Guess Which Countries Have Government-run Health Care
An Investor's Business Daily article provided some interesting statistics from a survey by the United Nations International Health Organization (see citation at bottom):
Percentage of men and women who survived a cancer five years after diagnosis:
U.S. 65%
England 46%
Canada 42%
Percentage of patients diagnosed with diabetes who received treatment within six months:
U.S. 93%
England 15%
Canada 43%
Percentage of seniors needing hip replacement who received it within six months:
U.S. 90%
England 15%
Canada 43%
Percentage referred to a medical specialist who see one within one month:
U.S. 77%
England 40%
Canada 43%
Number of MRI scanners (a prime diagnostic tool) per million people:
U.S. 71
England 14
Canada 18
Percentage of seniors (65+), with low income, who say they are in "excellent health":
U.S. 12%
England 2%
Canada 6%
I don't know about you, but I don't think I want "Universal Healthcare" comparable to England or Canada. Moreover, it was Sen. Harry Reid who said, "Elderly Americans must learn to accept the inconveniences of old age."
He is "elderly" himself, but be sure to remember his health insurance is much different from yours as Congress has their own high-end coverage! He will never have to learn to accept inconveniences. The fact of the matter is that "some" participants in both Canada's and Britain's systems get excellent care, but many do not. The overall figures don't lie.
Makeup of the Cabinet
The percentage of each past president's cabinet who had worked in the private business sector prior to their appointment to the cabinet. You know what the "private business sector" is... a real life business, not a government job. Here are the percentages:
T. Roosevelt........ 38%
Taft................ 40%
Wilson ............. 52%
Harding............ . 49%
Coolidge............ 48%
Hoover ............. 42%
F. Roosevelt...... 50%
Truman.............. 50%
Eisenhower.........57%
Kennedy........... 30%
Johnson............ 47%
Nixon............... 53%
Ford............... . 42%
Carter.............. 32%
Reagan............ 56%
GH Bush......... 51%
Clinton ............ 39%
GW Bush......... 55%
And the winner of the Chicken Dinner is:
Obama..... 8%!
Yep! That's right! Only eight percent -- or possibly as high as 20%, depending on whose work you are studying -- but still the least by far of the last 19 presidents. And these people are trying to tell our big corporations how to run their businesses? They know what's best for GM... Chrysler... Wall Street... the health care complex -- and you and me? This is your progressive Liberal agenda at work.
How can the president of a major nation and society -- the one with the most successful economic system in world history -- stand and talk about business when he's never worked for one? Or about jobs when it appears that up to 92% of his senior staff and closest advisers have spent most of their time in academia, government and/or non-profit jobs.
Incidentally, the moment you publish this information (which is puported to be "fake") you are bound to get responses. I should mention that the information is from a May, 2009 Investors Business Daily article which itself is based on information from Rep Mark Kirk (R-IL), which his office compiled from a variety of valid sources:
http://kirk.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3621&Itemid=88
The Cabinet data was originally presented by Michael Cembalest in an article in Forbes:
http://www.forbes.com/2009/11/24/michael-cembalest-obama-business-beltway-cabinet.html
Cembalest later admitted to some inaccuracies, but the overall thrust of his work is valid.
The information is not "fake", it is actually fairly well-researched. It's just that it has traveled around the Net in what some consider a slanted format that they find particularly difficult to digest.
Percentage of men and women who survived a cancer five years after diagnosis:
U.S. 65%
England 46%
Canada 42%
Percentage of patients diagnosed with diabetes who received treatment within six months:
U.S. 93%
England 15%
Canada 43%
Percentage of seniors needing hip replacement who received it within six months:
U.S. 90%
England 15%
Canada 43%
Percentage referred to a medical specialist who see one within one month:
U.S. 77%
England 40%
Canada 43%
Number of MRI scanners (a prime diagnostic tool) per million people:
U.S. 71
England 14
Canada 18
Percentage of seniors (65+), with low income, who say they are in "excellent health":
U.S. 12%
England 2%
Canada 6%
I don't know about you, but I don't think I want "Universal Healthcare" comparable to England or Canada. Moreover, it was Sen. Harry Reid who said, "Elderly Americans must learn to accept the inconveniences of old age."
