InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "PIVOT!!!"

sometimes sanity takes vacation time on me (keieeeye) wrote,
@ 2009-06-26 09:17:00

Current mood:	cynical
Entry tags:	faith in humanity

Irony
Incidentally, my mother (because she's nice) went to the pharmacy yesterday to pick up my medication refills, because the pharmacy doesn't want anyone to come in if they have flu symptoms.

Pharmacy: Sick people, DO NOT WANT.

We were discussing this just now while I got my breakfast and that doctors' clinics have the same signs up and mum reckons they're running the risk of someone dying of meningitis or something coz they didn't go to the doctor. Which actually isn't implausible, it seems to be more common here than in the states (I've seen it used as an "omg wtf uncommon!" illness on medical shows) and I can see someone mistaking stiff neck for general muscle/joint aches, and stiff neck is the one symptom that EVERYONE knows is linked to meningitis.

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mathteacher
2009-06-25 04:52 pm UTC (link)

mostly what i've seen around here the past few years is that clinics have lots of signs that say things like "if you think you're sick or if you're coughing or sneezing, please take a mask and let the intake staff know", where they're likely to move extra-contagious people to isolation immediately.

as for meningitis, my recollection is that there's been at least one outbreak at at least one high school in the area nearly every year since i became a teacher, but it's usually a close-contact-spread kind, so it tends to be a small group of close friends or something like that.

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keieeeye
2009-06-25 04:57 pm UTC (link)

My mother pointed out that patients have been endangering others in waiting rooms since doctors stopped doing home visits thirty years ago. Like kids with rubella around pregnant women.

I don't even know exactly how prevalent it is here - I know my sister's had it, and there used to be a lot of "don't share drink bottles or you'll get meningitis AND DIE" public service announcements, but it just seems... fairly normal. Like I reckon right now there is more of a chance of getting meningitis here than swine flu (varying depending on region - basically all the south island cases are in my region, except for one, the last I heard).

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katling
2009-06-25 07:09 pm UTC (link)

I hate sitting in a doctor's waiting room. It's like a little breeding house of sick people spreading their germs to everyone else. Now if I'm there with a cold or something then I usually don't care. I'm miserable enough to think 'Let everyone else have what I've got... so there Nyah! If I have to be sick, the whole world can be sick too'. But if I'm there for something non-sickness related then I hate it. :D

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