Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Matthew Holt, writing on Erza Klein's blog, has an interesting piece concerning the high price of health care in the United States. He reviews some new studies that reflect the higher prices we pay here for our health services. He states,
Two studies out. Neither providing exactly new news. I did a study looking at laproscopic cholecystectomy between Japan and the US for my master's thesis in 1992. The result then was that that surgery and basically all health care cost twice as much here, when in those days everything else in Japan (land, food, cars, golf club memberships, hookers) cost twice as much. Outcomes seemed to be similar even though patterns of care were very different overall.
Now a similar study (albeit done in a major journal and not for some punk's masters thesis) is showing the same thing about the costs of CABGs between the US and Canada. They cost twice as much here too. Outcomes again seem to be similar. * * * * *
Finally, in a repeat/update of an article he wrote with Uwe Reinhardt a while back called "It's the prices, stupid" Gerald Anderson shows that we spend more money here, not because of the canards of malpractice or even because we receive more services per capita, but because in general we pay more for the same thing.
The full text is an interesting read. [bm]