Editor,

I can now write again as my cataract has been removed, not by the National Health Service though as the waiting list was far too long and I would have gone blind.

I had no alternative but go private at a cost of £5,064 - plus other and travelling expenses, as the hospital was 66 miles from my home, which brought the real cost to almost £6,000.

I had to take this amount out of my capital from which I used to draw interest to boost a meagre pension. Thanks to ‘Covid’ interest is no longer being paid, but I’m hoping that one day it might.

I begrudge spending this money after military service and 45 years’ compulsory contributions from wages for such a purpose.

No furlough for me or others in the same situation. I never came out clapping Thursday evenings, I was weeping for those who couldn’t afford private care and are now suffering the consequences that ‘Covid’ created and dying in pain because of lack of care.

In my opinion those should never have been shut down, only advice to protect one’s self with a little help for the vulnerable. See what’s been done to genuine sick people and the economy but then again perhaps it’s all an exercise to thin the world’s ever-growing population.

We all know what’s been causing global warming. There are just too many people for the planet to support, with our selfish needs, swarming the earth grabbing everything.

Every intelligent government knows it can’t go on or we will exhaust resources to sustain us and lead to our extinction. Forget colonising another planet, no matter what we do we will never get to one that could support us. We would first have to find the right kind of planet out of millions (more chance of winning the lottery), and how would we overcome distance and time, let alone gravity?

I don’t want to depress you, just put you in the picture that if we want to save us and every creature on the planet, cut population growth now, stop expanding into the natural world.

To finish could I tell those reading your excellent newspaper awaiting cataract operations, whether NHS or private, who like me feared the thought of anyone touching their eyes, the most precious of all organs in your body, ‘sight’, I can assure those who worry there is absolutely nothing to fear. I felt no pain nor saw the operation being carried out; it’s all over in 15 minutes. I was amazed because at the time I was terrified of anyone being near my eyes, and I can see perfectly.

F C Oliver Fairbourne Gwynedd

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