President Trump says he will announce new tariffs on pharmaceutical goods soon, and will probably describe them as a shot in the arm for US drug companies, or healthy competition, or something.
This advance notice from President Trump gives newspaper editors time to polish up some medical puns for their headlines.
‘Strong medicine’ would be a suitable short, but slightly lazy headline. More sophisticated efforts might include ‘stop taking the tablets’ or ‘fly in the ointment’. More desperate efforts could include ‘anti-buy-otics’, ‘tariffs on depression meds are a real downer’, ‘medicine balls’, ‘now you’ll just have to make do with sex and rock’n’roll’ and ‘now it’s harder to get Viagra’.
You can expect Donald Trump to be referred to as a drug lord or medicine man and his tariffs as ‘a drug on the market’ and/or ‘an ill wind’. Or how about 'Trump calls in sick'. Or 'Trump's prescription'? In comparison, British invalids, and the workshy, will be 'worried sick'.
You can expect plenty of pill references – bitter pill, poison pill, no sugaring the pill, for example. Unhappy pills, perhaps. ‘Trump imposes tariffs on suppositories by the backdoor’ is a possibility. Not really what you’d want to read at breakfast time. But hey! - if it sells newspapers....
Don’t say we didn’t warn you.
Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay
