A recent report comparing healthcare systems has ranked US been as the worst among eleven developed countries. This is the fifth successive time the US has finished at the bottom with the same study done in 2010, 2007, 2006 and 2004 also ranking it worst.
Not only did the US have the worst health outcomes, it also ranked last or near last on efficiency, access and equity. The UK ranked first overall, followed closely by Switzerland.
The UK and US have entirely different healthcare models. The US has a highly privatized system with people forced to expend heavily from their pockets on healthcare in spite of a plethora of private health insurance companies.
On the contrary, the UK has a substantial publicly funded National Health Service (NHS). As per the study, it is found that the US spent more than $8,500 per capita annually on health, while the UK spent less than half that at $3,400 per person.
The study by the New York-based Commonwealth Fund, a private foundation, titled `Mirror Mirror on the Wall’ used international surveys conducted with patients and doctors in addition to data on health spending and outcomes from the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
The report ranked the nations’ health systems on five parameters – access to care, quality of care, efficiency, equity and healthy lives, which included three indicators: infant mortality, mortality amenable to medical care, and healthy life expectancy at age 60.
In terms of provider-patient communication, the US did well and in relatively rapid access to specialty care but lack of access to healthcare in general continued to be a problem.
The BMJ article pointed out that though it was common to associate universal coverage with long waiting times for specialty care, the study had found that this was not necessarily true.
“The UK has short waiting times for basic medical care and non-emergency access to services after hours. The UK has also improved waiting times to see a specialist and now rates fourth on this dimension with the US ranking third,” the report said.
In terms of efficiency, the US count last, spending 17.7% of its GDP on healthcare, with 7.1% of that spending paying for administrative costs. The UK, on the other hand, spent 9.4% of its GDP on healthcare, with 3.4% on administration.
The US also did poorly on equity. “Americans with below average incomes were more likely to report not visiting a physician when sick, not getting a prescription or skipping doses when needed because of costs,” said the report adding that one third or more of lower income adults in the US said they went without care because of costs in the past year.