Inflating the US infant mortality rate

Reasons why this is a poor measure when evaluating the US health care system:

On it’s face, the statistics appear damning: according to a Save The Children report funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the US has the penultimate newborn mortality rate in the developed world–only Latvia ranks lower. Our current infant mortality rate of 6.4 per 1,000 live births is high compared with the 3.2 to 3.6 per 1,000 estimated for the three top-scoring countries in the world-Iceland, Finland, and Japan. One has to focus a critical eye on the statistics to understand what they really say about American health care for newborns: the US provides some of the best care for neonates in the world.

Comments

Anonymous
She writes:
“In the Canadian system, or any nationalized health care plan, how much money something is going to cost comes first. When you are paying for your own health care, your satisfaction comes first. This is why there are countries that won’t try to resuscitate a 25 week old baby–it costs the government too much money.”
First of all, Canada does not have a nationalized health plan. England does, but Canada and England have vastly different systems. If she’s going to comment on a foreign healthcare system, then she should at least know what kind of system it is.
Second, in the U.S. it is only when you are wealthy that your own satisfaction comes first over cost. There are middle-class people who definitely have to consider cost as the #1 factor, and plenty of people who simply don’t have enough money for any care, and so can’t even begin to experience any satisfaction. The problem is that these people don’t count – they’re erroneously all dismissed as being irresponsible, or quite simply ignored.
Third, she cites one of the possible reasons for the higher mortality rate as the fact that America is more racially and economically diverse. This means that there are higher extremes of poverty and wealth, and more visible minorities. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that race is a big factor in determining income, and that income has a direct effect on health.
Finally, the U.S. government spends 18.5% of its revenue on healthcare, higher than any other G8 country despite the fact that all other G8 countries provide more healthcare services. This is likely due to the fact that instead of providing universal preventative care, the taxpayers are stuck providing expensive emergency care more often in less appropriate situations.
Anonymous
It is due to the fact that Americans believe that their is a technological solution to every problem–including death, old age, and ugliness.
Jamila Akil
First of all, Canada does not have a nationalized health plan. England does, but Canada and England have vastly different systems. If she’s going to comment on a foreign healthcare system, then she should at least know what kind of system it is.
The systems may be called different things and funded in different manners but the principle is the same–everybody has access to health care.
Second, in the U.S. it is only when you are wealthy that your own satisfaction comes first over cost.
There is no health care system that can provide excellent care to all people under all circumstances. Ask the Canadians who come here to avoid long waiting periods for basic services in their own country, or the Japanese cancer patients who come here because treatment in their own country is sub-par, or the British citizens who come here for infertility treatment because although the treatment is paid for in their own country they can’t access it for one reason or another.
Third, she cites one of the possible reasons for the higher mortality rate as the fact that America is more racially and economically diverse.
Diversity means more than economics. When you have a large ethnic population you also have more genetic deformities and other diseases ( think of sickle cell for African Americans). In the African American population 70% of women are overweight which increase the risk of premature birth and thus of infant death. You also have a substantial population that lives in rural areas and thus does not have access to many services while countries such as Iceland and Finland where the population is overwhelmingly in an urban area and comes from the same genetic stock will be much easier to treat. You have more illegal immigrants come into America every year than the entire population of Iceland.
Finally, the U.S. government spends 18.5% of its revenue on healthcare, higher than any other G8 country despite the fact that all other G8 countries provide more healthcare services.
This is a topic for a whole nother post because the response cannot be done justice in comment, but here is a link to further information More Expensive, But Cheaper I think you need to do some research into why health care in America costs so much before you go postulating on what it is likely due to.
Anonymous
“There is no health care system that can provide excellent care to all people under all circumstances. Ask the Canadians who come here to avoid long waiting periods for basic services in their own country..”
There is in reality only a tiny percentage of Canadians who go to the U.S. for certain procedures. When they do go, it is paid for through taxes, so whoever needs the treatment gets it no matter their personal financial status. Most of the Canadians that need to come to the states are coming from rural areas too – exactly what you cite as a reason for limited access in America, and rural areas can be even more isolated and spread out in Canada. At least the patients are getting the care, unlike those in the U.S. who suffer because they can’t afford it.
You still haven’t adequately supported your claim that health care in America is superior to other countries because it is about satisfaction before costs. In America healthcare is simply rationed by ability to pay instead of medical need. That may be considered a perfectly valid way to do things, but you have to recognize that America does ration its care like the other countries do.
And it is important to name the different healthcare systems properly. Falsely labelling complex and very different systems under a simple umbrella term hinders intelligent, informed debate about this issue.
Anonymous
I hope that the US keeps their current health care system the way it is, so that wealthy Canadians can hop the border and get their treatment down south. That way, us in the north can save money that would otherwise be spent treating the wealthy, and use it on everybody else!
Keep up the good work, without you we’d have even longer wait lists!
Anonymous
The vast majority of the tiny number of patients that have to use U.S. hospitals for procedures have it payed for by the government. So it doesn’t save us money, or have a noticeable effect wait times. You must obviously not be from Canada or you would know this.
Second, the U.S. would not scrap their entire system, if any reforms are enacted on, there would probably only be an expansion of insurance coverage for more people.
S. Paskell
You might find the following example interesting: gateway.nlm.nih.gov/MeetingAbstracts/102275303.html. It confirms the obvious, that income is related to positive outcome for infant mortality. I believe the fact that the US spends so much on healthcare results in a biphasic distribution of infant mortality: for the resource rich (high-end insurance or wealthy) infant mortality is very low, perhaps the best in the world. However, for resource-poor people, infant mortality is so bad it drags the overall average down to one of the very worst in the industrialized world. I cannot see any other way the data at hand makes sense, but I would also like to see some work done on this. The recently documented rise in infant mortality in the U.S. South among the poor may be a step in this direction. Any way you look at it, the overall data points to an abhorrent system – not healthcare per se, in which the taxpayer along with the consumer is supporting the highest level of healthcare investment in the world, but the political and social system underpinning healthcare. Right here. In the U.S.A. The worst. By the numbers.
jeteramesa
The Canadian system may not be perfect, yes you may have to stand in line but as someone who is uninsured I would at least appreciate having a line to stand in.

Inflating the US infant mortality rate

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