At a press conference in Waterlooville today, the Health Secretary Patricia Hewitt outlined a new initiative which she claims will revolutionise healthcare in the UK.

"Home testing kits are becoming widely available for an increasing number of conditions" she said. "Also we've been issuing thousands of pedometers to children from 250 schools to encourage walking. We have successfully reduced hospital waiting times by discharging patients before they are fully recovered. We are merely extending the self-help principle so the patients themselves can perform minor surgical procedures.

"It's just a question of educating the public to carry out simple operations such as setting broken bones, extracting teeth and  removing cataracts. These are relatively easy to do and should pose no major problems. I know the patients will occasionally experience difficulties so we are setting up a free helpline based in Bangalore, with specially trained advisors who can provide assistance. We don't anticipate a high volume of calls."

Ms Hewitt added that exciting developments are also taking place which will reduce the need for expensive diagnostic equipment. "We are investigating the ability of bats to use their ultrasound to 'see' through the human body and detect abnormalities. We know that dolphins can use their sonar systems to detect tumours. Unfortunately the use of dolphins on such a massive scale would pose serious problems and we feel the use of bats would be far more practicable."

The Health Secretary summed up by saying: "We believe these imaginative schemes will reduce waiting times and the cost savings will be huge. The impact on the nation's health will be unfathomable."