The Claims of Osteopathy The House of Lords' Select Committee
has turned down the Osteopaths Bill on grounds which must be accepted as valid for the moment; however much we may desire that the Bill should become law in no remote future. Its essential purpose was to protect the public .against incompetent osteopaths by establishing a State register for competent ones. But for that there must first be in existence a well-established and efficient system of examination to ascertain who the competent Osteopaths are. Of the only existing establishment for this . purpose in Great Britain the Committee formed the opinion that it was " of negligible importance, inefficient for its purpose, and above all in thoroughly dishonest hands:" -We express no opinion - whether this drastic verdict is true ; but the mere fact that such a Com- mittee could pass it disables the Bill. There was also an unsolved doubt as to how the sphere of osteopathy should be defined, some osteopaths claiming all diseases for their province and the Committee not finding the claim made out. It is regrettable that the profession of osteopathy, which has a future of great usefulness, should suffer this legal check. The next thing is for its leading exponents to put their house in better order.
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