Thank you, NHS, for teaching us English

When I was a tiny Muscovite, all children were supposed to intone “Thank you, Comrade Stalin, for our happy childhood.”

I hated that even as 5-year-old, and I still loathe effusive public displays of gratitude to anyone other than God. But in this case I’m willing to make an exception.

For, in addition to saving us from the Chinese virus, the NHS spares no time and effort to save the English language from being ossified in its obsolete form. It has fallen upon the Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust to blaze the trail.

Leading the way is its maternity services department, henceforth to be known as ‘perinatal services’. You see, the word ‘maternity’ has an offensively feminine ring to it, which is bound to traumatise trans persons for life. It’s good to see the Trust taking seriously the Hippocratic oath of “do no harm”.

In the same vein, the gender-appropriating word ‘breastfeeding’ must now be replaced with ‘chestfeeding’. This, I feel, is a bit less clear-cut: after all, that part of the body may be described as ‘breast’ or ‘chest’ for both men and women. However, perhaps the plural of ‘breast’ does sound more gender-specific and therefore potentially injurious.

The Trust must be commended for its consistency: banning a word would be useless without also banning all its derivatives. Thus ‘breastmilk’ will now give way to ‘human milk’, ‘breast/chestmilk’ or ‘milk from the feeding mother or parent’… Oops! I’ve just commended the Trust for its consistency and then the offensive word ‘mother’ creeps in. More work needs to be done, clearly.  

I’ll be quoting densely from now on because no paraphrase could do justice to the lexicological breakthroughs effected by the Trust. But before I go on, it’s essential we all appreciate the epic efforts of our medical professionals to advance the fields ostensibly outside their remit.

Actually, I don’t think it’s medical professionals proper who deserve our admiration for this. Being too focused on such trivialities as treating patients, those boffins can’t devote much time to lexical nuances.

No, the kudos must go to those who are more indispensable than doctors and nurses to the core business of the NHS. They are called ‘facilitators of optimisation’, ‘optimisers of facilitation’ and, especially relevant to today’s theme, ‘directors of diversity’.

It’s these tireless, dedicated professionals who can devote all their energy, unused in medicine as such, to creating within the NHS a virtual Lexical Trauma Unit. After all, it’s not just physical problems that can bring a person down, but also the psychological wounds caused by the obscenity ‘woman’.

The Trust’s policy paper phrases this desideratum more elegantly than I ever could: “Gender identity can be a source of oppression and health inequality. We are consciously using the words ‘women’ and ‘people’ together to make it clear that we are committed to working on addressing health inequalities for all those who use our services.

“As midwives and birth workers, we focus on improving access and health outcomes for marginalised and disadvantaged groups. Women are frequently disadvantaged in healthcare, as are trans and non-binary people…

“We also recognise that there is currently biological essentialism and transphobia present within elements of mainstream birth narratives and discourse. We strive to protect our trans and non-binary service users and healthcare professionals from additional persecution as a consequence of terminology changes, recognising the significant impact this can have on psychological and emotional wellbeing.”

When people teach others how to use English, their own style must establish their credentials for providing such a service. The Trust meets this requirement with flying colours: seldom does one see thoughts of such vast import expressed so trenchantly yet gracefully.

Sensitivity to minority feelings is vital to majority rule. As a champion of one vote for every man, woman, other and child, I applaud the Trust for upholding this sacred principle.

But exactly how small is the minority so lovingly protected in Brighton? According to statistics, about one per cent of Britain’s population are trans, not that I would have known.

One in 100? In all my lamentably long life I must have met tens of thousands of people, of whom only two have been transsexual. So the official data got me thinking.

Since such data are always right, thousands of those I’ve met must have been trans without my – possibly even their – knowing. Suddenly, a jolt went right through me. What if I myself am a transsexual without realising it?

What if I’m a pregnant woman? After all, I have every clinical symptom of pregnancy: a prominent belly and no periods. No, that can’t be. Or can it?

I’d go to Brighton to find out, but I can’t: the lockdown is still in place. I’ll just have to wait and see, and you’ll be the first to know if I give birth.

Meanwhile, I hope you’ll join me in thanking the Trust for educating us all. Thank you, Trust – and thank you, NHS.