A recent model by Staebler and Hinton (Nucl. Fusion 29 (1989) 1820), for the case of currents flowing in the scrape-off layer of diverted tokamaks, has employed and incorrect expression for the heat flux to the plates. Use of the correct expression can substantially change the qualitative predictions fo the model. The sheath heat transmission coefficient for diverted plasmas may require inclusion of epithermal electron/ion effects.