Health Care In The 19th Century

The United States faces a major crisis in primary health care, and unless Congress acts immediately it is likely to become much worse. It is widely acknowledged that we currently have the most wasteful, inefficient, and expensive health care system in the world. American health care is caught in a vise, which has created a dire situation. The squeeze comes from the positive gains in life expectancy on one side and unsustainable medical costs on the other. Meanwhile, headlines are being grabbed by crises as serious as the outbreak of Ebola, vaccine-preventable diseases such as measles, and an obesity epidemic. In the early 1900s, leading causes of death were influenza, tuberculosis and gastrointestinal infections. Because of preventative
care and medicine including sanitation and vaccines, these diseases have plummeted over the last 100 years. Now, chronic diseases such as heart disease, cancer and non-infectious lung disease are some of the leading causes of death. A few of the crises that are currently going on in the United States are opiate addiction, preventative care, health care in U.S., Canada, & New Zeeland, and community health centers.
History of Health Care Health Care in the United States is different than most of the first world countries. America’s healthcare first began towards the end of the 19th century. The Industrial Revolution brought more jobs to the United States; however, the dangerous levels of those jobs led to more injuries. As jobs began to increase, the unions grew stronger causing the unions to provide forms of sickness protection. The American Medical Association (AMA) was formed in the early 1900s by the end of 1910, the AMA gained 62,000 physicians and was growing stronger every day. Theodore Roosevelt, the 26th President of the United States, believed health insurance was important because “no country could be strong whose people were sick and poor” (Griffin, 2017). After WWI, the pressing matter of healthcare was hospitals and doctors started charging more than what the average person could afford. Once a group of teachers discovered that this was a pressing issue, they formed a program through Baylor University in which they would agree to pre-pay for any future medical services. The pre-payment could be for up to 21 days in advance. This resulted in an
organization being non-profit and only covered hospital services (Griffin, 2017). Blue Cross and Blue Shield began to expand across the country Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd President of the United States, knew healthcare would grow to be a substantial problem, so he got to work on a health insurance bill that included the “old age” benefits so desperately needed at the time.
The AMA once again fiercely opposed any plan for a national health system, causing FDR to drop the health insurance portion of the bill. The resulting Social Security Act of 1935 created a system of “old-age” benefits and allowed states to create provisions for people who were either unemployed or disabled (or both) (Griffin, 2017). Lyndon B. Johnson took over as the 36th President of the United States, plan focused solely on making sure senior and disabled citizens were still able to access affordable healthcare, both through physicians and hospitals. Though Congress made hundreds of amendments to the original bill, it did not face nearly the opposition that preceding legislation had — one could speculate as to the reason for its easier path to success, but it would be impossible to pinpoint with certainty. It passed the House and Senate with generous margins and went to the President’s desk. Johnson signed the Social Security Act of 1965 on
July 30 of that year, with President Harry Truman sitting at the table with him. This bill laid the groundwork for what we now know as Medicare and Medicaid (Griffin, 2017). In 1986, Reagan signed the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA), which allowed former employees to continue to be enrolled in their previous employer’s group health plan — if they agreed to pay the full premium (employer portion plus employee contribution). In 1996, Clinton signed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), which established privacy standards for individuals. Clinton Administration was part of the Balanced Budget Act of 1997. It was called the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) and it expanded Medicaid assistance to “uninsured children up to age 19 in families with incomes too high to qualify them for Medicaid.” CHIP is run by each individual State and is still in use today. On March 23, 2010, President Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), commonly called the Affordable Care Act (ACA) into law. Because the law was complex and the first of its kind, the government issued a multi-year rollout of its provisions (Griffin, 2017).