YOU ARE APPROACHING the end of the first of 3 days of a beautiful scientific program covering a broad range of medical problems, many of which are of regular and repeated concern to the practitioner. Medicine, however, as a blend of the physical and biological sciences on the one hand, and of the social sciences on the other, cannot be separated from the socioeconomic setting in which it is practiced. It is significant, therefore, that your program committee has recognized this fact in scheduling this afternoon's mid-meeting interlude.
A better title for this paper would be "Some Reflections on the Social and Economic Aspects of Medicine." I say "some reflections," for this is a vast subject, and about all I can hope to do in the time allotted is to skim over a few highlights which may serve as a stimulus to some of you to reflections of your own.
Any consideration of the social and economic forces which are so inextricably related to today's complex medical care problems, perhaps would best be brought into perspective by a brief historical review.
Self-sufficiency has been one of America's most cherished traditions—self-sufficiency of the individual, the family, the community, and the state; and in our federal system of government, action at national level has been invoked only to deal with problems of a magnitude and difficulty beyond the scope of the individual, and of government at state and local levels. It was in this context that Lincoln made his oftquoted statement to the effect that it is the function of government to do for the people only what they cannot do for themselves otherwise, or cannot do as well.
Medical Care for All the People