He is "elderly" himself, but be sure to remember his health insurance is much different from yours as Congress has their own high-end coverage! He will never have to learn to accept inconveniences. The fact of the matter is that "some" participants in both Canada's and Britain's systems get excellent care, but many do not. The overall figures don't lie.
Makeup of the Cabinet
The percentage of each past president's cabinet who had worked in the private business sector prior to their appointment to the cabinet. You know what the "private business sector" is... a real life business, not a government job. Here are the percentages:
T. Roosevelt........ 38%
Taft................ 40%
Wilson ............. 52%
Harding............ . 49%
Coolidge............ 48%
Hoover ............. 42%
F. Roosevelt...... 50%
Truman.............. 50%
Eisenhower.........57%
Kennedy........... 30%
Johnson............ 47%
Nixon............... 53%
Ford............... . 42%
Carter.............. 32%
Reagan............ 56%
GH Bush......... 51%
Clinton ............ 39%
GW Bush......... 55%
And the winner of the Chicken Dinner is:
Obama..... 8%!
Yep! That's right! Only eight percent -- or possibly as high as 20%, depending on whose work you are studying -- but still the least by far of the last 19 presidents. And these people are trying to tell our big corporations how to run their businesses? They know what's best for GM... Chrysler... Wall Street... the health care complex -- and you and me? This is your progressive Liberal agenda at work.
How can the president of a major nation and society -- the one with the most successful economic system in world history -- stand and talk about business when he's never worked for one? Or about jobs when it appears that up to 92% of his senior staff and closest advisers have spent most of their time in academia, government and/or non-profit jobs.
Incidentally, the moment you publish this information (which is puported to be "fake") you are bound to get responses. I should mention that the information is from a May, 2009 Investors Business Daily article which itself is based on information from Rep Mark Kirk (R-IL), which his office compiled from a variety of valid sources:
http://kirk.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3621&Itemid=88
The Cabinet data was originally presented by Michael Cembalest in an article in Forbes:
http://www.forbes.com/2009/11/24/michael-cembalest-obama-business-beltway-cabinet.html
Cembalest later admitted to some inaccuracies, but the overall thrust of his work is valid.
The information is not "fake", it is actually fairly well-researched. It's just that it has traveled around the Net in what some consider a slanted format that they find particularly difficult to digest.
Incidentally, I often get blog comments to the tune of “you should stick to coding issues”, indicating that my political views are distasteful to the commenter. I started this UnBlog a long time ago, and since the day of it’s inception, the Masthead has stated “Pete’s views on .NET, Politics, and Everything else that’s wrong in the world”. I write about what I think is interesting or important, and above all, I try to get people to THINK. I almost always approve comments that oppose my view, unless they are outright ad-hominem attacks. Do you disagree with what I have to say? I respect your opinion.
Could you please provide a link to (or cite) your resources for these statistics?
ReplyDeleteDid you know that England banned jews for 350 years?
ReplyDeleteSo apparently Universal Healthcare for senior citizens (Medicare) and the social safety net that has reduced the poverty rate for senior citizens (Social Security) is working rather well...
ReplyDelete@Clay,
ReplyDeleteI have updated the post with an appropriate source
I read your others posts and I think really showed your character when you said:
ReplyDelete"If I sound partisan, it's because I have become so, with America becoming so incredibly polarized. Now maybe the Bush-hating left wing elite media establishment will shut up for the next four years and we can get on with business!"
Your writings are extremely biased and I know it became cool to be one sided in the US when Bush said "If you aren't with us, you are against us" but really, I would much rather see a well balanced argument rather than a one sided tirade in the style of Fox or CNN.
To blame everything on Obama that has happened in the economy would be delusional - do you not remember that your entire economy started to take a nose dive during the presidential debates but yet you seem to blame everything on Obama? Take note that the President before him helped spend your way into the current recession by spending billions on a war based off falsified information. Also note that your recession is due to the housing rules that were helped put in by Clinton. If you are unaware of that, then I suggest you do a bit of reading on the sub-mortgage crisis.
