Privileged Communications: Implied Waiver of Privilege.—
In December 1928, before issuing four policies providing certain benefits in the event of disability, the defendant insurance company required the plaintiff to undergo a physical examination. During that examination he, in answer to a question, stated that he had never consulted a physician for or suffered from any ailment of the lungs. Some three and one-half years later the plaintiff sued the insurance company, to recover disability benefits, alleging that he was disabled by pulmonary tuberculosis. The company, in defending, claimed that the plaintiff had answered falsely the question noted above, propounded to him during the medical examination, in that he previously had had tuberculosis and had undergone medical treatment for it. At the trial, a physician, who had examined the plaintiff for the first time on the day of the trial, testified on his behalf that he was then suffering from moderately