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As a person who does not get on well with needles, I was not very impressed by this advertisement in the August edition of the island 'Beacon'. I think I would rather have a proper nurse take my blood, rather than someone fresh off the streets or out of the jobcentre, with no previous experience or qualifications, but who has done a few hours training with Geopace. On offer at £285 inclusive of VAT.

As far as I am aware, I have never had a blood sample taken by anyone other than a proper nurse, or a doctor, with the exception of the finger pricking technicians at the warfarin clinic. But that is not quite the same thing.

And I am not encouraged by what I read at reference 1, although it is not entirely clear that graduates can go straight on to taking blood for pay. But perhaps beggars can't be choosers. People who vote into government people who seem hell bent on dismantling our education and health services should not complain when some of the birds come home to roost.

PS: I suppose I have to allow that there might be a case for getting jobs of this sort done on the cheap, by people who have not been expensively trained as nurses, rather in the way that we mostly get our teeth cleaned by people who have not been expensively trained as dentists. But I don't trust the Tories on this one, any more than many other people don't trust Labour with the economy.

Reference 1: http://www.geopace.com/.