Where We Stand
Posted by nadeem on December 5, 2005
we’ve all asked ourselves the following question: where does our healthcare system stand in comparison with our neighbors and other industrialized nations?
for those of you who may not be aware, the 2000 issue of the WHO World Health Report tackled that very question. it compared the different systems and ranked 191 nations. the investigators used five indicators: overall level of population health; health inequalities (or disparities) within the population; overall level of health system responsiveness (a combination of patient satisfaction and how well the system acts); distribution of responsiveness within the population (how well people of varying economic status find that they are served by the health system); and the distribution of the health system’s financial burden within the population (who pays the costs).
again, keep in mind that this was undertaken in the mid-90s.
the good news is that kuwait ranked 45th. not bad you would think, right? however, when compared to the other gcc members, we came last. oman, being one of the poorest neighboring nation, ranked 8th worldwide! i would be curious to know how far down the list we stand today. unfortunately, i suspect that the divide between our neighbors and us has widened knowing that many systems have dramatically improved in the recent years. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in health policy, kuwait | 1 Comment »
