SCATHING ATTACK

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 4, Issue 173, 29 October 1941, Page 2

SCATHING ATTACK

NEW ZEALANDERS FOOLS !

COMMENTARY ON DOCTORS' BILL A scathing commentary on the Social Security Amendment Bill, which has created such a Avide variance of opinion in the Dominion, Is contained in an American paper. The article, under the heading, "You Get What You Pay For," attacks the Government's latest legislation.

"Capping a half-century of radical law-making," says the writer, "the Ncav Zealand Parliament is now considering a bill to limit doctors' fees to 1.25 dollars per visit. The State is to pay medical fees for the people and the doctor Avill collect from the Government, not the patient. New Zealand Avill pay the doctor a dollar and a quarter and that means that eventually the doctor's serA r ices Avill be AA-orth no more than one dollar and 25 cents.

"When the present generation of competent doctors are all dead we may be quite sure that the profession will be manned by bargaincounter docs. Laws may regulate a doctor, but no laws can compel a competent man to become a doctor. We trust that there will be enough horse doctors in New Zealand to take care of the asinine population that must be increasing under Herbert Spencer's old formula, "The net result of passing laws to protect fools from the consequences of folly is to fill the world Avith fools.' "

It should in fairness be remarked that the above comment was made before the bill was amended to provide for a higher scale of fees for the doctors than originally proposed.