Toledo union journal. [volume] (Toledo, Ohio) 1942-current, 1949-04-15
The Need for Health Insurance

(Written by Rep Andrew j. Blemlller and
reprinted from Consumers Report Magazine).
MO matter how the picture is viewed
~ we are faced with the dismal fact
that the price of medicine in the market
place is beyond the reach of most Ameri-
cans. We have known this for more than
decade. For back in 1889, the Bureau of
Economics of the American Medical AS
sociation published study showing that
families with incomes less than $4,000
could not afford adequate medical care
for serious illness. With today's greatly
increased living costs, it is perhaps con-
servative estimate which states that 100,-
100000 Americans need help.
Here is national problem - national
rather than private or local - since it
concerns the great majority of our people.
We must devote our energies toward it's
immediate solution.
I stress the need for immediate i'm
provement For so long as we temporize,
or delay, or compromise, we shall be con-
demning to death each day some 900 per-
sons whom modern medicine has the
service, the skill, but not the economic
power to save.
Voluntary health insurance, excellent
aid though it is, affords comprehensive
medical care to not more than 100000
persons. The great clamor about how 49,
100000 are covered by some plan or other
- and therefore there is no need for any
further concern - is definitely mislead-
ing. Twenty-Five millions of these As
100000 have insurance for disqualification
only. Others have even less adequate pro-
tie C tt o. n. furthermore, many voluntary
plans including those operated by State
and county medical societies, have con-
tracts full of jokers. When you need to
claim benefits you find that you are so
beset with ifs, ors, and whereases, that
you end up owing the doctor and the hos
pital a lot more than you bargained for.
The problem of meeting our national
sickness bill can be solved by nothing
less than an overall approach which in
cludes Federal, state, and local govern
ments
Speaking of this proposition, Bernard
Baruch - Americas elder statesman -
told the medical profession a little more
than year ago:
Nothing has been suggested so far,
which promises success, other than some
form of insurance covering the people by
law and financed by the Government .
what some would call compulsory health
insurance. 1t can be devised, adequately
safeguarded, without involving what is
termed 'socialized medicine any more
than l fear it in education or housing"
There is now before Congress a ma
tional health insurance bill which en-
bodies the safeguards necessary for the
preservation of both American medicine
and the doctor-patient relationship. That
bill is S. 5 HR783), sponsored by Sena-
tors Murray, Wagner McGrath, Pepper
Chavez and Taylor, and in the House by
Congressman Dingell
1t is essential for all of us to realize
the sincerity of the bills purpose and its
raightforward, sensi lie provisions
Above all, it represents the sound and
tested American principle of insurance -
a principle that dates back to the days of
John Paul Jones and Old Ironsides.
But we need not take national health
insurance on faith. We can observe it's
operation abroad in other English-speak-
ing countries like Canada, New Zealand,
and England. In Great Britain, for ex-
ample, national health insurance was first
in 1911 over the opposition of
the British Medical Association. After
working with it for number of years, the
British Medical Association reversed it's
stand and in 1928 recommended that it be
greatly extended.
The recently inaugurated British Ma
tional Health Act was first proposed by
the Conservative Party. Said Winston
Churchill in his wonderful style: en-
surance is employing the magic of aver
ages for the benefit of the Individual"
Now, after several months of operation,
a favorable verdict is being returned by
the people.
Unlike either the Canadian Medical
Association or the British Medical AS
sociation has rejected all such proposals,
lock, stock and barrel. The impartial OBJ
server who surveys the record of the
ANA on legislative proposals to help
make adequate medical care available to
all, will read therein a record largely of
negativiSm, obstructionism and of do
if you will permit the word
We have made great strides in recent
years in protecting the people of this coun-