US Health System Ranks Last Compared to Other Countries: Studies

[babylonsister]

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/05/15/1198/

US Health System Ranks Last Compared to Other Countries: Studies

WASHINGTON - The US health care system ranks last among other major rich countries for quality, access and efficiency, according to two studies released Tuesday by a health care think tank.

The studies by the Commonwealth Fund found that the United States, which has the most expensive health system in the world, underperforms consistently relative to other countries and differs most notably in the fact that Americans have no universal health insurance coverage. 0515 03

“The United States stands out as the only nation in these studies that does not ensure access to health care through universal coverage and promotion of a ‘medical home’ for patients,” said Commonwealth Fund president Karen Davis.

“Our failure to ensure health insurance for all and encourage stable, long-term ties between physicians and patients shows in our poor performance on measures of quality, access, efficiency, equity, and health outcomes.”

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[TahitiNut]

1. Nonsense!!! It obviously ranks FIRST ...

... in profits. :evilgrin:

[warren pease]

3. Also first in innovation in dealing with the poor and uninsured...

Rather than conceding the old saw that "the poor are always with us," the US has actually figured out a legal, financially sound and socially acceptable system that condemns the indigent or uninsured to a squalid, painful death, untreated or even seen by a health professional, wasting away from any among an encyclopedia of horrid diseases -- but most morally uplifting, giving the poor the deep satisfaction of allowing them to serve their masters even in death.

In sacrificing themselves on the altar of the market economy, the poor can go to their eternal reward with the inner peace and deep contentment of knowing that their death served society by freeing up scarce hospital bed space needed by the wealthy.

And physicians get a break, too, since they can spend the majority of their time contributing to the vibrant (and expensive) good health of the rich rather than dealing with the sordid panoply of medical horrors that characterize the traditional ill-health of the poor: wheezing, hacking, oozing, scabby, incontinent, lacerated, fractured, dislocated, shot, stabbed or beaten. Sometimes all of the above.

Yup; any sane doc would rather treat a dowager with the vapors than an indigent with infected pustules. And any bottom-line oriented society would rather keep the wealthy dowager consuming expensive gee-gaws, while doing its best to shorten the life of the non-indigent. It's just sound fiscal policy.


wp

[Double T]

2. But 'we' all thought we were living in the greatest nation on earth.......

'of', 'by' and 'for' the people. How did our health care system get hijacked by the greedy SOB corporate and medical profiteers???