TUSCON, Ariz., March 09, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Since the early years of American independence, life expectancy increased from 32 years in 1800 to 68.2 years in 1950. Private indemnity insurance developed to help cover the cost of medical care. Only 9 percent of the U.S. population had such coverage in 1940, but 75 percent did by 1960, writes George L. Smith, III, M.D., in the spring issue of the Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons. Dr. Smith, current president of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), practices family medicine in Covington, Ga.
The federal government has increasingly been involved in the financing of care, starting with the Hill-Burton Act of 1946, which provided grants for hospital construction. Passage of Medicare and Medicare in 1965 has been followed by incremental controls on allowable services and charges, and efforts to end private indemnity coverage and even our entire private medical system, Dr. Smith writes.
During a mission trip to Ukraine in 2000, Dr. Smith experienced the reality of socialized medicine. A nurse kept him from discarding a used tongue depressor that he had brought along so that it could be used on another patient. He also notes that in a communist system, there is not just scarcity of material resources but no room for morals or rules to protect the individual.
“The communist has no security as long as capitalism exists,” Dr. Smith points out. The goals and methods in the 1946 Blueprint for World Conquest are still pertinent in the ongoing all-encompassing class struggle despite the collapse of the Soviet empire.
As physician stewards. Dr. Smith states that “we have the responsibility to warn others regarding socialism and communism and help them realize we must solve our own medical coverage problems in a manner that protects the freedoms we hold so dear.”
The Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons is published by the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS), a national organization representing physicians in all specialties since 1943.
Contact: George L. Smith, III, at gsds74@icloud.com or Jane M. Orient, M.D., (520) 323-3110, janeorientmd@gmail.com
