>>In a message dated 6/23/00 2:58:30 PM Pacific Daylight Time,
>>bill@wkidston.freeserve.co.uk writes:<< This was because there is a group
of
>>up to around 10 per cent of Americans who have such poor health that their
>>life expectancy drops to around 50 and lowers the overall average. >>
>Fri, 23 Jun 2000 18:51:51 -0400
>"Michael S. Lorrey" <retroman@turbont.net> leapt to the defense of the USA
political system with -
>So the ranking is a political attack on our system of health care, and
>not an actual evaluation of the health of people.
>Fri, 23 Jun 2000 20:34:03 EDT
>Dehede011@aol.com responded
>BillK,
> Could you identify the group? I would like to know something about it.
>Ron H.
-----------------------------------------
This very large and detailed report from WHO covers 191 countries. Basically
they are saying the obvious, namely, that if you live in poverty, have
little access to health care, have little health education, possibly live in
a polluted or dangerous environment, - then you are not going to live as
long. The report can be downloaded as a series of .pdf files from
http://www.who.int/ and then you can search for references to particular
countries.
The report does not seem to have any particular political axe to grind. The
statistics for the majority of the nations are far worse than for the USA.
They are only pointing out that although the USA has the best medical care
in the world, it comes at a price and not all USA citizens can afford it.
The cost of aftercare and continuing treatment is also out of reach of most
poor people. They attempt to analyse the statistics to give rankings by
various different criteria. One of their gradings is for "fairness". So
while most countries do not have as good health services as the USA, if
more of their population have access to what they do have, then they are
higher on the "fairness" table.
As I said originally, good medical treatment is available in many countries,
so if you have the resources, you have a wide choice of where to live. And
you can always fly into the USA if a very advanced operation becomes
necessary and it is beyond the skills available in your chosen country. (As
many foreign political leaders and rich people already do).
BillK
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