MISUSE OF AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION DATA

Dr. Channing Frothingham, Chairman of the Committee for the Nation's Health, stated recently: "The AMA's own statistics show that 80 per cent of the population—all those with incomes under $5,000 a year—are not able to meet the expenses of serious illness out of their own resources."¹ Testifying before the Senate Committee on Education and Labor, Dr. Allan M. Butler, associate professor of pediatrics at the Harvard Medical School, said, "The American Medical Association agrees that patients whose family income is $3,000 per year cannot pay the costs of serious illness."² Seymour E. Harris, professor of economics, Harvard University, made the following statement before the Senate Subcommittee of the Committee on Labor and Public Welfare, "Actually in 1939 the AMA estimated that families with incomes under $3,000 could not afford a serious illness. This is the equivalent of $5,000 today and, therefore, the AMA estimate suggests help for 80