HIGH INCOMES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26777, 21 May 1948, Page 6

HIGH INCOMES

NEW ZEALAND DOCTORS COMMITTEE INVESTIGATING POSITION REPORT EXPECTED SOON Special Correspondent WELLINGTON, May 20. One doctor in'five in New Zealand last year, according to official figures, received payments or refunds under social security totalling more than £3OOO, and three received more than £IO,OOO. Criticism of the existing medical benefits system, by which doctors in general practice are paid 7s 6d a visit, has been voiced by some visiting medical men and students of social security. Lord Beveridge, author of Britain’s Beveridge Plan for Social Security, is reported from Australia to-day as saying that New Zealand is “ in somewhat of a mess in this matter,” and that some doctors are earning fantastically high incomes in the free medical SChGITIG. The Minister of Health, Miss Howard, when she addressed the annual conference of the British Medical Association’s New Zealand branch in Dunedin in February, said that the general medical practitioner scheme was a great boon to many~people and had for the most part fulfilled its service, but nevertheless there were some weaknesses and defects in the scheme to which eyes could not be shut. The great majority of doctors, said Miss Howard, had considered it beneath them to give other than the best that their knowledge, experience, and ethical standards fitted them to give. A few, on the other hand, were undoubtedly exploiting the scheme. It was of no little concern that for 232 doctors, or approximately 20 per cent. of the total number, payments or refunds for the last year exceeded £3OOO. A number of these were men of outstanding skill and reputation, and it was not them, but the “ black sheep, with which the department was concerned, and the great bulk of the profession was also equally concerned. The attention of the B.M.A. to the substantial increase in cost ana the number of prescriptions issued by doctors to their patients was drawn by the Health Department last year, and the suggestion was then made that there had been excessive prescribing. Figures quoted at the time by Dr E. H. Luke, chairman of the Council of the 8.M.A., showed that m 1943 3,500,000 prescriptions cost the State £563,247, while in 1947, 5,882,000 prescriptions cost £1,439,686. ... The, Medical Services Committee which is soon to make its report was set up at the end of last October. Its chairman is Mr T P. Cleary, a prominent Wellington barrister. ; Representatives of the British Medical Association appointed to the committee were Dr H. F. Buist, of Hawera; Dr D. S Wylie, of Palmerston North; and Dr e’ D. Pullon. of Christchurch., There are also three representatives of the Department of Health on the committee.