who here says the United states has the best health care system in the World?

Those who oppose a national health-care plan, even if its optional, frequently use Canada, France, Sweden and England as examples of how dangerous "socialized medicine" is. They say, "They have to wait for critical surgery," "They can't get the medications they need," "People die waiting for health care..."

Well, let's look at real life, documented statistics to see how countries with universal health care -really- stack up to the USA for-profit heath-care system...

Healthy Life Expectancy (WHO):

3rd - France (73.1 yrs)

4th - Sweden (73.0 yrs)

12th - Canada (72.0 yrs)

14th - England (71.7 yrs)

24th - USA (70.0 yrs)

FACT: You're likely to live 2 to 3 years longer in nations with universal health care.

Infant Mortality (NCHS / WebMD, 2004)

4th - Sweden - 3.1 (deaths per 1,000 live births)

9th - France - 3.9

23rd - England - 5.0

24th - Canada - 5.3

29th - USA - 6.9 (worse than Cuba!)

FACT: Your baby is up to 3 times more likely to die than babies in nations with universal health care.

Overall Heath Care System [Quality] Ranking (WHO):

1st - France

18th - England (UK)

23rd - Sweden

30th - Canada

72nd - USA

FACT: Seventy-one nations, most with universal health care ("socialized medicine") have better health-care systems than we do, and we rank only slightly higher than Cuba and Slovenia.

Total health care expenditure per capita (per person, in USA $$):

$2,317 - England

$2,745 - Sweden

$2,998 - Canada

$3,048 - France

$5,711 - USA

FACT: We pay more than twice as much for health care as many countries that have lower infant mortality, higher life expectancy and better over-all quality of health-care than we do.

Those who profit from our health-care system (and those whom they have duped) say the USA's heath care system is the best in the world, the facts say otherwise.

Why aren't Canadians flooding across our border to take advantage of our health care system and escape from socialized their system of socialized medicine? Why do Americans, especially the elderly, go to Canada and even Mexico for affordable medicines and health care?

Opponents of universal health care speak for profit-based health care and pharmaceutical companies. The facts speek for themselves, and for us.

PERSONAL NOTE: I am sorry that your son, like millions of Americans, cannot get quality health care or the medications they need through no fault of their own. I just spoke to a person who told it like it is. Their child was in critical condition and they were bluntly told, "Sign this paper or he will die."

It is too bad that so many people gullibly believe verifiable lies and let themselves be led along like sheep to the slaughter so that insurance and medical companies can line their pockets, and so that their senior executives can personally take outrageous bonuses with only feigned compassion for the human lives that are destroyed in the process. Perhaps after they have a crisis of their own they too will find the profits-before-lives industry as immoral and unworkable as we do.

My best wishes to you and to your son and family. Please feel free to email me if you like because, unlike so many on here, I do care.

Why do the conservatives believe the United States have the best health care system in the world? I guess for the same reason the left thinks every nation and culture on Earth is better then the U.S. Conservatives believe everything is great about America and the left believes nothing is great about America. We'll all go far in this nation with this type of attitude.

I am sorry to hear about your son.

I know exactly where you are coming from, our system is crap and I have plenty of experience with it.

In fact, I had to go see the doctor a couple weeks ago. My doctor was late in coming into my room because she had to handle a phone call where a newborn has just been circumcised, and then hadn't peed for almost 2 full days. So, they pretty much knew they had made a mistake in the circumcision, but wouldn't let him stay in the hospital over night because the parents had no insurance. Are you kidding me? Ridiculous.

It's the middle class who suffer in the US -- the poor have government subsidized healthcare - Medicaid, and the wealthy can pay for it outright. The ACTUAL working people are the ones who get screwed.

We could probably have paid for two healthcare systems at least with all the money we sunk in the Iraq war. Thanks Bush II! Oh, and you think Obama can fix it just like that some of you . . . please, he cannot even really do want he would like to do because he's cleaning up problems of the last 8 years. Thanks Bush II.

BTW, if you don't think I know healthcare, think again -- I've been a nurse for over 15 years. I've seen necessary surgeries be postponed and denied. People have to wait in this country too. Money talks.

Since the Red Cross rated our health care system a "D", I would say not.

Also, my daughter was overdosed my her medication because the manufacturer made double-dose pills. The FDA knew about this for a full year before they made them recall it. My daughter didn't have to die.

All you have to do is turn on the TV and see all the killings and sickenings people have suffered due to the inattentiveness of the FDA. I think they are in Congress' pockets.

