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In other countries, the cost/benefits analysis would be done and you'd just not get the drug until it's cheaper. In the US, healthcare is addicted to new techn
by thatfrenchguy 5y ago
In other countries, the cost/benefits analysis would be done and you'd just not get the drug until it's cheaper.
In the US, healthcare is addicted to new technologies even if they improve outcomes by 0.01% while being 10x more expensive.
- roywiggins 5y agoEven if they don't improve outcomes at all. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/19/health/alzheimers-drug-aduhelm-fda.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/19/health/alzheimers-drug-ad...
- TheDong 5y agoThe statistics do not show that we improve outcomes even though we spend more. Almost every metric for the quality of healthcare outcomes in the US is worse than most european countries. For example, if you sort the under 5 mortality rate [0], you'll see that the United States comes in 47th, after Cuba, Russia, Qatar, and basically all of western europe. If you check life expectancy, you'll find similar subpar numbers. Ditto for infant mortality. You can easily argue that life expectancy is partly lifestyle based (the fast food industry killing us rather than healthcare), but for infant mortality and under-5 mortality, those numbers should track quite well with the quality of our medical system I think. And those numbers, well, our medical system is obviously doing quite poorly compared to other countries that spend far less. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_and_under-five_mortality_rates https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_an...