The United States : The Greatest Nation Of The World

The U.S. Health system spends a higher portion of its gross domestic product than any other country but ranks 37 out of 191 countries according to its performance.” (WHO, 2000, p. 1) Progression in the United States has not kept up with the advances in other wealthy nations dealing with the population health. Disease and chronic disability report almost 50% of America health problem (JAMA, 2013).

Secondly, “even in those instances in which health care is important, too many Americans don’t have health care, receive it too late, or receive poor-quality” (Schroeder, 1). Schroeder also emphasized on the fact that the United States have more ethnically heterogeneous than most of the nations at the top of the rankings, “rationalization that the United States is more ethnically heterogeneous than the nations at the top of the rankings, such as Japan, Switzerland, and Iceland” (Schroeder, 1).The fact that the U.S also ranking last on infant mortality and on deaths that were potentially preventable with timely access to effective health care and second-to-last on healthy life expectancy at age 60, can also be a great factor to why the U.S ranking

Despite having the most expensive health care system, the United States ranks last overall among 11 industrialized countries on measures of health system quality, efficiency, access to care, equity, and healthy lives, according to a new Commonwealth Fund report. The other countries included in the study were Australia, Canada, France, Germany, the Netherlands,

According to the Garber & Skinner (2008), the United States spends more on health care than other nations but continues to score below other nations in numerous areas of measurement. These scores in, consideration with amount spent, suggest that healthcare is the United States is inefficient. Additionally, the United States has a significantly large portion of under

Because the United States spends the most on a health care system, one would think that most people in the U.S. would be healthy. This is not the case. Surprisingly, the United States does not have a particularly high life expectancy rate. Within this paper I will discuss heath issues in the United States including how heath effects behavior, economics, and social structure. I will also include key stages of medical technology development and population demographics.

Contrary to what many people believe, America’s health status is not quite “up-to-par,” to say the least. Over forty-seven million people in the United States lack health insurance; that is more than 15% of our nation’s population! At first this disturbing truth seems impossible to believe, being as America is one of the most technologically advanced and economically developed countries in the world. “We spend trillions of dollars per year on medical care. That’s nearly half of all the health dollars spent in the world. But we’ve seen our statistics. We live shorter, often sicker lives than almost every other industrialized nation. “We rank 30th in [global] life expectancy” (Adelman 2008). Knowing this brings rise to the question: why are

In the Common Wealth Fund’s most recent report of Mirror, Mirror on the Wall, despite the fact the US Health care system has the highest healthcare per capita expenditure and the highest proportion of specialists; it consistently has an overall ranking of last, in comparison to other industrialized nations in terms of health care efficiency, equity, quality, access, and healthy lives (Davis, Stremikis, Squires & Schoen, 2014). Healthy lives measured by mortality amenable to health care (deaths prevented with timely and effective care), healthy life expectancy and infant mortality, illustrates that a country is ensuring individuals live long and flourishing lives (Davis, Stremikis, Squires & Schoen, 2014). Healthy People 2020 which was launched

With these outstanding evidences the Commonwealth Fund placed United States last in terms of overall health system ranking measured by different categories of access to care, equity, quality, efficiency and healthy lives compared to other developed countries. Among those rank categories, our health system is specifically placed last in access to care and efficiency. 37% of the adults in United States reported that they did not receive the recommended treatment, surgery or follow up care due to high cost. 40% of adults who had visited emergency room reported that they could have instead just visited a regular doctor if it was available. U.S. was also ranked last in infant mortality rate and amount of deaths preventable through timely access to healthcare.

What does America have to show for all the money it is spending on health care? It wouldn’t be unreasonable to speculate that the U. S. would have the lowest infant mortality, the highest life expectancy, and the most efficient health care in the world. Unfortunately, however, that is not the case. The United States according to the same article, ranks 46th out of 48th in health care efficiency, Serbia and Brazil are the only two ranking lower. Infant mortality and life expectancy in the United States rank 167thand 44th out of 224 respectivelyaccording to the CIA World Factbook (2015). Additionally, approximately 15 percent of people in the U.S. are still uninsured. The return on investment in health care needs to have better results; a system that provides the highest quality care that leaves no one out.

First of all, a study has shown that Americans have a lower life expectancy rate than those living in countries that have universal health care, even though the United States pay more for health care (Mahon, Weymouth, “U.S. Spends Far”). According to a study by the Commonwealth Fund, in 2009, the U.S. spent about 8,000 dollars per capita on health care (Mahon, Weymouth, “U.S. Spends Far”). Other countries, like Japan and New Zealand, spent one-third as much, or like Norway and Switzerland, spent two-thirds as much. A separate study by Global Research has shown that in 2007, among seventeen countries examined, U.S. ranked dead last in life expectancy for males (seventy-five years) and second to last for females (eighty years) (Randall, “U.S. Life Expectancy”). The same study shows that women in Japan, a

Actual medical care in the United States is better than many other countries, but there are those who think adoption of universal government-controlled healthcare is the way we are headed. In fact, the United States and Mexico are the only countries of the 34 members of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) that do not have universal health care. (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), 2013)

According to data presented by Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the US health care cost exceeded $ 8,000 per capita, in 2010, comparing to the next most expensive system (Norway) $5,000 per capita (OECD Health Data, 2012). Despite being the most expensive system in the word, US healthcare system has failed on many areas of performance and quality. According to OECD data, US has much lower life expectancy than other industrialized countries, also the infant mortality rate is higher than those countries. Moreover, the US is the only industrialized country that does not provide its citizens a protection of a universal health care coverage.

America is well known for being the land of opportunities, the land of freedom, land of diversity, and overall, the land of success. However, the title of being " The Greatest Nation" didn't come to America so easily. It surely is a challenge to make of the United States of America the ideal nation that Thomas Jefferson envisioned. For this reason, the constitution emphasizes the guidelines that one must follow in order to be an ideal American. In the Bill of Rights, James Madison remarks the 10 basic amendments that America needs to follow in order to maintain its values. To be an ideal American, one must understand the vision of the founding fathers. It is understandable to conclude that The Bill of Rights is a set of guidelines that make up an ideal American. Therefore, what truly defines an ideal American is being able to

Oddly enough, even with all the medical technological brought forth by the US we are still ranked with a higher infant death rate than Japan. In a study published by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and titled "America's Health Starts with Healthy Children: How do States Compare?” the report found that the high infant death rate is correlated with the lack of education of the mother. Access to healthcare is another correlation to the problem since about 45 million Americans, or 15 percent of the population, are now estimated to be without any form of health insurance (O'Connor, 2008).

4) There are large numbers of physicians, especially specialists, in certain parts of the country