I know this debate has been raging on this Board reflecting just how emotive an issue it is but have you considered that you may not be getting the bang you think for your buck

It seems the average person in the US spends more on health care than UK or France, sufferers a higher infant mortality rate and has a lower life expectancy. Now I know this could be considered heresy but just maybe the system is broken

Now please don't rush in and shoot the messenger because I post this just to get some new statistics into the debate and maybe those in the US might realise they don't live in the best of all possible worlds where health care is concerned

Which article?
I saw a bunch of articles for Asia.

And NO we are not getting any bang for our buck. Especially when you get older and end up in a nursing home... they kill you there!!

I tried to post this link earlier but it didn't work but I will try again
BBC NEWS | Health | Healthcare around the world

Look it is well known here that to rely on the public system could kill you but there are poor medicos everywhere, yes nursing homes run for a profit are a problem but who is going to take it on?

It's not the nursing homes run for a profit that are a problem here. They give fine quality care .But it is expensive and ultimately the person in the nursing home ends up in a public run, urine stinkin, holding pen of a nursing home. Government run on full display.

The devil is in the details on statistics . Infant mortality as an example is just a question of how they are counted.

The United States counts all births as live if they show any sign of life, regardless of prematurity or size. This includes what many other countries report as stillbirths. In Austria and Germany, fetal weight must be at least 500 grams (1 pound) to count as a live birth; in other parts of Europe, such as Switzerland, the fetus must be at least 30 centimeters (12 inches) long. In Belgium and France, births at less than 26 weeks of pregnancy are registered as lifeless.And some countries don't reliably register babies who die within the first 24 hours of birth. Thus, the United States is sure to report higher infant mortality rates.

Our life expectency numbers are lower not because of the quality of our care ;but other factors like we ranked first or near first in:automobile deaths, drug and alcohol related deaths, obeisety related deaths, and homicide.These are cultural related factors and not quality of care .

And of course we all have a difference of opinions on how to contain costs. I think there are some reforms that could be implemented that would make real costs reductions that would not require the dismantling of the system... or more accurate... taking a wrecking ball to a system that covers almost 20% of the GDP , as the President and Congress want to do in a bumrush fashion.
We already see their vision for cost containment... deny care... it is written into their bills ,and is written extensively by the "thinkers" who authored the model that the dems used as a template and a formula when crafting their bill.

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Originally Posted by tomder55

The devil is in the details on statistics . Infant mortality as an example is just a question of how they are counted.

T

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A fine political answer, Tom, the statistics have been twisted, we are more truthful than anyone else, and in any case our system represents too much of the GDP to reform. Why do you guys bother electing politicians, you should just let your local doctors elect the President and by the way that last excuse is used for climate change as well, so now you have two things you can do nothing about because of the impact on GDP. What happens when one effects the economy so much you can't afford the other?

The reality is it's only the poor people who can't afford health care and they don't contribute much of the GDP, actually they are a drag on the GDP aren't they? Not keeping up their share of making the doctors rich by increasing the take of the medical profession. I have news for you, you have been counting the wrong things in GDP. GDP is product not services and the reason you can't afford the services is you have stopped making the product. That is a macroeconomic lesson for you.

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Originally Posted by tomder55

it's not the nursing homes run for a profit that are a problem here. they give fine quality care .But it is expensive and ultimately the person in the nursing home ends up in a public run, urine stinkin, holding pen of a nursing home. Government run on full display.

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Really! You have government run nursing homes? No wonder you have a problem.
What we have here is that the government gives a benefit for every nursing home patient and the patient makes up the difference, or not, perhaps, but it doesn't run nursing homes. But then we have a different philosophy of life to what is obviously common there

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The reality is it's only the poor people who can't afford health care and they don't contribute much of the GDP, actually they are a drag on the GDP aren't they? Not keeping up their share of making the doctors rich by increasing the take of the medical profession. I have news for you, you have been counting the wrong things in GDP. GDP is product not services and the reason you can't afford the services is you have stopped making the product. That is a macroeconomic lesson for you.

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Nonsense ;our medical device ,pharmaceuticals industries etc are the best in the world .

