Posted on 02/23/2010 9:18:23 AM PST by AtlasStalled
An unapologetic Danny Williams says he was aware his trip to the United States for heart surgery earlier this month would spark outcry, but he concluded his personal health trumped any public fallout over the controversial decision.
In an interview with The Canadian Press, Williams said he went to Miami to have a "minimally invasive" surgery for an ailment first detected nearly a year ago, based on the advice of his doctors.
"This was my heart, my choice and my health," Williams said late Monday from his condominium in Sarasota, Fla.
"I did not sign away my right to get the best possible health care for myself when I entered politics."
(Excerpt) Read more at google.com ...
France, Italy, San Marino, Andorra, Malta, SIngapore, Spain, Oman, Austria, and Japan.
Yeah, doncha just love all the state of the art technologies, procedures, research and Rx that comes out of Malta, Singapore, Andorra et al?
Wow, sure wish the USA had such smarts /s
These rankings are highly dependent on who is writing the rules and selecting the criteria.
Oh yeah, I can imagine that some people can take some of that raw data and twist it around..., and if that is what has been done -- I can also imagine that someone else has taken the data and presented it correctly.
So, I would be happy to see how they have done that with the data. And I know if anyone can come up with that kind of ranking and listing of the various countries from that kind of data -- that certainly a FReeper here can do that.
I guess we'll wait for that FReeper to come along and reference that other ranking for the countries and what data was used.
In the meantime, this is the only one I know of.
With the US rated at 37 and Cuba at 39, inquiring minds would like to know just how the data was compiled, and what weighting various factors were given in determining the ranking, and what sort of data manipulation has been done.
That would be interesting to find out. And as I said, if there is something that wasn't handled right with the data that we have, then I'm sure it would not take someone very long to put the correct listing together using the data in the correct way.
Raw data, itself is not usually the problem. I'm sure someone (who was experienced in handling data like this) could come up with something correct, if it was not put together correctly in this listing given.
I'm just waiting for that reference to that assembling of the data as it is. This is not something that I normally get into, so I don't have a background in this sort of information. I can only take what has been put together and relay that to others.
The nice thing about FRee Republic is that if this is incorrect, then someone will know the reference to another listing of these countries in the world, have the data referenced correctly and have a correct list to present. And if someone could do that, I would be happy to have it.
It is quite disconcerting to have the U.S. listed almost next to Cuba ... LOL...
Well, I knew the U.S. was going downhill in a lot of ways, but I didn’t think it was that bad in medical care. But, if you’ve got a better listing of these countries, do give me the reference for it. I’ll post the entire listing here, on this thread, too...
"I did not sign away my right to get the best possible health care for myself when I entered politics."Thanks AtlasStalled.
Nice spamming from the WHO from 10 years ago, I’ve seen health care in Greece (number 14), they call ambulances there “meat wagons” for a reason. I lived there for 3 years. Try again.
I didn't see a more updated list. If you've got one, please do post the more recent info... I just didn't find it. But, this is not an area of knowledge and/or background information that I concentrate on, so I wouldn't know where else to go and get this kind of updated list.
Do you know where I can get it?
I'd be interested in how the ranking was conducted. I suspect it's based on the level of care available to the average Medicaid patient, rather than the level of care available to somebody who can afford a good insurance plan, or pay cash for the best available.
Are you for real? I hope all of this crud you’re posting has been sarcasm— but I’m getting tired of waiting for the reveal. So here:
Low Health Care Ranking Debunked
John Stossel takes a look under the hood of the WHO study that Michael Moore and so many others make so much of when they push for socialized medicine, and finds, in his words, “less than meets the eye”.
So what’s wrong with the WHO and Commonwealth Fund studies? Let me count the ways.
The WHO judged a country’s quality of health on life expectancy. But that’s a lousy measure of a health-care system. Many things that cause premature death have nothing do with medical care. We have far more fatal transportation accidents than other countries. That’s not a health-care problem.
Similarly, our homicide rate is 10 times higher than in the U.K., eight times higher than in France, and five times greater than in Canada.