I came to your site looking for code information but was instead shown a heavily biased post. It makes it hard for me to read your blog when I know how one sided you can be in other areas. It makes me wonder if you take the same approach to your coding.
Approve this or not, it's up to you but you really should dig more and realize that no one drop of water blames itself for the flood. It takes a lot more than one person and 18 months to bring a country to it's knees. You think Rome was undone by one person in the span of 18 months?
Also, this whole Left wing liberal media thing you talk about is quite humourous. Both political parties have huge investments into media propoganda because it is a time proven method of getting the public on your side.
Personally, I think the polarization in your country is the single greatest threat to your continued existence as a superpower. I remember when politicans would work together but it seems that since 9/11, things are only black and white in your country. I hope you realize that there are many many shades of gray in between on most issues you read about in the news.
@Anonymous,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comment. I write about whatever I think is important. The Masthead for my UnBlog has stated this since the day I started it.
Here's another article comparing health care in the US vs countries abroad.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/healthday/640404.html?chan=rss_topStories_ssi_5
In regard to US health care:
ReplyDelete"At least 15.3% of the population is completely uninsured, and a substantial additional portion of the population (35%) is "underinsured", or not able to cover the costs of their medical needs."
- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_care_in_the_United_States
The statistics shown in your post are misleading. The comparative percentages are based on those who have coverage and who report the illnesses (What about those without coverage? See further below for references to unreported illness). As per Wikipedia's description above (see sources via the link), we would see inflation in numbers at minimum of 15% and up to 35%, pertaining specifically for the numbers reported for the US once we compare apples to apples, not just those in the US who have appropriate coverage.
I would strongly encourage readers to do their own research on the subject as most of these types of posts omit essential information in order to distort or better support their argument.
For example: Peter's reference article uses the 2008 Commonwealth Fund International Health Policy Survey of Sicker Adults.
Link: http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/media/Files/Surveys/2008/The%202008%20Commonwealth%20Fund%20International%20Health%20Policy%20Survey%20of%20Sicker%20Adults/Surveypg_Schoen_inchroniccondition_1190_itl%20pdf.pdf
In the opening Synopsis we see charted the differences in health care of chronically ill adults. The first item on the chart compares Access problem because of cost.
US: 54%.
Canada: 25%.
UK: 13%.
54% of chronically ill patients in the US did not fill RX prescriptions, Skipped Doctor recommended doses and did not visit a doctor with a medical problem or get the recommended test, treatment or follow up.
Sorry Peter. Your reference article statistics are so heavily distorted, the comparative values are meaningless.
See for yourself. The privatized health care in the US shows the worst statistics in all three displayed categories in the linked PDF. No mention of these statistics in Congressman Mark Kirk's article nor yours.
So. Ask me if I'd rather wait an extra month to see a specialist as a Canadian or possibly not having the proper coverage as an American but having the potential of receiving quicker treatment. I'll wait the extra month.
Ask me if I would trade in my Canadian health care card for a privatized health care coverage card issued by my insurer. Not a chance.
The information presented by Peter warrants further research. I hope you take the time to look at all of the facts, not just the statistics shown by Congressman Mark Kirk.
Follow the trail of his (Kirk's) references and you'll begin to see that the privatized health care system in the US has fundamental flaws. Not to mention an enormous percentage of it's people who do not have access to basic health care.
@Bjorn,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. I think you are on the right track when you point out that a significant percentage of Americans cannot afford treatment. So what we have to do is provide the funding for them, perhaps on a sliding scale. We do not need to have a government-run, nationalized healthcare system to accomplish this. Unfortunately, with the Obamacare health bill, that is what we are getting.
So now, we're on to a new topic. Who can run the health care system more efficiently?
ReplyDeleteDo we want a private institution versus the government to manage the industry?
Are private companies more efficient?
Maybe. But the statistics show otherwise. What's shown is that government has the ability to be MORE efficient than private institutions.
