Medical patents : a letter on the patenting of inventions in connexion with medicine / by John Chapman.

  • Chapman, John, 1821-1894.
Date:
1867
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Medical patents : a letter on the patenting of inventions in connexion with medicine / by John Chapman. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    PREFATORY LETTER. To the Editor of The Medical Press and Circular. Sir,—A few weeks ago I sent to each of the weekly medical periodicals a letter concerning sea-sickness. In that letter I gave a summary of the evidence now accumulated, proving the reality of my discovery of a remedy for the “ evil of the sea ” (mol de mer), as the French expressively call it. I invited medical men about to cross either the Irish Channel, in order to attend the meeting of the British Medical Association at Dublin, or the English Channel, in order to attend the Medical Congress at Paris, to test the value of my discovery; and, by way of inducing them to do so, I offered to lend an ice-bag, and to supply gratuitously the requisite quantity of ice, packed ready for transit, to each medical man willing to try the experiment. The Lancet ignored the letter; the Medical Times and Gazette both inserted and called attention to it; the Medical Press and Circular did the same ; but the British Medical Journal, instead of inserting the letter, said,—“ Dr. Chapman’s views as to the prevention of sea-sickness by the use of an ice-bag to the spine have already been made widely known by his various publications, and as the patenting of inventions in connexion with medicine is not in accordance with the principles generally approved by the profession, we shall content ourselves with stating that he offers,” &c. The reason alleged for not publishing my letter seemed to me so extraordinary, that I was induced to write an expostulatory letter to the editor of that journal; but he refused to publish it. Now, sir, I am of opinion that the question on which the British Medical Journal has given judgment, before hearing counsel, deserves thorough discussion; but the Directory of that journal seems to think otherwise : this is one of those questions in respect to which, for reasons, I suppose, of profound medical “ state policy,” it deems dis- cussion in the organ of the British Medical Association dangerous, and therefore suppresses it. Indeed at times I have felt as if my brain were beginning to reel with wondering doubt whether on this subject my poor thoughts which I have been wont to regard as at least innocent, if not sound, are not in fact both dangerous and wicked ; for I have been told that in the