A decision which should be applauded

The British Government announced today that from next year every schoolgirl in the country between the ages of 12 and 18 would be offered the opportunity for free vaccination against the virus which, it is calculated, is responsible for 75% -80% of cervical cancer.

In deciding to do this they have gone beyond the minimal steps recommended by health experts and, in doing so, I believe the government deserves to be congratulated.

It is calculated that the initial scope of vaccination could cost £100 million and the later 'catch up' effort up to a further £200 million.

The United States has already begun such a programme but at a State's individual discretion, Texas being the first to begin such a scheme. Predictably, given the mix of cultural and religious strands of opinion in the US, critics (primarily right wing Republicans) have managed to halt such programmes in some states mainly on the basis that such a facility will encourage promiscuity. Presumably they prefer their women to die horrible deaths as opposed to enjoying sexual intercourse but I can't see the same problems occurring in Britain where so far the public reaction seems to be overwhelmingly in favour.

It will be 20 or 30 years before the effects of the vaccination are really able to be assessed but there is great confidence that the move will bring a sharp downturn in the cases, and consequent deaths, from cervical cancer.

Well done the UK government for taking this particular bull by the horns and having the courage to spend the money on such a comprehensive medical programme.

Why are the English so good at plucking defeat from the jaws of victory?

This weekend we have had two sporting contests in which English hopefuls offered so much only to let us down at the final hurdle. The first was the World Cup of Rugby Football in which England, against all the odds, reached the final. They had been playing rubbish rugby all the way up to the competition and, indeed, in the first round league system they lost to South Africa 36-0. But suddenly they came good. They scraped through to the quarter finals and there, against all expectations, they beat Australia - a complete turn up for the form book. In the semi finals they beat the hosts, France in another storming performance. But having reached the final they weren't quite good enough, losing again to South Africa but this time only 15-6.




The second example is perhaps even more stark. The wunderkind of the Formula 1 car racing world, England's Lewis Hamilton, in his first season at senior level, managed to amaze the racing world by, apparently, having a virtually unassailable lead in the World Championship with two races to go. He would have been the first racing driver ever to have won the world championship in his 'rookie' year. But he blew it. He blew it in China two weeks ago with a horrendous mistake and today in Brazil he blew it again - though in fairness part of the problem was the car.



Now in both these cases, fair minded critics might say that both the England rugby team and young Hamilton did far better than anyone ever expected them to but that's rational, objective logic. My passionate sporting heart says why do English sports persons and teams always fill us with so much expectation, bring us to the brink of near hysterical national pride....and then break our hearts. It happens every time!

Is my life really safe in THEIR hands?

For the last twelve years, I have suffered from ulcerative colitis - a nasty, rather frightening disease which, because symptomatically, it resembles bowel cancer, needs to be identified quickly and treated urgently. The disease is incurable and life long, but it can be controlled with the right treatment. Fortunately thanks to a good early diagnosis and good treatment, my life is infinitely better than it was at the time the disease was diagnosed.

So why my rather dismal title for this piece? Well today I went for my biennial appointment at the hospital, my usual nerves even more strained than usual as I had been alerted on my previous visit that this time I faced having to make an appointment for a colonoscopy - not the most pleasant of experiences but one which I accept is intregral to an early alert for cancer - and colitis sufferers run a much higher risk than the average human being.



So when the consultant had asked me a few fundamental questions, made notes on my weight and then dismissed me with a 'see you in two more years', I experienced a deep sense of relief at first, then I plucked up the courage to ask about the promised colonoscopy.

"Oh we've scaled those back," he said, "and now, until you're 65, we arrange one every fifteen years."

Well my immediate relief was tinged with a sense of concern. Fifteen years? For someone with colitis? I'm sure they get a lot of information from blood tests and so on which are mandatory on each visit, but I am both surprised and concerned that the NHS is now leaving this very important investigatory process for so long between examinations.

I am pretty sure that this is not the situation in the United States for example where people at risk are examined in depth far more frequently than that. I'm sure the Health Service will say that, given other supporting evidence via blood and urine tests, there is no need for colonoscopies on a more frequent timescale - but I am really hoping that this is driven by a rational look at necessary procedures and NOT by the lack of resources to do the job!

"The Big Feartie frae Fife " +

...That is the label Alex Salmond, First Minister of the Scottish Government, has pinned on Gordon Brown for his decision, after weeks of vacillation, not to call a General Election in November. Under the British system Brown had no need to call an election until 2009 but he has invited scorn and ridicule by playing up to the suggestion that he was ready to seek a personal mandate from the British electorate - until he saw the opinion polls which showed Labour's lead having evaporated.



A wise move therefore not to jump over a cliff to your doom when there was no need, many may say, but others would ask why Brown flirted with the cliff edge in the first place..and I would be among them. In the few months he has been Prime Minister, Brown has shown sure-footedness in dealing with Iraq, America, the foot and mouth situation and the terrorist threat. He was beginning to get a reputation as a formidable Prime Minister.

Now he has shown an incredible degree of naivety by hyping up the likelihood of an election only to draw back from the brink at the last minute. The Labour Party may bluff and bluster that it never intended to call an election, that it was all media hype. They may also claim they have forced the Tories to reveal their hand with regard to policies.

