---
title: Don't be your own doctor! If you're sick - report sick
url: https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dont-be-your-own-doctor-1944/
description: 'Soldier''s-health poster: a helmeted soldier frowns at a bottle of pills tipped into his palm, under the headline ''Don''t be your own Doctor!'' and the slogan'
section: Collection
---

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3. Don't be your own doctor! If you're sick - report sick

[![Don't be your own doctor! If you're sick - report sick, 1944 US poster: Soldier's-health poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/dont-be-your-own-doctor-1944.jpg)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/images/dont-be-your-own-doctor-1944.jpg)

# Don't be your own doctor! If you're sick - report sick

Soldier's-health poster: a helmeted soldier frowns at a bottle of pills tipped into his palm, under the headline 'Don't be your own Doctor!' and the slogan 'Never give a germ a break!'. The appeal is a warning against self-treatment, with the fear-appeal faint and carried by the grimace and the word 'germ'.

## Propaganda techniques used in this poster

[Fear appeal](https://propagandaarchive.org/techniques/fear-appeal/)

## Text on the object

Original (English) · read from the image, not independently checked

```
Don't be your own Doctor!
IF YOU'RE SICK - REPORT SICK
NEVER GIVE A GERM A BREAK!
Distribution: Continental: In accordance with Part II, ASF Cir. No. 313, 1944 and Section I, ASF Cir. No. 181, 1944. Overseas: 1 of Opns (10), Depts (10), SvC (10), Base Comds (10), Island Comds (10), Def Comds (10), Sectors (10), Base Sectors (10), Armies (1), Corps (1), D (1), B (1), R (1), Sep Bn (1).
DON'T BE YOUR OWN DOCTOR
Approved War Department Graphic Training Aid 8-13
WAR DEPARTMENT - 15 OCTOBER 1944
Reproduction without permission prohibited
[imprint:] U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE: 1944-O-619225
```

[← Don't be discouraged. Keep trying! Make a suggestion today](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dont-be-discouraged-keep-trying-asf-1944/) [Don't bite off more than you can chew! Take only what you can eat! →](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/dont-bite-off-more-than-you-can-chew-navy-1944/)

## More propaganda examples that use the same techniques

- [Miniature of Pope Urban II at the Council of Clermont, Les Passages d'outremer (BnF Fr. 5594, fol. 19r)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/passages-doutremer-council-of-clermont-colombe-1474/) (France · 1474 · Testimonial, Fear appeal). Content note: Medieval religious imagery and a French text describing alleged killings and captivity of eastern Christians, as used to argue for the First Crusade; the text is shown as written.
- [Anacoana fut pendue sans raison (engraving in Le miroir de la cruelle et horrible tyrannie espagnole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/anacoana-hanged-miroir-tyrannie-espagnole-1620/) (Dutch Republic · 1620 · Fear appeal, Name-calling). Content note: Engraving of a hanged, bare-breasted Taino woman, burning huts and people being killed by Spanish soldiers.
- [Der Warner (broadsheet lampoon on the Jesuits after Breitenfeld and Rain)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/der-warner-anti-jesuit-broadsheet-1632/) (Holy Roman Empire · 1632 · Scapegoating, Fear appeal)
- [Sans-Culottes, feeding Europe with the Bread of Liberty (James Gillray)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sans-culottes-bread-of-liberty-gillray-1793/) (Kingdom of Great Britain · Jan 12, 1793 · Fear appeal, Name-calling)
- [Proclamation de Sonthonax en créole, Cap-Français (Proclamation of Commissioner Sonthonax in Creole)](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/sonthonax-proclamation-creole-1793/) (France · Aug 29, 1793 · Fear appeal, Scapegoating). Content note: Colonial-era proclamation on slavery and emancipation in Saint-Domingue; speaks of slaves, whips and 'Nègues' in period terms.
- [Gazette of the United States, "The Jeffersoniad" no. VIII, 14 August 1800](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/gazette-us-jeffersoniad-1800/) (United States · Aug 14, 1800 · Name-calling, Fear appeal)
- [Tyrants Prostrate, Liberty Triumphant (pro-Polk cartoon on Dorr), 1844](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/tyrants-prostrate-liberty-triumphant-polk-1844/) (United States · 1844 · Name-calling, Fear appeal). Content note: Speech balloons contain anti-Catholic and nativist wording ('the ruins of Popery') in the mouths of the Whig figures, written by a Democratic cartoonist and shown unaltered.
- [Brolej Žemajčiaj! (Brothers Samogitians!): hand-painted broken-cross poster](https://propagandaarchive.org/collection/brolej-zemajciaj-broken-cross-1862/) (Russian Empire · 1862 · Fear appeal, Transfer)