Evening star., 1937-04-18
BY BERTRAM BENEDICT.

u 0CGNAO cnly- AOlo VI
need medical care and don't get
1t, while at the same time some
L hospitals function at about two
thirds capacity, many nurses are un-
employed and most doctors earn a
living too inadequate, In view Of their
abilities and training
The Nation has set up old-age pen
sions for you and me when we reach
IS, but II sickness incapacitates us
before that time we are just out Of
luck. The States have arranged for
unemployment compensation, but US
ually that doesn't get worker any,
where II he isn't well enough to hold
down job.
This, then, is the case for insurance
against sickness-the so-called health
insurance, which may more accurate
ly be described as 'ill-health insur-
ance," For some time the United
States has been the ony important
industrial Nation without a system
of health insurance. Yet, we may go
into it in big way in year or so.
In fact, the way was prepared more
painstakingly for health insurance.
which we don't have, than for old-age
pensions and unemployment insur-
ance, which we do now have.
1t is true that in some States the
unemployment compensation laws al
low payments to workers for chronic
sickness from industrial causes. But
that is only in some States; it covers
a few of the illnesses from which
workers suffer, and it attacks the
problem in a roundabout way.
Two Benefits Mixed.
1t is true also that in the unemploy-
ment insurance schemes now set UP
by the States, worker may receive
compensation if he is idle because Of
sickness But in these cases the sick
ness will probably have to be of a
temporary, not Of lasting nature.
In any event, the two things, unem-
ployment compensa ton and health
insurance, ought not to be mixed,
Workers, male and female, lose from
one to two weeks employment every
year from sickness. on the average.
The loss OF earnings is about $50
annually, again on the average.
We'll, that doesn't seem so bad"
you say. About 10 days and $50
gone out of the year. There are
worse things than that"
But wait: These figures are the
average. Some workers won't be i'll
at ALL or more than one or two days.
What brings the average up to almost
two weeks is that some workers are
laid up for months and months, lose
hundreds and hundreds Of dollars in
wages. It's these cases which make
the problem serious.
No one can tell in what year he
or she will be hard hit, to counter
balance the previous or the following
years when illness was not or will not
be a problem. To say that the av-
erage figures don't show serious
situation would be like saying that
drought, or floods, or automobile &C
cidents aren't deplorable because they
hit so small proportion of the popu-
lation on the average.
Sick Can Least Afford it.
The problem Is especially grave be-
cause those who get sick the most
are apt to be those who can afford
to get sick the least. Study after
study, in community after community
was shown that the farther down you
60 in the income level, the more
working days are lost in the year from
ill-health. II it were the other way
around the situation might be less
serious. People with high incomes
at least, those on salaries instead of
wages-usually don't lose any income
when illness makes them drop out a
few days from time to time.
Still another thing seems silly: An
illness may cost q worker as much as
or more than the medical care would
have cost to prevent the illness. If he
loses slO0 in wages from bad health
that could have been prevented by
spending s100, he could have been
spared all his suffering and trouble
without being penny the worse off
n1lo 2AA oOlAlC SdoCS SCU NOl tll Va lllCo-
ical care would have forestalled wage
loss Of 500. 1t doesn't make sense.
So if workers as a class were taxed
on their wages throughout the year
for medical care, they would prob
ably still be as we'll if not better of
financially. The employer also coulo
afford to pay something toward the
cost of his workers medical care. fol
when illness makes workers drop out
substitutes must be hired.
These substitutes usually aren't sc
good as the men they replace, at least
for a time. Labor turnover is es-
pecially costly in highly skilled in.
dustry. where certain workers may bt