The increase in the health levy from ten to twenty dollars for the coming year may call forth protests from many students to whom any blanket tax is a bit of unwarranted tyranny, but when the question is one of raising the rate to this new high or cutting down on the activities of the Hygiene Department, the choice is obvious.

Regarded from the insurance angle alone, the payment of twenty dollars is a good investment. Two weeks' hospitalization, whether in Stillman or the affiliated Boston hospitals, is assured every student under the present plan. If payment for such services were required at even the lowest rates, it would amount to many times the new tax.

During recent years, as the statistics show, the Hygiene Department and Stillman have become increasingly important institutions in the life of almost every student. Last year the number of patient days at Stillman was nearly half again as large as it had been in 1930-31. Visits to Holyoke Street this year have increased to such an extent that even further expansion of the facilities there will soon be necessary. Faced with a heavy deficit and with no prospect of increased aid from Lehman Hall, it is hard to see what else Dr. Bock could have done without curbing the great progress he has made since the beginning of his administration.

The ideal solution to the problem of the Hygiene Department, like that of so many others, is outside assistance, either in the form of a grant from the University or a bequest from a private philanthropist. With both these solutions improbable during these lean years, it appears that the Hygiene Department must "live of its own". Taking into account the services rendered by the medical units and the unquestioned increase in efficiency of Dr. Bock's administration of the Department, it does not seem unfair that the rate should be raised to cover the costs incurred.