The Old Roots of the Italian Health Legislation

Abstract

Current Italian Health legislation is a paradigmatic example of a system based on the fundamental principles of the safeguard
and right to individual health. This raises the question of its evolution and gradual shaping stemming from very old and deep roots. Such
a long process started in the second half of the 19th century, when the newly reunified Kingdom of Italy, born in 1861, started to face the
issue of a very obsolete health system. A number of laws sequentially provided the regulation of physician activities and health care for all
people in need, regardless of their economic status and without any religious or political belief distinction, and culminate in the
“Comprehensive Law on Health” enacted in 1934. These whole systems of laws have oriented the legislation on health care and
organization, becoming a fundamental landmark until the promulgation of the Italian Constitution in 1948.