Cost and Life expectancy

Map of Countries with Universal Health care

The blue areas are countries with national universal health care systems. The Green areas are countries attempting to implement universal health care systems and the orange countries are countries that have universal health care provided by United States War funding. Click on map to see more detail.

Trends in number of uninsured Americans

Trends in costs of sevices

Is the UK NHS a good model for US healthcare?

"We need to have the same discussions in health care and other issues, with a way to describe what various options would be like. That would allow people to imagine their future and participate in it. Right now, it’s hard to imagine these things, and politicians exploit that."

Tim Brown IDEO

Nearly 45,000 people die each year in the United States due to a lack of health insurance

Nearly 45,000 people die each year due to a lack of health insurance, according to a study published on Thursday in the online edition of the American Journal of Public Health.

The study, carried out by Harvard researchers and funded by a research grant, found that uninsured, working-age Americans have a 40 percent higher risk of death than their privately insured counterparts, up from 25 percent in 1993.

The study was released by Physicians for a National Health Program, an organization that favors a single-payer system. It takes into account socioeconomics, health behaviors and baseline health. The bottom line is that the uninsured are more likely to go without the kind of care that can save their life.

http://albuquerque.bizjournals.com/albuquerque/stories/2009/09/14/daily52.html

The US health care system (click to enlarge)

The average cost of a family health insurance plan which now exceeds $13,000 per year in the US, is growing faster than inflation

Trends in uninsurance and healthcare related bankruptcies

US spending on health care as a percent of disposable income 1930 to 2007

International comparison of spending trends on health

Estimated average healthcare spending for a typical US family in 2006

Global Obesity

Per capita spending for Canada and New England

Number of Uninsured