The BBC is making a big fuss that the NHS is buckling beneath the most severe flu epidemic in years – and its reporters don’t know the half of it!

All the information is in its live feed to allow you to infer what’s not being said – perhaps because the reporting team hasn’t thought of it:

• The number of patients in hospital with flu averaged 5,407 per day last week – up from just below 4,500 the week before.
• Patients are waiting intolerably long amounts of time to be seen – sometimes longer than a calendar day – while NHS staff struggle to cope with a workload that they simply aren’t intended to take on.
• GP surgeries are not a part of this – flu sufferers are calling 999 and asking to be taken to A&E. But this is perfectly reasonable because there is nothing a local doctor can do.

Looking at these facts, though… I mean, if you thought you had the flu, would you want to go through a possibly long, uncomfortable journey to hospital, only to wait outside in the ambulance, possibly for hours, before a place is found for you – in a corridor, waiting up to 26 hours (?) for triage, possibly passing out or succumbing in other ways to your illness before anybody even examines you, with an even longer wait before you actually get any help?

It makes staying at home seem more attractive.

There’s just one problem with that, and it is simply that this year’s dominant flu strain is savage.

I’ve said it in other articles, and I’ll repeat it here: I count myself extremely strong, physically. A doctor once told me I had the constitution of a bull, because I used to shrug off big illnesses like they were nothing.

This one hammered me down and hollowed me out in a matter of hours. Then it switched off all my lights.

I have no idea how I came back from that. All I know is, one minute I wasn’t there and the next I was. Maybe I’ve got that bullish constitution to thank.

I wonder how many other people around the country stayed at home because of the state of the NHS – but aren’t quite as well-made as me?

What happened to them?

Will we ever find out?

I’m well on the mend now – but I’m still isolating myself from other people as much as I can – until I can be sure I’m not contagious. I don’t want to risk anybody I know catching this (including some who I know will be vulnerable because they already have respiratory conditions).

I urge everybody in a similar position to do the same.

And remember this is a political situation. There is plenty of money for health but it suits the people who pay politicians to keep working people sick, and in fear of sickness.

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