MEDICAL EXAMINATIONS

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 84, 2 January 1918, Page 6

MEDICAL EXAMINATIONS

Sir,—ln your" issue of to-day's date a correspondent under the noin de plume of "Fair Play" directs the attention of the Hon. the Minister of Defonce to the fact that a Hastings medical man is a member of a Medical Board that visits Hastings to examine recruits. What does your correspondent iuftr?. Does he mean that medical men car.nob be trusted to examine recruits in their own town? In other words, classes their acquaintances as unfit, irrespective of their state of health.. This letter contains an innuendo as it invites the : Hon. tho Minister to publish the names of Hastings men examined by this cificer, and it is : also a slur on the inhabitants of Hastings. Major Barcroft is an old soldier and, throw up his practice in th« early days of the war to do his bit. He has been, overseas, in camps, and on boards, and! 1 lion , is the butt- of an anonymous correspondent in a daily newspaper. This Medical Board only visits Hastings once in two months, and, further, there ig another medical man as a member, who was a long time at the front. In conclusion, I would like to ask "Fair Play" whether he was passed as fit by the' officer he slurs, or whether ho will volunteer and thus tost the board, as I presume he writes from Hawke's Bay. "Fair Play" would be advised to solect a more fortunate nom de plume in future, or to sign his own name, as it is not an honourable action to cast a slur at a profession that has sacrificed more in the present war than any, other seotion of the public: Moreover, I he may find that it is dangerous, and ; that a nom do plume won't protect him. - am, ec, NQT MIJI) _

January 1. [Our previous correspondent did noti' caat any slur on Major Barcroft. Hβ merely challenged the Minister's statoment that recruits are examined by medical officers appointed from other districts than those from which the recruits are summoned. The principle l«id down by tie Minister is a sound one, designed to strengthen public crnfidunco in the medical examination being free from any suggestion of Was, consoious or otherwise. The question at issue is whether the principle 'isrigidly adhered to.]