China was called the sick man of Asia during the late 19th century and the leading up to the early twentieth century. It was a time whereby the middle kingdom was perplexed and rife with internal government conflicts, division and foreign interventions.
The derogatory term somewhat befits the Chinese during those dark days, at least to certain extent as the majority of the population indulge in drugs such as opium, thanks to the British traders who exported it to the mainland.
Times and tide has changed in today's world. I bet you may not know that China is no longer the the sickest nation in the world so to speak (even though in terms of population, it might still stand as the highest in the world for those admitted to the hospital or needing treatment of somesorts.
On the contrary the United States by virtue of the size of the healthcare budget, the number of citizens receiving healthcare easily outrank others to be as the number one in the world. So is the USA the new sick man of the West?
Healthcare spending in the US constitutes over 16% of the country GDP, the highest percentage amongst developed nations. Medical spending in the year 2010 alone exceeds 2.3 million US dollars, a staggering amount.
The rate of increase for health cost surpassed wage increment by a factor of at least 3 times and over sixteen percent of the population do not have any health insurance. Government spending for hospitals and related activities expected to surpassed 60 billion dollars each year!.
If President Obama gets reelected then the Obamacare policy which is popular known will surely takes effect and this implies the entire cost of the health expenditures will likely to quadruple as the government sought to provide free insurance coverage for every single of the citizen.
It is indeed mind boggling and hard to figure out why a developed nation like the US need to spend trillions of dollars on the population medical care. Obviously, there are more sick people in the country relative to other developed nations.
It is not surprising that the FDA is working in cahoot with big pharma to fleece on the population by providing expensive and ineffective treatments for even mild and common diseases.
Despite all the advances in medical and biological technology and science, the US food chain is making its population more sick than ever. Reports by the US CDC indicates one third of the adults are obese and overweight!.
Is US the sickest nation in the world? Well, you be the judge!
