Medical Heretics During The 1960's

“During the 1960 election campaign, the medical profession spent tens of thousands of dollars trying to defeat the party that proposed the medical care plan. A key-man system was set up, and each key men was responsible for a small cell of doctors. Plans were passed from the hierarchy and its hired public relations experts to the key men and then down to the troops manning the barricades. Potential medical heretics were excluded from the communications systems, and if they held positions on any committees of the profession, they were purged.” (Badgley, R., & Wolfe, S., 1965) The doctors feel they were safeguarding the rights of the individual against intrusion of the welfare state. The doctors said the government cares more about its budget then its patients.

The doctors did not want to negotiate a change that might threaten their monopoly. Members of the profession were free to decide if they wanted to practice or not. (Badgley, R., & Wolfe, S., 1965) The organized medical mounted a ferocious propaganda campaign fronted by the local College of Physicians and Surgeons with the support of the Canadian Medical Association (CMA), the AMA, the local economic elite and most of the media in the province. “The College wielded tremendous power and discipline because it was the only economic group representing doctors and was also the licensing body which determined who could practice medicine. Doctors who favored Medicare were isolated and ostracized by the hierarchy of the