I have for a couple of years been under treatment for glaucoma – just eyedrops, but the first ones that I tried for 6 months didn’t work, so now I’m using a new kind. This is a beta blocker which, the doctor mentioned, could adversely affect my athletic performance – not a big problem!
Another potential side effect, according to the information sheet in the package, is that the drops could make my irises darker. That would be hard to notice – my eyes are already dark brown.
People assume that blonde hair perforce means blue eyes. When Rossella was born with big brown eyes, some people looked me straight in the face and said “Brown eyes! She must have got those from her father.” Actually, my eyes are darker than Enrico’s.
The side effect I have noticed is that my eyelashes have become thicker and longer. Not darker, alas – I still need mascara, but it’s a lot more effective now. Cool.
…One big aspect of Italy’s national health system that I forgot to mention previously: it’s available to EVERYBODY. There’s no nonsense like asking for insurance information while you’re bleeding in the emergency room (they do ask for your national health card, but if you don’t happen to have it on you, no one cares). And there’s no such thing as being uninsurable because of pre-existing conditions. You’re in the system and you get treated, period. Quite a few people not in the system, i.e. illegal immigrants, also get treated.
I met a guy once in Austin, Texas, who was undergoing an extremely expensive experimental treatment for multiple sclerosis. He could not change jobs, because that would force a change in insurer, and no new insurer would take him on, knowing they’d have to take on that expense. There is something very wrong with this picture. You can only be insured if you’re healthy?
This ties in with the privacy concerns that Brin addresses. Medical records stored in electronic format can be hacked into and viewed by people other than our doctors. One risk is that a company might decline to hire you after learning about an expensive medical condition that they wouldn’t want their insurance to have to cover. In America this is a legitimate fear; your career mobility and life could be ruined by leaked information. The answer to this is the Italian (and British, and Canadian, and…) one: a national health system, where you’re covered no matter what you’ve got.
Deirdré Straughan on Italy, India, the Internet, the world, and now Australia
