SHORTAGE OFDOGTORS

Evening Post, Volume XCIII, Issue 129, 31 May 1917, Page 7

SHORTAGE OFDOGTORS

POSITION ACUTE

LEGISLATION POSSIBLE.

Speaking on the subject of the short- ■ age of doctors in the Dominion, owing to so ihany having gone to the front, or being at work in the camps, the Minister of public health (Hon. G. W. Russelty said that some of the leading hos-: pitals -had recently been reduced to the direst straits, and had had great difficulty in carrying on. "These facts," he ! said, "and the shortage of doctors in; some of the country districts of the Do- ; minion point to the absolute necessity for the medical services of New Zealand being mobilised and some control exercised throughout the period of the war as to the location of medical men. So far as the large cities are concerned, the medical men in theni are •feeling tha pressure of the large amount of additional work, entailed in them through the absence of their professional brethren. The cities with their large institutions and the large staffs they possess probably will he able to win , through without any material trouble, but that position apparently does not apply in other districts. For example, I received word the other day from the Westland. Hospital Board that there was. only one doctor on the coast for 300 miles of country.: I have been in con- 1 ference with the executive of the' British Medical Association, and understand that a meeting of the association is to be held shortly in Wellington, at which '"'arrangements for the future will be dis- ■ cussed. , "' ■ ' V "It appears to me that it may be necessary for the State through legislation to "take power to place medical men in districts which are without medical service. The financial arrangements arising out of this compulsion will require very careful consideration. In England the policy of compulsion has been in force for some time past, and authorities taking the power to remove men from the districts in which they 'reside and: ■locate them in other districts where there is a shortage. In these cases y the 'men who remain are, I understand, required to pay over a proportion of theiiv earnings of the men who. remove, the idea being that the increased ;emolu- ■_ inents arising from the fact .' of the smaller number justifies this adjustment , of receipts. If it comes here to the State taking power to order tho locations of the medical men, the fixing/of locations could not be done arbitrarily. , There must be in that case a. board' set up, . upon which the medical profession and' the . officers, of ithe .Public Health Department, ■ and probably also the Defence Department, would require to be fully represented. " And in any such case the. State would have to guarantee an adequate income to the practitioner, certainly of an amount not less than is paid to medical men holding commissions in the Army Medical Service. I hope to have the assistance of the British Medical. Association' at its conference during the: coming month in considering the matter before 'legislation is brought down. I am aware that many -lnedio»l men are totally opposed to any-thing'-'jn the way of 'compulsion; but while the war is on, it becomes necessary in the interests of the .State, that prin-, ciples of action should be applied thati"" never would be considered for ones moment when times are normal." ■■ •• ■"'.