Men's health highlights funding hypocrisy

If health funding was allocated on the basis of need, not race and location, New Zealand men would be a lot better off, says Dr Lynda Scott, National's Health Spokesperson.

PHOs with high numbers of Maori receive 20-40% extra funding.

"The Government justifies its race-based PHO funding on the back of the fact that Maori die, on average, 10-years earlier than non-Maori. Yet men, who die an average of 5 years younger than women, don't receive an extra bean," says Dr Scott.

"The PHO access formula actually sees men receive less funding than women across all age groups from age five despite their lower life-expectancy.

"If the Government was interested in improving health across the board, men, who under-utilise health services and can expect to die earlier than women, would clearly be targeted.

"This makes an absolute mockery of Labour's funding formula and their justification for it. They are simply weighting the funding by race," says Dr Scott.

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Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>