This week at the University the Student Health Center, which is used for… something health-related I think… has finally been required to provide a service to students who get injured on campus (usually as a result of the squirrels being mocked – they don’t like that). Now, it’s commonly known that the Student Health Center has been around almost as long as the University, but what is less commonly known is just what mysterious service this facility performs. After all, with COVID cases rising rapidly to an astonishing 11 active cases from the last time I checked the dashboard over the summer when we had like … one, things are starting to get pretty serious. 

This is not to say that Student Health is useless. Recently, Student Health has been forced by the University to provide a service. What is this service, you may ask? Well, we’re back to COVID testing. Student Health has larger q-tips, they stick them deeper in your nose, and they relish your pain. At least, that’s what happened during my optional test. They didn’t even give me a warning, they just stuck it up there and ripped it back out again and sent me on my merry way. Speaking of which, it turns out that 100 percent of the recent positive COVID cases had bloody noses. I don’t think there’s a connection, but if the University starts requiring us to wear tissues up our noses I’ll know who to blame. Then again, I have no idea what Student Health does apart from that.

I tried looking on their website, but I already knew everything they had to say. The University website states that “Services [from the Student Health Center] include treatment for routine illnesses and injuries, sexual health, drug and alcohol education, travel medicine, and campus outreach.” Routine illnesses? I can just go on WebMD for that. That’s how I self-diagnosed my severe Hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia. Drug and alcohol education? I’ll just watch what my friends do – they all drink! Sexual health? I’ll just watch… nevermind. Travel medicine? Where would I want to travel? They’re just gonna quarantine me when I get back anyways. Campus outreach? Since when? I’ve been writing for about a year, and have been a student on campus for longer, and this is the first time I’ve seriously heard of the “Student Health Center”. How do we know it isn’t just some fantasy the Administrators conjured up, like the Land of Oz, or Narnia, or Kentucky? Any rational human being could see that none of these places actually exist, so what’s different about the Student Health Center? It’s obviously just propaganda for Big Tote so the University can give out more tote bags full of weird-tasting clear stuff and strange blue napkins. 

Well I, for one, am not going to fall for this obvious scam. The University needs to come clean about the Student Health Center. If the Administration thinks they can just lie about how many squirrel attacks there are on-campus, or how filled up the isolation housing is with students suffering from “vegetarianism” – whatever that means – then they have another thing coming. I don’t know why Big Tote is so involved in our campus Student Health Center, or how high up this squirrel nest really goes, but as the most anti-squirrel journalist at this newspaper, I will find out! For you! For the University! For Pennsylvania! For America! Goodnight, everybody!