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66
NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICE ACT, 1946.
It was on 5th July, 1948, that there came into being the
National Health Service—the greatest and most comprehensive
scheme of public medical provision ever to be put into operation
in any country.
In the knowledge that nothing impoverishes a people more
than war and disease, the Government decided that medical treatment
should be available free-of-charge to every man, woman and
child in the country; and by so doing it was hoped that disease
and disability would be brought under control.
In spite of the fact that most of the greatest and most beneficent
advances in human health and happiness have been made in the
realm of preventive medicine, and that it is much more economic
to spend time and money on the prevention of disease rather than
on its cure, widespread surprise was felt and expressed that the
National Health Service Act devoted such overwhelming importance
to the cure of disease and such scant attention to its prevention.
Now that the Service has been in operation for over two years,
and has got over what has been described as its "teething troubles",
some idea of its effects are becoming apparent.
There can be no doubt whatever that it has banished from
countless homes one of the great sources of fear—fear of disease
and impoverishment due to the cost of medical treatment. It is
a welcome and beneficent change for people to know that they can
avail themselves of all the resources of modern medical treatment
(including specialist and hospital treatment) free of charge.
The administration of the National Health Service is entrusted
to three independently constitutional authorities—Hospital Boards,
Executive Councils and Local Health Authorities; and the success
of the service will depend primarily on the extent to which these
three administrative branches can be intertwined. There is already
evidence that they are tending to become independently isolated
units, whereas there is need for the closest possible h'aison between
them.
Before "the appointed day" there was one authority responsible
for the maternity service; now there are three. There is
also division in responsibility for the treatment and care of those