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0 pointsbarry-cotter9y ago0 comments

Most of the difference between US and other OECD countries in infant mortality is that the US has a much lower standard for what's considered a viable birth. Basically, lots of what in France are classified as still births would be infant deaths in the US.

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Normal_gaussian9y ago· 4 in thread

Using: http://chartsbin.com/view/1445 and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_infant_mo...

births out of 1000 that are stillbirths:

France 3.87

UK 3.50

USA 2.95

Germany 2.43

Infant Mortality (under 5) per 1000 live births

USA 5.87

UK 4.38

France 4.30

Germany 3.70

Combining the two for a birthed (Still or not) and didn't make it to 5 rate:

USA: 8.8

France: 8.2

UK: 7.9

Germany: 6.1

Obviously the studies aren't matched, but it does suggest that the variance isn't as great as either statistic shows, and there likely is a very strong ranking.

brianwawok9y ago

Now refine that down to college educated nonndrug using people. I suspect it would be even more narrow.

alkonaut9y ago

Why would one take a subset of healthy people in a comparison?

If anything, healthcare systems ought to be ranked on the life expectancies of the bottom percentile. Making a great health care system for the not-poor, not-addicted and those without preexisting conditions isn't a hard problem.

Part of the difference in mindset might be that addiction or poverty is partly seen as self inflicted in the US whereas I would always classify both as being mostly beyond the control of the individual. Even with our socialized medicine rich people eat bettter, excercise more, stress less and thus live longer. I'm glad our healthcare system offsets the life expectancy difference down to 5-10 years between me and a poor person, and I'm happy to pay for it.

Normal_gaussian9y ago

Because you are now selecting for that which is untreatable, assuming access to finance and an education of the parents are the primary factors in treatable deaths.

If that is the case the interesting comparison would be the rate for the populace excluding those people.

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witty_username9y ago

Could downvoter(s) explain?

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