The High Cost of American Healthcare

[GusherING]

Americans spend 15% of their GDP on health care. Most European states don't even spend that and they have far better services. And yet we here in Ireland think private provision of health care is the way forward! It is not!

Please provide evidence for this. YOu cannot even get start of the art treatment or drugs in some counties. for example, Herceptin is not avaiable in some EU coutries.

Here is the OECD's statistics. Its an excel file which shows what percentage of GDP countries spend on health:
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/20/51/37622205.xls

This is where I found the file:
http://www.oecd.org/document/16/0,23..._1_1_1,00.html

Bear in mind that Ireland's GDP is also grossly exaggerated due to multinational profits in Irish companies for tax reasons and that our figures on health are boosted by the inclusion of spending on other aspects not directly related to health care. From those figures (spending is on both public and private health care) in 2004, the USA spent 15.3% of their GDP on healthcare, while Germany spent 10.3%, the UK spent 8.1% and Sweden spent 9.1%. Ireland spent 7.1%.

Sweden, Germany and the UK all have universal health care systems of a sort (although their funding systems vary from case to case) and none have a two tier system. The US is spending almost a third more in most cases, yet as Pax has shown not everyone has access and it costs a hell of a lot more. Just in terms of value for money, universal health care is the best way forward. Why on earth would we want to copy the US?

Now obviously, health can be a bottomless pit for money, but relatively efficient access to services which a reasonable amount of people require (say 10-15% of the population are likely to fall ill from) is what I think we should be striving towards.

[owenfeehan]

Sweden, Germany and the UK all have universal health care systems of a sort (although their funding systems vary from case to case) and none have a two tier system.

Germany does have a two-tier system, as does the UK I would imagine [what with a significant % of the public having private insurance such as BUPA].

In Germany, if your income is over 40/50-something thousand a year, you can opt out of the public insurance system and elect your own private provider.

This has various pros and cons, but for many people [particularly single people] it is both cheaper and gives you access to a much wider array of doctors, as a certain % of doctors only deal with the private insurance providers. The reason it is cheaper is that you are bypassing the redistributive element of the public system and just paying for yourself.

That said, the public system [i.e. public insurance providers who charge a fee in terms of a % of your income] is nevertheless quite excellent compared to Ireland.

Apparently they have is that they have too many doctors going into the system, and consequently this is driving up costs.

Amazingly difficult to believe from an Irish perspective!

I rang a consultant a few weeks back for an apointment. Imagine my surprise when the response was "today or tomorrow?"..... and I hadn't even gotten a referal.

But it does cost quite a bit in terms of taxes (only nominal direct costs). Very expensive, I think quite possibly the most expensive in the EU. Apparently doctors make a fortune by doing all sorts of uncessary tests and examinations and thus charging the insurance companies more than necessary. This is one of big drawbacks of an insurance-based system compared to a NHS-type system.

[GusherING]

Sweden, Germany and the UK all have universal health care systems of a sort (although their funding systems vary from case to case) and none have a two tier system.

Germany does have a two-tier system, as does the UK I would imagine [what with a significant % of the public having private insurance such as BUPA].

In Germany, if your income is over 40/50-something thousand a year, you can opt out of the public insurance system and elect your own private provider.

This has various pros and cons, but for many people [particularly single people] it is both cheaper and gives you access to a much wider array of doctors, as a certain % of doctors only deal with the private insurance providers. The reason it is cheaper is that you are bypassing the redistributive element of the public system and just paying for yourself.

That said, the public system [i.e. public insurance providers who charge a fee in terms of a % of your income] is nevertheless quite excellent compared to Ireland.

Apparently they have is that they have too many doctors going into the system, and consequently this is driving up costs.

Amazingly difficult to believe from an Irish perspective!

I rang a consultant a few weeks back for an apointment. Imagine my surprise when the response was "today or tomorrow?"..... and I hadn't even gotten a referal.

But it does cost quite a bit in terms of taxes (only nominal direct costs). Very expensive, I think quite possibly the most expensive in the EU. Apparently doctors make a fortune by doing all sorts of uncessary tests and examinations and thus charging the insurance companies more than necessary. This is one of big drawbacks of an insurance-based system compared to a NHS-type system.

Sorry, I knew that. I should have been a bit more specific and said:"a two tier system like ours!". There's no way nearly two thirds of the population there has private health insurance like ours does.