Diana Wichtel: Laughter still the best medicine

The tavern I pass on my way to work wasn't advertising the usual special du jour the other day. Its sign read "Save Starship! Wayne change your own name".

Perhaps Auckland District Health Board chairman Wayne Brown should consider a name change. Possibly to "Mud", given the ongoing fallout from the hospital name debacle.

Starship. It was one of those ideas, like Sky Tower, that sounded silly at first. But I've come to love how the top of the Sky Tower pops up everywhere, suddenly appearing to direct me when I'm driving lost in the wilds of suburban Auckland.

Last year, when I was visiting my mother at Auckland Hospital, the whimsical colours of Starship had a similarly cheering effect. As with the Sky Tower, you can't miss Starship. Both have become part of Auckland's identity, stamping some focus and personality on our sprawling tribal metropolis.

Focus? Personality? Auckland? That will never do. I've read the reasons given for changing the name and painting over Starship's defiantly non-institutional exterior. It seems the place is a victim of its own success at hogging attention and donations.

It has even been suggested that children, dazzled by its glamour, can't keep away, although I've never been tempted to schlep mine over there instead of to our excellent local GP just because Starship has better decor.

Integrating hospital services into a single, grey - or in this case off-white - bureaucratic entity no doubt makes for a more easily controlled system. It worked for the Soviet Union.

It's less easy to estimate the value, and possibly even benefits to health, of things such as staff morale, client satisfaction and a sense of community identification.

Still, they say laughter is the best medicine and, as always when contentious matters come up for discussion in this country, the debate has been hilarious.

That fundamental principle of journalism - when in doubt, ask a television personality - was swiftly deployed. "I just jolly well don't like it," said Petra Bagust.

There has seldom been a better example of New Zealand's prevailing leadership philosophy: if it ain't broke, take a sledgehammer to it. The suggested new names were cunningly designed to appeal to no one. Think of the time wasted by receptionists having to get their mouths around the first version - Auckland City Hospital Children's Services. At the moment, as I discovered when I called, a simple, pleasant "Starship reception, can I help you?" suffices.

As a compromise, the new name was changed again, to the Starship Children's Department, which sounds like something you'd find manned by Mrs Slocombe, somewhere between Menswear and Lingerie. I guess they could answer the phone with "Are you being served?".

Surely one key to effective management is good communication skills. Brown's have landed him in hot water with some of the country's top scary women, from Helen Clark to Lucy Lawless. His airy "There is nothing special about the children's hospital" was hard to beat but he managed it, reportedly telling a Sunday paper: "There are probably a number of people that will take me as some sort of Adolf Hitler of health. If everyone wants to bag shit out of someone with a great track record of health management, who are they going to find to do it?" Indeed.

With the highly successful Starship Foundation and some sponsors still unhappy with the compromise name, you get the feeling this isn't over.

I haven't yet read what fast-food behemoth McDonald's thinks of the name debate. It has an outlet at the Starship, which is ironic on many levels. If Wayne Brown is serious about making the place unattractive to its small clients, what's with the Happy Meals?

Meanwhile, some health officials are calling for a ban on children eating burgers and demanding that fast-food outlets be banned from within 1km of schools.

Yet there's one in a children's hospital. What's the thinking here? Only sick children should be allowed to eat burgers?

Still, you can see why officials and experts are keen to focus attention on that easy scapegoat, the fast-food industry. They've been promoting until recently a food pyramid - loads of pasta, potatoes, bread, rice - that might have been making us fatter than the odd Big Mac. Now they've abruptly turned the pyramid on its head. Confused?

The anxiety produced by all these mixed messages will no doubt drive us to scoff comforting, unhealthy refined carbohydrates by the truckload, thus confirming my theory that health officials are bad for our health.

In the end, there's nothing wrong, per se, with fast-food outlets, as long as there are other cheap, healthy choices available. Just as there's nothing wrong with the original name of our respected children's hospital.

Let's try to be positive. The crisis presents a marvellous opportunity for two iconic institutions, Starship and McDonald's, to enhance their highly successful brands while working together for a healthier nation.

Why not create a delicious, nutritious McStarship Burger (it sounds so much better than McDepartment Burger) - lean meat patty, wholemeal sesame seed roll, hold the mayo, with a bit of greenery, some tomato sauce and the always essential dill pickle.

Merchandising could include a Xena figure dealing - "Aiiieeeeee!" - to a tiny, plastic Wayne Brown. I can feel my cholesterol levels lowering just thinking about it.