When you adjust for these “fatal injury” rates, U.S. life expectancy is actually higher than in nearly every other industrialized nation.
Unsurprisingly, the study also skewed its results through a criterion it called “fairness”, which basically gave points for government interference in the medical sector — a category in which our nation should strive mightily for last place.
And Stossel’s not done yet. He closes with this teaser: “Next week: the truth about the Commonwealth Fund study.” Stay tuned.
That list is wrong. I’ve been to the UK and had surgery. It’s not better than the states. A trip to the vet would be better than the treatment and care I received in the UK. I just had another surgery in the US about a month ago and the treatment was miles above the UK.
I’m sure if someone wanted to go into the analysis of this data, they could. But, I don’t think it would be worthwhile for any individual here to go into it — because — with this listing having been out for about 10 years... (and this is the latest data that I could find on it) — I’m sure that others (who are probably very qualified to do so) have analyzed this up one side and down the other.
So..., I would just recommend going out and finding someone else’s good analysis of the data. I haven’t done that, but if I spent enough time on it, I’m sure I could come up with something. I just did a quick search for general information on health care in different countries and this is what popped up.
I’m sure there must be other FReepers who are in the medical profession and have known about this data for a long time and can provide a source for the analysis of this data and listing.
I know I heard some refutation on TV several months back, but can not remember where. I can understand skewed data when someone else explains it, but I too am not really equipped to pull this stuff apart.
I just know that statistics can be used to give false appearances, and when the US ranks that close to Cuba, something is rotten and it ain’t in Denmark.LOL.
I don’t know what the criteria that was used, any biases at the WHO etc, but I don’t have to have something else to know that the best and the brightest are here. It’s not rocket science that the world’s elites come here to get care and that the inventions and pharmaceuticals usually originate here.
Not trying to be argumentative nor cynical in this post. It’s just the reality that the world’s best is here, just like about anything else one can name. American First & Foremost.
That list is wrong. I’ve been to the UK and had surgery. It’s not better than the states. A trip to the vet would be better than the treatment and care I received in the UK. I just had another surgery in the US about a month ago and the treatment was miles above the UK.
I know that we could find a long list of people who could give a lot of anecdotal information about their experiences, but what I was hoping to find was someone who did analysis of the data that produced this list and came up with something in regards to that data.
I'm not in that field of work so I'm not the one to do that kind of analysis, but I'm sure there are others who are qualified and who have already done it and have written up reports on this very same list (it's been out for about 10 years...).
Perhaps someone could reference someone's analysis and research on it.
I know I heard some refutation on TV several months back, but can not remember where. I can understand skewed data when someone else explains it, but I too am not really equipped to pull this stuff apart.
Well..., knowing that this has been around (i.e., the report) for about ten years and knowing that if there was something wrong with it, so that it had to be corrected -- that there would be "people all over it" and correcting it in no time flat... I just knew that there had to be reports written out there somewhere to that effect.
And someone here will be able to produce it, I'm sure... :-)
You betcha, someone here will be able to explain it no doubt. I just hope it happens before bedtime, or I won’t be able to sleep. LOL. Nice talkin’ to ya.
Not trying to be argumentative nor cynical in this post. It’s just the reality that the world’s best is here, just like about anything else one can name. American First & Foremost.
Well, as you and I know (or we should know, being on Free Republic) -- is that people have opinions (we've got them all right here, for sure... LOL...) -- but an opinion is one thing and something that can be backed up by sourced and reliable information is quite another.
Even when things are backed up with authoritative and reliable information, there is still disagreement, right here on Free Republic, about different topics. I see it all the time.
Even so, it's important to have not only one's opinion on the matter, but to have some good information and data and other authoritative sources that can back up one's opinion.
That's what I'm looking for here, in regards to this.
I mean..., we've got a "health care issue" going on in this country ... and so, it's "right now" that it would be good to get information like this from some kind of authoritative source, that could be referenced -- so that if someone says "The U.S. is 37th on a list of nations for health care systems" -- that one could come back and correct the information, and say, "Well, here's what it actually is..." ... you see...
