It was as if at that moment the doctor morphed into Cinderella’s fairy godmother

21 May 2026, The Tablet

This past fortnight, I’ve been riding a wave of kindness, and it’s mostly thanks to the NHS.

For 30-odd years, I’ve had a chronic lung disease called bronchiectasis. It’s not rare: there’s a sufferer for every 200 people in the population, apparently. Pope Francis was one; many Tablet readers will be others. But it’s incurable, and it’s a bore. The main symptom is a persistent cough – rather revoltingly called a “productive” cough.

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