NOTES 



Awards for Medical Discovery (R.R.) 



Our previous number contained a full account of the report of the Con- 

 joint Committee of the British Medical Association and the British Science 

 Guild in connection with this subject. These bodies asked the Government to 

 receive a Deputation on the subject ; and finally Mr. Balfour, Lord President 

 of the Council, interviewed the Deputation, consisting of the members of 

 the said Conjoint Committee named in our last issue, together with several 

 medical and other Members of Parliament, on March 2. The Deputation 

 was introduced by Sir Watson Cheyne ; and Sir Clifford Allbutt and Sir 

 Richard Gregory also spoke. A good account of the proceedings will be 

 found in the British Medical Journal for March 6. Sir Watson Cheyne 

 pointed out that scientific workers were assisted by scholarships, etc., while 

 doing their work, but that after it was done there was at present no provision 

 for them, although, excited by the interest of their investigations, they had 

 often neglected to make any provision for themselves. Sir Clifford Allbutt 

 described particularly the conditions under which medical scientific work ia 

 done. He himself had been chairman for some years of the Scientific Relief 

 Committee of the Royal Society, and knew how often even very distinguished • 

 scientists are in need of help. It was desirable to attract a great many more 

 potential workers, but, if the Treasury adopted the proposed scheme, he 

 feared that the expenditure which it would have to meet would not be large, 

 j as the kind of intellectual research which would be benefited by it was 

 scarce. Sir Richard Gregory said that there should be a fund for some time 

 for making suitable awards to be considered as payments for results achieved 

 and not as grants for favours to come. The scientific worker, unlike the 

 worker in literature or art, may not dispose of his achievement to the public 

 for profit. In reply, Mr. Balfour admitted his interest in the matter, and 

 promised to lay the proposal of the Deputation before the Prime Minister. 

 At the same time he suggested that there might be considerable difficulties 

 in selecting for the proposed awards the men who had actually made a given 

 discovery. He made a very good suggestion that wealthy men in this country 

 might do more to meet the point raised at the Deputation. After Mr. Balfour 

 had spoken, I was allowed to say, with regard to the difficulty of selecting 

 men for the proposed prizes, that our suggestion was to give a number of 

 pensions of five hundred pounds or a thousand pounds each, so that men 

 who had done really definite work were not very likely to be left out in the 

 cold. The selection of candidates was simply a matter of thorough exam- 

 ination of details, by the methods used by the Royal Society and the Nobel 

 Committee. Mr. Balfour said that he thought what was proposed was in 

 the nature of an addition to the Civil List Pension Fund. Any such action 

 taken with regard to the medical profession must also be extended to the 

 other branches of scientific research. 



Since then we have not heard further from Mr. Balfour as to what has 

 been decided, but the two bodies concerned have asked him not to allow 

 the matter to drop. 



It is not advisable to go further into details at present ; but I should 



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