What is a morality rate? Is that the number of adults who claim to be moral and don't have extra-marital/pre-marital intercourse?

Interesting. The first set of statistics aren't the only thing affecting the second set though. Life Expectancy, Mortality rates etc can also be linked to cultural practice, diet, alcohol consumption and so on. I'm quite surprised the US government spends more proportionally than the UK though :S

no but mortality rates are very good indicators, and american and uk cultures are pretty similar, except the drinking culture is bigger in the uk.

I'd argue the diet has significant differences, and the relative prevalence of obesity and gun crime in the USA would inflate mortality rates. We do drink too much though, it's true.

but it wouldnt inflate by 29 people per 1000 thats a massive leap

Wow. I must admit I expected to see rather UK-based figures, but the government spending one is a real shock to me. I guess that comes from having a good infrastructure set up?
Also, immigration rates are quite a major factor to take into account when looking at the effect of health care.

Note: All stats are pre-stimulus package.

Draugnar: sorry, lol.
Hereward77: The reason for choosing these two countries is because they are as similar as is possible. Obesity is higher in the US I think, but drinking higher in the UK. We must consider the fact that a not insignificant amount of the UK spend on health is to change behaviour. I don't know about the

I would like to highlight a few things:

1. UK spends less (First block)
2. UK has less bureaucracy (Mangers:Health Providers)
3. UK's health statistics are universally higher.

When you look at the massive gap, $4000 per capita, between the two countries, you see that the US population would save $1.2 trillion by moving to the UK system and costs. The taxman would save $200billion. Now, given how much more is being spent, can we argue that the USA's personal habits are so very bad as to cost that much?

For perspective, that's more than 1.5 times Obama's stimulus plan. Enough to pay for NASA for 70 years in just 1 years' savings.

@Ghost: That just means NASA is underfunded.

Also worth pointing out is that I just went for the most significant and nationwide indicators I could see, avoiding looking at particular percentiles, and I did not look up a single statistic that I did not include.

(Ok, lets increase it's funding 7 fold. That's still a decade of funding.

No I know, it's a good comparison to make. I hadn't thought about the behavioural spending either. I'll just be quiet and absorb the very good point you're making :D

That is, NASA's

The most alarming is that it is twice the USA's annual military spend.

And uhh...are UK and US comparable in terms of size and population? You gotta take THAT into account as well.

US has roughly five times the population of UK. That definitely has some kind of effect on spending.

Per capita spending though?

lol exactly ghost

Haha, my bad.

But I'm also thinking in terms of number of hospitals and clinics needed to cover a wider area...plus there ARE many other factors that could be related to mortality stats and health care expenditure stats....

Still, I suppose that's an interesting correlation.

Indeed. Health is what people are most willing to pay for, so the demand is highly inelastic. There's a lot more money in the cure than the prevention, and people are almost always willing to fork over the cash for treatment. So even though prevention is less costly and more efficient, it becomes far more profitable to develop and sell treatment rather than the cure.

Private companies have much higher interest in people getting sick and buying their treatments than selling preventative measures. They have a much higher interest in a disease NOT being fully defeated because as soon as it is, their cure becomes relatively worthless. Private companies depend upon a sick population to profit.

Government has a higher interest (or so we hope) in the more effective preventative measures because it saves them money and allows for politicians eager for votes to promise more tax cuts. Government has a higher interest in completely defeating a disease because it means one less disease their bill has to worry about. Government depends on a healthy population to keep it's economy going.

I don't think these statistics mean much. The UK and the US are two *very* different countries. It would be a mistake to generalize without a full understanding of what factors are impacting the statistics.

That does assume that the NHS is run directly by the government though, which it is no longer is. In many cases it contracts out to other providers, or uses private money (which obviously expects a greater return). In general though what you say makes a lot of sense.

maintgallant, a single one of them doesn't mean much, and it cannot be conclusive in its results, but the UK and US are very similar for two different countries. It cannot be ignored that the UK actually pays less and the standard of health (although it does not necessarily follow healthcare) is higher in the UK. It also makes a refreshing break from being told that an NHS would cost too much and would provide awful treatment, and the US UK comparisons that compare the very best healthcare in the US with the UK's standard levels of healthcare.

dont see any of our resident free market rules forever crowd participating in this one. facts beat slogans once again

Hey, I'm a fan of the free market. I just believe that healthcare is one of the services, along with national defense and such that should be delivered by the government.

There are people in the United Stated who do not seek medical treatment because they cannot afford it. This is bad.

The reason there are more healthcare providers and more proportionate spending in the US is because SOME people are getting the BEST treatment. In the UK ALL people are getting GOOD treatment. When you have a really unhealthy poorer class of Americans that don't have access to healthcare then obviously they will mean they will lower mortality rates etc. But the spending differences are because some people have all the bells and whistles.

@ Centurian, you are implying that rich British folk don't have the choice of paying extra for better treatment. Crap.

thank you for this thread...

the US comes up short on almost any measuring stick you can come up with no matter WHICH western 1st-world power you compare it to. try it out. the numbers dont lie.

the main difference is not size, or per capita fatness - its the profit motive that drives american healthcare, vs the public-good motive that drives the alternative systems (including UK, Canada, Japan... etc etc etc).

we pay much more - and we get much less. and worst of all - its making our companies even less competitive.

@Caviare
Is that not the case? Its how it works in Canada. Otherwise you get a two tier health system where the poor with serious illnesses wait while the rich get expressed through with a cold.

Centurian, there are private hospitals and private provision within the UK, and you can get health insurance from most major insurers.

So yes, the wealthiest can, and do "go private", they get no refund from the NHS, it's not a voucher scheme, but it does happen.

Personally, I'm not a huge fan of our health system, too much centralisation and bureacracy, I'd much rather a single payer health insurance scheme with hospitals run as non-profit charitable trusts.

But our system, for a massive variety of reasons, is a lot more efficient and effective than the US system, I've read a lot of analysis on this in the past, a significant reason is that it's in the interests of the hospitals and insurers to stiff you, combined with patents on medicine that are overly restrictive.

A massive single purchaser (like the Govt) can negotiate the cost of patent medicine down, but individuals cannot, and as the medicine is patented, there's no competitor.

In a market that isn't actually competetive, you get massive private profits, reforming the US system to make it competetive would require a bigger change than simply nationalising what's there. A happy medium would be to nationalise the insurers and move to a single payer model, but it's not really my issue.

I do know that I can't afford to risk travelling there, which is a shame, as we'd hoped to honeymoon in San Francisco, that's not going to happen now our finances have gone messed up.

Centurian, the US government spends more than the UK government per capita, and gets much more help from people "going private" than the UK government, and still comes out worse, which is the thrust of the point I am making.