#welovethenhs

I saw something yesterday that made me realise the amazing power of the social network and felt that I should really talk about it.  Graham Linehan, an Irish TV writer, made a comment on Twitter about another comment that some right wing folks in the US had made around the UK health service.  He then tweeted the hashtag #welovethenhs.  His call to arms was as simple as this -

                                           Please retweet all your NHS love using the hashtag #welovetheNHS

and so it began...

This was tweeted at around midday yesterday and by the end of the day was the number one trending topic on the Internet.  On twitter alone there were literally hundreds of pages worth of tweets all commenting on why they loved the NHS (personally it saved my life in 1994 - that's why I love it).  Then it broke out from there.  It made frontpage news in some mainstream newspapers and even had people building pages around it and posting pictures.  I sat at my desk yesterday having seen the first post and watched as it took off wildly.  Hundreds of thousands of tweets later and it's still the top trending topic on twitter and is spawning much chat.  It made it onto the radio too and Mr Linehan was talking this morning on Radio 5 Live about it apparently (didn't catch the piece as I am working).  It even went to the Prime Minister...although I think Mr Linehan was not best pleased about that.  Someone has even kicked off a we love the NHS twibbon.

For Mr Linehan I'd be worried I could have the power to kick off something like this (although wouldn't we all love it?) but it shows that if you have the right message and if people believe in it then these things can really take off.  It was also a particularly British reaction - No matter how we personally may criticise our own health service -  'woe betide' anyone who does the same from foreign shores.