Socializing Medicine: A Rational Plan

Abstract

Since medicine has already come to be of prime importance, competitive doctors who are free from proper control and supervision are individually intrusted with too much responsibility. As private health has become a matter of public moment, individualism in medicine must give way to collectivism. The adequate regulation of medical practice and the necessary co-operation of physicians can be insured only by organization. For such the government alone can furnish a working model like the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery of the navy. This medical service puts prevention before cure. It avails itself of the economic principle of the division of labor. It possesses demostrable Superiority over civilian practitioners in general. The system can be applied to civilian practice provided the people be willing to relinquish their right to choose their doctors. This privilege, which is being decreasingly exercised, is generally incompatible with modern medicine, so dependent upon science.