LOL... well, by bedtime would be nice... but I won’t be losing too much sleep over it, because no matter what, I’m not traveling to other countries to get my health care and so far, I haven’t personally run into problems. :-)
Well isn’t that special! Meanwhile, the other Canadians just have to wait in line..Hay buddy..when your wonderful style of medicine hits our nation guess what???? You ain’t getting anything special anymore. Put that in your pipe and smoke it.
Are you for real? I hope all of this crud you’re posting has been sarcasm— but I’m getting tired of waiting for the reveal. So here:
No, no sarcasm here. I just posted the information I found and have stated things in a pretty straightforward manner and would really like to see what other "listing" that someone has for these nations based on whatever they've come up with, in regards to this data.
I don't have any problems with anyone producing whatever information they have.
Low Health Care Ranking Debunked
And do you have a link for that study... I'll go get it now.
And Stossel’s not done yet. He closes with this teaser: “Next week: the truth about the Commonwealth Fund study.” Stay tuned.
Do you have a date and time for this show? I'll mark it down on my DVR and record it.
But, what would be a whole lot better, too... would be if there was some printed information on this. I would appreciate it, if you had that.
But, by all means, give the date and time of the show... I don't want to miss that one... :-) [and are they going to repeat the previous segment, or is there some place that has recorded it already so that we can see it?]
When you posted the list, you did so under the guise that it provided information as if it was useful:
The real irony is him coming to a country that ranks 37th in the world health care systems (according to year 2000 rankings, which may have changed today... somewhat).
When confronted, suddenly you play dumb, as if you don't know if the data is valid or if there are issues with it. Sorry, you brought the data to the party, so you have to dance with it. And the data stinks:
Overall Level of Health: A good health system, above all, contributes to good health. To assess overall population health and thus to judge how well the objective of good health is being achieved, WHO has chosen to use the measure of disability- adjusted life expectancy (DALE). This has the advantage of being directly comparable to life expectancy and is readily compared across populations. The report provides estimates for all countries of disability- adjusted life expectancy. DALE is estimated to equal or exceed 70 years in 24 countries, and 60 years in over half the Member States of WHO. At the other extreme are 32 countries where disability- adjusted life expectancy is estimated to be less than 40 years. Many of these are countries characterised by major epidemics of HIV/AIDS, among other causes.
Distribution of Health in the Populations: It is not sufficient to protect or improve the average health of the population, if - at the same time - inequality worsens or remains high because the gain accrues disproportionately to those already enjoying better health. The health system also has the responsibility to try to reduce inequalities by prioritizing actions to improve the health of the worse-off, wherever these inequalities are caused by conditions amenable to intervention. The objective of good health is really twofold: the best attainable average level – goodness – and the smallest feasible differences among individuals and groups – fairness. A gain in either one of these, with no change in the other, constitutes an improvement.
Responsiveness: Responsiveness includes two major components. These are (a) respect for persons (including dignity, confidentiality and autonomy of individuals and families to decide about their own health); and (b) client orientation (including prompt attention, access to social support networks during care, quality of basic amenities and choice of provider).
Distribution of Financing: There are good and bad ways to raise the resources for a health system, but they are more or less good primarily as they affect how fairly the financial burden is shared. Fair financing, as the name suggests, is only concerned with distribution. It is not related to the total resource bill, nor to how the funds are used. The objectives of the health system do not include any particular level of total spending, either absolutely or relative to income. This is because, at all levels of spending there are other possible uses for the resources devoted to health. The level of funding to allocate to the health system is a social choice – with no correct answer. Nonetheless, the report suggests that countries spending less than around 60 dollars per person per year on health find that their populations are unable to access health services from an adequately performing health system.
In order to reflect these attributes, health systems have to carry out certain functions. They build human resources through investment and training, they deliver services, they finance all these activities. They act as the overall stewards of the resources and powers entrusted to them. In focusing on these few universal functions of health systems, the report provides evidence to assist policy-makers as they make choices to improve health system performance.
Talk about skewed criteria. Which you should have known with a little due diligence...
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