What’s Wrong with the US Health System?
As we all get older, we have a greater appreciation and need for the health care system. And we have a far greater understanding of its failures.
The US health system is far more costly and has much worse outcomes than the systems in the rest of the developed world. https://www.pgpf.org/article/how-does-the-us-healthcare-system-compare-to-other-countries/ and https://www.kff.org/global-health-policy/health-policy-101-international-comparison-of-health-systems/?entry=table-of-contents-health-spending We are spending twice as much per capita as other developed nations. We are spending five times as much on administration of the health system as the average for all other developed nations. With all this health spending, we still have 25 million Americans uninsured.
Our outcomes are terrible as compared to our peers. https://www.pgpf.org/article/how-does-the-us-healthcare-system-compare-to-other-countries/ and https://www.internationalinsurance.com/health/systems/#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20Mirror%2C%20Mirror,this%20edition%20of%20Mirror%2C%20Mirror. We are a dismal last on infant mortality, on life expectancy, on safety during childbirth and on managing chronic diseases like diabetes.
Access to care is highly uneven; the care is often fragmented; innovation is often misdirected and/or stifled; patients can be exposed to enormous out of pocket costs. https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/is-our-healthcare-system-broken-202107132542 and https://www.pgpf.org/article/us-healthcare-system-ranks-seventh-worldwide-innovative-but-fiscally-unsustainable/
The bad health outcomes and very high costs are very bad for US citizens, very bad for American businesses, and very bad for our national competitiveness. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK568874/ and https://hbr.org/2024/11/why-the-u-s-healthcare-system-is-so-much-worse-than-its-peers