An apple a day keeps the doctor away, or so they say. I rather suspect that this phrase was coined by apple farmers back in the Seventies, worried about fighting off competition from exotic fruits such as pineapples and mango. Well, never mind apples – keep the doctor away by whatever means possible. Put up barricades and man the drawbridge. Just don’t go anywhere near a doctor, and you will live longer. Your life may be a little shorter, but you’ll live it free of stress and worry.

Why do I say this? Because in my experience, when you visit the doctor you will almost certainly come away clutching a sheaf of prescriptions for ailments you didn’t know you had, and a fresh crop of new worries about your health. Oh my, doctors love to put the fear of God into you. Even non-believers might find themselves praying that all will turn out well once they’ve had a simple check-up. The most innocuous enquiry initiates a cycle of periodic health checks and daily medication These people are merciless. Once they get their claws in you will never escape. And they enjoy your fear.

Take my recent example. I entered the urologist’s office with some minor symptoms, and exited with the words of Doctor Doom ringing in my ear that I might lose yet another organ to the surgeon’s scalpel. I swear there must be a big empty space inside me. Maybe I could rent myself out as storage. Anyway, cue months of anxiety until hearing the (relatively) happy news that although I did indeed need to be sliced and diced, said kidney would remain with its twin just as nature intended it to be.

Face it – you’ve got to die some day, so why not eat, drink, live merry, and raise a finger to the medical profession and their gleeful attempts to create paranoia. Those people are sadists, I swear. They probably gather at the end of the day and cackle about how many patients they wound up.

So I have a simple suggestion. To stay healthy, just cut everything unhealthy down by half. Drink half a bottle instead of the whole one. Share that cake with a friend. Foist your anxieties onto someone else. You’ll stay relatively healthy and the waiting rooms will be empty. Then the doctors will have to wind each other up instead. Ah, sweet karma.