When Doctors Go on Strike

In a book published in 1979, Dr. Robert S. Mendelsohn draws attention to the fact that, during a 52-day period in 1976 when doctors in Bogotá, Colombia, gave only emergency care, the death rate went down 35 percent. In Los Angeles County there was an 18-percent drop in the death rate that same year when doctors were on strike. And in Israel in 1973 there was a 50-percent drop in the death rate when doctors drastically reduced their daily patient contact for a month. What is the message? Dr. Mendelsohn reasons that most people would be better off with less medical treatment.