popularity of Sir Luke Fildes' famous picture, and by the
verdicts in which juries from time to time express their
conviction that the doctor can do no wrong. The real woes of the
doctor are the shabby coat, the wolf at the door, the tyranny of
ignorant patients, the work-day of 24 hours, and the uselessness
of honestly prescribing what most of the patients really need:
that is, not medicine, but money.


THE PUBLIC DOCTOR

What then is to be done?

Fortunately we have not to begin absolutely from the beginning:
we already have, in the Medical Officer of Health, a sort of
doctor who is free from the worst hardships, and consequently
from the worst vices, of the private practitioner. His position
depends, not on the number of people who are ill, and whom he can
keep ill, but on the number of people who are well. He is judged,
as all doctors and treatments should be judged, by the vital
statistics of his district. When the death rate goes up his
credit goes down. As every increase in his salary depends on the
issue of a public debate as to the health of the constituency
under his charge, he has every inducement to strive towards the
ideal of a clean bill of health. He has a safe, dignified,
responsible, independent position based wholly on the public
health; whereas the private practitioner has a precarious,
shabby-genteel, irresponsible, servile position, based wholly on
the prevalence of illness.