CHAIR OF MIDWIFERY

Evening Star, Issue 20428, 8 March 1930, Page 26

CHAIR OF MIDWIFERY

FULL SUPPORT FROM PROFESSION (Pbb Unitod Pbbss Association.] PALMERSTON N., March 7. A statement which was circulated that members of the New Zealand branch of the British Medical Association were opposed to the dominion-wide appeal now being made to endow a chair of midwifery at the Otago Medical School was refuted to-day by Dr Dons Gordon, secretary and organiser of the fund, in the course of an interview. Dr Gordon said there was no truth in the statement in circulation that the doctors dr 1 not approve of the obstetrical endowment appeal. In February, 1929, during the annual conference of the 8.M.A., the whole assembly of New Zealand graduates of medicine passed a unanimous resolution urging upon the Government the immediate necessity of establishing a new obstetric hospital in Dunedin as a first step towards efficiency in this department, and already two divisions of the B.M.A. —namely, Wanganui and Taranaki—had given liberally to the endowment fund. Any criticism must, therefore, have originated from doctors who were graduates of the English universities, and ho were not conversant with local needs and conditions.

Dr Gordon also said that there was no truth in the statement that the officials of the cancer campaign were in any way opposed to the obstetrical appeal. ' All of them were the warmest supporters of Mr Victor Bonney when lie visited New Zealand in 1928 to prepare the way for this obstetric appeal, and had assured him that the improvements ho was advocating in the midwifery department would soon be made possible in New Zealand. Moreover, the officials of the cancer campaign, knowing that tho obstetrical appeal had been pending for four years, and that the obstetrical department of the Medical School had for the last five years fallen below the standard of efficiency set by the Central Medical Council of Great Britain, admitted thai Hie obstetrical appeal was most urgent, and had kindly deferred their appeal in some districts in favour of the obstetrical appeal. It was generally understood that the cancer appeal should receive substantia] assistance from the Travis bequest for cancer research in New Zealand, and there was not tho least rivalry between ' these two humanitarian appeals. As tho Queen’s advisers had looked thoroughly into all matters concerning the obstetrical appeal before they submitted the movement to Her Majesty for consideration, her recent cable message expressing her personal interest in the appeal, and good wishes for its full success, established beyond all question the urgency of the midwifery appeal.