DENTISTS & ENLISTMENT

Evening Post, Volume XCIII, Issue 45, 21 February 1917, Page 7

DENTISTS & ENLISTMENT

TO THS ZDITOK. Sir,—To the lay v mind the reasons brought forward, to show why dentists should be treated in a democratic community as a privileged 'class, and to be excluded from combative- service, may seem ponderous and weighty. ■' But, when •these arguments are examined in the light of inner knowledge, there appears to niy mind no grounds for certain dentists to hope that the Government will reverse the just decisions of the Appeal Boards. After all, the issue Ito foe decided is primarily this: To -what extent are dentists necessary to the general public in times like the present, when all exorbitant and false vValues 'automatically resolve, themselves into ■their essential worth? As a dentist, I take it thai the relief of pain will be for the- public the ultimate or bedrock duty of a dentist, and when so many thousands of men aro going to their death, what matter ■if a few thousand molars that would have b^en treated conservatively in times of peace aro -extracted? Surely we uru&t all make sacrifices. Are the dentists as willing to make them as the public are? ■Tilings are not in such an extreme plight as some dentists would Save the public and the Government believe. In Wellington alone many dentists have either enlisted or have been absorbed into the Camp Dental Corps, and yet I think I may safely affirm that the practice of dentistry is falling no heavier on the shoulders of the remaining men, as the public are only having work ithat is absolutely essential at present performed. The bedrock number of dentists remaining in New Zealand has not nearly been reached yet, and until it has been it certainly is not very inspiring to hear these utterances because dentists have to shoulder the common burden of all men to-day and leave comfortable homes 'and lucrative practices. To me these pleas appear unseemly and unworthy of the- dignity of the profession, and doubly unworthy of (those dentists who have/ from the 'beginning preferred the honour of being combatants to that of everything eke. Trust-ing you will find space for a dentists-humble •opinion,—l am., etc.V

ENLICTED.