🌅 Today’s stat: $3,744

SOURCE

Peterson-KFF

WHAT TO KNOW

• U.S. healthcare spending per capita ($13,432) is nearly double that of similarly large and wealthy nations ($7,393), and far more than the next two closest countries, Switzerland ($9,688) and Germany ($8,441). Other research shows drug prices in the U.S. are nearly three times higher than in other high-income countries.

WHY IT MATTERS

• Despite the extra spending, life expectancy in the U.S. (78.4 years) is by far the lowest among peer nations, behind Germany (80.6 years) and the U.K. (81.1 years), and four years lower than the comparable country average (82.5 years). Life expectancy in the U.S. is also significantly lower than in high-spending Switzerland (84.2 years, highest among peer nations), low-spending Japan (84.1 years; spending $5,640 per capita, lowest among peer nations), and average-spending Sweden (83.4 years; spending $7,522 per capita).

CONNECT THE DOTS

• It hasn’t always been this way. In the 1980s, the U.S. had similar spending and life expectancy to that of comparable wealthy nations, however, the trends began to diverge in the 1990s and never recovered. One explanation: the U.S. has consistently had higher childhood (0-14 years) death rates than peer nations since the 1980s, experiencing around 20 more deaths per 100,000 children each year than the comparable country average.