The Health Secretary is popping the champagne corks because nearly two-thirds of patients are being seen within eighteen weeks—a metric that redefines ‘success’ as ‘only leaving a third of people rotting in a queue’. While the government pats itself on the back for this mediocre miracle, the rest of us are busy dodging HIV-infected dentists in Sydney, hantavirus on cruise ships, and posh sandwiches containing enough salt to preserve a pharaoh. It seems the only thing more rampant than the preventable cancers and meningitis outbreaks is the delusion that a daily pill will solve the obesity crisis while we’re all too busy dying to eat lunch.
🎵 (s)Hit of the Day 🎵
Version 1
Version 2
📜 Lyrics 📜
[Intro]
[Clean chiming guitar arpeggios in 7/8]
[Wurlitzer piano enters with dissonant jazz voicings]
[Verse 1]
Wes is beaming from the dispatch box
Sixty-five percent treated in eighteen weeks
He calls that "right on track" with a grin so wide
While someone's nan is waiting for the hip she needs
It's an interim target, a mediocrity parade
Whitehall pops the champagne, exclaims:
"We've hit the bare minimum!"
And the graveyards fill with patients
Who missed the cut by seven sad percentage points
[Pre-Chorus]
[Bass guitar slides up]
Survival is an extreme sport now
Russian roulette with a stethoscope
[Chorus]
[Time signature shifts to 5/4]
Right on track, right on track
For absolute disaster
We're meeting targets no one asked for
With dizzying alacrity
Right on track, right on track
To fail in record time
The graph goes up, the patients drop
But God, the numbers look sublime
[Verse 2]
[Returns to 7/8 with intricate ghost notes on drums]
Book yourself a cruise, they said, you've earned a break
Now they're tracing passengers for hantavirus exposure
A floating petri dish in the middle of the ocean
"Hell on earth," the survivors told the news crews
Back on dry land, the dentist calls you in
"We didn't sterilise the tools, you might have HIV"
Just a standard letter, nothing personal
They're very sorry for the inconvenience caused
[Pre-Chorus]
[Woodblock percussion accent]
Dodge the virus, dodge the drill
Dodging death takes skill and iron will
[Chorus]
[Time signature shifts to 5/4]
Right on track, right on track
For absolute disaster
We're meeting targets no one asked for
With dizzying alacrity
Right on track, right on track
To fail in record time
The graph goes up, the patients drop
But God, the numbers look sublime
[Bridge]
[Stop-start dynamics, instrumental breaks]
[Guitar tapping passage]
Your healthy lunch contains more salt
Than five cheeseburgers in a greasy paper wrap
The M.P.s want to ban the sunbed ads
To stop the cancers that we didn't know we had
A student died of meningitis up in Reading
Just another statistic in the margin of the page
The pharmaceutical industry has got a pill for you
To keep the weight off after all those jabs
But don't expect the N.H.S. to find the funding
They're too busy celebrating:
"We're right on track!"
[Spoken word section over frantic instrumental]
[Spoken]
Right on track for what, exactly?
Right on track for a system that measures success
by how few people die waiting in corridors?
Right on track for self-congratulation
while the public dodges biological hazards?
Right on track for absolutely bugger all
except a very depressing headline.
[Guitar Solo]
[Two-hand tapping technique, frenetic and precise]
[Chorus]
[Full band, 5/4]
Right on track, right on track
For absolute disaster
We're meeting targets no one asked for
With dizzying alacrity
Right on track, right on track
To fail in record time
The graph goes up, the patients drop
But God, the numbers look sublime
[Outro]
[Gradual breakdown, chiming arpeggios]
Right on track...
[Final dissonant chord]
Right on track...