900 ADDRESSES AND STATE PAPERS

large in numbers. Again, this is no accident. It is our intention and
our earnest desire, Ladies and Gentlemen, to involve as many knowl-
edgeable people as possible in the planning function and thus avoid
the pitfalls of having one group or another complain after an action
has been taken that it had no advance knowledge of such plans. For
the first time, we will try to work as a group to get the total interest
of the health community behind a program and thus assure achieve-
ment. Heretofore, nearly every decision in public health has met
resistance because certain groups were not included in the planning
stages.

For far too long, the fragmentation of health services in Maryland,
as elsewhere, has taken its toll in effectiveness — in dollars, even
lives — by the very fact that these health services have been piecemeal.

Comprehensive health planning is an opportunity not only to co-
ordinate but to bring modernization and uniform quality to Mary-
land's health services. Right now a disparity exists between personal
and environmental health services. Personal health programs have
been around for almost two centuries and in two hundred years their
growth has been both enormous and unguided. Environmental health
services are a relative newcomer and have benefited from modern
administrative concepts. Efforts to coordinate personal health pro-
grams have been largely ineffective, while environmental health pro-
grams have been improving as a result of administration on a state
or regional basis.

Now we are about to develop a planning mechanism — through
this Advisory Council — to encompass both environmental and per-
sonal health services. Public Law 89-749 charges you with this dual
responsibility. "Fulfillment of our national purpose, " it says, "de-
pends on promoting and assuring the highest level of health attain-
able for every person, in an environment which contributes positively
to healthful individual and family living. " You thus will be de-
veloping a plan that will not only affect the health care of the in-
dividual, but a plan that will affect the very environment in which
we live and work.

I caution you that the planning process which you begin today will
be continuous. It will require your sustained interest and your dedi-
cation.

This plan must designate and provide for the establishment of a
single State agency solely responsible for administering the State
health planning function. It must provide direct contact with and
feedback from the consumers of these health services.