Why do we need health reform? Don’t we have the best health care system in the world?
No. Not even close.
According to a study released yesterday by the Commonwealth Fund, “Compared with six other nations–Australia, Canada, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom–the U.S. health care system ranks last or next-to-last on five dimensions of a high performance health system: quality, access, efficiency, equity, and healthy lives.” [emphasis added].
The report goes on to note “Newly enacted health reform legislation in the U.S. will start to address these problems by extending coverage to those without and helping to close gaps in coverage–leading to improved disease management, care coordination, and better outcomes over time.”
While there’s no question there are some very, very good hospitals, physicians, and other providers in the US, this isn’t about individual providers – it measures the entire ‘system’.
The report was based on surveys of patients and primary care providers and data on outcomes from previous Commonwealth Fund research.
While the report notes a major failing of our system is a failure to provide coverage for all Americans, even when access issues are not considered, we still rank below the other countries on most measures. This is particularly valid when considering cost, the only area where we rank far above the other six countries.
The top-ranked country overall is the Netherlands, followed by the oft-decried Brits. But the most troubling finding is not a shortcoming on one of the various measures of quality or cost; the US ranks lowest in living long, healthy, productive lives.
“The U.S. ranks last overall with poor scores on all three indicators of long, healthy, and productive lives. The U.S. and U.K. had much higher death rates in 2003 from conditions amenable to medical care than some of the other countries, e.g., rates 25 percent to 50 percent higher than Canada and Australia. ”
What does this mean for you?
The newly-enacted reform bill will help improve access, quality, technology usage, and other metrics.
But we’re still going to be – far and away – the most cost-inefficient system in the world.
Jun
24
The newly enacted reform might be a step in the right direction but we’ll never get control of costs unless we switch to a single-payer plan. We also need to better manage end-of-life care. The current system is basically a blank check to providers, hospital systems, drug companies and so-called managed care organizations.
Health care costs are he no. 1 reason the deficit projections look so bad. If we spent what other countries spend and trimmed back our military spending, our long-term deficit problem would be solved. We might even have surpluses.
The health care reform initiative was more of an insurance reform project and not health care. We should look at not only the cost of defensive medicine, but the food industry using pesticides and herbicides that are carcinogenic in our food. The extensive use of MSG in almost all processed food as well as the impact of processed meats containing sulfites and bovine growth hormone as well as antibiotic use in animals. This fosters disease complexes, diabetes, heart disease, obesity. When are we going to learn to avoid disease rather than wait for it to occur and then try to control? When will the gov’t agency’s help to avoid disease and be more diligent in allowing drugs on the market that have more potential side effects than benefit.