US slips to 49th in life expectancy

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I blame your food.

Food and murders and traffic accidents may cause the overall low ranking (so I don't see what that's supposed to show) but they say it doesn't explain the drop relative to other countries.

We found that none of the prevailing excuses
for the poor performance of the US health care
system are likely to be valid. On the spending
side, we found that the unusually high medical
spending is associated with worsening, rather
than improving, fifteen-year survival in two
groups for whom medical care is probably im-
portant.
We speculate that the nature of our health care
system—specifically, its reliance on unregulated
fee-for-service and specialty care—may explain
both the increased spending and the relative
deterioration in survival that we observed. If
so, meaningful reform may not only save money
over the long term, it may also save lives.

I don't understand this part though. What does what?

It says our survival rate has increased ~3%. Canada and the UK went up 4%.

Anyway I don't know why they quote the study as the source of the "49th" ranking since they just cite the ciaworldfactbook in the introduction.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publicat.../2102rank.html

we are .2 below denmark

Not sure what to make of it all.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Food and murders and traffic accidents may cause the overall low ranking (so I don't see what that's supposed to show) but they say it doesn't explain the drop relative to other countries.



I don't understand this part though. What does what?

It says our survival rate has increased ~3%. Canada and the UK went up 4%.

Anyway I don't know why they quote the study as the source of the "49th" ranking since they just cite the ciaworldfactbook in the introduction.

https://www.cia.gov/library/publicat.../2102rank.html

we are .2 below denmark

Not sure what to make of it all.

Whoops, you are right. Skimmed too much of the intro in an attempt to read the meat of the article. I guess it's really more of the two professors analyzing what this shift means and what the causes are. I will edit accordingly.

EDIT: Also the paragraph you quoted from the article is saying that prevailing arguments about why our health care system isn't working (not enough money, unhealthy food etc..) don't hold up and that it is actually most likely the nature of our system (a for profit system) that is the most likely cause of decreasing trends in the health of the demographics they looked at.

What you should make of it is that for as much as we spend, we are not #1; also it is not spending or food that is holding us back from better statistics according to the study. It's probably because our system quite frankly isn't socialist enough.

[Sasaki Kojiro]

I wonder what caused australia's relative jump.

Anyway, so the question is "why did we drop a relative 1%"?

The conclusion of the article was what I didn't know what to make of. It suggests that the # of uninsured might be the culprit, then say that the RAND experiment found health care didn't have much effect on mortality, that it was just weeks for the population as a whole, then said that was uncertain, then said that investing in things other than medical care might be the best way to go, then said the profit stuff in our system might be decreasing health but said they had no idea how much (that part is speculation as they said acin).

[a completely inoffensive name]

I wonder what caused australia's relative jump.

Anyway, so the question is "why did we drop a relative 1%"?

The conclusion of the article was what I didn't know what to make of. It suggests that the # of uninsured might be the culprit, then say that the RAND experiment found health care didn't have much effect on mortality, that it was just weeks for the population as a whole, then said that was uncertain, then said that investing in things other than medical care might be the best way to go, then said the profit stuff in our system might be decreasing health but said they had no idea how much (that part is speculation as they said acin).

Yeah it was speculation. Forgive me for reinforcing that speculation with my own personal bias.

[miotas]

Or to look at it another way: "USA improves life rating for 24 countries!"

[naut]

I wonder what caused australia's relative jump.

Less deaths from wrestling with crocodiles recently.