TOTAL ABSTAINERS.

Thames Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 20285, 9 April 1938, Page 3

TOTAL ABSTAINERS.

PREFERENTIAL TREATMENT.

ALLIANCE'S SUGGESTION.

EXTRACTS FROM REPOETS.

[By Telegraph.—Press Association! WELLINGTON, April U. '

The opinion that abstainers might reasonably .expect some preferential treatment under the national health

insurance scheme was expressed by Mr. J. Malton Murray, representing the New Zealand Alliance, in giving evidence before the Select Committee on National Health and State Super-

annuation yesterday afternoon. Mr. Murray, who was accompanied by Mr. 11. W. Milner, general superintendent of the alliance, read scvera 1 extracts from reports by leading public health experts and others on alcohol and national health, and alcohol and life assurance.

Referring to the Government's proposal for extended health education. Mr. Murray contended that efforts in this direction were met with almost instinctive hostility when cherished usages such as the consumption of alcoholic liquor were assailed by new knowledge. Mr. Murray said that insurance experience had established the superior longevity of total abstainers compared with even moderate users of beverage alcohol, while on the sickness and invalidity side there was a probability that abstainers were less likely to make demands upon tho funds for accident and sickness benefits.