ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a general overview of the development of state involvement in the provision of health services in the United Kingdom. The most important area of state involvement in the provision of health services during the nineteenth century, in terms of the impact on people’s health, was the enactment of public health legislation. From the beginning of the twentieth century, the sphere of concern of medical officers of health extended into the area of personal health services as the result of increasing state concern with the health of mothers and young children. The administrative structure of the National Health Service which came into being in 1948 was the product of the bargaining and negotiation which had taken place in the health policy community. Both Health and Welfare Plans outlined developments in relation to four main client groups: mothers and young children, the elderly, the physically handicapped, and the mentally ill and handicapped.