Misdiagnoses abound. Doctors are incompetent and think they are God. It is a disgrace.

First, you have my deepest sympathy for your son. While I will answer plainly on some points, I do not want my directness to detract from communicating my desire that your son receive the best care possible and that he achieve health.

I don't at all believe that the U.S. has the best health care system in the world. It has many problems. However, I would like to see better clarity about what is our system. Commentators often like to talk of comparing U.S. health care as a free market to the socialized health care of other nations. This is not at all the case.

The U.S. health care system follow a fascist model. Private property is allowed to exist in the industry, but its uses are dictated by an ever-intrusive government. From licensing to medical regulation, tax law influencing the insurance delivery systems to regulation on insurance itself; central government bureaucracies dictate much of what is done in health care. Whatever problems we have, I would like you to at least consider that freedom is not the primary contributor. Blaming the inadequacies of the system to free markets (as some have - you never said that though it seemed implied) is ridiculous.

Now, your primary complaint is that your son can not get the care he needs. Under a socialist system, you may hope that his treatment would be guaranteed. However, dictate can not assure this. The stories of waiting lists and poor care in socialist nations are well-known. While everyone is "covered", there is never a guarantee that they will receive care.

I know that it sounds like a simplistic cure-all, but the market is the best mechanism for providing health care as it is for providing anything else. The profit mechanism, if freed from the constraints of central regulation would induce providers to give the best combination of quality care at the lowest cost. Providers not doing this would lose market share to better competitors.

While health care is especially scary because of its grave consequences for our lives, the market can provide the regulation needed to avoid abuses or punish them when they occur. We are naive to expect a central regulatory monopoly to accomplish this. Don't we understand by now the extent to which insurance, pharmaceutical and other health care companies lobby congress? They don't do so without expecting results. The consequence is that regulations, though advertised as benefitting consumers, actually benefit the people spending money to influence government.

Free market regulation, because it would not constitute a legal monopoly, would be much more tied to actually accomplishing its aims. Of course, there are no guarantees in life. I am sure that mistakes would be made. We just have to have the wisdom and courage to deal directly with them rather than ceding our liberty out of fear.

While I expect that insurance would operate quite differently under freedom than it does under fascism, you might still find yourself in a bind. I believe that the care needed by your son would be better and less expensive, but it might still be beyond your means. And there still could be few insurance companies willing to underwrite your son. After all, insurance companies exist to spread risk out over society. Once a sickness is known, it is no longer a risk, but a certainty. [1]

I can understand your desire to receive assurances. While I think that free market insurance, through competitive pressures becoming cheaper, would be more universal, you might fall through some cracks. If this occurs, I suggest that we are all still better off if you find voluntary means to get the care that your son needs. As another answer suggested, many doctors might consider providing the care at no or reduced cost. Additionally, you can find charitable organizations to fund the care.

Seeking coercive institutions does not serve the victims. It serves the people with the ambition to most influence those institutions. While desires to serve your son through central command economy may seem valid, it is a dangerous tool to the people who would rule us.

Not I! I know damn good and well we do. I'm positive that the best health care system in the world is somewhere in Northern Europe.

So which is it? You want the health care workers to work for free, or do you want me and people like me to work for free to pay the taxes required to fund your "free" health care? Either way you are demanding someone to labor with no compensation. The last I checked, slavery was still unconstitutional in this country.

Our healthcare system is certainly not perfect, I don't know anyone who claims it is. But to give up and hand it over to the U.S. government is just suicide. What in the world makes one think they can handle it better than anyone else?? They haven't done anything right so far.... Medicare, Social Security....??? They mess up everything they touch. We need reform, no doubt, but not from the government....

Thoughts to your son ^^

As a veteran, I have had government health care. Yes... the health care that my husband and I pay for now is better than the care I received while in the military.

If the government treats its AD and veterans as it does, how will it treat the common citizen?

Sorry about your son but, why is it my responsibility to pay for his health care. It would appear that YOU are his parent and that responsibility is yours.

Where does the US Constitution say that anyone is entitled to free health care?

Generally speaking we have a wonderful healthcare system. My wife had heart trouble 3 years ago and she is still here, alive and well, now.

That's thanks to the US health care system.

Perhaps if you guarantee payment for his treatment he will be able to get treatment when and if he needs it. Or are you unwilling to make some sacrifices for him.

Lots of people gripe about being unable to pay for health care while they drive one of their two or three cars to see the doctor or cash their dividend checks.