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72
stantially the provision now made by Welfare Authorities as
part of their Maternity and Child Welfare Services, and putting
more emphasis on conservative treatment."
Again, the Report of the Inter-Departmental Committee on
Dentistry (the "Teviot" Committee), set up by the two Health
Ministers, contains the following observations:—
"There are certain classes of the community who stand
particularly in need of dental care and who can benefit in a
special way from it. Steps must be taken to see that that care
is made available to them and also that, so far as education
and persuasion can go, they accept it.
" We have received a great deal of evidence in favour of a
concentration of effort on the dental care of (a) expectant and
nursing mothers; (b) children, and (c) adolescents. There
are already, as we have shown, public services organised by
local authorities which go some way towards meeting the needs
of these classes, namely the school dental service and the
dental arrangements made by maternity and child welfare
authorities. Our concern is not to dispense with these services,
nor to regard a general service as a substitute for them, but
rather to strengthen and improve them by all practicable
means; they must form, as it were, the sharpest point of
attack of the dental force of the country upon dental disease.
"The claims of these classes need hardly be argued. In
the case of the expectant and nursing mother, the harm that
oral disease can cause both to mother and child is well known.
As regards the young it is not only that their health and development
benefit in a special degree from dental care; a point
ultimately of even greater significance is that if they come to a
true valuation of dental health, our major problem is solved
not only for them in their adult lives, but also for future
generations."
Unfortunately these precepts are, and will be for some considerable
time, impossible to put into practice due to the great shortage of
dental surgeons throughout the country and the fact that dental
surgeons are leaving the service of local authorities in large and
alarming numbers in order to take advantage of the greatly-enhanced
remuneration available in private practice since 'the appointed
day'. If mothers and children showed willingness to attend private
dental surgeons for conservative dentistry (fillings, etc.), the new
dental arrangements under the provisions of the National Health
Service Act could be regarded as, in any case, a substitute for the