In a previous essay I presented data derived from the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (the OECD). These statistics encompass information from each of the 34 members of the OECD, popularly known as a rich country’s club. Forty eight annual health-care related indices accumulated over 50 years from 1960 comprise the data base. It makes for fascinating reading and analysis.

Two countries for which many of the health-related categories stand out as outliers are the United States and Japan. The former is notable for its extravagant use of its national treasure as 17.5 % of its Gross Domestic Product is devoted to health care in the U.S. A distant second is Finland at 11.8 %. Yet despite this largesse, we fare poorly. For instance, we rank near the bottom in life expectancy. Similarly we are ranked 31st of 34 in deaths per live births under age of 1 today when we were 12th of 34 in 1960. We are 32nd of 34 in medical graduates per 100,000, 29th of 34 in the number of hospital beds because we have found hospitalization to be too expensive. Moreover, with respect to the number of doctor consultations per year we are in 30th place. There are things to be proud of course in the US including access to care-assuming you have insurance-and innovations in technology. But overall it is fair to claim that our health care system needs major reforms.

Japan’s health care has a radically different statistical profile. Life-expectancy at birth both genders, is 83.0 years—in the US, it is 78.2. Life expectancy at age 65 for women is 24 versus 20.0 years in the U.S. Infant mortality in Japan is 2.4 deaths per 1,000 births in infants up to 1 year of age. In the U.S. it is nearly 3 times higher. The U.S. and Japan have about the same number of physicians and annual medical graduates proportionate to the population but in Japan, doctor consultation per capita per year is 23.2-nearly 4 times the American average. Japan has more than 3 times the number of acute care beds than we do and average length of stay is an unbelievable three and a half times higher at 18.5 days-yes that is 18.5 days.