NavalMoose said:
"At least it's still easy to tell us apart from the British by the quality of our teeth."
Really? That "joke" is about as old as Trafalgar...do you get your info from The Simpsons?
:highjack:
OK, basic
Economics 101 lesson ...
Caveat lector: I do not have the references any more, but I did 40
ish years ago when I wrote a paper on this subject so I'll ask you to take me at my word ...
The medical rejection rates in both the UK and Canadian armies were very, very high in 1939 and 40 (and, indeed, even after), much higher than in 1914-18 and much higher than officials and generals expected. It appeared that the overall health of both nations had declined but dental fitness was a matter of special, noteworthy concern: far more young men (mostly men) than expected were rejected as being dentally unfit ... so "unfit" that remedial dental care was considered to be useless.
Why?
The Great Depression.
One of the first impacts of the Great Depression (1930-39) was to constrain household expenditures ~ there were few social services and no National Health or Medicare. One of the impacts was that good, healthy, nutritious food was less plentiful on the tables of the unemployed or, even, of the working class. The 18-25 year old cohort was less well nourished that its parents had been. One of the first "discretionary expenses" to be cut was dental care ~ and given the state of more health insurance plans today I suspect it might be again ~ because the perception is that it's either or both of
a) a luxury or
b) something that is unlikely to be a real, serious problem.
(Even growing up in the 1940s and 1950s I can recall that regular dental checkups were "new' to many people. Regular, free, dental checkups for school children were introduced many (most?) Canadian provinces in the late 1940s,
partly as a result, I think, of the wartime experience.)
The British were slower to catch on and I can, personally, recall that many of my UK colleagues and classmates were envious of our, Canadian, dental care, especially of our military dental care. There was, in the 1970s, still a Canadian Army dentist on staff at CDLS (London) to provide Canadian standard/quality care for CF members posted in the UK.
In
my opinion poor dental care became a habit, especially in Britain, but the roots (pun intended :nod: ) were, pretty clearly,
I think, in the economic distress of the Great Depression.
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Sorry for the
ff topic: