Ultimately, the Flexner report allowed for academic monopolization, which in turn monopolized science. Let us explore some key events.
American Medical Association
The American medical Association was established in 1847 to document birth, deaths & marriages. Shortly followed by the establishment of the board of investigates for quackery (1849-1906). Here they attacked herbology, massage, homeopathy, eastern medicine, etc., anything that was not of the allopathic framework. In 1883 the journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), was released. Within they promoted scientifically ‘tested’ pharmaceutical drugs and essentially, monopolized the field of medicine.
We will remember that Pasteur has recently gained notoriety in the field regarding germ theory and vaccination. When the AMA incorporated in 1897, they were quick to implement compulsory smallpox vaccination in 1899. Then came out the American Medical Directory (1906), where the licensing of doctors was centralized by a regulating body. Shortly after, the AMA involved the Carnegie Foundation (Andrew Carnegie) (1907).
Flexner Report
The Flexner Report was released by Abraham Flexner (1910). From AMA website:
The Flexner Report, Medical Education in the United States and Canada, funded by the Carnegie Foundation and supported by the AMA, is published and facilitates new standards for medical schools.
The Flexner Report was completely funded by the Carnegie foundation and backed by the AMA. The Flexner report provided medicine with reconstruction & regulation of medical education, standardized pharmacology as the only solution to disease (based on the AMAs recommendations and “scientifically tested” drugs).
The needs of pharmacology are in these respects not different from those of physics
The Flexner report showed that funding is paramount to medical education, which the report proved. Funding was unregulated at this time, still is. Vested interests were rampant, still are. Essentially, money and medicine began to be intertwined.
University curriculum was largely, if not solely, influenced by the Flexner report. The report, alongside the AMA, was a regulatory process for medical education, practice and practitioners.
Academic Monopolization
Carnegie & Rockefeller (& Flexner) relationship was a well known one. Carnegie rich from steel & railroads, second richest man in the world, and Rockefeller rich from oil, richest man in the world, & perhaps mainstream history. Both businesses worked very well in conjunction to one and another. Abraham Flexner was employed by the Carnegie foundation, and later became the first director of the Rockefeller Philanthropy programs in medical education
Carnegie & Rockefeller were greatly involved in medical research, medical education, general education, etc. Rockefeller created the General Board of Education in 1902, as a means to move away from agricultural knowledge to industrial knowledge. Rockefeller’s education advisor Fredrick Taylor Gates wrote the Country school of tomorrow in which he states:
We shall not try to make these people or any of their children into philosophers or men of learning or science.
Carnegie established the Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching in 1905. This set the nationwide curriculum for public schools. The public school and medical school curriculum was largely shaped by these gentlemen, based off the profitable, and fear mongering germ theory model, as proposed by Pasteur, Jenner, Koch, etc. The timeline is uncanny. It is clear that there was blatant academic monopolization.
Thoughts
The monopolization of the medical fields happened through academic monopolization. As we can see this was shaped by the two richest men in mainstream history. Medicine and science in general became problematic when money was involved. It is no wonder that the medical symbol shifted from the Rod of Asclepius, to the Caduceus of Hermes. The former representing natural healing, self-healing, and the medicinal arts, the latter signifying commerce, merchants, trade, alchemy, liars & thieves.
The shift of money into academia as well as the dogmatic thinking in science was fundamental in the creation of the allopathic model. It was important to remove all eastern or traditional native American medicine, and to demonize it. One could argue that the father of modern medicine, Hippocrates, was much less allopathic than the modern perspective. Which is why Flexner demonized Hippocrates, and Galen, in his text.
Flexner made the claim that all knowledge in medicine should be through the use of controlled trials. Flexner, not realizing that the literature of the germ theory was truly unscientific, as there was no valid control ever used. Still to this day, medical research struggles to use valid controls. Here lies the death of rationalism, not realizing that empiricism relies on rationalism to induce any sort of information from an observation. Unless, falsification was employed, which if it were, the idea of contagious microbes would have died a long time ago, due to the hundreds of failed contagion studies.
Lastly, the most problematic, the dogmatic materialistic, animalistic worldview:
The third era is dominated by the knowledge that medicine is part and parcel of modern science. The human body belongs to the animal world. It is put together of tissues and organs, in their structure, origin, and development not essentially unlike what the biologist is otherwise familiar with; it grows, reproduces itself, decays, according to general laws. It is liable to attack by hostile physical and biological agencies; now struck with a weapon, again ravaged by parasites. The normal course of bodily activity is a matter of observation and experience; the best methods of combating interference must be learned in much the same way.
This really speaks for itself. Flexner’s goal was to implement basic science and curriculum into medicine. Through this, the funders were able to shape that as they pleased. Lets remember that all pharmaceutical drugs are derived from petroleum, the Rockefellers bread and butter. The byproduct (it is well argued that this is a direct product, as shown by the direct vested interests), was that the field of medicine and science is dogmatic. Due to the foundations of funding stemming from the pharmaceutical industry, the tightly held beliefs of pharmacology, based on the many failed theories in science, can not be let go.
Modern science and medicine is lost. It has lost objectivity. It has lost true empiricism through falsification, and utilizes selective rationalism (induction) to back up their doctrines.
For more read the original text: Flexner Report