But underneath all that, the image that remains is of a man who thought he would win , then decided he might not, and chickened out. This was not one of Gordon Brown's better moments and it will take some time to repair the image of a calm, confident clear minded decision maker, I'm afraid.


+ = 'Big coward from Fife'

Why I won't watch the Olympics

Well I'd have plenty of good reasons not to bother.

Should China have been given them anyway bearing in mind the country's appalling human rights record?

Hasn't the whole thing become just one disgusting junket for the International Olympics Committee with one nation after another falling over itself to offer more and more incentives, bigger and better wining and dining for these pampered officials?

Isn't the whole bidding process just another link in the chain of corruption that sees tax payers money squandered in paying vast fortunes for the privilege of hosting an event which will bring dubious, if any, long term benefits to the hosts..and based on past evidence...possible bankruptcy?

Then, of course, having mentioned corruption, there is the main singular overriding reason. It stinks! Stinks to high heaven of athletes having sullied themselves in secret drug-taking in order to win medals at what should be the honourable pinnacle of sporting prowess. Lying, cheating, hiding what they are doing because the urge to win at all costs transcends any concept of honour and decency.

The latest in the dock is Marian Jones, once considered the greatest female sprinter in the world. Rumours have circulated for years about Jones ' drug taking and all the time this woman denied them emphatically. Even when she was at high school and won her schools athletics prizes she had to be defended in court, successfully, against doping charges.



She had a relationship with Tim Montgomery, with whom she had a child, Montgomery himself a world record holder who was banned for life after admitting to being a drugs cheat. Her coach has admitted administering performance enhancing drugs to all his athletes. So Marian Jones, all her athletics career, lived in a druggie stimulants world. Its only a pity that she wasn't caught early in her career before she disgraced the Sydney Olympics by cheating her way to a record haul of medals...all of which will now undoubtedly be stripped from her.

But that's too late for the athletes who were denied their rightful place on the winners rostrum. Hell they were probably on drugs too so what does it matter? Marion Jones joins a long and hardly distinguished list from all across the world

When doping tests were introduced in 1968, two Olympic athletes were found to have taken illegal substances. By the time we reached Athens 3 years ago it was up to 24. Well that's bad enough, but quite clearly the number discovered is merely the tip of a very large iceberg. The standards of testing have improved but so has the ability of coaches and athletes to hide the use of performance enhancements by a clever and careful timing of exactly when they are administered.

Basically any sense of the Olympic ideal has long flown out of the window. Today it is just a huge money making racket for all concerned and for the athletes who win medals, the consequent fame and the big money contracts make cheating well worth while.

The sport is corrupt. Rotten to the core and as far as I'm concerned the Beijing Olympics can go hang. I'd rather watch paint dry.

A credit to womankind!

On Sunday the Women's World Cup of Association Football came to an end with the Germans retaining the crown they won four years ago, beating Brazil 2-0 in the Final. The much fancied USA team, beaten by Brazil in a semi final of incredible skills,took third place by beating Norway 4-1.

More than the results themselves, the whole competition has put women's football firmly on the map and given it respectability. The standard of play has been incredibly high and has firmly buried the idea that women's football is 'a joke'.

The competition started badly, giving succour to all the male dinosaurs who said it was a pantomime when Germany beat Argentina 11-0 in the very first game, the poor Argentine goalkeeper performing in a way which gave all the 'knockers' some weighty ammunition.

But from then on the competition improved in leaps and bounds until by the time it reached the semi final stages I was glued to the screen, loving every second of the matches..and I never ever thought I would say that about women's soccer. The competition has been a real eye opener for me and for a lot of other men too, I believe, in how far women's football has progressed in relatively few years.

OK back in the early 90s when the women's game was in its international infancy, much of the cruel joking could be justified. They looked clumsy, they couldn't trap a ball and much of the shooting looked like 6 year old's on a parks pitch. But that was before, certainly in Europe, proper leagues were introduced and a careful training and development scheme was put in place. But after that first world cup, when the women began to come through training schemes and had proper coaching academies the standards increased in leaps and bounds until we saw the results over the last two weeks of genuinely gripping competition.

OK you still get the 'knockers' in the pubs...'they wouldn't beat a men's non league team' etc etc...No maybe not. But why do we constantly compare women's sport against what men can do. It should be judged on its own merits and its own rate of development - and those have been fantastic.

It was interesting that some of the good and bad things inherent in the male game found their way into the play of their female opposite numbers. The American girls were strong, fit and very athletic..as you would expect American sports persons of either gender to be...but perhaps, this year, lacked a little finesse and harmony as a team. The Brazilians were fluid, wonderfully skilled attacking players..but they angered, particularly, their American opponents by celebrating joyously after getting a US player sent off in somewhat dubious circumstances, and were capable of nasty, niggling little fouls a la South American tradition. The Germans, eventual winners, played rather like their male counterparts too. They lacked the Brazilian flair but they were grimly determined not to give them space, not to give the ball away and to play in a disciplined team ethic..and it worked.

Abby Wambach (United States) testing the Brazilian defence


Anyway a wonderful competition...congratulations ladies on doing your gender proud..and may your game go from strength to strength!

The winning German team celebrate their World Cup Final victory