Asclepios
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Saving Lives
January 17, 2008 • Volume 8, Issue 3One measure of the quality of a health care system is how well it prevents death from diseases that can be cured or contained by existing treatments. For example, a number of cancers are no longer fatal if they are diagnosed and treated early enough in the diseases’ progression. Diabetes, as well as various heart ailments and circulatory problems, should not generally be fatal for middle-aged patients who are properly treated.
Unfortunately, new research sponsored by the Commonwealth Fund shows that the U.S. ranks dead last among the world’s wealthiest nations in preventing death from diseases that are amenable to effective treatment. Advances in health care treatments have helped spur a slight decline in such deaths in recent years, but the U.S. has now slipped behind United Kingdom, Portugal and Ireland. France, which covers all its citizens under a system much like Medicare, has extended its first-place lead over the U.S. and the other countries in the survey.
The researchers do not offer an explanation for the poor performance of the U.S. health care system. We know it is not money. The U.S. spends more per person on health care than any of the other countries surveyed. One possible reason is the surging number of uninsured Americans—some 47 million, according to the latest data. There is some evidence to back up that theory. A separate study by the Urban Institute estimates that 137,000 people in the U.S. died between 2000 and 2006 because they lacked health insurance.
It really should not be a great mystery. People who cannot afford to go to the doctor when they are sick often do not go, and so do not receive the diagnosis and treatment that could save their lives.
Who is going to solve this health care crisis?
Recent polling by the Commonwealth Fund suggests that a sizable majority of Americans—Democrats, Republicans and Independents alike—have a common sense answer:
All of us together.
Two-thirds of Americans believe that individuals, the government and employers should all share in the cost of providing health care. Right now individuals, the government and employers share in the cost of Medicare for older adults and people with disabilities. It could work the same way for all of us.
Over 80 percent say that a presidential candidate’s views on health care are important in deciding who they will vote for this November. It should be important. It’s a matter of life and death.
Medical Record
“Even when the uninsured see doctors, they often can't afford drugs. ‘You prescribe, you send them home, they don't get well,’ says Efrain Garcia, a cardiologist who volunteers at San Jose. ‘They die sooner. They have more complications. They are more disabled’” (“What does a health crisis look like? See Houston,” Richard Wolf, USA Today, June 21, 2007).
“In ‘Measuring the Health of Nations: Updating an Earlier Analysis’ (Health Affairs, Jan./Feb. 2008), Ellen Nolte, Ph.D., and C. Martin McKee, M.D., D.Sc., both of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, compared international rates of ‘amenable mortality’—that is, deaths from certain causes before age 75 that are potentially preventable with timely and effective health care. In addition to the U.S., the study included 14 Western European countries, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and Japan. According to the authors, if the U.S. had been able reduce amenable mortality to the average rate achieved by the three top-performing countries, there would have been 101,000 fewer deaths annually by the end of the study period” (“Measuring the Health of Nations: Updating an Earlier Analysis,” The Commonwealth Fund, January 8, 2008).
“In 2002, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) estimated that 18,000 Americans died in 2000 because they were uninsured. Since then, the number of uninsured has grown. Based on the IOM’s methodology and subsequent Census Bureau estimates of insurance coverage, 137,000 people died from 2000 through 2006 because they lacked health insurance, including 22,000 people in 2006” (“Uninsured and Dying Because of It: Updating the Institute of Medicine Analysis on the Impact of Uninsurance on Mortality,” Stan Dorn, Urban Institute, January 2008).
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Medicare Part D Monitoring Project
The Medicare Rights Center (MRC) would like to hear about your experience, or that of someone you know, enrolled in a Medicare private drug plan. With information about what the issues are with Medicare Part D, we will be able to demand that those problems be fixed.
Submit your story at http://www.medicarerights.org/partdstories.html.
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The Louder Our Voice, the Stronger Our Message
Asclepios—named for the Greek and Roman god of medicine who, acclaimed for his healing abilities, was at one point the most worshipped god in Greece—is a weekly e-newsletter designed to keep you up-to-date with Medicare program and policy issues, and advance advocacy strategies to address them. Please help build awareness of key Medicare consumer issues by forwarding this action alert to your friends and encouraging them to subscribe today.
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The Medicare Rights Center (MRC) is the largest independent source of Medicare information and assistance in the United States. Founded in 1989, MRC helps older adults and people with disabilities get good, affordable health care.
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