72.3% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
“72.3% of all statistics are made up on the spot”
The statistic is legitimate, having come from the U.S. Institute of Medicine. It’s actually probably higher now since the number of uninsured has increased since 2000 http://www.urban.org/publications/411588.html
Assuming it’s valid, the House health reform plan (i.e., the most liberal version of health reform under active consideration in Congress) will reduce uninsured deaths by 105,000 during its first 7 years at a cost of $1.2 trillion, or $11.2 million per death averted. Needless to say, if saving lives were our only objective, we could save WAY more than that, so for every uninsured person we save through expanded coverage, there likely are 2,3, 4 or more people we COULD have saved had we taken those same dollars and spent them on something else. So universal coverage is far from the most cost-effective way to spend our tax dollars.
It gets worse. As a rough rule of thumb, every $10 million reduction in personal income in a community results in 1 statistical death. That is, as income rises, people are better off and have better health (e.g., can afford to drive safer cars, eat healthier food, and live healthier lifestyles). Thus, the $1.2 trillion sent to Washington for health reform will generate about 118,000 statistical deaths, i.e., deaths that could have been avoided had Uncle Sam left these dollars in the pockets of taxpayers. Thus, when BOTH sides of the equation are considered, health reform is at best a wash in terms of death reduction and arguably makes things slightly worse.
In short, if this is the principal rationale for health reform, it provides just one more reason to oppose rather than support the plan about to be approved by Nancy Pelosi and company.