In todays news...

[MyLittleStudPony]

Let's try not to be nasty old racists. For everyone's sake.

[irie]

This is taking the piss

https://news.sky.com/story/anger-over-s ... k-13030865

Nope, the car park was taking the piss....

But it was a ridiculous arrest, unless the cop tried having a quiet word and the mom started waving the R card about the place......

It's the police taking the piss ...

Police said the officers had violated training on how to deal with children - and one was "no longer employed", while the others would be disciplined.

... but the police still prosecuted!

[MingtheMerciless]

Finally!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-67756413

https://en.vedur.is/about-imo/news/a-se ... last-night

[gremlin]

How's yer gnashers?

NHS dentistry as we know it 'gone for good'

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-67754983

I don't think I know anybody with an NHS dentist, although it's not my usual small-talk opening line, granted. Mine is a reasonably priced private dentist which charges c. £50 for a check up, maybe a score or so per filling to boot plus I get to see the chatty, mad-as-a-box-of-frogs hygienist for about the same.

Who on here has got the golden ticket of an NHS dentist?

[Cousin Jack]

I gave up on NHS dentistry 10+ years ago. I got fed up with the dentist explaining that I had to have certain treatments even though he and I knew there were better treatments available.

[Count Steer]

I was NHS from being at infant school. Signed up on the NHS with a local chap when at uni. Stuck with him for years until he retired. Somewhere along the line he 'went private' and we signed up to Denplan, basically insurance. Moved into this house about 17 years ago and signed up with the local practice that's on Denplan.

Shame but there y'go. It meant that we had cover abroad and when I lost a filling they directed me to the nearest one to work at the time.

Had one cause to use the NHS emergency service when the missus had a temporary filling for a week during a root canal job. By the time we realised she was going doolally - it got infected and she got sepsis - it was the weekend so I bundled her in the car with her going 'I'm OK' in a three sheets to the wind fashion. Kudos. They were and prescribed the sort of antibiotics you might give an elephant....so she lived to get the the job finished.

The current drive towards private is how these systems inc the medical one get dismantled -underfunding and neglect. Once the insurance companies get involved price rocket. cf vets too, that's gone the same way (not that they were ever NHS, obvs).

[Skub]

How's yer gnashers?

NHS dentistry as we know it 'gone for good'

https://www.bbc.com/news/health-67754983

I don't think I know anybody with an NHS dentist, although it's not my usual small-talk opening line, granted. Mine is a reasonably priced private dentist which charges c. £50 for a check up, maybe a score or so per filling to boot plus I get to see the chatty, mad-as-a-box-of-frogs hygienist for about the same.

Who on here has got the golden ticket of an NHS dentist?

We still have an NHS dentist.

[weeksy]

Yes.

[gremlin]

So how do NHS prices compare to my private one? I reckon:

£50 -check up
£30 X-rays
£50 filling (typo on the previous post)

Guesswork as I can never remember how much I actually pay.

[weeksy]

£20 check up with x-rays, fillings about £12
Root canal was about £40

[gremlin]

£20 check up with x-rays, fillings about £12
Root canal was about £40

That is bloody cheap. I had root canal plus crown a few years back, three looooong sessions (albeit painless. Modern drugs are bloody brilliant) and I reckon that was not far short of a bag of sand.

I did have an extraction a year or so ago and enquired about the option of filling the gap that the missing fang had left behind. When the cost of having an implant was calculated I stopped my dentist mid-sentence and told her I'd live with the gap.

[Mussels]

Tax advisers to be the growth industry in Scotland, all based in England probably.
BBC News - Scottish Budget: Higher earners to pay more income tax
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland- ... s-67759418

[Count Steer]

So how do NHS prices compare to my private one? I reckon:

£50 -check up
£30 X-rays
£50 filling (typo on the previous post)

Guesswork as I can never remember how much I actually pay.

Our Denplan thing costs approx £25/month each (hers actually costs more than mine but that's the ball park figure). So, £600pa. If nothing needs to be done that's 4 check ups and scale+polish a year. However, if you factor in all the other stuff like root canal work etc, some years you win, some you lose but the I think the wins outweigh the losses plus there's a degree of peace of mind on holidays in emergency etc. Never thought about stopping doing the insurance thing, more so as we get older. The dentist explained that humans are now 'outliving their teeth'. It wasn't a problem for the ol' neanderthals 'cos they didn't eat a lot of sugar, chewed hides to soften them and died in their 20s - if they were lucky. The northern tribes (eskimos) didn't have a problem either....until they got the magical touch of the diet from further south.

[Yorick]

Dozey old folk reject £300k and get greedy for 10 times that.
Dozey fuckers lose the lot

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67759639

[Cousin Jack]

£20 check up with x-rays, fillings about £12
Root canal was about £40

That's bloody cheap. Last root canal I had done was £1000 or thereabouts. It was with a top bloke mind, Prof at London Dental School.

[Yorick]

I wanted a crown 15 years ago. Dentist quoted about £500

Had a word with BIL and he made it for price of a curry.

It pays to cut out the middle man

[Dodgy69]

Our NHS dentist is going private from January. State of the nation init.

[Taipan]

Speaking of the NHS, the junior doctors want a 35% pay rise, which even SKS says is unaffordable. What planet are they on ffs.

I listened to some representative on TV this morning saying the additional 3.5% on top of the offered (?) 8% is unacceptable so the strikes will go ahead. She then added there will be no break in service? WTF, I thought you were all over worked and couldn't cope, but now you can take multiple days off with no disruption to service. When questioned why one hospital would be shutting A&E she said it was just safety measures and good planning! Really! its obviously because no one will be there as they are all striking!

They are underpaid, but striking for a 35% raise in this economic climate will do little more than alienate their supporters.

[Dodgy69]

Been announced energy bill's coming down 200 odd £ in April. Does that take January increase into account. it's a sham....

[irie]

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/2 ... hts-groups

Samira Sabzian, who had been in prison for the past decade, was executed at dawn in Ghezel Hesar prison in the Tehran satellite city of Karaj, the Norway-based Iran Human Rights (IHR) group said.
...
Rights groups have repeatedly said Iran's sharia-based murder laws -- based on a principle of "qesas" (retribution in kind) -- fail to take into account potentially mitigating factors such as abuse or domestic violence in such cases.

Iran has executed eight men in cases related to the protests that erupted in September 2022 but rights groups argue that the surge in hangings on all charges is aimed at instilling fear in the wider population.

According to IHR, Iran executed 582 people in 2022 but this year's total is expected to be significantly higher.

Reported elsewhere that Samira Sabzian had been a victim of long term domestic abuse.

Shocking.