Two values, among others, are necessary for a healthy and flourishing economy. One for supply which needs innovation, the other for demand which requires trust between seller and buyer. This story tells how quickly trust can be lost.
The story I’m about to tell you shows how trust can fade quickly, seriously and permanently. The seriousness and veracity of the story are undeniable, since the adventure was not reported to me by anyone but experienced by myself, just last week.
A story among stories
My doctor prescribed me a scanner to “assess” the risks of a disease that I have contracted. I make an appointment and go one morning to a radiology laboratory whose name I will not mention. After the preliminary analyzes to see the strength of my kidneys to filter the contrast solution, injected before, I go under scanner. Everything was going normally until then.
Two hours later, the laboratory calls me to ask me to come back, because the radiologist would like to see me. I figured the after-sales service is pretty professional, thinking maybe she wanted to explain the results to me. I come back to the laboratory, I still don’t see a radiologist. They “pushed me”, without any explanation, towards the scanner room, informing me that “we are going to repeat exactly the same operation” of three hours ago. I had to ask the technician the reason for this repetition. He answers me in a pithy way that he took the images of an organ and not of another. In short, I understand that he did not read the order which was, on the other hand, very precise. Perhaps an automatism linked to the routine.
Commit even more nonsense, out of nonsense
The seriousness of this situation resides in the concealment of the information he was supposed to give me, namely that the two injections of contrast must be spaced out by at least two days. The risk can be fatal if the product is not filtered quickly and well enough by the body. Instead, out of fear or stupidity, to make up for another stupidity, they push me to do another scan at three-hour intervals without informing me of the risks I’m taking. Fortunately, I have strong kidneys, which is not the case for everyone.
Moral of the story: we prefer to play with someone’s life to evade an error instead of assuming it and inform the person concerned by involving him in decision-making on what concerns him in the first place, his life. A culture of fear that leads to stupidity and which could be the cause of unmentionable and unpunished medical errors. I keep the conditional in the previous sentence, although I am almost certain that many readers will recognize themselves and remember at this moment reading a memory, near or far.
Trust, a value that is still too fragile
Confidence, being a value that is still too fragile in our society, above all needs to be constantly maintained because “it is gained in drops and lost in liters”, said JP Sartre. This confidence, applied to the economy, determines the health of a market, its durability, its reflexes and its setbacks. Every investor takes a risk by investing, the consumer, also sometimes, by consuming. It is for this reason that this confidence must be maintained with rules, controls, punishments for those who do not respect them and end up harming others, merchants and consumers, by installing suspicion in the market. When there is a lack of confidence in an area as vital as that of health, it is a disaster that is looming not only for the market, but also in the minds and the constitution of the citizen himself. We no longer talk about consumption but about humanity. I’m not even giving you the litany of the Hippocratic sermon and all the stuff. Culture is the solution.