with non-doctors about this.

I’m a GP Anaesthetist

With respect, you are not a doctor. You have no concept of how complex the decisions are around prescribing medications. Do you know the number needed to treat vs number needed to harm for Paxlovid?. Do you have any idea what the drug does and in which populations it has been studied?

You’re young and healthy. You don’t need Paxlovid. End of story. It’s only indicated for over 70s / immunosuppressed / significant cardiorespiratory comorbidity to prevent hospitalisation and death. The decision of whether ir not to prescribe a drug is more complex and nuanced that “I have virus, give me virus pill”. Do you really think your doctor has never heard of long COVID?

It is not just some magic pill to be thrown around “just in case” to young healthy people anxious about rare complications.

Every time you prescribe it you roll the dice. You might be selecting for a strain that is resistant to Paxlovid. You might have an unwanted side effect or allergy. You might have picked up the last pack from your local pharmacy which means the 80 year old diabetic with a kidney transplant can’t get it.

I smoke two joints in the morning…

Imagine I sell a product that everyone needs to buy in order to live, but I’m a massive creep and like to take photos of people without their consent. But I put a sign up so now it’s ok. Cool and normal.

Or you know, maybe just don’t profiteer during inflation.

Conservatives don’t bother with things like reading the article, using the correct your/you’re or just thinking in general.

Price per litre / kg etc is in Australia too