Again, see http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/media/Files/Surveys/2008/The%202008%20Commonwealth%20Fund%20International%20Health%20Policy%20Survey%20of%20Sicker%20Adults/Surveypg_Schoen_inchroniccondition_1190_itl%20pdf.pdf for reference.
(Chart to the right of the Synopsis)
My conclusion from what I read in your above comment regarding a sliding scale system, is that those who can afford it deserve the best, while those who can't, get what they're given.
I ask:
Why the segregation based on social status?
Are we unable to accomplish equal global coverage for all citizens? Sure we can. There are countries that do. But for some reason, those who have top tier coverage (paid for), do not want to see those without gaining access to the same level of care. I wonder why?
From your article, the opinion expressed is that government run health care institutions are worse than those privately run. And based on the statics you reference, that looks to be true. Until we start looking at all of the factors. Then it becomes evidently clear that privately run institutions are anything but better unless you actually have coverage. Even then, not always. Again, see the above referenced material.
The sly tactics used in the private health care system (pre-existing conditions for example) leave me with the dreadful thought of not being covered even while paying premiums. Under an equal coverage system, everyone has the same level of care and thus those issues vanish. We no longer have an agent sitting in a cubicle deciding the outcome of your medical application.
The media depicts government run health care poorly by using statics to show increased duration in wait times or surgeries. What isn't mentioned is that these governments provide these services to everyone, not those who can afford it. Comparatively speaking, we're looking at apples and oranges.
EVERYONE has access to the medical facilities nearest them (in Canada anyway) along with access to the best treatment for their illness, regardless of social status.
"So what we have to do is provide the funding for them"
Under no circumstance would this model be acceptable to any profit driven organization without massive reform. Again. Look at the mandate of ANY profit centric company. They're in business to make money. Period.
That leaves the obvious choice for who should run health care. If they are incapable, time for a new government. The beauty of democracy.
Nixon............... 53%
ReplyDeleteMany of whom became convicted felons later.
:)
"Cembalest later admitted to some inaccuracies,". Then you should toss the data, not try to whiteash it with "but the thrust..." Bad data helps not argument.
ReplyDeleteThe bottom line is this: On average, we have a less healthy, more obese population than most developed countries, a glaring failure of private health insurance. Do you really think a private, for-profit health insurance company wants to pay continuously to keep its ''sick'' customers healthy?
Blorn, thanks for taking the time to set the record straight.
My understanding is that the US is not getting a "government-run, nationalized healthcare system".
ReplyDeleteI believe there is an attempt to get everybody, or almost everybody, covered by some level of basic health care insurance, by forcing people to buy insurance from private companies and giving subsidies if they can't afford it.
This amounts to the government subsidizing insurance companies to extend the coverage already provided partly by companies and partly through government programs like Medicare.
The only objection I can see is to the idea of forcing people to buy insurance. There may be some people who don't have insurance because they are so wealthy they don't need it, not many I imagine, given the costs. For them, it's like a tax and probably a small one compared to their income. Most people who don't have insurance probably either can't afford it, or don't want it, but those people will very likely end up using sevices at some point that will have to be subsidized by the government anyway. This way, they pay what they can of their share to support these inevitable subsidies, so that's like an indirect tax too, a payment on future services.
This is far from "government run nationalized health care". Obama's changes are not socialism. They are more like a way of preserving as much capitalism as possible in the insurance system, while ensuring everybody is covered by insurance. It probably costs more than if the government assumed more of the insurance role itself, but that would generate even more screams of "socialism", and a lot of anger in the powerful insurance industry.
"Government-run nationalized health care" is not necessarily even an accurate description of all the systems in other democratic countries. They're all a private/public mix. They all have more public involvement than the US and they are all cheaper because of it. Whether or not the US system is better depends on what statistics you look at. The ones posted here look like they were chosen to prove a political point. There are more comprehensive studies that show the US system as far from the best when various effects on the overall population are considered. One only has to google around on "countries health systems" to find them, or add "comparisons".