By Kara Masterson
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Global Health Observatory, 2.5 billion people still lack access to proper sanitation facilities. By contrast, the resources of industrialized nations should ensure stellar health and hygiene standards. Unfortunately, that’s not the case for the United States, which consistently falls behind every other industrialized nation when it comes to health care access, efficiency and expense.
Obamacare and Privatized Medicine
As the Affordable Care Act takes effect, health care continues to dominate the debates of pundits and politicians alike. Detractors don’t want to make insurance mandatory or fund health care services with tax dollars, while supporters want to prevent the deaths and bankruptcies that occur when health care is a privatized, for-profit industry.
The United States has a host of nationwide health problems that need to be addressed. According to recent Bloomberg rankings, France, Canada, Switzerland and the United Kingdom are among the countries that consistently outperform America in everything from life expectancy to affordability of emergency surgery.
Failing to Prevent Deaths
Though health care professionals attend 99 percent of all births in the United States, infant mortality continues to plague Americans disproportionately. The National Institutes of Health studied the seventeen wealthiest nations in 2013, and the United States topped their lists for rates of infant mortality, teen pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases, heart and lung disease, and even general disability and injury.
These preventable conditions, deaths and illnesses increase overall health care expenses in the United States, but those same expenses keep people from the information and resources that could protect them. A Harvard Medical School study discovered that in 2009 alone, 45,000 people died because they didn’t have health care coverage that would have funded life-saving treatments or early diagnoses.
Expenses vs. Efficiency
Despite the inferior results and poor availability of American health care services, they’re actually far more expensive than in any other country. In 2013, the United States spent the most on health care both per capita (nearly $9,000) and as a percentage of its total GDP (17 percent).
While their babies are more likely to die, the majority of American mothers actually spend at least $15,000 on C-sections and $10,000 on normal deliveries. The International Federation of Health Plans discovered that the next-highest rates were in Australia, France, Netherlands and the Switzerland, where fewer infants die and the same procedures cost less than $5,000.
The Commonwealth Fund put it simply: American health care has the worst quality, yet the highest cost. This imbalance between expense and value has contributed to an inefficient health care system that continues to fall behind its peers.
The government is trying to work to decrease cost as well as increase efficiency in the healthcare industry. This is the aim of many Obamacare incentives, as well as medical programs such as ACO’s.
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