Covid sure has eaten up the cash. Grant has spent $64 billion on the pandemic so far (before it has even arrived here) and there is nothing left. Our annual health budget is a paltry $20 billion, the $64 billion has been in addition to that.
So those of you who were thinking and blogging that the unvaccinated were depriving them of hospital beds might like to rethink. Perhaps it is profligate spending on the vaccinated which has led to those long queues for tests and treatments for diseases like cancer (10,500 deaths per year) and heart disease (600 deaths per year and rising). Just 52 people have died of Covid in NZ during the last two years and most of those few left in hospital are double vaccinated.
If you think the opposition will have
a different view, think again. Deputy leader Simon Bridges (he who tried to be
prime minister and failed to excite the populace) chided Grant for not having
enough of the readies to spend on those tempting fourth boosters. Bridges urged
Robertson to "prioritise funding for vaccines, given the impact this is
having on New Zealanders and the economy”. He is right there, government
spending and policy has certainly had an impact on the economy, but why does he
want to spend more?
You may be aware that just before
Christmas I posted a short video on YouTube about the alarming NZ pandemic
spending. After raising 20,000 views in a week, it was taken down because, in
the words of the YouTube censorship team, it was not in accord with NZ Ministry
of Health guidelines. If I worked in the Ministry of Health like Director
General Dr. Ashley Bloomfield (he who refuses to grant vaccine exemptions to
people injured by the first inoculation) I would want to take it down too.
Embarrassment is one of the most painful of emotions that any government
department should try to avoid if at all possible.
Although we now live in a North
Korean-style enclave (apologies to North Korea, many of you have written to me
that North Koreans have more opportunities than we do), it should not have
escaped the notice of our Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern (she who promised never
to introduce vaccine mandates and changed her mind a week later) that many of
our sister countries like the UK have announced they are ending all Covid
restrictions. Why are our politicians competing with one another to announce
further spending on a dead horse?
According to our local rag the NZ Herald (the paper that uncritically Heralds government policy no matter how silly it is) Omicron is here and has been for a while. Striking a note of alarm, their lead article warned its readers that this will probably lead to a shortage of toilet paper. They didn’t lead with our record Trade Imbalance—the second half of 2021 stands at $8 billion, nor on the housing market—houses prices up 30% in 2021, nor on our total loss of tourism formerly worth $38 billion per year, nor on the increase in Government debt in 2021 of $19 Billion. But that really doesn’t matter because Dr. Ashley Bloomfield and our dear Prime Minister are quite rightly looking out for our mental health by keeping these items of disturbing news safely away from us delicate folk in danger of running out of toilet paper. Long Live the Republic.
Dr Guy Hatchard is a former senior manager at Genetic ID, food testing and certification company.
4 comments:
I think you should have written 6000 people dying of heart disease per annum
That censorship thing bothers me because the public are un aware what they are missing out on. Just owning the space and stocking the shelves is enough.
The corporate dominated media is no better (although they stock some products the others don't).
Can we see that video elsewhere?
It's tragic isn't it. The government spends $64 billion to save us but the country is significantly worse off than it was before.
Grant will likely borrow a lot more and will be urged on by National.
It's socialism to a tee. Tax or borrow a shitload, enact a raft of rules and regulations that hurt or restrict business, nationalise as much as you can, make everything more inefficient.
But in NZ we're going one better with a Maori version of everything we've already got so more costs and inefficiencies for the same or worse outcomes.
But the real tragedy is that National has become a pseudo-socialist party with steadily decreasing points of difference to Labour and we are stuck with it.
The real issue is that the Government has taken taxpayer monies and: - paid off the mass media to print is propaganda, squandered billions of a "Jabb-a-thon" for what is meant to be a confirmed actual virus, that no one seems to have found yet (Pharmacy companies are doing fine though...), jabbing all comers with a known to be toxic substance, know harmful effects etc and critiquing anyone who dares say a word... Geez wayne!!!!
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