LIFE INSURANCE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 346, 23 March 1910, Page 5

LIFE INSURANCE.

AX IMPORTANT? DECISION-. By Cable. —Press Association.—Copyright Melbourne, March 22. The High Court gave an important decision in an appeal from the Scute Full Court, • which refused a new trial in the case Goodrich versus Natioual Mutual Life Association. Mrs Goodrich took out a policy for £OOO. After her death the company refused to pay over the amount due, on the ground that Mrs. Goodrich falsely answered certain personal questions' with a View to obtaining the policy. At the Lower Court trial a medical man tendered evidence regarding Mrs. Goodrich's physical state before ner death, but the evidence was rejected on the ground that the doctor had not obtained the consent of the patient. The jury found that Mrs. Goodrich wis not conscious, when she answered tie questions, that she was suffering any such physical derangement. A verdict was given for plaintiff, the executor, for the full amount, with costs. The defendant company based the appeal on the limitation of - the clause of the Evidence Act, which provides tb J< no physician or surgeon shall, without consent of a patient, divulge in any suit or action, unless) the sanity of the patient is the matter in dispute, any information acquired in attending a patient. The High Court could not see any satisfactory ground for limiting the moaning of the clause, and upheld the Lower Court's decision.