A night out using the NHS iPhone alcohol app
By Asavin Wattanajantra in Editorial
Posted in alcohol, NHS, iPhone, Apple on
As the Apple adverts say, you can get an app for everything these days.
The NHS has released an iPhone app to keep track of the amount of alcohol that you are drinking.
Downloading it will allow a user to work out how much alcohol they are consuming, and whether they are drinking too much.
It does sound like a good idea, but I’m not sure how useful this is going to be. For instance, much of the problem that Britain has is over binge drinking, and I’m not totally sure this is going to help this particular issue.
Imagine the scene, Friday night in the pub. You’ve just had a round of drinks - time to get your trusty iPhone app and try to work out how many units you have in your drink.
Can you already see the problem here?
OK - now you’re on your fourth drink. It’s been a pain to do all these calculations - but you’ve just about managed it.
Whoops. You’ve dropped it. It’s logged out of the app before you’ve saved the data from the last drink you’ve had - dammit got to put those details in again - what was it that I was actually drinking?
Hi! What is this you bring me - a shot of sambuca?
Oh crap - I need to put this in my phone. Hang on a second while I work out what this might mean unit size.
Wait a sec! OK, you’ve drunk it. My turn.
One hour later
You what? My iPhone app? What about my iPhone app? Oh that. I can’t be bothered any anymore with it.
Four hours later….
Where’s my iPhone?
So as an app to measure a night’s drinking for many people - it’s not practical. But if you do remember how much you’ve drunk the night before and manage to type details for every day of the week - yeah it could be useful.
The real solution would be an iPhone breathlyser app
I don’t think this is even possible, but what could be really useful is a way that you can breathe on your iPhone, which can detect how much alcohol you have on your breath.
They’ve got that stupid Carling beer drinking app. Surely this won’t be too much of a stretch?
On a serious note though, I do think that it’s good that public sector healthcare is trying to experiment with the technology to improve things for people.
If used properly, the app could be used to help people, but most people already know what moderate drinking is for them - it’s simply the case of following it. Problem is that the Brits don’t really know moderation.
A simple solution would be to do what the continentals do and go with 24 hour drinking, so that people didn’t drink so fast, but this hasn’t really been the biggest success either, normally because nothing ever stays open 24 hours in this country.
So what do you do?
Solutions aren’t easy. But one thing is that nobody forces alcohol into your mouth. It’s a personal choice how much you drink, and in nannying state days, maybe you just got to face the consequences.
It’s nobody’s fault but your own.
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How the British fell back in love with the NHS
By Asavin Wattanajantra in Editorial
Posted in campaign, NHS, Gordon Brown, Twitter, government on
It’s a very British thing to complain, and of things to complain about the NHS is often quite high on the list.
Dirty hospitals, long queues, poor pay for nurses, big money spent on computer systems that don’t work - the NHS usually gets a good kicking.
But when we complain about something, it’s us who complain - we have a mentality where we really don’t like outsiders suggesting that something is wrong with our country.
This seems to have been what has happened with the sudden popularity of the NHS on Twitter and social networks, with even figures like Gordon Brown and David Cameron joining in to defend and praise it.
The background
It really all started when the nationals reported on how some Americans (particularly the Republican party) were waging a campaign against President Obama’s moves to transform their healthcare system.
There’s opposition to the plan - fair enough - it’s a big change and the Americans should decide for themselves.
However, the British started to pay attention when it was found that the Republicans were using the NHS as an example of a ’socialist’ system with waiting lists and treatment rationing.
Among the ‘failures’ of the NHS included an ‘Orwellian’ financial cap on the value of human life, and of leaving elderly people untreated.
The British fight back
Understandably, the British weren’t happy about this. In the Guardian story that I first read about the Republican campaign it reads 916 comments and still counting. Most indeed were saying that they wouldn’t swap the NHS for an American system of private healthcare.
However, it was Twitter that was really the catalyst for a concerted NHS PR campaign that really did work - money could not buy the type of good publicity that the NHS has been getting.
The Twitter NHS campaign
The ‘welovetheNHS’ tag has been one of the top trending topics in the last few days, with it seems thousands of people giving their support to the NHS system and praising it - including government leaders
Dennis publication The First Post said that one of the prime movers behind the campaign was Graham Linehan, comedy writer behind Father Ted and the IT Crowd.
The Republicans may have bitten themselves on the ass with this one as the debate has now penetrated the blogosphere - people are talking about it, people are trying to figure it out - people are trying to make their own judgements.
Instead of trying to reply against the propaganda with expensive advertisements, it is by the means of a social network where the NHS has been defended in a way nobody could have expected
It also shows how powerful something like Twitter is becoming as a tool to motivate the masses - it wasn’t that long ago that Twitter was a big factor in creating a movement against the Iran elections.
Rated: 60% (2 votes)
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