Americans spend far more on healthcare than do people almost everywhere else, healthcare executives and physicians get paid far more than do their equivalents in other nations, and the nation’s medical outcomes lag most of the Developed World.
So perhaps it’s no surprise that a new report finds the U.S. healthcare system among the least-cost-and-outcomes-efficient in the world.
Bloomberg News reported:
“America was 50th out of 55 countries in 2014, according to a Bloomberg index that assesses life expectancy, health-care spending per capita and relative spending as a share of gross domestic product. Expenditures averaged $9,403 per person, about 17.1 percent of GDP, that year — the most recent for which data are available — and life expectancy was 78.9. Only Jordan, Colombia, Azerbaijan, Brazil and Russia ranked lower.
“The U.S. has lagged near the bottom of the Bloomberg Health-Care Efficiency Index since it was created, in 2012. Hong Kong and Singapore — consistently at the top — are smaller countries with less diverse populations. Their governments also play a stronger role in regulating and providing care, with spending per capita averaging $2,386 and longevity averaging about 83 years.”
“The U.S. system ‘tends to be more fragmented, less organized and coordinated, and that’s likely to lead to inefficiency,’ said Paul Ginsburg, a professor at the University of Southern California and director of the Center for Health Policy at the Brookings Institution in Washington.”
To read the Bloomberg article, please hit this link.