Calpol – The Miracle Drug

I have often wondered which medical speciality would be the quickest to learn, and whether other consultants look down upon their colleagues in the “easy” departments.

For many years, I presumed it would be something to do with feet. How much can go wrong with feet that you can’t blame on some other part of the body and make some other specialist responsible?

However, since becoming a parent I have come to the conclusion that training to be a paediatrician must be easier even than foot doctoring, because 95% of childhood health problems have one single cure – and that is Calpol.

For those of you not in the know, Calpol is paracetamol in a pink sugar solution. And it cures LITERALLY EVERYTHING.

When you are an adult, you wouldn’t dream of taking the same medicine for – say – a headache, an upset stomach, a cold, skin complaints, trench foot, hammer toe etc. And yet, Calpol sorts all of these out in children.

This is not just me saying this. I cannot remember a time taking our kids to the doctor (well,  a time of Elvira telling me about her taking the kids to the doctor) where Calpol has not been foremost amongst the medically-mandated remedies.

And kids bloody love it (admittedly, the white version does raise the occasional eyebrow, despite tasting exactly the same and having identical medicinal properties).

Granted, there may be some problems that Calpol can’t solve. But why is the top priority of the entire global pharmaceutical industry not the synthesis of an adult version of this miraculous wonder drug? 

Sometimes the best ideas are hiding in plain sight.