The comparison is between countries is between those people who do reach the relevant age group. Anywho, there is surprisingly little difference in life expectancy between countries anymore. Especially if you factor out higher infant mortality in poorer countries, which has a huge impact on life expectancy stats.
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/rankorder/2102rank.html
USA is 50th (!) in the world.
One reason we rank higher in Infant Mortality is that we try to save a lot of premature babies that would (under socialist medicine) be counted as a miscarriage.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2011/08/infant_mortality_figures_for_us_are_misleading.html
One reason we rank higher is that we try to save a lot of premature babies that would (under socialist medicine) be counted as a miscarriage.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2011/08/infant_mortality_figures_for_us_are_misleading.html
Low birth weight infants are not counted against the “live birth” statistics for many countries reporting low infant mortality rates.
According to the way statistics are calculated in Canada, Germany, and Austria, a premature baby weighing <500gGgAgHgMgPGVGcgjgkglgmgpgG’sGAGEGIGUGaGegoGBGMGPGdGkGrgmgrgsgtFHfhCJKQcjkqWYwyABDEI is not considered a living child.
But in the U.S., such very low birth weight babies are considered live births. The mortality rate of such babies - considered “unsalvageableunsolvableinsolvable” outside of the U.S. and therefore never alive - is extraordinarily high; up to 869 per 1,000 in the first month of life alone. This skews U.S. infant mortality statistics.
Let me try that again......
Low birth weight infants are not counted against the “live birth” statistics for many countries reporting low infant mortality rates.
According to the way statistics are calculated in Canada, Germany, and Austria, a premature baby weighing <500g is not considered a living child.
But in the U.S., such very low birth weight babies are considered live births. The mortality rate of such babies - considered “unsalvageable” outside of the U.S. and therefore never alive - is extraordinarily high; up to 869 per 1,000 in the first month of life alone. This skews U.S. infant mortality statistics.
[...]
Some of the countries reporting infant mortality rates lower than the U.S. classify babies as “stillborn” if they survive less than 24 hours whether or not such babies breathe, move, or have a beating heart at birth.
Forty percent of all infant deaths occur in the first 24 hours of life.
In the United States, all infants who show signs of life at birth (take a breath, move voluntarily, have a heartbeat) are considered alive.
If a child in Hong Kong or Japan is born alive but dies within the first 24 hours of birth, he or she is reported as a “miscarriage” and does not affect the country’s reported infant mortality rates.
[...]
Too short to count?
In Switzerland and other parts of Europe, a baby born who is less than 30 centimeters long is not counted as a live birth. Therefore, unlike in the U.S., such high-risk infants cannot affect Swiss infant mortality rates.
Efforts to salvage these tiny babies reflect this classification. Since 2000, 42 of the world’s 52 surviving babies weighing less than 400g (0.9 lbs.) were born in the United States.