understanding and mutual ignorance. In the end it is the patient who suffers in this artificial no man's land between the three divisions.
b) Animal experimentation is under the control of the civil servants of the Home Office, who sometimes has little or no knowledge of hospital problems, medical care or of medical research. Any experimentation involving the use of animal requires a written application to the Home Office. Permission is usually given without difficulty but still there are exceptions.
c) The private charitable and the voluntary welfare associations have been chocked and replaced by the cold, slow and impersonal machinery of the various government bodies.
d) Since the actual number of young physicians prepared for consultants 'posts is too great there is strong competition for these, as well as competition between consultants for the special awards, with all the unwelcome features attendant on these struggles.
e) Because of the number of certificates required and the impersonal character of hospital care, professional secrecy and discretion are in many instances things of the past.
f) Surgeons are paid by operating sessions and receive the same payment whether they do one appendectomy per operating session or four gastrectomies.
g) In the care of the aged, tuberculous patients, the chronically sick, the infirm and the patients with infected tonsils the situation is so bad that there is a waiting period of non-urgent cases of 6 months to 2 years before admission to the hospital and during that time the patient becomes a burden on the general practitioner.
In summary, the main weaknesses of the NHS consist of :
1) The lack of unity between the three divisions of general practice, public health, hospital services and consultants;
2) The excessive demands for services of the general practitioners which render them unable to give the necessary time to cases which deserve close attention;
3) The isolation of the general practitioners from hospitals, the long waiting list in all hospitals for non-urgent cases, and the lack of facilities for the aged and chronically sick patients.
References
1) National Health Service Act, 1946, 9 & 10 Geo.6 Ch.81, H.M. Stat Off-
Amendment-1949, 12,13,14, Geo.6 Ch.81
Amendment-1951, 14,15, Geo.6 Ch.31
2) Beveridge Report on "Social Insurance and Allied Services ", H.M. Stat. Off., 1942, Cmd 6404
3) Green, F.H.K.: Science, 116:99, 1952
4) Peterson, O.L.: "A study of the National Health Service of Great Britain ", 1951
