Americans live a little longer, still lag other rich countries

http://www.nbcnews.com/health/americans-live-little-longer-still-lag-other-rich-countries-6C10588107

July 10, 2013
Maggie Fox, NBC News

Americans may be living longer and even exercising a little more, but we really are not much healthier than we were 10 years ago and we are still far behind other rich countries when it comes to our health, researchers said Wednesday.

The biggest survey of U.S. health in 15 years breaks down death, disease and disability county by county – and makes some very unflattering comparisons to other countries. It’s a big, comprehensive dive into what kills us and what makes us sick.

It finds that how healthy you are depends on where you live. If you live in a rich area like San Francisco, Colorado or the suburbs of Washington D.C., you’re likely as healthy as the Swiss or Japanese. If you live in Appalachia or the rural South, you’re likely to be as unhealthy as people in Algeria or Bangladesh.

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But Americans lost ground compared to people living in other countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. “Among 34 OECD countries between 1990 and 2010, the U.S rank for the age-standardized death rate changed from 18th to 27th,” Murray’s team wrote.

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“The United States spends more than the rest of the world on health care and leads the world in the quality and quantity of its health research, but that doesn’t add up to better health outcomes,” Murray said in a statement.

One place the U.S. does better – treating some cancers.

“Five-year survival for breast cancer and colorectal cancer are higher in the U.S. than in many OECD countries,” they wrote.

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“The United States spends the most per capita on healthcare across all countries, lacks universal health coverage, and lags behind other high-income countries for life expectancy and many other health outcome measures.

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"For the first time we're saying that the composition of diet, which is made up 14 different components, things like fruits, grains, nuts, seeds (and) other aspects of diet being analyzed is the biggest determinant of health in the US, followed by smoking, followed by obesity, and then followed by high blood sugar and physical inactivity," Murray told NBC news.

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Counties that score higher in terms of health have social services that support parents and better education outcomes, Woolf argues.

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And Jeff Levi of the Trust for America’s Health sees a telling pattern in the county-by-county breakdown of U.S. health.

“Those distinctions are really about income and education level,” Levi told NBC News.

“OECD countries are spending more on education and income support than we do and that is what is helping to create this healthier environment,” he added.

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