BERLIN IN WARTIME

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23614, 26 March 1940, Page 3

BERLIN IN WARTIME

FOREIGNER'S IMPRESSIONS ACUTE SHORTAGE OF DOCTORS [from our own con respondent] LONDON, Feb. 23 Berlin is suffering from an acute shortage of doctors, according to a foreigner who has just arrived at Zurich from Berlin. About half the 20,000 or so doctors in tiic whole Reich of 50,000,000 people were mobilised, lie said. The remainder Avere overworked and could hardly attend to panel patients. Oil Sundays many locked their and went away as their only means of obtaining a respite. The observer also remarked that there had been a great increase in drunkenness and immorality in Berlin during the black-out. There had, however, been little change in the popular attitude since the beginning of the war. There was the same lack of initiative and the same mixture of pride, fatalism and fear of Nazi persecution. Only a great shock would make the German people politically alive. Germans had not yet had the war brought home to them and still felt secure behind their "West Wall," ho added. Nazi propaganda that defeat meant dismemberment had also taken a strong hold. The working classes, which had been specially tavourcd, appeared fairly contented. Disruptive tendencies could only come from above. The fear that money would lose its value or be taxed away had led many people to invest in jewels, pictures and antiquities of all kinds.