BARRIERS UP OR DOWN

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 77, 27 September 1941, Page 8

BARRIERS UP OR DOWN

It is interesting to note that, while the Government is pressing for a measure to remove financial barriers to general practitioner medical service, the Wellington Hospital Board has referred to a committee the question of. erecting a financial barrier excluding from hospital dental service people who are able to pay for private treatment. The two subjects are not related, but, nevertheless, the contrast suggests important points that demand consideration. Hospital dental treatment is not a Social Security service, nor is it free, but it is probably carried out, like other hospital services, at charges much below cost —the balance being made up from rates and taxation. The less-than-cost service has brought patronage from people who could pay for private attention. In Consequence of this and of the shortage of staff, the' work is months behind schedule. Does this not suggest that, before instituting a free or less-than-Cost service, it is prudent to make full preparation for giving it? There may be objections to financial barriers, especially when (as with hospital services) ratepayers all have to pay for the services, but it is surely better to begin on a modest scale, with first attention to those who cannot afford to go elsewhere, than to launch a grand plan and then find it grounded. It may be said that the hospital dental difficulty,, if not caused by the war, has been aggravated by it; that the work could be done if so many dentists and dental mechanics were not working for the troops. But exactly the same argument applies to the medical ' service. So many doctors are away that the inauguration of a free general practitioner service at this time is not only unfair to the doctors, but against common sense from the practical working viewpoint. It is not as if the poor were suffering or likely to suffer from postponement of the plan. The doctors have freely agreed to operate a series of plans providing full medical service (not only general practitioner) for those most in need, and other benefits for other classes. But the Government wants all barriers down; and the Hospital Board wonders if it will not have to put a barrier up!