MEDICINE

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 104, 5 May 1933, Page 7

MEDICINE

OUTLOOK FOR STUDENTS >.■ ■ ■ : PROFESSION OVERCROWDED "~"~ , . ■ i (From "The Post's" Representative.) SYDNEY, April 6. The large number of youths who are flocking into the medical faculty' at the Sydney University is causing great concern in some quarters. Jt is stated that Victoria and New South Wales have relatively more doctors than any other country, in. the world,., and the plea is v made that youths should not be allowed to enter the long corridor of medical education unless their eyes are fully opened to the possibilities. There should be no illusions about, .the probable, conditions at tha other end. There is a tendency all over the world, according to one medical man, to overcrowd the medical profession, and Australia should take steps to see that what ha 9 happened elsewhere should not happen i here. ; : : It is pointed out by.those who Lave made a study of the position that.in France, where the medical profession is perturbed at the overcrowding end lis taking steps to deal with it, the ratio of medical practitioners to the population is 1. to "15.00., In the British Isles the ratio is 1 to iOBO. The .position in Spain is serious. A medical journal tells of several doctors there seeking work as pick and shovel men, of others seeking • employment in hospitals as wardsmen, The free soup kitchens frequently find medical, men applying for food. Some doctors sock entrance to hospitals as ordinary patients "in order to find in a hospital bed the remedy against hunger and misery." Austria, with a ratio of I'm 788, is the most crowded with; doctors. So much for the European countries. . The position^in at least two of the Australian States is worse than it is in Australia. In New South Wales the ratio is now 1 in 780, and in Victoria 1 in 704. In Queensland the ratio is 1 in 1629. A doctor- said the other day that conditions in New South Wales and Victoria were already: serious and would rapidly become worse. That could easily be foretold,- because the growth of the population was rapidly declining and" the number of medical students was rapidly increasing. The numbers that have been admitted in recent years fo the first courses are:— 1926, 58; 1928, 68; 1930, 99; 1931, 129; 1932. 148. Here is an extract from a letter <$üb: lished in the last issue of the "Medical Journal of Australia": *'It is apparent" that many of the young people at present studying medicine are doomed to disappointment. They are studying medicine • because there is .no .work elsewhere, and.the study solves the problem of giving them something to do for the next six or seven years. But what then? When they havo completed their courso many will suffer the degenerating influence of semi-idleness during the best years of their lives— lin fact, for, the whole of their lives if the present tendencies continue."-