USA: Private Healthcare Kills

According to a study published in the academic journal Health Affairs, the United States now ranks 49th in the world in overall life expectancy, a dramatic fall from just a few years ago. In 1999, the US ranked 24th.

“As of September 23, 2010, the United States ranked forty-ninth for both male and female life expectancy combined,” concludes the study, conducted by Columbia University health policy professors Peter A. Muennig and Sherry A. Glied.

The report found the prime culprit of the plunge to be America’s deteriorating health care system, marred by ever-rising costs and growing numbers of uninsured and under-insured individuals.

Noting that the United States spends over twice as much per capita on health care than other industrialized nations, it adds: “The observation that Americans are spending relatively more on health but living relatively shorter, less healthy lives has led some critics to allege that the US health care system is ‘uniquely inefficient.’”

Photo: Steve Rhodes The findings present a stark contrast to the claim by defenders of for-profit healthcare that the United States has the best health care system in the world. The United States remains the only advanced industrialized country without a universal health care program. In short, unless you are wealthy, US capitalism is deadly dangerous to your health!

Thanks to Healthcare Now! for information used in this article.

Source: Socialist Appeal (USA)