Presence without purpose.

Total number of British soldiers killed in Afghanistan = 307

When will the British public express their anger? The death toll in Afghanistan is accelerating. The arguments for our presence there grow less convincing by the day. Any certainty in the hearts of the politicians is fading. Another day of sorrow is ahead as a half a dozen body bags return. For every one of those there is an unseen toll of bodies that are maimed for life.

The Viet-nam war ended with a stampede out by the Americans. The wisdom of the Prime Minister Harold Wilson kept British soldiers out of the doomed conflict. The Americans justified the war on the grounds that withdrawal would lead to the conquest of the whole region by communism - the domino effect. Of course, it did not happen.

Our media have been slow to express the deep pointlessness of our presence without purpose. if the death toll continues to accelerate perhaps their consciences will be stirred.

Handling of the H1N1 pandemic: PACE calls for safeguards against ‘undue influence by vested interests’

Strasbourg, 24.06.2010 – At the end of a debate on the handling of the H1N1 pandemic, the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) today endorsed the conclusions of its Health Committee, which were published on 4 June last. According to the Assembly, the handling of the pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), EU health agencies and national governments led to a “waste of large sums of public money, and unjustified scares and fears about the health risks faced by the European public”. The adopted text says there was “overwhelming evidence that the seriousness of the pandemic was vastly overrated by WHO”, resulting in a distortion of public health priorities.   The parliamentarians indentified, as did the rapporteur Paul Flynn (United Kingdom, SOC), “grave shortcomings” in the transparency of decision-making about the outbreak, generating concerns about the influence of the pharmaceutical industry on decisions taken. Plummeting confidence in such advice could prove “disastrous” in the case of a severe future pandemic, they said. The WHO has been “highly defensive”, the adopted text underlines, and unwilling to accept that a change in the definition of a pandemic was made, or to revise its prognosis of the Swine Flu outbreak. The WHO and European health institutions were not willing to publish the names and declarations of interest of the members of the WHO Emergency Committee and relevant European advisory bodies directly involved in recommendations concerning the pandemic. The Assembly did set out a series of urgent recommendations for greater transparency and better governance in public health, as well as safeguards against what it called “undue influence by vested interests”. It called for a public fund to support independent research, trials and expert advice, possibly financed by an obligatory contribution of the pharmaceutical industry. ” It also called the media to avoid “sensationalism and scaremongering in the public health domain

Comments

[DG]

"When will the British public express their anger?"

When it makes the slightest bit of difference if we do so.

Perhaps you might consider expressing your anger at Iraq (and the damage done to the core values of the Labour party) by withdrawing your support for David Milliband and giving it to someone who supports your views?

[Paul Flynn]

No DG. David is the best hope of Afghanistan. I know it's not obvious. but I have had many conversations with him on this. He listens changes his mind when presented with good evidence and acts accordingly. Trust me. David will not let you down.

[DG]

You, I trust. Your views are clear and based on principal, even though I disagree with them on occasion.

David Milliband though? What exactly does he stand for, apart from wishy-washy words like "fairness" and "progressive" that can mean a hundred things to a hundred people?

I'd like to see each of the contenders publish a fully costed "Shadow-budget" to make a fair comparison with what the coalition are doing now.