Health Care worse than in Slovenia

This article in today's NYT sums it up -- for all the talk about how great the US healthcare system is, fact are pretty stubborn and lag behind most nations:

A child in the United States is two-and-a-half times as likely to die by age 5 as in Singapore or Sweden, and an American woman is 11 times as likely to die in childbirth as a woman in Ireland.
...
“I will never forget standing outside the chemo treatment room knowing that the medication needed to save my life was only a few feet away, but that because I had private insurance it wasn’t available to me,” Linda wrote. “I read a comment from someone saying that they didn’t want a faceless government bureaucrat deciding if they would or would not get treatment. Well, a faceless bureaucrat from my private insurance made the decision that I wouldn’t get treatment and that I wasn’t worth saving.”

I rest my case.

Originally posted by buddhasystem

I rest my case.

You made a case?

The article lumps together some sobering statistics, but doesn't necessarily link those to the health care system, nor does the article prove that the Congress can build a better health care system.

Comparing the US population as diverse as it is to countries like Sweden or even Slovenia is pretty ridiculous without controlling for myriad variables.

This piece is an op/ed and doesn't bother to "make a case," only to express a pretty flimsy opinion.

So, I ask again, "What case?"



[edit on 2009/11/5 by GradyPhilpott]

Originally posted by GradyPhilpott
The article lumps together some sobering statistics, but doesn't necessarily link those to the health care system, nor does the article prove that the Congress can build a better health care system.

That proof was clearly outside of the scope of the article. As you put it, sobering statistics it was.

Comparing the US population as diverse as it is to countries like Sweden or even Slovenia is pretty ridiculous without controlling for myriad variables.

All right, what does diversity have to do with health care? Switzerland has 4 pretty distinct nations in it, too.

So, I ask again, "What case?"

The case is: there is a myth perpetrated upon the American public that our healthcare is the best ever, and this aint true.