Health and Wealth

I attended an American Heart Association conference late last week where the most interesting thing I bumped into was a poster by Dr. Santiago Garcia and his colleagues at the University of Minnesota. The group followed 100 veterans who arrived at the local Veterans Administration hospital after heart attacks or strokes. They followed the patients for six months.

Then they tabulated their outcomes based on self-reported income. They divided the men into four equal groups. The top two quartiles (incomes of $11,800 to $22,800 and $22,800 to $116,000) had survival rates after six months of 94 and 91 percent, respectively. The bottom two quartiles (incomes of $1,200 to $8,500 and $8,500 to $11,800) had survival rates of 64 and 63 percent, respectively.

Each of these groups got the same exact health care -- at least, that is what Dr. Garcia and colleagues claimed in their poster. As a favorite professor of mine once said: "Discuss."

The health care debate would be a lot more interesting to most Americans if the media began paying attention to who gets sick in this society, why they get sick, and why they have worse outcomes even after receiving adequate care. I wonder if any politician will have the gumption to put the nation's health at the center of the health care debate. It would be a lot more interesting than endlessly fressing about the 15 percent of Americans who lack health insurance -- as tragic as that is.