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This is one of the Studies of the Committee on Medicine and the Changing Order of the New York Academy of Medicine, established in 1942 to inquire into economic and social problems confronting the medical profession today.
Public medical care has been traditionally identified with the dispensing of relief to the destitute. The "Old Poor Laws" which spring from the Elizabethan "Poor Laws" of 1601, and which became the "Town Poor Relief System" in New England, largely dominate distribution of such services.
Dr. Stern goes into the historical background of medical services and finds that new patterns are emerging which are transforming the field of government medical care. In the chapter "Medical Service by Local Government, Recent Development" the author outlines, after quoting the Resolution of the American Medical Association of 1938 on Medical Care for the Indigent, the various methods of giving such care and the methods employed in