22 NOVEMBER 1913, Page 1

The Times of Tuesday published from its Berlin corre- spondent

a survey of the difficulties which have arisen from the extension of compulsory insurance in Germany. Under the new regulations, which are to come into force on January 1st, 1914, there are a number of new obligations as to sick insurance and the insurance of domestic servants, and the public seems to be hopelessly at sea as tc their exact meaning. But more serious is the controversy—which is "something like a state of war "—between the sick fund societies and the doctors. The two sides accuse each other of bad faith. The doctors, generally speaking, wanted to insist on the principle of "free choice of doctor," but they were unable to maintain their position, and later they made an offer to the sick fund societies which the doctors themselves regarded as not merely reasonable but generous. This view of the offer was by no means taken by the sick fund societies, and the doctors looked upon the rejection of the offer as an insult. At a recent meeting in Berlin, at which more than twenty-one thousand doctors were represented, it was agreed almost unanimously that from January 1st there must be "war."