I'm baaaack....with comments about health care!

So I took some time off for the holidays. Like more than a month. But with the legislature back in session, be certain that I will have lots of fun news to share!

In the mean time, here are a couple items related to health care in the United States. First, as I like to stay connected to rural Arizona, an article from the Sierra Vista Herald reports on the severity of the health care crisis in this corner of rural America. Most rural areas have few large companies, over 90% of whom offer health insurance to employees, versus just 39% of Arizona small businesses who offer health insurance to their employees. Moreover, more of the clients in Sierra Vista are on Medicare (it is a retirement haven) or AHCCCS (our state's Medicaid program), which reimburse hospitals at lower rates. Those low reimbursement rates combined with lots of uninsured patients coming in and paying nothing has left the local hospital in financial straights, threatening the quality and availability of care to local residents - even those lucky enough to have good insurance. Moreover, the article points out there are far fewer doctors practicing in Cochise County than the national average (what a great selling point for a retirement community!). Unfortunately, the Pearce-Burns budget proposal in the legislature would cut $3 million for a medical residency program for 95 medical residents in Arizona.

Meanwhile, the Center for American Progress reported in their daily Progress Report e-mail today that the U.S. health care system ranks worst in the world in preventable deaths:

HEALTH CARE -- U.S. HEALTH SYSTEM RANKS WORST IN PREVENATABLE DEATHS: In Saturday's ABC/Facebook presidential debate, former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani said, "The reality is that, with all of its infirmities and difficulties, we have the best health care system in the world." It's a claim conservatives like to tout. Last month, President Bush insisted, "We have fabulous health care in America, just so you know." He added, "[B]efore people start griping about the health care system here...compare it with other systems around the world." Today, researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine released a report that ranked the United States "worst among 19 countries in the number of deaths that could have been prevented through better access to timely and effective health care. ... Had the United States performed as well as the top three countries -- France, Japan and Australia -- it would have seen about 101,000 fewer deaths per year." All three countries have publicly-financed health systems. One of the study's researchers, Ellen Nolte, "said the large number of Americans who lack any type of health insurance...probably was a key factor" in the low ranking.