Hilary's Desk

After last night's Sunday documentary, Nikki Turner hit out, with the email below.  However, all this document does, is to show just how little Nikki Turner actually understands the very system she's trying to explain.

She says:

Firstly we need to remember that ACC is no fault compensation – it is not proving causal links. 

This is the biggest load of rubbish I've ever seen her spout.  Here's why.

ACC has never been "fault" compension insofar as the injured party cannot find fault with the doctor, the practice, the DHB, the Government and the manufacturer, who were all indemnified for perpetuity.  Parents couldn't "blame" them.  No "fault" was ascribed to them. Furthermore, compensation was only available for "uncommon" injuries.  Soreness at site just didn't count.  That was "normal".

ACC never paid these parents compensaion on some beneficent whim.  I know.  You know how I know?  I spent 15 years helping parents fight for ACC compensation.  The PARENTS had to prove that there was nothing else that could have caused the brain damage - that the only possible thing "at fault" was a product called a vaccine.  The standard of evidence required the parents to PROVE a causal link, and not only to prove a causal link, but to find a doctor who will AGREE that there is a causal link, and preferably, to produce medical evidence from the medical literature to support that causal link. Read Full Blog

In the Sunday Star Times today, Judge David McNaughton delivered a swift message to Starship doctors about predictive and substandard medical care, and the presumption of guilt without good cause.  The Judge found Famaile Lino not guilty of abusing his six month old child after Starship jumped to conclusions, and robustly defended their own preconceived mindsets.  The Lino's lawyer said, " "It's a very important case. It shows how suddenly a person can be at home with their feet up looking after their children, and a nightmare commences."  Here's the rub though.  Court cases like this USUALLY only happen to people like the Linos or the Kahuis.  Starship doesn't usually go after people who know what's going on; the limitations of the medical profession; and how to defend themselves.    Starship are of course, scuttling into a "risk management" position, by defending the indefensible: Read Full Blog

Watching TNVZ SUNDAY’s programme about the oral contraceptive pill, called “Wonder Drug”, my mind kept flitting back to the fair grounds of old. Merry go round horses, ever rising, and lowering and the ceaseless crackly potted music;  metal clown heads, swinging wide open mouths, and the croaky voiced candy floss man intoning his automated speil. This was how I perceived the surreal presentation which characterised Janet McIntyre's uncritical canonization of a British Medical Journal article published on 11 March 2010. She followed the rest of the media who described this study as “titanic”.... forgetting that the unsinkable Titanic,...  sank.   Janet was unblinkingly content to present people who thought that the Pill should be available over-the-counter, with no controls, to anyone of any age.  Caution and monitorring be damned. Let’s get with it, full speed ahead. Titanic, indeed. Which will of course, fix global warming!  Hurray.... Read Full Blog