THE AMA SEEKS A CLOSED SHOP
McMillin, Miles
The Cooperative Movement: The AMA Seeks A Closed Shop By MILES McMILLIN DURING a recent debate in the United States Senate on the Farm Security Administration's group health program for low...
...Indeed, the American Medical Association itself has come to see the handwriting on the wall...
...Similar legislation has been introduced in Wisconsin by the Wisconsin State Medical Society...
...Its coming is as certain as anything can be...
...All over the country there is a surging wave of discontent with the present pay-as-you-go medical practice...
...The extraordinary success of Henry Kaiser's pre-paid health plan for his employes and the rapid growth and remarkable record of the cooperative Group Health Mutual in Minnesota have set people to thinking...
...I will vote to let you guys have a closed shop—which is more than I would do for the CIO.' "Regardless of whether anyone likes it or not, we are going to have more and more group medical attention...
...The AMA's past record and the reluctance with which it was converted has not been such as to inspire confidence in the high honor of its intentions...
...It may be that Sen...
...The Cooperative Movement: The AMA Seeks A Closed Shop By MILES McMILLIN DURING a recent debate in the United States Senate on the Farm Security Administration's group health program for low income farmers, Sen...
...Charles D. Madsen...
...Kansas Republican, rose to make some remarks about group health in general...
...It was only a few years ago that the hierarchy in the AMA viewed any group health proposal as dangerous to our "American heritage," as a booby-trap in the path of the American way of life, no less...
...Pointing out that group medicine is growing rapidly in his state and in the Middle West, Sen...
...Under Madsen's bill no attempt is being made to "socialize" medicine or to interfere with private practice...
...The Co-ops Do Some Kicking In Minnesota the monopoly bill was narrowly defeated, but only after the co-ops raised unrefined hell...
...These laws, of course, would paralyze the extensive cooperative program in this field...
...The soundness of Sen...
...A Booby-trap Fizzles Then too, people are observing the benefits, both financial and medical, of the various group health programs that have sprung up throughout the country...
...The issue, as it is crystallizing today, is who should have the authority to establish group health programs and who should maintain control over them...
...Coming from a rather conservative Republican, Sen...
...Its inability to provide adequate medical care for the nation was glaringly illustrated by the shocking number of rejectees for military service, many of whom were unfit because of the failure of our present system to provide proper medical care...
...Reed's observations are quite remarkable and I want to pass them along as the text for this week's sermon...
...The coops have asked for an amendment assuring them of their rights to organize their own medical insurance groups...
...one of the leaders of the Progressive Party...
...I am very happy to see that it is easing its policies...
...These bills, which have made their appearances in 17 state legislatures, provide that only doctors can set up medical corporations to provide health insurance...
...The American Medical Association has been very restrictive in its rules...
...People are beginning to wonder out loud why the state, which does such a good job of financing a healthy mind through its school system, can't do equally as well in financing a healthy body...
...It was also ditched in South Dakota...
...Naturally, the cooperatives and other groups interested in a genuine program of low-cost medical care look upon the AMA drive with a good deal of suspicion...
...I said in reply, 'Yes...
...In Iowa, however, it was passed and the co-op health groups have been eliminated...
...Reed's prediction, of course, is indisputable...
...Reed of Kansas is not the only Republican from the Midwest who has heard the rumble out where the voters live...
...The bill merely calls for a compulsory health insurance program among wage earners to be financed by a 2 per cent payroll deduction and an employer contribution of a like amount...
...Reed commented: "I received a letter from a doctor who is a friend of mine asking me to vote thus and so...
...The politicians of the AMA are determined that they should have a complete monopoly in this field and they hold to those views with the same obduracy with which they clung to the earlier opinion that group health was a dangerous subversion of democracy...
...Although Madsen's bill is given little chance of passage because of the conservative Republican make-up of the legislature, people interested in health insurance are watching it with a great deal of interest...
...Clyde Reed...
...They have launched a national drive to buck monopoly medical bills through the state legislatures...
...There has been a gradual backing down from that stand...
...Meanwhile, legislation proposing a state system of health insurance has been introduced into the Wisconsin legislature by Sen...
Vol. 9 • May 1945 • No. 20
