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[–] Vindicator [S] ago 

Was Flexner a eugenicist?

Flexner viewed blacks as inferior and advocated closing all but two of the historically black medical schools. His opinions were followed and only Howard and Meharry were left open, while five other schools were closed. His perspective was that black doctors should only treat black patients and should serve roles subservient to white physicians. The closure of these schools and the fact that black students were not admitted to many medical schools in the US for 50 years after Flexner has contributed to the low numbers of American born physicians of color and the ramifications are still felt more than a century later.[14]

Furthermore, given his adherence to germ theory, he argued that, if not properly trained and treated, African-Americans posed a health threat to middle/upper class whites.[15]

"The practice of the Negro doctor will be limited to his own race, which in its turn will be cared for better by good Negro physicians than by poor white ones. But the physical well-being of the Negro is not only of moment to the Negro himself. Ten million of them live in close contact with sixty million whites. Not only does the Negro himself suffer from hookworm and tuberculosis; he communicates them to his white neighbors, precisely as the ignorant and unfortunate white contaminates him. Self-protection not less than humanity offers weighty counsel in this matter; self- interest seconds philanthropy. The Negro must be educated not only for his sake, but for ours. He is, as far as the human eye can see, a permanent factor in the nation."[15]