Evening star., 1938-10-19
Group Health Movement
Background Thought
Being Presented.
BIG CHART is CARRIED
INSIDE BY ATTENDANTS
Clem Linnenberg of Antitrust
Division Is Summoned to
Follow Industrialist.

miliariZing the special medical in
quiry grand jurors with the whole
background of the group health move
ment, the Department of Justice today
offered to the grand jury testimony by
Charles w. Taussig, New York indus
trialist. who is prominent supporter
of the Roosevelt administrations lib
eralized health program.
Mr. Taussig was the third witness
called before the extraordinary grand
Jury investigating allegations that the
American Medical Association and
the District Medical Society infringed
the Sherman antitrust laws in their
fight against Group Health Associa-
ton, Inc, Government employees med
ical cooperative. Like his predeces-
sors, DR.. Hugh Cabot of the Mayo
Clinic, and DR.. Michael M. Davis of
the National Committee for Research
in Medical Economics, Mr.. TauSsig has
been an active campaigner for pro
gressive medicine
Held Not Undemocratic.
AS a spokesman for big business"
Mr.. Taussig, who is president of the
American Molasses Co.. told the Ma
tlonal Health Conference here last
July there was nothing undemocratic
or sinister in the Governments plans
for co-ordinated Federal, State and
losal attack on the problem of ade-
ouate medical care for the under
privileged.
The American concept of democ-
racy has never carried with 1t the
implication of a changelesS political,
social and economic ORDER he told
the conference. yet it has become
the habit of a certain group to brand
every suggested effort to improve the
condition of the underprivlleged and
to make less cumbersome our govern
mental processes as being destructive
to democracy"
He declared large Federal eXpendi-
lures for public health do not frlghten
business. Business bears a far greater
financial burden now, due to our ne
glect of an adequate health control" !"
he said, than its share of the tax
burden will be under the proposed
administrator plan"
Advisory Board of the Advisory Com
n1ittee of the National Youth Admin
.stration, in which position he has
made a study of medical needs of
underprivileged youth.
Glen Linnenberg, q staff economist
of the antitrust division of the De-
partment of Justice, was called to
follow Mr.. Taussig into the grand
Jury room on the third floor of the new
Police Court Building A large chart
was carried into the room by court
attendants.
The first two witnesses, believed to
come within the background cate
cory, were DR.. Hugh Cabot of the
Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MINI. and
Dr. Michael NJ. Davis, nationally rec
ognized authority on medical econom-
ics. whose doctorate is in philosophy,
not medicine.
Picture Seen Changing.
DR.. Davis, whose testimony monopo-
lized yesterdays grand jury session,
was well qualified to give the jurors
an authoritative picture of the national
problem of providing adequate medical
care for persons in the loWerincome
brackets, for he has conducted extern
sive researches in that field.
although he refused to disclose the
jury, DR.. Davis told reporters later he
believed the whole medical picture"
was changing under the stress of eco
nomic conditions, and that there were
two sides to the picture
In response to question, DR.. Davis
expressed the opinion that the Ameri-
can Medical Association had taken
"some steps toward solving the prob
lem of providing medical care for those
of limited resources, but he declared
1t was his conviction that the A. M A.
alone could not work things out with
out substantial outside aid"
DR.. Davis declined to discuss the
group health movement, as he said
this was the subject of grand jury
discussion, but he asserted the gen.
eral problem of providing cheaper
medical service for persons of low in
come was one in which physicians
as, we'll as their patients had deep
interest
The doctors. he explained, are con-
Cerned with improving medical serv-
ice and with getting paid for their
services, while the patients are seek
ing better medical care for less money.
He declared he could see no good
reason why group of patients should
not join in a plan to employ their own
physicians in order to obtain cheaper
care. The wealthy as well as the poor
should enjoy this right without inter-
ference, he asserted.
DR.. Davis is chairman of the Com
mittee for Research in Medical Eco
nomics, which is supported by the
Julius RosenWald Fund, Chicago, and
has been a consultant in clinic and
hospital organization since 1920. He
vas associated with the national sur
vey on costs of medical care made
under direction of former Interior Sec
retary Ray Lyman Wilbur.
For the announced purpose of pro
tecting" witnesses, Government attor-
neys yesterday ruled against interview
ing of any witnesses inside the court
building. What happens outside the
building, they said is not their busi-
ness. At the same time they dropped
their policy of keeping names of wit
nesses secret, apparently because they
found it impossible to do so. They
refused, however, to make public in
advance the entire list of witnesses to
be called,
Glenn Linnenberg. staff economist
of the Antitrust Division of the De-
partment of Justice. was called to fol-
, low Mr.. Taussig into the grand Jury
room on the third floor of the new
Police Court Building. A large chart
was carried into the room by court
attendants.