Thank you for your canned response to my email dated 7/19/09. I realize that you are very busy and cannot personally respond to every communication you receive from your constituents.
Although you did not directly answer my two questions (Are you a statesman? Or are you just another run-of-the-mill politician?), your tepid and ill-informed response leads me to believe that you are the latter.
In your form letter, you claim the following:
"... the United States ranks 42nd in the world in life expectancy, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and our health care system ranks lower than many countries on quality, access, efficiency, equity, and preventative care."
Sir, you are quite incorrect. Here are the facts:
The World Health Organization (WHO) lists the U.S. 37th out of 191 countries for quality of healthcare. Our life expectancy isn’t even in the top five. Isn’t that pathetic-why even Cuba has a lower infant mortality rate than us!
Oh ... wait a minute... what standards and guidelines does WHO actually use for measuring quality? How about these?
1.health level
2.health distribution
3.responsiveness
4.responsiveness distribution
5.financial fairness
Yeah that's right. In order to "balance the playing field," WHO ranks health care systems around the world based upon some things that have absolutely nothing to do with health care at all.
For example, WHO counts car accidents and murder rates when factoring life expectancy. Murder and accident rates indicate social ills, not the quality of one's health. And if these two factors are removed from the equation, guess what? Yep! The United States has the highest life expectancy in the Western world! Who could have imagined?
Infant mortality? The United States actually saves more premature babies, and counts them as live human beings. Some European countries do not even count a baby born alive if under a certain weight. And both Cuba and Europe have higher abortion rates than the U.S., so we are penalized for not aborting babies with more life threatening anomalies and problems.
WHO's rankings include factors like “fairness” and “equality. Do all citizens pay the same percentage of their income for health care? No? Oh sorry, you lose points USA because in your country some people make more money than others. And that's a bad thing.
So, because of all of these "skewing" factors in WHO's measuring system, the United States, even though it beats every country in the world in regards to cancer survival, technology, and many other treatments, is ranked low.
Even Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) are counted as "unfair" in WHO's rating system.
Finally, if the "skewing" factors in WHO's measuring system are removed, the measure of how quickly patients can access care, the manner in which they are treated (dignity, confidentiality) and the choice of doctors and treatments (ie: responsiveness), the U.S. is actually number one again!
Sir, I understand that for any number of reasons, many in America do not have health care. I also understand that America's health care system is not perfect. But let's not throw out the baby with the bathwater, OK? We don't have to completely replace something to improve it.
Well, that is of course unless we are talking about our representatives in Washington.
READ THE BILL before you vote!
Respectfully,
Mark W. Weaver
Thanks to my good friend, K.S. for researching this topic. Information in this letter is taken from the following sources:
http://www.rangelmd.com/index.php/2007/08/25/the-misleading-who-health-care-rankings/ “The Misleading WHO Health Care Rankings” by Chris Rangel, M.D.; RangelMD.com; August 25, 2007
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=9259 “WHOm are They Kidding?” by Glen Whitman
http://smartgirlnation.com/2009/06/01/is-there-political-bias-in-universal-healthcare-reform/ “Popular Ranking Unfairly Misrepresents the U.S. Health Care System” by Richard Fessler, PhD
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-613.pdf Policy Analysis: The Grass is Not Always Greener, A Look at National Health Care Systems Around the World, by Michael Tanner; Cato Institute; March 18, 2008
JOIN NOVA 912.
http://www.rangelmd.com/index.php/2007/08/25/the-misleading-who-health-care-rankings/ “The Misleading WHO Health Care Rankings” by Chris Rangel, M.D.; RangelMD.com; August 25, 2007
http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=9259 “WHOm are They Kidding?” by Glen Whitman
http://smartgirlnation.com/2009/06/01/is-there-political-bias-in-universal-healthcare-reform/ “Popular Ranking Unfairly Misrepr esents the U.S. Health Care System” by Richard Fessler, PhD
http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-613.pdf Policy Analysis: The Grass is Not Always Greener, A Look at National Health Care Systems Around the World, by Michael Tanner; Cato Institute; March 18, 2008
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