Meanwhile: Who lives better - Americans or Europeans? - by Timothy Egan
"One of the memorable scenes in "Sicko," Michael Moore's latest cinematic provocation, comes from France, where he shows doctors in their little white cars making house calls - for free. But it's not just France. When we lived in Italy some time ago, a doctor came to our farmhouse rental on Easter Sunday morning to diagnose a stomach ailment. He charged nothing.But even with insurance, Americans are stuck with what may be the worst of all systems: one that lets a handful of corporations make life-and-death decisions, with incentive to dump and deny. Little wonder that the United States ranks 37th in effectiveness of health care. Italy ranks 2nd. This is a country that can't form a government to last longer than the soccer season, and yet, they make the U.S. medical system look barbaric.
If America's system doesn't kill you - see the infant mortality and life expectancy rates, bringing up the rear - it can put you in the poorhouse. Medical catastrophes are the leading cause of bankruptcy, and most of those are people who have some insurance, clinging to the frayed edge of the middle class. O.K., so what about leisure? Americans spend nearly a third of their disposable income on good times, baby. But we can't relax. Sorry - no time. Lunch averages 31 minutes. And the U.S. ranks dead last among 21 of the world's richest countries when it comes to guaranteed days off, according to the Center for Economic and Policy Research. Most Americans don't even use their allotted days of leisure. The Italians take 42 vacation days a year - No. 1 in the world. The average American takes 13."
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