396Section IV.H. E. Jordan.
THE PLACE OF EUGENICS IN THE MEDICAL CURRICULUM.
By H. E. Jordan
(Chairman of the Eugenics Section of the American Association for the
Study and Prevention of Infant Mortality).
If the possibilities now exist for developing a physically, mentally and
morally stronger and healthier race, true social progress demands that such
end be quickly achieved. The possibilities undoubtedly do exist; and
the need for racial improvement is urgent. The ultimate ideal sought is a
perfect society constituted of perfect individuals. Logically, and from
the higher viewpoint, it is more desirable to be able to prevent the
production of social inferiors than to raise such elements to physical,
mental and moral par. Social therapy is economically much more expensive
than social prophylaxis.
Modern medicine, yielding to the demands of real progress, is
becoming less a curative and more a preventive science. From an art of
curing illness, it is becoming a science of health. It is safe to predict, I
believe, that in several centuries medical men generally will be more of the
order of guardians of the public health than doctors of private diseases.
This represents the medical aspect of the general change from individualism
to collectivism. Medicine, in many of its present phases, notably the more
purely therapeutic, will be greatly altered. Its surgical and obstetrical
phases, however, will become only relatively less important.
It would seem that the sooner this high end be realized the better for
all concerned; and the greater the economic saving. Eugenic conduct is
undeniably a factor in attaining the speedy achievement of the end of
racial health. The status of the medical situation, accordingly, seems to
be this : Medicine is fast becoming a science of the prevention of weakness
and morbidity; their permanent not temporary cure, their racial eradication
rather than their personal palliation. Not that the latter ends be not
accomplished wherever and whenever cause requires, and as effectively as
at present, but merely as incidental to the greater endeavour in the interests
of the race. Eugenics, embracing genetics, is thus one of the important
disciplines among the future medical sciences. The coming physician
must have adequate training in matters relating to heredity and eugenics.
And the medical curriculum that includes these subjects (properly
combined as one) and provides for their clear scientific presentation is, other
things being equal, the one which best meets the needs of the very near
future. For, as the general population becomes better educated in matters
of personal and racial health and hygiene, it will more and more demand
help along these lines and such advice regarding the prevention of weakness
in themselves and their offspring. The physicians are logically the men
who must supply the information and give the help sought.
