French Medical Service.- -M. Bertillon, the eminent medical
statistician,
is tlius
quoted bj the foreign correspondent
of
the Medical Times and Gazette:? "
From 1846 to
1865,
the annual
mortality
of the officers of
army has been 6'1 per 1,000, but that of the medical officers has been 15 per 1,000 ! Whence comes this enormous excess ? Is it from difference of ages ? By no means. Many of our
our confreres quit early so unhealthy a profession ; and, in fact, while, in the army, one year with another, there are but 23 resignations in 1,000 officers, among the medical officers there are as many as there are deaths, viz., 15 per 1,000. In the time of war the mortality is not less. During the Crimean campaign, the English army, which, for an effective that did not reach a third of ours, had 448 medical officers, had the good chance not to lose one of them, (?) while of our 450, we lost 82, or more than 18 per cent. Thus, prolonged studies, greater danger, miserable pay, a subaltern position assimilated to that of the commissariat and paymasters, a long preparation and the incessant danger incident on visiting patients, remunerated and esteemed on the same scale as the keeping of books?such is the practice of the profession which it behoves our young confreres to medi-
tate before
joining.
statistician,
is tlius
quoted bj the foreign correspondent
of
the Medical Times and Gazette:? "
From 1846 to
1865,
the annual
mortality
of the officers of
army has been 6'1 per 1,000, but that of the medical officers has been 15 per 1,000 ! Whence comes this enormous excess ? Is it from difference of ages ? By no means. Many of our
our confreres quit early so unhealthy a profession ; and, in fact, while, in the army, one year with another, there are but 23 resignations in 1,000 officers, among the medical officers there are as many as there are deaths, viz., 15 per 1,000. In the time of war the mortality is not less. During the Crimean campaign, the English army, which, for an effective that did not reach a third of ours, had 448 medical officers, had the good chance not to lose one of them, (?) while of our 450, we lost 82, or more than 18 per cent. Thus, prolonged studies, greater danger, miserable pay, a subaltern position assimilated to that of the commissariat and paymasters, a long preparation and the incessant danger incident on visiting patients, remunerated and esteemed on the same scale as the keeping of books?such is the practice of the profession which it behoves our young confreres to medi-
tate before
joining.
