
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, April 27, 1990                   TAG: 9004270428
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                LENGTH: Short

DOCTORS URGE HEALTH-CARE OVERHAUL

In a major break from the long-dominant position of organized medicine, the American College of Physicians, the nation's largest group of specialists, called Thursday for a radical restructuring of the nation's costly and uneven health-care system to guarantee equal access for all Americans.

"The current situation is intolerable for patients, their families and physicians," said a statement released by the college's board whose members are specialists in internal medicine. "We have concluded that nothing short of universal access to a level of basic health care will be fair in the long run."

The proposal makes the ACP, with 68,000 members, the first major medical organization to endorse the concept of a single health-care system for all Americans, a position that has been steadily and bitterly opposed by the American Medical Association. - The Washington Post

by CNB