1. The study lauds the UK, when "everybody know" that the UK's NHS sucks, because, well, everyone knows.
2. The study emphasizes equity (rather than innovation or "choice"), and therefore is ideological. Okay, I'll buy that: it is an ideological judgment that access to medical resources by everyone, not just those with sufficient wealth, is a positive thing.
3. Cancer survivability in the US are almost all better than in the UK. More on that below.
4. The study relies on patient satisfaction, which is stoopid because Americans rightfully expect higher standards and service, therefore we are more unhappy with our system. Um …
5. The study relies on infant mortality, where the US sucks, but that's because (a) those other countries count it differently, but, more importantly (b) it's all the fault of "racial diversity" (more on that below, too).
Unmentioned by Klein is that the US system costs twice the amount per capita, and twice the percentage of GDP, than the UK (and the others). He also ignores the other indicators the study uses (life expectancy, mortality amenable to medical care).
Reading the full study (http://www.commonwealthfund.org/~/media/files/publications/fund-report/2014/jun/1755_davis_mirror_mirror_2014.pdf) makes it clear that the US has some things going for it. Which brings us to the cancer numbers, which Klein focuses on as proof that the US is great in the health care arena. Indeed, it's the one critique of the study he makes that's data based (http://www.cancer.org/acs/groups/content/@epidemiologysurveilance/documents/document/acspc-027766.pdf, Table 5).
I dug at this a bit, and some possible causes for the distinction:
The ACS data the article cites is for the US 1999-2006; the UK is 1995-1999. But in the US, at least, cancer death rates have been dropping since around 1992. Assuming that rate is reflected among developed nations, that 5 year differential could be significant.(http://www.cancer.org/acs/groups/content/@epidemiologysurveilance/documents/document/acspc-036845.pdf, PDF page 4) The ACS text above the table notes that cancer detection processes have been steadily improving over time, further reinforcing the difference even five years can make in the numbers.
For example, the cited ACS data for the UK 1995-1999 shows a breast cancer survival rate at 5 years of 77.3%; more recent data 2005-2009 is 85.1% (http://www.cancerresearchuk.org/cancer-info/cancerstats/types/breast/, http://www.cancerresearchuk.org/cancer-info/cancerstats/types/breast/survival/).
The other key here is that the Commonwealth Fund notes that the US excels in preventative care measures — discussions with patients about healthy eating and self-care, reminders about testing that is needed, etc. This latter is a key to this variance, I believe, as early detection is the number one determiner of cancer survival.
The aggregate US survival rate numbers still higher than in the UK, though the gap is narrower than the article suggests, and at least some of the difference is due to early testing and detection. But it's also worth noting, though, that the survival rates are highly uneven within the US. So a similar ACS document on the US for 2014 (http://www.cancer.org/acs/groups/content/@research/documents/webcontent/acspc-042151.pdf) shows a 5-year survival rate for breast cancer in the US 2003-2009 at 90% — but that includes a 92% rate for whites, 79% for blacks.
That indicates a health care system that has some significant problems, which circles back to that "equity" and access question again. Would we consider a country to have the best housing for its people simply because it had the largest mansions available for the super-rich? One can possibly argue that the US has the best health care system for those who can afford it … but I will (ideologically) say that's not the ideal we should be striving for.
Reshared post from +Andreas Schou
Shorter Phillip Klein: When you measure access to healthcare, or the cost of that healthcare, or the outcomes of that healthcare, America fails miserably. But it's socialism to care about whether people are dying of preventable diseases! What we should really be measuring is the right to choose bullshit which doesn't measurably improve outcomes, or, alternatively, the availability of novel bullshit which doesn't measurably improve outcomes.
In other words, the means justify the ends.
Flawed study ranks United States as the worst health care system | WashingtonExaminer.com