U.S. Health Care Compared to Other Developed Nations

[JohnWxy]

http://www.suite101.com/content/us-health-care-compared-to-other-developed-nations-a289836


According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the United States has the highest per capita health expenditures of any country in the OECD. The U.S. spends 15.7 percent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on health care compared to 8.4 percent for the United Kingdom, 8.1 percent for Japan, 10.4 percent for Germany, and 10.1 percent for Canada. Yet all the other countries mentioned have a higher life expectancy at birth and lower infant mortality rate than the U.S.
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[BrklynLiberal]

1. FACTS! JUST FACTS!! We don't need no damn facts!!!!

[Igel]

2. You have to look past the overall stats.

Take reading and SAT scores in the US: Reading scores look pretty bad, with a very slight increase. If you break them down by groups you find that some groups have increased and others have decreased. SAT scores have decreased over the years--but if you look at whose taking the test, you find that over the decades there have been huge increases in the numbers of people taking the test, with many test-takers among groups that wouldn't have dreamed of taking the SAT in 1965. The result is that the "traditional" college bound students tend to do better than ever but there's a large number of poorer-performing students dragging down the average.

Same for health care. Money matters. Access to health care matters. Yet Latinos tend to have lower infant mortality rates than whites, even if the whites under consideration are middle class and the Latinos poor. Blacks have higher infant mortality rates--even if you look at middle class blacks vs poor whites. At the top of the health care scale the differences between adjacent rankings become very small. A shift in demographics--as blacks become a few more percentage points of births--can alter global rankings.

There was a study reported in the last couple of days that looked at where money's spent. A huge amount of American health-care spending is for those over 70. If you hit 70, you should be in the US--the life expectancy for 70 year olds in the US is higher than for Europeans. In other words, the money spent actually makes a difference, but you have to match up spending and results closely, you can't look at life expectancy vs total expenditures. After all, the expenditures aren't evenly distributed, and how they pattern might well matter, increasing mortality for some groups (whether SES, race, age, or other) disproportionately.

Life style also matters considerably. Ethnicity, since it often correlates with culture, can matter. Education levels matter. Lots of things matter.

It makes for a topic easy to demagogue but hard to actually understand.

[Bennyboy]

4. Very interesting.

Because my Mom and Dad have spent a lot of time in the Healthcare system since they turned 70. My Mom is in the hospital right now in fact. My dad was in and out for years before he passed...after a week long stay in the hospital...the fifth time that year.

[JohnWxy]

7. Providing data for comparisons and analysis is the antidote to demagoging an issue.

I am not demagogueing the issue (the people who say Obama "wants to kill your grandma." ARE demagoguing this issue).

That's WHY you look for good data to begin making comparisons. BUT, YOU HAVE TO LOOK AT THE FUCKING DATA, BEFORE YOU CAN GET ANYTHING OUT OF IT.

Citing a bunch of specifics without looking at adequate data samples so you can make some conclusions can be considered obfuscation. ..especially when adequate data is available from which conclusions can be drawn. In this case, logically sound and sensible conclusions re U.S. cost and quality of health care are obvioous. THe U.S. compared to other developed nations spends the most and ranks 37th in quality of outcomes, according to the World Health Organization.


YOu said: " Money matters. Access to health care matters".. Your damn right money matters. In our system that is what determines ACCESS to health care. That's the whole fucking problem. Our "system" (actually we have no system of health care) is great IF you have the money to pay for it. But the way health care costs are going up fewer and fewer are going to be able to afford it.

Health care costs over the last dozen years or so have been rising about twice as fast as inflation in general. But in 2009 it broke all records:

http://www.redorbit.com/news/health/1839238/employer_healthcare_costs_rising_faster_than_inflation/

Researchers at the agency found that employer healthcare costs spiked by 7.9-percent per capita in 2009, according to a survey of 144 companies that provide health benefits to a combined 9.5 million people. The net healthcare payments for employers in the U.S. rose from $3,113 to $3,341.

In contrast, the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which measures inflation, declined by 0.4-percent.

At the rate of increase in Health Care costs without doing something to reform the "system" we could have been looking at one third of the population unable to afford health insurance in 10 to 15 years. THis is an untenable situation. People without health insurance have to go to emergency rooms to obtain health care. The Government (that is all of US) reimbursed hospitals for caring for those who could not pay for their care. IN 2004 that bill was about $38 Billion*. Now, getting your health care by going to the emergency room is the most expensive , least efficient (in terms of cost and outcomes) way of delivering health care. Letting people go without health insurance DOES NOT SAVE YOU MONEY. IT COSTS YOU MORE IN THE LONG RUN (especially when you consider lost productivity).

