Despite Americans paying nearly double that of other nations, the US fares poorly in list of 10 countries

Despite Americans paying nearly double that of other nations, the US fares poorly in list of 10 countries

The United States health system ranked dead last in an international comparison of 10 peer nations, according to a new report by the Commonwealth Fund.

In spite of Americans paying nearly double that of other countries, the system performed poorly on health equity, access to care and outcomes.

“I see the human toll of these shortcomings on a daily basis,” said Dr Joseph Betancourt, the president of the Commonwealth Fund, a foundation with a focus on healthcare research and policy.

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The fund said the US would need to expand insurance coverage and make “meaningful” improvements on the amount of healthcare expenses patients pay themselves; minimize the complexity and variation in insurance plans to improve administrative efficiency; build a viable primary care and public health system; and invest in social wellbeing, rather than thrust problems of social inequity onto the health system.

  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.worldEnglish
    51·
    18 hours ago

    The line I’ve heard is

    best in the world for those who can afford it

    But medicine is still an industry that benefits from economy of scale. It still benefits from public sector R&D. It still benefits from robust safety regulations and enforcement of best practices.

    We’ve been chipping away at all of that. Hell, we’re straight up closing hospitals and clinics all over the country, purely because so few of them are economically viable when pitted against a ruthless private insurance market.

    If they instead ranked the results by which system generated the most private profits

    There are sectors that bring in big profits, but they’re extracting those profits from the sectors that deliver the medicine.

    The snake is eating it’s own tail. This isn’t a long term strategy for profit. Every quarterly cycle leans harder on Medicaid and Medicare as the private systems fail.