The REAL National Lottery maybe coming!……

So what is occupying the powers that be this summer?  Well apart from the recession, the busiest Government Department is Health.   Civil Servants are busy working on decisions that could affect our lives!  YOUR life, YOUR families lives!

Swine Flu is still the big unknown….how will it take effect.  Will it mutate?  Will it turn more deadly?  Questions none of us can answer as yet.

The Government has purchased enough vaccine against this strain of swine flu ie H1N1,  to vaccinate the entire population of 61 million people. All fine and good there……..but there is a but. A big but!  Come the end of this year, with the UK in Winter, with the swine flu projected to be at its height, we would have only received half of the order.  There comes the issue……..who is the priority and who gets the treatment?

As you would expect, health service workers on the front line will be in the first wave. We all support and understand that.   Pregnant women, the very young and those with existing poor medical conditions will also be high up the list.  Again, who can disagree with that?

Who next?  Should it be pensioners?  Normally high on any list.   Here’s the interesting dilemma, the elderly don’t seem to be as much as risk of swine flu. It is reported rates of infection and hospitalisation are relatively low.

So this leads to the crux. Who should be in wave 1?  Some have suggested a lottery. This gets round issues of discrimination by age, sex, or utility / criticalness to society.  If the young and old are equally open to infection then does this route make matters fair?  Some state that we need to make a valued judgement on who is most critical to society ie do we prioritise certain people based on their value to society eg is a businessman of higher value than a refuse collector?  A fireman over a librarian?  A teacher over a dinner lady?

Tough questions……and ones that officials are sweating over at the Department of Health as you read this.  All routes have their disadvantages.  How would society feel about asylum seekers getting injections over long term subjects of the crown? 

Maybe a lottery is the best way forward in a free society?