Problem of Medical Students is Jewry’s Own, Says Rongy

This is the last of a series of three articles in which Dr. A. J. Rongy, Chief of Gynecology at the Hospital for Joint Diseases, discusses the problem of discrimination against Jews by the medical schools of this country and the correlated problem of overcrowding of the profession by Jews.

And now what is the situation in New York City? Dr. Harold Rypins, secretary of the New York State Board of Medical Examiners, himself a Jew, made a survey of the situation in the metropolis in 1930. Recently, in an address at a New York synagogue, he reviewed the facts ascertained then.

“In 1930,” he said, “the five medical schools in New York City had a total of 523 places for freshmen medical students, amounting to 8.7 per cent of all the places in American medical schools, although the population in New York City is only 5.7 per cent of the total population of the country. In other words, New York City has somewhat more than its proportionate share of the country’s facilities for medical education.

“The total number of applications received during 1930 for admission to New York City medical schools was 4,789, of which 3,640 or 76 per cent were from Jews. It was impossible to ascertain how many of these applications were multiple, but it is probable that these 3,640 Jewish applicants represented not more than 1,500 individual Jewish applicants.

NO RACIAL PREJUDICE

“Of the total 4,789 applications, 524 or 9.13 per cent were successful, of whom 226, or 43 per cent of those admitted, were Jewish. Since the Jews form less than 30 per cent of the total population in New York City, the fact that over 43 per cent of all the freshmen admitted to medical schools in New York City were Jewish is the best possible evidence of the absence of racial or religious prejudice in the selection of candidates for admission to medical schools in Greater New York.

“Assuming that there were only 1,500 individual Jewish applicants in New York City, of whom only 226, or 15 per cent of the total number of Jewish applicants, were accepted in the medical schools, it is not difficult to understand the natural conclusion of rejected Jewish applicants that they were discriminated against unfairly.

“They cannot be expected to realize that, taking the country as a whole, any given application has only a little less than one chance in two of being accepted, or that in New York City any given application has only a trifle over nine chances in a hundred, as compared with the 6.2 successful chances per hundred for Jewish applications.

“In other words, they do not realize that apart from the question of discrimination, admission to a recognized medical school in the United States is a difficult achievement, and that the competition for a strictly limited number of places is very keen, particularly in New York City, and operates against the chances for admission of all applicants and not simply Jewish applicants.

“The chances of any application being accepted in a New York City school are less than onequarter the chances in the country at large. However, the application of a Jewish student in New York City has only two-thirds as good a chance as all applications in the metropolis.”

Concluding, Dr. Rypins says: “To construe this, however, as evidence of racial or religious prejudice not only overlooks the fact already stated, that over 43 per cent of the applicants admitted to medical schools in New York City are Jewish, but leaves out of account the peculiar distribution of the Jewish population, which in my opinion is the determining factor in the whole situation.”

And further, Dr. Rypins states:

“While I am the first to admit that historically and temperamentally the Jews are somewhat better material for professional training, including the profession of medicine, only the most fanatical Jewish advocate would attempt to support the claim that on the average there are between four and five times as many desirable Jewish as non-Jewish candidates for the study of medicine per unit of population.

“They simply show that an accidental concentration of a disproportionately large Jewish population in New York and the unusual ambition of Jewish students to study medicine has created a problem in medical education to which there is no solution.

POSITION OF DEANS TRYING

“For example, if every medical school in New York City accepted Jewish applicants only, there would still be facilities for the training of not more than one-third of the Jewish applicants. I leave to your imagination the happy experience for the deans and faculties of these schools in selecting the fortunate one-third and soothing the ruffled views of the rejected two-thirds of the Jewish applicants, none of whom could claim anti-Semitic prejudice.”

With the facts in mind, as presented in this little survey, the fair-minded, non-fanatical Jew will readily understand that Jewry has no cause for complaint at its treatment by the medical schools of this country. He will see that a production of too many Jewish doctors is an evil Jewry can well do without.

For one thing, an over-production would tend to a lowering of standards among Jewish doctors and consequent injury to the Jewish race as a whole, which always suffers for the deeds of individual Jews. For another thing, insistence on larger representation in the medical schools than the already large representation would be playing into the hands of some possible future American demagogue who might easily make a case against Jewry by Jewry’s pursuance of such a policy.

PROBLEM IS JEWRY’S OWN

On the other hand, Jewry should never—so long as it has any power of resistance at all—stand for a numerus clausus in medicine, or in any other field. Such an action would be the most dangerous of all possible precedents; it would inevitably lead to the unhappy minority problem which is troubling the Jewry of Poland, which is being forced upon the Jews of Germany and which threatens the Jews of Austria.

American Jewry must realize that the problem of the Jewish medical student is its own not an American problem. Because of the overcrowding of the field, and its consequent dangers, Jewish parents must be made to realize that for the time being, at least, they must not encourage their children to study medicine. They must be impressed that from a purely economic viewpoint the study of medicine is unsound business except for the exceptionably personable and gifted student.

And in this self-imposed limitation of Jewish medical students it might not be out of place—as Dr. Rypins has suggested—that a representative society of Jewish physicians have a standing committee on medical education, which might serve not only to advise individual students in reference to the entire situation of medical education, licensure and practice, but also to serve as an unofficial body to weed out the less promising applicants. If such a committee were to do its work conscientiously, I believe its efforts would be very much welcomed by the various medical school authorities and that its recommendation of Jewish applicants for admission to medical schools would carry a great deal of weight.

Carrying this self-regulation one step further, some responsible Jewish organization should prepare studies and charts similar to ones recently prepared by Rabbi Morris Lazaron revealing the number of internships open to young Jewish doctors and indicating the density of the overcrowding of the Jewish medical field in various American cities.

HARTFORD SEEN LIKELY PLACE

The knowledge that Baltimore, with a Jewish population of 8 per cent of the municipality’s total, has 18.2 per cent of the doctors in the city is extremely valuable and should keep the young Jewish doctor—except in special and particular cases—out of a city where there is already one Jewish physician to every 224 Jews.

On the other hand, Hartford which has a Jewish population of 17 per cent, according to Rabbi Lazaron’s figures, and a Jewish medical proportion of only 9.43 per cent would seem a better opportunity for the young Jewish doctor who seeks to avoid overcrowding.

This vocational guidance, both in the limiting of Jewish medical students and the guidance of young Jewish doctors, is the answer to the problem of discrimination against Jews in the medical field. It is strictly a Jewish problem, one that shouldn’t be neglected.

The American Jewish Committee, B’nai B’rith or the American Jewish Congress might well consider the possibility of undertaking some such thorough and comprehensive survey. It would be a really constructive piece of work, something that any organization might well be proud of having done.