Aftermath

On Friday 24^th June, Nigel and I were sitting in the acute admissions waiting room of the hospital.  It was Nigel who was waiting to be acutely admitted. 

We had thought that by exercise and a largely vegetarian diet he might have outrun his family’s long-running flirtation with angina.

 But finally the condition had caught up with him.  As we sat in the waiting room we didn’t know whether Nigel would be facing the insertion of a stent, a life-saving operation which is undertaken under local anaesthetic, or whether he would need full bypass surgery.

There was a TV there.  It was the morning after the referendum and it looked as if it was not only Nigel, but our country itself whose heart was in danger.

A young couple were being interviewed in Manchester.

The guy said, “I’m studying economics, so I voted to stay in.”

His partner said, “I voted to leave.  I don’t know why really.  And now I wish I hadn’t.”

 I can only draw a veil over Nigel’s  response to this.

On Monday, they examined Nigel  and inserted a stent into his coronary artery there and then.  The threat had been grave but the process of recovery is now straight forward.

Can our country be fixed with some straightforward procedure, or do we need bypass surgery?  And if so, just who should we be bypassing?