(i) We may consider first the proposal that the selection should be made by the School Doctor, school meals being ordered for all children whom he finds to be suffering from mal-nutrition. This method, which is strongly recommended by the Chief Medical Officer of the Board of Education, has been adopted in a few towns, but only to a very limited extent and always in subordination to the system of selection based on the "poverty test." The selection by the "physical test" would obviate all the disadvantages arising from the demoralising enquiry into the parents' circumstances. On the other hand, the practical difficulties would be very great. At present a child is normally examined by the doctor only two or three times during the whole of its school career. Under the system proposed frequent examinations would be necessary, which would entail an enormous increase in the school medical staff. But, however frequent the examinations, the discovery of all underfed children would not be assured. It is not always possible for the doctor to determine the cause of malnutrition in any particular case; hence many children would be included who get plenty of food at home, but yet, from some other cause, do not thrive. More important, numbers of children would be excluded who fail to get sufficient food but who yet appear healthy. As a School Medical Officer points out, "temporary lack of food does not stamp the child in such a way that it is possible to detect past privations by ordinary inspection."[537] The underfeeding might be prolonged for a considerable time before its effects were apparent. But it is essential that underfeeding should be discovered before the child shows definite signs of malnutrition, since the object to be aimed at is to prevent its ever getting into this state. The physical test, therefore, forms too narrow a basis to be satisfactorily employed, at any rate as the sole test, in the selection of children to be provided for. Footnote 537: Report of School Medical Officer for Leicester for 1912, p. 34.