Another Reason Socialized Medicine Sucks

Okay. I'm not sure I gave you a first reason that socialized medicine sucks, but trust me, it bites the weenie. I'm sure you probably have two or three reasons already in mind anyway.

In what can only be described as horrific failure, a hospital in the UK admits it erroneously gave cancer patients the all clear, when patients actually had cancer. And they told cancer-free patients that they had the disease and began administering unnecessary treatments.
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Presented without context

Mr Allison admits to no formal acting training, although he says he starred in a very successful school play - Toad of Toad Hall.

His acting experience includes parts in a short film called Penguin: Naked Penguins Save the Earth, in which he and other nude men imitate penguins, a pop video entitled the Bearded Nymph, and another film, Aged Raver.

While on leave from his job as a prosecutor, he's apparently available for "lingerie, glamour, implied nude, adult and topless" modeling.  Yay.

If, for some strange reason, you'd like a peek at the very pallid, very middle-aged, very (non-frontally) nekkid Mr. Allison, I suppose you could click here. 

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Where would we be without Welsh scientists?

You know, your country might have a little problem with the sauce if you need scientists to redesign your streets so they're safer for drunks:

Scientists have decided that redesigning streets to make them more user-friendly for drunks could help reduce conflict and violence.

After using computer simulations based on the Welsh to mimic the movements of people staggering home after a good night out, researchers came to the staggering realisation that drunk people trip over things.

You don't say. Next they'll tell us that the booze these people drink tends to be full of alcohol.

The researchers plan to investigate how moving street obstacles or increasing pedestrianisation might ease congestion around nightspots, New Scientist magazine reported.

The model could also be used to look at the effect of a new bar or fast-food outlet opening in a crowded city centre.

They hope to come up with street designs that direct late-night revellers safely home to their beds instead of into the path of trouble.

They've found that staggering drunks are a problem because they get in people's way, making them possible "targets of violence." I'm sure that the people staggering around in the streets of Wales drunk off their asses are never, ever the instigators of violence themselves. I mean, when has that ever happened?

(Via Moron Central)

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You might not want to go casually tossing around the "S" word

Yes, I know this was just a joke, but the kind of people who might be encouraged are not exactly renowned for their keen sense of humor:

The man who could become Britain's next prime minister joked Thursday that he was thinking about bringing in Sharia law for bicycle thieves after having his own bike stolen outside a London supermarket.

"I'm contemplating introducing Sharia law for bicycle theft," said the leader of the main opposition Conservative Party, David Cameron, referring to the Islamic law code, after thieves took his bike as he stopped to pick up groceries near his west London home.

I suppose I'd be pissed if someone gaffled my bike, too, but I don't think I'd go to the press and suggest slicing the thief's hand off.  Especially not in Londonistan.

Anyway, the part of this story that's actually pretty funny is that Cameron can only blame his own dumb ass for the theft:

Cameron told London's Evening Standard newspaper earlier that he chained the mountain bike through the wheel around a three-foot (0.9-metre) tall bollard but when he emerged from the shop it had disappeared.

A "bollard" is apparently a post in whatever crazy language it is that they speak over there, and chaining you bike to a three-foot-tall post is basically a recipe for FAIL in any language.

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So why not just get rid of the police dogs at this stage?

And Britain's downward spiral continues.  Following the efforts to make police dogs wear booties when they are to be taken into muslim homes for searches, the Brits are now working to set setting guidelines demanding police avoid frightening criminals with their dogs and to be mindful of potential allergies. 

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UK considering anti-Moron policies

So, the number of people being treated for alcohol-related illnesses is apparently sharply on the rise in Britain, but that doesn't mean they have to resort to drastic measures, right?

Supermarkets have faced repeated calls to ban discount alcohol, in particular deals in in which beer is cheaper than bottled water. And ministers are considering plans to tackle the problem, including cigarette-style health warnings on bottles and cans, a ban on “happy hours” where bars sell cut-price drinks and rules outlawing supermarket discounts.

Asked for his reaction to these proposals, one prominent figure who spends a lot of time with British dudes had the following reaction:

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Limey kids sipping something other than tea

It looks like a lot of British kids are getting an early jump on the Ace of Spades Lifestyleâ„¢:

One in five 11 to 15-year-olds in England - 640,000 school pupils - had drunk alcohol in the past week, figures published by the NHS Information Centre show.

The study found that the average amount consumed by teenagers who had drunk recently was 12.7 units a week, equivalent to six pints of beer or almost a bottle and a half of wine.

Pfffft. What a bunch of friggin' lightweights. I can drink a hell of a lot more than that over the course of a week.

The figures come despite concerted efforts by the Government to tackle substance abuse by schoolchildren, with £30 million spent on the drugs advice service Frank in the past five years and new laws being developed to stop teenagers binge-drinking in public.

Well there's one of their biggest problems right there, blowing thirty million on some dude named Frank who's apparently not very good at his job. No wonder they have problems.

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Brits to allow increased rights to defend against criminals?

The Brits finally got something a little right?  I'll be damned, I thought this day would never come.

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Wait a minute

How can this even be possible? I mean, I thought they had laws in the U.K. banning people from carrying knives in public, right?

Twenty teenagers have been stabbed to death in London alone this year. Last week, six people died in knife-related attacks in a single 24 hour period.

[...]

In the early hours of Sunday morning, a 23-year-old woman was found in the street in Cannock, Staffordshire, suffering from stab wounds. She is in a stable condition and two men were arrested in connection with the incident.

A 15-year-old boy has been detained over the stabbing of a 20-year-old in a skatepark, who was knifed in the legs, according to North Wales Police.

Another 20-year-old man is recovering in hospital after being stabbed five times outside a seaside pub in Blackpool. A 48-year-old man has been charged with attempted murder.

Meanwhile detectives were continuing to question two people following the fatal stabbing of a father-of-two, named locally as Johnny Derrick, in Bristol.

I mean, it's like the criminals aren't even paying attention to the law! Simply astonishing, isn't it?

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Parody, thy name is England

From the "You Can't Make This Stuff Up" department:

Bristol City Council wants to prune bushes and remove cover from an area known as the Downs to improve the landscape and encourage rare wildlife.

But its own gay rights group has opposed the move, claiming that cutting back the bushes was "discriminating" to homosexual men who used the area for late night outdoor sex known as dogging.

Work on the beauty spot has been temporarily delayed while talks with gay rights groups take place to try and break the deadlock.

According to the article, yes, screwing in the bushes is illegal, but they're having this ridiculous debate anyway. I mean, it's not like there aren't any hotels in the Bristol area. I'm sure they'd be happy to have these "gentlemen" as paying guests, but yeah, cutting back overgrown bushes where people congregate to have illegal public sex is discrimination.  I'd say "Get a room," if I wasn't afraid of a Hate Crime lawsuit.

(h/t)

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