Also if the concern is the poor ,then there are social systems in place in the country to account for their difficulties. As has been posted already ,our gvt provided care is a significant proportion of the overall system we have. In fact ;a large part of the costs associated with gvt provided care is one of the prime reasons that costs are high .

On infant mortality rate UK

The babies born in hospital corridors: Bed shortage forces 4,000 mothers to give birth in lifts, offices and hospital toilets | Mail Online

Hard to believe the Brits are giving better prenatal care then we are .

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Why do you guys bother electing politicians, you should just let your local doctors elect the President

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At least doctors take oaths to do no harm.

Please take DailyMail articles with a grain of salt - they are the National Enquirer of England. Here's more fun reading for you from that site: Femail | Mail Online

I'll take it into consideration . I advise the same caution from linking with the NY Slimes or... see my posting today about CBS

Here is the only thing I look at. According to the World Health Organization the US is ranked 37. Something needs to be fixed. If France is ranked number 1 then maybe we should check out what they are doing. The link below shows all the rankings.

The World Health Organization's ranking of the world's health systems

In a few minutes I expect certain people here to crap all over WHO because they don't like the findings.

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Originally Posted by NeedKarma

In a few minutes I expect certain people here to crap all over WHO because they don't like the findings.

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Gee I wonder who would do that?

I have already said my peace about that discredited organization.

Right on cue!

Hahahahahahhahahahahahah!!

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Originally Posted by paraclete

The reality is it's only the poor people who can't afford health care and they don't contribute much of the GDP, actually they are a drag on the GDP aren't they? Not keeping up their share of making the doctors rich by increasing the take of the medical profession. I have news for you, you have been counting the wrong things in GDP. GDP is product not services and the reason you can't afford the services is you have stopped making the product. That is a macroeconomic lesson for you.

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How about another little look at the numbers. Hospitals agreed to "contribute $155 billion in cost savings over 10 years" to help pay for Obamacare. IN return, the hospitals are projecting to receive about $171 billion in new dollars from the newly insured. You know, all those poor people that can't afford insurance or health care. So the hospitals are forecasting a $16 billion gain from cutting costs for Obamacare.

Here's the kicker:

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But some experts wonder at the price of that political support. Alain Enthoven, a health economist at Stanford University, noted that $155 billion was only about 1.5 percent of total hospital revenue over 10 years — even before taking into account the new, larger amount of money that hospitals can expect if more people have insurance.

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$155 billion is only 1.5 percent of total revenue? That's the cost to hospitals for treating the uninsured, less than 2 percent of hospital revenue?

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Originally Posted by paraclete

I know this debate has been raging on this Board reflecting just how emotive an issue it is but have you considered that you may not be getting the bang you think for your buck

It seems the average person in the US spends more on health care than UK or France, sufferers a higher infant mortality rate and has a lower life expectancy. Now I know this could be considered heresy but just maybe the system is broken.

Now please don't rush in and shoot the messenger because I post this just to get some new statistics into the debate and maybe those in the US might realise they don't live in the best of all possible worlds where health care is concerned

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Here's the problem with the statistics that you are citing... the USA and the European countries don't measure infant mortality the same way.

In the UK and France, if a baby dies beneath a certain birth weight, it is considered never to have been born at all, and is ignored in the statistics. So the death of an infant below a certain birthweight is never taken into consideration. Also, babies that die after premature birth (regardless of weight) are not always taken into consideration in the statistics. In the USA, the statistics include births of babies of ALL WEIGHTS and all gestation periods. Under those circumstances, yes, you are going to get a disparity in the statistics. I wonder what the infant mortality rates would be if ALL BABIES BORN IN THE UK AND FRANCE were considered in their statistics.

What the statistics also don't show is that the number of premies that are saved in the USA is MUCH HIGHER than the number saved in any other country in the world. We have the technology to save babies that are born as small as 1 pound fairly regularly, whereas in other countries such babies are ABANDONED by the medical system, and are never even considered born at all.

So, like Babe Ruth, we have more strikeouts, but we also have more home-runs than anyone else. And the home runs FAR OUTPACE the strikeouts.

I'd say that that's money VERY WELL spent.

Well if you believe that Costa Rica (ranked 36) has a superior health care system then ours there is little left to talk about.