Old-Style Practitioners Combine to Combat West Peking, Mar, 25.
Chinese doctors of "the old school united in a society to protect interests of their profession, which they declare is being threatened by the growing popularity of Western medicitie. About 200 old-style doctors assembled in Peking for the purpose of forming the society, and speakers pointed out} the fact that Chinese medicine has been useful to humanity in this part the world continuously for thous-Jands of years, and still has much to offer to. suffering persons. It waa agreed to organize a national group, which all reputable Chinese doctors of the old school would be asked The society wilh seek to ize the Chinese medical pro-Hfession, which has been left pretty much to its own devices, and to establish schools in which old-style [medicine may be taught.
Even in Peking, which may described as the centre of Western medicine in China, because of the presence here of the Peking Union 'Medical College, endowed by the Rockefeller Foundation to teach Western medicine to Chinese, the old-style medicine has held its own in competition with the newer' rival. Most of Peking's Chinese residents still depend, in part least, upon old-style doctors. This. is partly due to the fact that old-school practitioners are much more moderate in their fees than private physicians in Western medicine. The Medical College and _clinies, however, offer treatment at very} low rates, and the real reason for the persistence of the old school is, the traditional conservatism of the Chinese, who dislike innovations more than most people. The old-style medicine has been good enough for their ancestors, and 0 many of them insist that it is good enough for them.
Apart from these considerations, Western medical teachers hospitals here agree that el Chinese medicine has tributions to make. Some Western physicians here admit that old-style! Chinese doctors ea ses where others and that it is not possible for Wes ern medical men to determine how. they do it. One of the worst fea tures of the old schoo! in Chis according to Western idea secretiveness. Chinese physicians who make useful discoveries about the treatnient of disease will not reveal their secrets even upon their} deathbed, except to members of their own families. For this rea-ison, such discoveries cannot be extensively used, as they would be the West, or if found by a Chinese doctor educated in modern medi The Chinese doctors who have formed the new society are aware fof the drawbacks under which their! profession has toured in the past, and the chief purpose of the new ion, they declare, isto me of the hand-They wish to take a leaf; from' the book of their competitors trained in Western medicine, and to reform their own profer-sion—United Press.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.