Medicine: Britain’s Bad Teeth

Among 16-to-19-year-old Britishers who dare the dentist, 12% need a complete set of false teeth.* Open spaces are as common in the West End as in Limehouse. Bad teeth plague cabinet members and ships’ stokers alike. What is wrong with British teeth?

Britain’s Nuffield Foundation, hoping to find out, last week gave $360,000 to four universities to look hard into the British mouth. Some suspected that part of the money had best be invested in propaganda against indifference: of the 14,000,000 Britons whose insurance entitles them to dental care, less than 7% apply for it.

*The percentage was figured out by an insurance company.