According to Some Metrics …
The Commonwealth Fund reported last year:
The United States health care system is the most expensive in the world, but this report and prior editions consistently show the U.S. underperforms relative to other countries on most dimensions of performance. Among the 11 nations studied in this report—Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and the United States—the U.S. ranks last, as it did in the 2010, 2007, 2006, and 2004 editions of Mirror, Mirror. Most troubling, the U.S. fails to achieve better health outcomes than the other countries, and as shown in the earlier editions, the U.S. is last or near last on dimensions of access, efficiency, and equity. In this edition of Mirror, Mirror, the United Kingdom ranks first, followed closely by Switzerland
While UK residents averaged $3,405 per year on healthcare costs (the second-lowest, trailing only New Zealand), Americans paid $8,508 per year. And yet Commonwealth ranked the UK as number 1 for healthcare, and the U.S. dead last … 11th out of 11 industrialized nations.
Of course, Commonwealth’s main complaints with U.S. healthcare are access, efficiency and equity:
In other words, America’s extreme inequality – and lack of socialized medicine – means that healthcare is only good for those who have enough cash to pay for it.
