PolitiFact: Romney says Americans pay more and die sooner

The statement

"The lifespan of the average American is less than that of people in nations that spend far less (on health care). . . . To put it bluntly, we spend more and die sooner."--Mitt Romney in the book No Apology
The ruling

In his new book, No Apology, former Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney devotes a chapter to health care policy — a topic that animated his tenure as governor of Massachusetts.

Romney passed a health care overhaul that was designed to get his state as close to universal coverage as possible.

While he does not support President Barack Obama's health care proposal, he does agree in his book that the U.S. health care system has problems.

"The lifespan of the average American is less than that of people in nations that spend far less" on health care, Romney wrote, adding, "To put it bluntly, we spend more and die sooner."
The first place we looked was the statistical archive of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a group that represents 30 advanced, industrialized nations, mostly in Europe, Asia and North America. Scholars consider OECD figures to be among the most reliable for international comparisons on health care.

The OECD's most recent figures, for either 2005 or 2006 (the year varies by country), show that the United States ranks 24th — well under the average level for the 30 nations studied.

Specifically, life expectancy in the United States was 77.8 years. (Japan was tops with 82.4 years in 2006.) The life expectancy in Canada is 80.6 years. Canada, of course, has a national health care system. The World Health Organization ranks the Canadian health care ystem 30th in the world.
the US is ranked 37th.

Now, we'll look at health care expenditures. There are two ways to measure this — by expenditures per capita, or by expenditures as a percentage of GDP. However you measure it, we're No. 1 — by a mile.

Using the first measure, the OECD reports that the United States spent $7,290 on health care per capita in 2007. The only two other countries where per capita health care expenditures exceeded even $4,000 were Norway and Switzerland.

Here are some other health care facts. Other than South Africa, America is the only developed country in the world that does not provide healthcare for all of its citizens.

Yet, the US ranks 26th in infant mortality and 24th in the number of healthy years a person can expect to live - putting America’s healthcare system in the company of Cuba and Slovenia rather than Canada and Western European nations.

According to Reuters, France, Japan and Australia rated best and the United States worst in new rankings focusing on preventable deaths due to treatable conditions in 19 leading industrialized nations, researchers said on Tuesday. More than 100,00 deaths could be prevented each year if our medical system performed better.

source: http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/politifact-romney-says-americans-pay-more-for-health-care-but-die-sooner/1077270

source: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071202181726AAufewm

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