As the new century started, the winter's flu epidemic was a reminder of times we all thought had ended in the Victorian era.

A struggling NHS was forced to use refrigerated lorries to cart bodies to the morgue from some of Sussex's hospitals.

This year managers are working on mass vaccinations to prevent a repeat. Hospitals and GPs will have the back-up of an NHS direct phone line.

Trusts across Sussex are talking optimistically of reducing the risk to vulnerable elderly patients.

Co-ordination is a way forward and the trusts should be applauded. But the big problem remains, a lack of funding.

Healthcare costs dear, it's a fact of life. No mention has been made of extra funding for this year's fight against influenza, historically a huge killer.

The epidemic after the First World War led to more deaths than the terrible conflict itself. Flu spreads very quickly.

The feeling remains that worthy, hardworking staff in Sussex are being forced to cover a gaping slash wound with ordinary household plasters.

Let's hope the epidemic doesn't come again this year.

Food fight finale The seemingly never-ending dispute about who should pay the £300,000 redundancy costs for sacked dinner staff in West Sussex is finally going to be resolved.

The county council and caterer Castle View will slug it out at an employment tribunal in September.

Since the staff were made redundant last year, as part of a £500,000 budget saving, the whole business has become messier than a tapioca pudding fight.

Many children have lost their hot meals and, for the unfortunate workers now without gainful employment, it has left a foul taste in the mouth.

Let's get it sorted and get on with the real business - giving every child a decent meal at lunchtime.

Arthouse division Only a road divides their houses, but Debbi Moffat and Jill Jerome's artistic ideas are as far apart as Caravaggio and Cadburyland.

One has turned her Saltdean garden into a sculptural shrine to artist, poet and film director Derek Jarman.

The other has created a mermaid-studded garden more like a Disney scene.

It just goes to show the cliche is true - home is where the art is.