Via New Zealand Doctor, a gust of common sense as cold and clear as the winds off the Antarctic ice sheet: Christchurch GPs encouraged to take a break.
GPs and practice nurses in Canterbury are being encouraged to take time off in the coming weeks following February's earthquake.
Primary carers from around the country have offered to cover Christchurch practices for three to seven days over the next few weeks, a statement from the Canterbury Primary Earthquake Group says.
To arrange cover for your practice please call 027 4582537 giving more than 24 hours notice.
Over the past week, New Zealand has been giving us all a master class in how to respond to a major disaster. The response hasn't been uniformly brilliant, but it's shown us what to expect, including our own lapses. We ignore their experience at our peril.
Compared to Port-au-Prince in 2010, Christchurch 2011 has been trivial, with a death toll literally less than one-thousandth that suffered by Haiti.
Even so, the self-styled "advanced" nations have much to learn from both countries. They're more likely to learn it from the Kiwis than from the Haitians they still can't quite regard as equals.
