[EVENT]The Clinics

The Empire was always a humanitarian endeavor.

At first, it was about the law, preserving the rightful claims of English lords in France and Ireland. Then, about religious freedom, fighting against the tyrannical authority of the Pope and his Spanish masters.

Then it was against slavery. Against the horrors of Oriental despotism. For free markets, so that all can become rich.

Now, the empire, rebuilt and repurposed a thousand times over, was fighting for the health, safety, and democracy. The welfare state is yet another fine British invention, like Tikka Masala, the steam engine, and calculus. Even the runts of the British Empire, the Rhodesians, are building a little NHS in their adopted African home.

The government has provided a significant amount of funding for the construction of a large network of clinics across the country, specifically to serve the native worker population. Miners and farm laborers are susceptible to injury and illness. Even the most unfortunate members of Rhodesian society deserve protection.

As part of this medical program, hundreds of new nurses, of African and European heritage, will be employed by the state, replacing the many nurses now languishing in Rhodesian prisons as a result of the Kurtz Scandal.

These clinics will provide high-quality medical care, including prescriptions for anti-malarial drugs, antibiotics, and non-addictive painkillers, like the newly introduced Dysatol.

!Dysatol. The name itself rings like a noxious, dissonant note over Rhodesian culture. The little white pill, cheaply made, crumbled with a single hit with a heavy pint glass, or the bottom of machete.!<

!Dysatol, whose name was a sick joke. A contraction of the chemical name — Diacetylmorphine. Not its proper name. Heroin.!<

!Dysatol, which burned as you snorted it. A side effect of the crude distillation, in large copper pots in the Rhodesian Countryside, White vinegar and Opium rising boiled together into a homogenous black paste.!<

!Dysatol, which came in packs of 60 pills, but was prescribed a month at a time. Just begging to be shared, to be sold. To be crushed and mixed with Tobacco, or injected directly into the veins of a people with no previous experience with it.!<

!Dysatol, produced en masse, and distributed to traditional leaders, traders, and merchants on the borders of Rhodesia for a pittance, moving through Southern Africa.!<

!Dysatol. The devil was inside Rhodesia, not in a therapist’s office. But in the loving embrace of oblivion.!<