TY  - JOUR
AU  - Preston,Samuel H.
AU  - Ho,Jessica Y.
TI  - Low Life Expectancy in the United States: Is the Health Care System at Fault?
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 15213
PY  - 2009
Y2  - August 2009
DO  - 10.3386/w15213
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15213
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15213.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Samuel H. Preston
School of Arts and Sciences
289 McNeil Building
University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6298
Tel: 215/746-5396
Fax: 215/898-2124
E-Mail: spreston@sas.upenn.edu

Jessica Y. Ho
417 Chapel Drive
Department of Sociology
Box 90088
Duke University
Durham, NC 27708-0088
E-Mail: jessica.ho@duke.edu
M2  - featured in NBER digest on 2009-11-24
AB  - Life expectancy in the United States fares poorly in international comparisons, primarily because of high mortality rates above age 50. Its low ranking is often blamed on a poor performance by the health care system rather than on behavioral or social factors. This paper presents evidence on the relative performance of the US health care system using death avoidance as the sole criterion. We find that, by standards of OECD countries, the US does well in terms of screening for cancer, survival rates from cancer, survival rates after heart attacks and strokes, and medication of individuals with high levels of blood pressure or cholesterol. We consider in greater depth mortality from prostate cancer and breast cancer, diseases for which effective methods of identification and treatment have been developed and where behavioral factors do not play a dominant role. We show that the US has had significantly faster declines in mortality from these two diseases than comparison countries. We conclude that the low longevity ranking of the United States is not likely to be a result of a poorly functioning health care system.
ER  -