Wairarapa Times-Age TUESDAY, MARCH 14, 1939. MEETING HOSPITAL COSTS.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 14 March 1939, Page 6

Wairarapa Times-Age TUESDAY, MARCH 14, 1939. MEETING HOSPITAL COSTS.

"RURAL ratepayers have long maintained that they are ununjustly burdened in the matter of hospital rates and through their organisations have presented some apparently weiMitv evidence in support of that contention. If these ratepavers are to obtain any relief, il is evidently necessary that thev should agree nnon common policy and speak on the subject of hospital rating with a single voice. This practical necessity seems to have been overlooked by the New Zealand Farmers’ Union in its recent criticism of the proposals regarding hospital rating dealt with by the president of the Municipal Association, Mr T. Jordan, in his report to the annual conference of that organisation.

To the contention of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union that hospital levies on local bodies should be assessed on a population basis, Mr Jordan has made the somewhat damaging reply that this policy has been rejected by the Counties Association—a body which surely has an even better right than the Farmers Union to speak on behalf of rural ratepayers. The question presumably was settled decisively at the conference in 1936, at which representatives of the Municipal Association, Counties. Association and Hospital Boards Association unanimously rejected two proposals—one that the hospital levy on each local body should he assessed.entirely on a population basis, and the other that the levy should be assessed as to fifty per cent on a population basis, and as to fifty per cent on a valuation basis.

That the decision implied'at that time still holds good is made manifest in the fact that an agreement has been reached between the Counties Association and the Municipal Association that the Government should be asked to consider raising the .whole of the money required for hospital purposes by a tax on wages and salaries, or alternatively to provide an increased subsidy. These requests are to be submitted to the Minister of Health pn Thursday next by a joint deputation representing the two associations.

There is evidently a,good (leal to be said for the proposal, that the whole of the hospital revenue needed fi’om year to year should be raised by a universal fax on wages, salaries and other income—on the same basis, that is to say, as the social security scheme, under which it is already proposed to provide a general medical service and to meet or offset that part of hospital revenue now derived from fees paid by patients. If it is right that, the costs of general medical service and part of the cost of hospitals should be met by a direct levy on wages and other income, it surely cannot be wrong that the remaining cost of hospitals should be met in the same way.

Under this scheme direct relief would be given to both rural and urban ratepayers in that capacity, where hospital, costs are concerned, and these costs would be levied in accordance with ability to pay. At the stage that has been reached, it seems likely that continued demands by the New Zealand Farmers’ Union that hospital revenue should bp levied solely on a population basis either will have no effect at all, or conceivably may be regarded as providing an argument against giving effect to the proposals advanced jointly by the Counties Association and the Municipal Association. It seems fairly obvious that the New Zealand Farmers’ Union will best advance the interests of rural ratepayers, and secure for-them relief from the grievance under which they now labour where hospital rating is concerned, by abandoning its declared policy in favour of that approved and advocated by the . Counties Association.

Apart from the question of the distribution of hospital costs, it has been suggested that in the conditions now developing the public hospitals will be invaded by an increasing number of patients, and that the burden of maintaining these institutions will become correspondingly heavier. The best antidote to that danger, in the extent to which it exists, is to be found in a vigorous extension of the campaign to promote physical and general welfare in which wide interest has been awakened in this country of late.; After all, the privilege of sojourning for a time in even the most comfortable and best-appointed hospital is a poor thing to set against the enjoyment of normal health, and it is not in doubt that by well-directed and methodical effort standards of health and general welfare iir the Dominion can be raised very considerably. The whole question of the organisation of medical services in connection with the social security scheme is still at a more or less tentative stage, but it is not in doubt that there is vastly more valuable work to be done by members of the medical profession in helping to elevate standards of health in the community than in treating sickness and disease when they occur.