THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES TUESDAY, AUGUST 19, 1924. THE DENIAL PROFESSION.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19254, 19 August 1924, Page 6

THE OTAGO DAILY TIMES TUESDAY, AUGUST 19, 1924. THE DENIAL PROFESSION.

It is a matter for regret that the Government should lend the weight of its authority to an effort to lower the status of the members of the dental profession iu the dominion. The enactment of a Bill which has been introduced in the House of Representatives can have no effect other than that the ranks of the profession will Ire swelled by the admission of practitioners who have not been capable of qualifying by satisfying the ordinary examination tests. Wo have no idea how many persons there are for whose particular benefit the Bill that is before Parliament has been framed, but, whatever the number of them may be, the interests of the public are of paramount importance, and it is most desirable that the community should be protected against the risk that imperfectly qualified individuals may be enabled to set themselves up in practice as registered dentists with liberty to exercise their unskilled hands upon unfortunate patients. Twenty years have elapsed since the passage of the Dentists Act which provided for the registration of dentists then practising in the dominion and for the admission of persons engaged at that time as pupils and apprentices of dentists upon their complying satisfactorily with certain specific tests. Wc shall not venture to say on how many occasions since 1904 Parliament has been begged to open a back door for the entrance to the profession of persons who wore not qualified to secure admission by the prescribed means, nor shall wo say on how many occasions Parliament has weakly made concessions to the suppliants for its consideration. A sinister feature of the present proposal is that, apparently in order to facilitate the admission of unqualified persons to the profession, it is proposed to transfer from the University Senate to the Minister of Health the direction of the examination in dentistry to which candidates for registration under this special legislation must submit themselves. It is the height of absurdity that in the twentieth year after the enactment of the measure which had for its object the establishment of the practice of dentistry upon a footing appropriate to its dignity and importance the effort should still be made to secure the admission to the profession of persons who have failed to pass the necessary tests. It is, moreover, a melancholy circumstance that the Government should aid and abet this effort.