THE QUACKERIES BILL.

NZ Truth, Issue 117, 14 September 1907, Page 4

THE QUACKERIES BILL.

The Quackeries Bill and the Methylated Spirits Bill introduced by Mr Millar are causing some stir among the chemists and druggists all over the colony, and unless some modification of some of the clauses be made the doctors are going to have a good time at the expense of the chemists. The object of the Methylated Spirit Bill is to prevent the indiscriminate selling! of what might prove, if put to improper uses, o£ great danger to the community. But the power of the Bill has been too drastic altogether. It allows no provision for many' liniments and preparations that no possible objection could be taken to. The Commonwealth Parliament found it necessary to modify their Bill on exactly the same grounds. The practice of the British' Inland Revenue Department is to allow medicines made of alcohol, if tiny are sufficiently medicated to make it impossible to use them as beverages. Wright Layman's liquor carbonics detergens is' one of the preparations that would be struck out by this ' Methylated Spirit Bill, andthere are plenty of others. Members .should surely see that m cases of this kind there can. be no fraud, but the pockets of the public are saved. No one gains, any advantage by the use of rectified spirit except the, Excise Department. Rectified spirit % is no better for external medicinal purposes than methylated spirit, and if the article is sufficiently medicated' to make it impossible to use it as a beverage, all the protection for the revenue and the public than can possibly be desired will b& obtained. All that is required is a regulation whereby all preparations containing methylated spirit for external use would be examined by the Department, to see that 'it was sufficierutly medicated. With . regard to the Quackeries Bill, .the case is even worse. It will debar chemists from supplying many articles that they nave been selling for years and to which there can be no possible objiectaon. They " will not be able to sell an ounce, of Paregoric over the counter without a doctor's prescription. What 'a .win for the doctors. . If a man gets up with a bad liver And wants a draught or. a pick-me-up, the chemist can't mix it for him. Hie must either <$ake some standard remedy or go to a doctor. 1 Fancy having to pay a doctor for prescribing a. headache draught! This sort of i/hkisj is carrying legislation ridiculous excess. If such a bill becomes law it is safe to say that it Trill be broken m every town m New Ze-i---laiicl evcrv day 61 the week. Nobody is . going to pay a doctor a guinea and a chemist 6d to. ease a headache, particularly when the chemist could supply «the same thing without the doctor at all. Of course the Quackery Bill is a louch-needed measure m many respects, but m framing such 'drastic regulations, more harm than good is likely to result. Protect the public from unscrupulous quacks and his nostrums by all means, but have Some regard for the public pocket and do not place the people at the mercy ' of the duly qualified shark. How many medical men are there, who work hand and glove with the patent mediciiie maker. • A traveller with some particular preparation known only to the profession, and of simple composition, leaves" a specimen with a doctor. The doctor, m prescribing for a patient, instead of'seridino-. as he might easily do, a prescription to the chemist, merely writes: "Jones' lotion," and the chemist has to use "Jones' lotion." So the public have to pay. the doctor, the chemist, and Jones. The- are fleeced m this way every day. and the patent medicine people nrrow rich. There are more people m the'medicine line than the quack who want hedging m a bit.with an act of Parliament.