Hong Kong 20 November 2017

FRIULI, LUCKY AND BEAUTIFUL LAND OF MIDDLE EUROPE

My origin is from Friuli-Venezia Giulia, so I am Furlàn, as they are called the inhabitants of this place and also the local language, totally different in comparison to Italian language and to all nearby regional dialects. Chinese people know quite well Udine, not just for the soccer team with a long history, but for the annual Chinese Movie International Festival that takes place regularly in the geographic capital of Friuli. And they know also Trieste, being the major port of the Adriatic Sea having access to all countries or Northern, Central and Eastern Europe. This territory used to be linked for centuries to the Republic of Venice, to the Venice of Marco Polo, so there is nothing strange in today’s cultural propulsion to the Far East and China in particular.

BETWEEN THE ALPS AND THE ADRIATIC SEA

Friuli, a privileged land of Italy, luckily and generously gifted with famous sandy beaches as Grado, Lignano and Bibione. A land with a chain of Alps bordering Slovenia and Austria, and containing a vaste fertile plan where fruits, vineyards, cereals and vegetables are intensively cultivated. Subalpine little lakes, morenic hills, nice and quiet surroundings, small torrents and canals, and a wide network of cycling paths make this region, without any doubt, a relaxing, peaceful and lovable place.

THE PRESTIGIOUS NORTH-EAST OF ITALY

We are talking about a prestigious sector of Italy called North-East, with Udine in the centre, Trieste and Gorizia on the Eastern frontier, Pordenone at South-West, and the historical towns of Cividale, Palmanova and Aquileia not far from Udine. A positive mix of people, cultures and economies, a balanced situation of natural resources and famous industries in the field of steel, furniture, wines and food.

BRILLIANT PROSPECTS WITH SOME SERIOUS SETBACKS

A green an not overpopulated area of enterprising and laborious people (less than 2 million) should be extremely well doing, serene and enjoying. But for some reasons it is not exactly the way. Trieste and Udine have got international universities and the Udine Hospital is reputed as one of the most equipped and advanced of Italy. At Aviano, just near Pordenone, there is one of the major American Air-Base of Europe. Aviano is well-known also for having the most specialistic antitumoral centre of Italy. But this Centre is called by many, even among medical doctors, with the sinister name of Auschwitz.

A PARADISE BUT ONLY IN APPEARANCE

The Furlàn people living in such a terrestrial Paradise, fully immersed in the Nature, with gardens, fields, nice woods, rivers, gardens and lakes, should enjoy a fantastic and exceptional health, but the statistics prove all the opposite. This region reveals actually a big surprise, having the unpleasant record of cancer, stroke, dialysis and diabetes. How come? How can it be possible? Here we are not in Arizona, with the Pima Indians compelled to eat McDonald’s diet and to become the sickest community of the entire planet!

HOW TO EXPLAIN SUCH ENIGMA?

Nothing is casual in the world. All effects have got a cause. Then, it is not so difficult to answer, not difficult to grasp what is going wrong. What happens here after all is happening every where in the world in different ways, forms, times, intensities. Wrong choices about food and behaviours, wrong and misleading information from schools and media, wrong ways to think and to face the consequences of all mistakes, wrong and poor understanding of how the body works, wrong and infantile methods to handle diseases by medical authorities in absolute and arrogant exclusivity. In Friuli, more than in other areas, it is totally missing the concept of a healthy hygienic life-style, the concept of assuming regularly healthy and light, and simple, and clean, and digestible and innocent food. For too many years, food in Friuli have meant “cicine” (meat), lard, cheese, mortadella, prosciutto, ragù and similar.

EATING WELL HERE MEANS EATING MEAT, DRINKING WINE AND SUCKING COFFEE

Furlàn people is grown up with the dangerous prejudice that nutrition means eating substance, eating proteic, eating greasy, eating cooked, eating killed, eating salty, eating tweeted. All these funny and ridiculous concepts are common and still prevailing in the world, but in Friuli more than in other places. The food and drink industries here are brilliant, enterprising, successful. Pity that they include the most famous prosciutto crudo Sandaniele, the best speck of Sauris, the best cheese as Montasio, the best wines as Merlot-Verduzzo-Picolit, the best grappa, the best coffee like Illy, the best frico, the best brandy as Stock84 and the best Gubana (Cividale sweet).

STRONG BELIEVE IN MEDICAL CARE

In addition to all that, people relies a lot on medical care, on surgery, on chemio, on vaccines an on all sort of medicines. At the end, all the world the same when it comes to make big errors and mistakes and wrong doings. Apart the almond eyes, Chinese and Furlàns have negligible differences: they both work hard, they both eat wrong, they both like to enjoy happy and long life but they fail and cry in front of the events. Chinese are Furlàns and Furlàns are Chinese!

A DANGEROUS SITUATION OF ANTIBIOTIC MASSIVE ABUSE IN HONG KONG

Let us come to Asia, to Honking and China in particular. Things do not look bright at all. Majority of people in Honking is frightened and in panic, terrorised by contracting disease through external contagium and contamination. The continuous fear of transmittable disease, and not instead of internally developed disease, obscures the mind of people. This panic comes from heavy and obsessive promotion by the aggressive medical authorities, very active in dominating the media and diffusing fear. No wonder if more than 50% of Hongkongers declare to take antibiotics.

