Digging into another myth about health care

Trying to distract myself during a medical appointment this morning, I asked my doctor what she thought of the health care reform proposals before the House and Senate. In a resigned tone, she flatly stated that the proposals did little for doctors or patients and mostly benefited insurance companies. I agreed with her and we commiserated together that little would probably end up being done to fundamentally reform health care. Then I asked what she thought about a government funded health care system. She was favorable to it and had familiarity with the British system but wondered how such an overhaul could be carried out in the United States. I was encouraged that she didn’t run a mile from the suggestion. So often we are told that our doctors would stop being doctors under a government funded national health care plan. In fact, my doctor seemed to indicate just the opposite. She told me stories of her doctor friends who are struggling just to stay in business under the current system. When I got home I checked the number of doctors per patients in major industrialized countries to see if there was any truth to this argument. According to the OECD, Australia, France, Germany, and the UK, all nations with so called ‘socialized medicine’ have more doctors per patients than the US. Only Canada and New Zealand have fewer doctors per person than the US. The claim that there would be a doctor shortage under “socialized medicine” turns out to be just another myth.

Practicing physicians, Density per 1 000 population (head counts)
(Source: OECD 2006 data)
Australia 2.81 Canada 2.15 France 3.37 Germany 3.5 Netherlands 3.82 NZ 2.28 UK 2.44 US 2.42