On Mon, 20 Jul 2009 02:30:25 -0400, gfretwell wrote:


There are lots of reasons why we have higher health costs. We generally
have less healthy lifestyles and diet. We invented "extreme sports" and
generally stupid human tricks people do, that result in a lot of
expensive injuries. We have a lot more violence in our cities that clogs
ERs every night and we have a big appetite for elective procedures.
We also have a huge lawyer tax. Ask your doctor what his insurance bill
is. Compare that to a Canadian doctor. Add in all the extra tests to
show "due diligence" that causes and you start to understand why we are
#1 in cost.

All of the above sound reasonable, although it does smack of blaming the
victim. I found this report that was made for Congress. It seems well
balanced, and contained several surprises for me.

http://assets.opencrs.com/rpts/RL34175_20070917.pdf

There are two main cost savings that jump out at me. Administrative
costs, we spent 20-25% of our health care dollars on administration. The
second would be, more professional health care workers, supply and
demand. I would also consider reducing the educational debt load that is
carried by our health care professionals. Perhaps even a free education,
for doctors.

One of the surprises was pharmaceuticals. We tend to pay more for new
drugs, but considerably less as the drugs get older. Overall, our
pharmaceutical spending, as a percentage of total health spending is
relatively low.

A second surprise, more visits to doctors, tend to keep the overall cost
of health care down. On first glance, perhaps counter-intuitive, but not
after thinking about it.

This country's obesity, as you pointed out above, is a problem.