WHERE ARE THE DANGERS

Taking antibiotics is not just an imperfection but a huge disgrace. Taking antibiotics spoils the most important organ of the body, the microbiota which is in charge of our precious bacterial balance, of our internal whole functionality, of our good digestion, of our actual survival. Taking antibiotics requires months before recovering and recreating a healthy immune condition, and this causes high vulnerability to all diseases. Taking antibiotics means also depression, anemia, stress, poor respect of yourself. Honking is such a dynamic and active metropolis. Impossible to survive in state of weakness. That is why people cannot go out and move efficiently without recurring to milk-tea, best selling drink these days, without recurring to coke, to coffee, to energetic drinks, supplements and various pills.

THE NEGATIVE SPIRAL LEEDS TO A CANCEROUS MILIEU

At the end there is a dramatic negative spiral where your body becomes more and more intoxicated, more and more acidified, more and more obstructed, more and more water-retaining, more and more unable to self-expel your poison during the night circadian cycle from 8-9 pm to 4-5 am, which includes assimilation of food, nightly recharge of batteries through melatonin reload in the pineal gland, and finally a brief fast in the last hours of the morning sleep. A negative spiral and trap where the flood becomes sticky and fat, where the pancreas ha difficulty to create enzymes for digesting your cooked and devitalised meals, where the liver has troubles in self-cleaning and getting rid of dirt, where the kidney are unable to filter the nitrogen and ammonia residuals, where the skin does not sweat out the poisons, where the lymph nodes do not depurate all cellular debris, where our heart has got insufficient blood flux and shows difficulties in maintaining the right low beat, where the arthritic and sclerotic signals cannot be easily understood and solved, where the right equilibrium between caloric intake and energy consumption can hardly be respected, where your milieu interior is compromised and does not allow you to come out from your pathological tunnel.

AT THIS POINT TUMOUROSITY INSURGENCE IS VERY HIGH

Reached this situation, the body defence mechanisms are inactivated and cancer has got easy and undisturbed access, free insurgence and free development. For men it will be prostate, colon, stomach, testicular, while for women will be uterus and chest. That is why in Hong Kong television there is a frightening spot every 15 minutes, inviting all males to go for a visit and a check, in order to avoid the new monster behind the corner. Having a check means that you will be examined and probably diagnosed and cured, supposingly with excellent results. They say so. But are they reliable? Can you trust them? Can you trust whoever spends millions in TV advertisements for creating panic and push you towards surgeries and radiotherapies and chemio? Can you trust whoever pretends to cure and solve symptoms called cancer without knowing the causes, without touching those causes? In Aviano-Italy oncologists do not make miracles at all. In Hong Kong unfortunately no difference at all. Same old distorted and blamed procedures, same sufferances and same failures. Avian Auchswitz and Hong Kong Auchswitz.

THE CASE OF AIN INDONESIA PATIENT CURED IN MALAYSIA

What about Singapore? In the South China Morning Post of 19 November there is an article by Kok Xing Hui, telling the experience of Gunawan Sugianto, a 67 businessman from Surabaya-Indonesia. He chose the Mahkota Medical Centre in Malacca-Malaysia twice yearly in the past 5 years in order to get full-body check ups and also for a was infection, taking with him the complete family of 10 people. “The service and quality care here is better than Indonesia, and much cheaper than in Singapore, which used to be the preferred destination for rich Indonesian medical tourists.

FIGURES ABOUT SINGAPORE AND VICINITIES

Singapore got 550.000 foreign patients last year, while Malaysia got 940.000 ones and Thailand 1,8 million. Thailand is favourite specially among those seeking cosmetic operations. But, for more difficult and complex interventions, the real competition remains between Malaysia and Singapore. The monetary record of Singapore in 2012 was, according to Malaysia sources, 1,1 billion Ringitt (6.3 HK dollars, 600 million Euro), down to 832 million in 2013, 994 million in 2014, 900 million in 2015 and 2016.

EXAMPLES IN STENT APPLICATIONS

In order to apply a cardiovascular stent, a room in a Singapore Hospital will cost you 166000 HK dollars a day (16000 Euro). The same procedure at Mahkota Medical Centre, which makes this kind of stent cure to 85000 patients per year, the cost is 51000 HK4. The net basic cost of a room at Farrer Park Hospital in Singapore is 3200 HK$ (320 Euro) per day, while in Indonesia an equivalent room in a Columbia Asia Group Hospital will only cost 440 HK$ or 44 Euro. Other costs like hotel rooms for the family and air tickets make the Malaysia option even more convenient. Nobody can beat Thailand for economy, kindness, hospitality. It has no sense trying to compete on easy operations.

SINGAPORE MARKETING STRATEGIES

Singapore offers expert surgeons for treatment of advanced cancers, or for abdominal problems, for vascular operations, for coronary by-passes, for mini-invasive and robotic interventions. Singapore is aware to be the most expensive, but he still lose Chinese clients which go to Cleveland clinics and Mayo clinics in Usa, where they spend 3 times more than in Singapore. That’s why Singapore is targeting to this kind of customers, counting on his access to innovative medicine and to advanced instrumentations. Singapore strategy is for a specific marketing of high-cost patients coming from China, Australia, Europe and even Usa.

AN ATTRACTIVE BUSINESS INDEED

That is the new frontier of business. Everybody in fight and competition to conquer a bigger slice of the market. But, at the end, kindness a part, technology and expertise apart, medical ability apart, it always remain a matter of business and making money, a matter of invasive medical care on symptoms and never on causes, a matter of lancet and chemio. Never in no case a question of giving the right instructions and schooling about how avoiding to put yourself in trouble.

Nobody engaged seriously in order to create many more enjoying tourists and less hospital tourists. Never, from any medical source in the world, the right answer to come out from your personal drama in a complete and stable way, avoiding to fall in the trap of the usual Auchswitz configuration.

Valdo Vaccaro (technical assistance of Francesco and William)