Which Country Ranks High In Focusing Preventable Deaths?

Which leading countries rank high in focusing preventable deaths? Don’t know, never, just make a wild guess!

United States! This is the first country that flashed on my mind. I bet many of you will have the same answer as mine.

The poll that I placed last week

But….

The correct answer is France, and the next 2 best countries are Japan and Australia. Surprisingly, among the 19 leading industrialized nations, United States was rated worst on focusing on preventable deaths due to treatable conditions.

The researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine reported the findings in the journal Health Affairs on January 8, 2008. In the study, they tracked deaths that could have been preventable if accessing to timely and effective health care were possible and ranked nations on how they did. According to the researchers, such deaths are an important way to gauge the performance of a country’s health care system.

Deaths before the age of 75 from numerous causes, including heart disease, stroke, certain cancers, diabetes, certain bacterial infections and complications of common surgical procedures, were considered when establishing the rankings. The results showed that such deaths accounted for 23 percent of overall deaths in men and 32 per cent of deaths in women. France did best - with 64.8 deaths deemed preventable by timely and effective health care per 100,000 people, in the study period of 2002 and 2003.

Nevertheless, if the US health care system could have been performed as well as those of the top three countries, the deaths in the United States could have been reduced by 101,000 per year.

According to the US government estimates, there is a large number of Americans, about 47 million, who lack any type of health insurance, out of about 300 million populations. Perhaps, this is the main reason for United States to perform poorly in the study.

There is no doubt that the health care in the United States is good if you have access. However, if the people do not have access, then the “picture” could be very different. Don’t you think so?

Stop Smoking, Lose Weight Or Be Fired?

If you are obese or overweight, you better start losing weight.

If you are a smoker, quit smoking seems to be your only option.

If you are obese and smoker, then you are not only at a higher risk of getting heart disease and other diseases, but also very likely to be fired by your employers.

Is this a joke? Don't believe?

Unfortunately, this is true and this has already happened in the US.

In order to have a better control on the escalating healthcare costs, employers have adopted stricter wellness policies.

According to press reports in the US, companies such as Scotts (gardening) and Weyco (healthcare) have fired employees who tested positive for nicotine. In fact, a policy was instituted by Michigan-based Weyco in 2005 that allow management to lay off employees who smoke, regardless of whether they do it at work or at home. The company subsequently fired 4 employees who either refused to be tested for nicotine or after tests showed they had nicotine in their blood.

Naturally, the implementation of these unpopular policies by the employers are certainly opposed by their employees. Last year, a Massachusetts man actually sued Scotts for firing him for smoking on his own time. He insisted that he was unfairly sacked for "engaging in legal activities away from the workplace."

In a online poll conducted by Harris Interactive early last month (October 07), most Americans were strongly against bosses firing workers who are obese or smoke. Out of 2,267 US adults polled, only a few actually agreed that employers are allowed to fire someone who is unwilling to lose weight (4 percent) or stop smoking (7 percent). Nevertheless, about one-third of poll respondents preferred employers to require staff to attend quit-smoking sessions or weight-loss programs.

Personally, I would not agree with companies firing their employees with health issues without first giving them a chance to modify their health conditions. But those employees who are obese or smokers should now have a pressing reason to cease smoking or reduce weight right away, not only for health reasons but also for bread and butter.

Prevention is Better than Cure!

For the last six months or so mainly, I have not posted anything here mainly because of time constraints.

Recently, I saw an article on newspapers discussing about healthcare. The heading reads something like this:

"Prevention is Better than Cure"
Instead of costly treatment, greater attention should be given to prevention of illness"

According to PriceWaterhouseCoopers, the world spent a total of US$4 trillion ($6.1 trillion) on healthcare last year (2006), of which 54 per cent was contributed by North Americans. With global demographic changes, it is estimated by World Health Organization (WHO) to reach US$10 trillion in 2020.

Whether you like it or not, HEALTHCARE is poised to be a key growth engine in the global economy. While this will no doubt create tremendous wealth for healthcare companies, it also means that the burden on governments and individuals will become much heavier.

Worst still, the impending ageing global population will see a tripling of people older than 60 years old, from 600 million to two billion by 2045 globally. WHO's predicts that healthcare expenditure should explode by 2015 with bulk of the spending on costly surgeries and treatments.

Besides heart disease, other sicknesses accompanying ageing population also include diabetes, hypertension, cancer, Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, stroke, etc.

Health experts believe that concentrating on prevention, on early diagnostics, and on remote patient management will enable us to build healthcare systems that are high quality, patient-centred and financially sustainable.

While finding means to increase funding to meet growing healthcare needs, government should also search for innovative ways to stretch the healthcare dollar.

For individuals, the best solution to counter the escalating healthcare cost is to concentrate on prevention at younger ages instead of dealing with treatment later on.

Is this feasible? Yes, it is possible.

In order to prevent from developing from heart disease or any other diseases, you should adopt a healthy lifestyle starting from young: healthy diet with regular exercise, plus taking some relevant supplements when necessary.

If you are able to do all these, you can greatly reduce the chance of, but unfortunately cannot be guarantee to be free from getting into diseases at older ages. This is because family health history also play an important part in your body's health condition.