ABSTRACT
Born in the USA into a family of poor German immigrants, Henry Kaiser began as a photographer’s apprentice, eventually buying the photography business and becoming an industrialist (the ‘father of modern shipbuilding’) and builder (part of the team that built the Hoover Dam). Called by President Johnson a ‘pioneer of the new breed of responsible businessmen’, he created a prepaid health plan for his employees, which was the impetus for health maintenance organizations (HMOs) such as Kaiser Permanente, now the largest non-profit health plan in the USA. He also established the Henry J.Kaiser Family Foundation as a source of health information and analysis for policy-makers, the media, health-care providers and the public.
