An Ode To Obamacare And Preventive Health Services

In Hartford around the time of the Revolutionary War, one Dr. William Jepson owned a home near where South Church stands now. The doctor was better known as an apothecary, as a nod to his main function of dispensing medicine, but for the most part in those days health care was delivered by the women of the family. Only when herbs and home remedies didn’t work were “bone-setters,” or surgeons and physicians such as Jepson, summoned. Treatment might involve bloodletting, which is exactly as it sounds. Preventive care—the standard for today’s medicine—has a spotty history in this country.