* (note: at 7% annual inflation the total of the cost for providing health care for the uninsured over ten years, the period often discussed with regard to the health care reform issue, would be $843 BILLION (escalating the 2004 costs up to 2010 and then adding the next 9 years to that) - and that's WITHOUT considering increasing numbers of people without health insurance). (https://sites.google.com/site/republicandystopia/costs-of-the-uninsured-inflated">See spreadsheet for computations)


ANyway you want to look at it, the United States pays the most (rel to GDP) and ranks low in terms of results. Without some action our position will only get worse. THat means something ain't working here.

http://www.suite101.com/content/where-the-us-ranks-in-world-health-a150590

The World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva has just released its annual report tracking the costs and outcomes of the health care systems of its 193 member states. The report entitled "World Health Statistics 2009" is a good tool for putting the American health care system in context especially as President Obama continues to push his health care reform agenda.

Top 10 Spenders Per Capita:

According to the WHO report the U.S. government ranks third in health care expenditures, spending $3,076 per capita. That number puts the American health care system behind only Luxembourg and Denmark. Here is a list of the top 10 countries in terms of health care costs per capita:

1.Luxembourg ($4,992)
2.Denmark ($3,239)
3.United States ($3,076)
4.Netherlands ($2,785)
5.Austria ($2,737)
6.France (2,727)
7.Germany (2,664)
8.Iceland ($2,628)
9.Canada ($2,587)
10.Sweden ($2,583)

Top 10 Spenders by GDP (%)

Additionally, the report provides information on national health care spending as percentage of gross domestic product (GDP). The United States is number one when it comes to health care spending as percentage of GDP. Here are the top 10 countries:

1.United States (15.8%)
2.France (11.0%)
3.Denmark (10.8%)
4.Switzerland (10.8%)
5.Germany (10.6%)
6.Austria (10.2%)
7.Canada (10.0%)
8.Sweden (9.2%)
9.Spain (8.4%)
10.Japan (8.1%)

Health Care Outcomes Worldwide

One of the most important measures of health is life expectancy at birth. According to the CIA World Factbook the United States ranks 50th in life expectancy out of 224 countries. Here is a list of the top 10 countries:

1.Macau (84.36)
2.Andorra (82.51)
3.Japan (82.12)
4.Singapore (81.98)
5.San Marino (81.97)
6.Hong Kong (81.86)
7.Australia (81.63)
8.Canada (81.23)
9.France (80.98)
10.Sweden (80.86)

~~
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How the United States Ranks Overall - World Health Organization

The WHO ranks France as the best overall health care system in the world. The United States ranks 37th while Canada ranks 30th.

1.France
2.Italy
3.San Marino
4.Andorra
5.Malta
6.Singapore
7.Spain
8.Oman
9.Austria
10.Japan

First in Spending 37th in Overall Performance

The United States spends the most money in the world on its health care system, as a percentage of GDP, and ranks 37th in overall performance. The United States' life expectancy rate of 78-years-old is indicative of a good health care system. However, it is important to remember that although the U.S. spends more money than any other country, we are only ranked 50th in life expectancy. In general when the U.S. health care system is compared to other developed nations in Europe and Asia, it does not do as well as might be expected. France, for example, spends considerably less the United States on health care, and yet it is ranked the highest in the world for overall performance.

Read more at Suite101: Where American Health Care Ranks in the World: The Facts About the United States Standing in World Health http://www.suite101.com/content/where-the-us-ranks-in-world-health-a150590#ixzz14j99s9uM

[Bennyboy]

3. But those other countries are like CANADA maaaaan.......

We are the US OF A and if we pay more it is better! The Rolling stones are better the more you pay, food is better the more you pay, cars are better the more you pay, handbags are better the more you pay....

[Recursion]

5. Two thoughts, though

1) It's hard to really compare life expectancies when people in other countries drive less, shoot at each other less, smoke less, don't have such extreme income inequality, and seem to actually occasionally care about what they eat (ie even with Canada's health care system, we would probably not live as long as Canadians on the whole).

the United States has the highest per capita health expenditures of any country in the OECD

This brings me to

2) Our delivery costs are insanely high. Even Medicare, Medicaid, and the VA -- systems that use more or less one of the payment systems that the other countries use, Medicare being like France, Medicaid like Canada, and the VA like England -- pay more for the same services and drugs than other countries' systems pay. With HCR we're (slowly) moving the rest of our health care system to something like the way Switzerland pays for health care, but there's no reason to think that's going to lower the costs to what Switzerland pays, either. And already it's hard to find a GP that takes Medicaid, or increasingly even Medicare.

There's a town in Texas where the per capita income is $12,000 and the per capita Medicare reimbursement is $15,000. Without changing a lot about how doctors and hospitals do business, private insurance and single payer are both going to be way too expensive.

[Uncle Joe]

6. No doubt, our reliance on for profit "health" insurance has driven up the cost of U.S. health-care.

Thanks for the thread, JohnWxy.