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America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

bloomberg.com

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Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#21

Post by DanBC »

wtbob wrote: post #5

I thought it was interesting that according to their numbers the U.S. has fewer homicides than Germany (which is worse than Syria?!). That's quite surprising.

It feels wrong. The US is remarkably violent. UNODC says the rate of homicide in the US is 3.9 per 100,000, and for Germany is 0.9 per 100,000 people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intention...

I think Bloomberg took numbers from here: http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-67...

> Performance of the health-related SDG index, MDG index, and non-MDG index, and 33 individual health-related indicators, by country, 2015

> Countries are ranked by their health-related SDG index from highest to lowest. Indicators have been scaled from 0 to 100. Definitions of health-related SDG indicators are shown in table 1. SDG=Sustainable Development Goal. MDG=Millennium Development Goal. MMR=maternal mortality ratio. SBA=skilled birth attendance. Mort=mortality. NN mort=neonatal mortality. NTDs=neglected tropical diseases. NCDs=non-communicable diseases. FP need met, mod=family planning need met, modern contraception. Adol=adolescent. UHC=universal health coverage. Air poll mort=mortality attributable to air pollution. WaSH=water, sanitation, and hygiene. IPV=intimate partner violence. HH air poll=household air pollution. Occ risk burden=burden attributable to occupational risks. PM2·5=fine particulate matter smaller than 2·5 μm.

They put that into a chart here: http://www.thelancet.com/cms/attachment/2065481409/206635003...

In that chart US is labled as 42, and Germany is labled as 81. I suspect Bloomberg made an error.

Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#22

Post by jnordwick »

I'm so sick of these articles:

1- poverty is defined differently in each country

2- so is infant mortality

3- so is life expectancy (who gets included isn't the same)

4- social justice issues have no clear definition

5- some of these stats aren't even quantifyable, such as hygiene.

...

How much is a percentage of obesity worth? As much as percent of GDP? Or why isn't the number of top 100 universities accounted for?

can keep going and going...

These are political rankings given the veneer of rigor because they have numbers attached to them. The UN Sustainable Development Goals are just busy work for the Social Justice Warriors with nothing else to do but make up yet another meaningless utopian index.

https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdgs

Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#23

Post by fake-name »

d--b wrote: post #18

So? Is it about time someone makes it great again?

Again implies it was great at some point, (or greater then it is now).

At what point, exactly, was the US "Great"? Was it when Women couldn't vote? Was it when black people couldn't sit in the "white people" part of the bus? Was it when you could get committed to a mental institution just for being gay?

While there are many things wrong now, the rosy past that such rhetoric seems to assume exists was never a thing. America was never great.

Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#25

Post by jnordwick »

tonyedgecombe wrote: post #4

"The U.S. is No. 64 in the rate of mothers dying for every 100,000 births, and No. 40 when it comes to the rate children under age five die." That is shameful for the tenth richest country in the world (per capita).

The real shame in that number is that other countries literally let premature babies die without intervention so they can keep their health costs down and infant mortality numbers down too while the US aggressively intervenes and reports all births massively inflating our infant mortality numbers.

Basically, if you are going to be a premature baby, you would much rather be born in the US than any other country in the world.

Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#26

Post by pmontra »

jnordwick wrote: post #22

I'm so sick of these articles: 1- poverty is defined differently in each country 2- so is infant mortality 3- so is life expectancy (who gets included isn't the same) 4- social justice issues have no clear definition 5- some of these stats aren't even quantifyable, such as hygiene. ... How much is a percentage of obesity worth? As much as percent of GDP? Or why isn't the number of top 100 universities accounted for?…

Some indicators could be subjective but how can infant mortality and life expectancy be defined differently in different countries?

Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#27

Post by JonnieCache »

jnordwick wrote: post #25
tonyedgecombe wrote: post #4

"The U.S. is No. 64 in the rate of mothers dying for every 100,000 births, and No. 40 when it comes to the rate children under age five die." That is shameful for the tenth richest country in the world (per capita).

The real shame in that number is that other countries literally let premature babies die without intervention so they can keep their health costs down and infant mortality numbers down too while the US aggressively intervenes and reports all births massively inflating our infant mortality numbers. Basically, if you are going to be a premature baby, you would much rather be born in the US than any other country in the…

Doctors stand by as babies perish because they're concerned about their nation's WHO rankings? Citation needed.

Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#28

Post by pmontra »

chme wrote: post #19
f_allwein wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The graphs are a bit confusing. higher = better, actually (there is a small bit saying "safe levels/ unsafe levels" above the 1st graph). I was also confused why Saudia Arabia would have such high issues with alcohol, whereas in fact it is Russia that does...

> Good performer: War (fatalities per 100k population): Germany 100 What does that mean?

Those graphs are very misleading. They rank countries from the first (left) to the last (right) for each indicator. Some indicators are such that left is better (hygiene), other are left is worse (war fatalities).

That 100 means that Germany is the 100th on war fatalities. But not! To add confusion to confusion, the number is the position of the USA on the scale. So it's the USA to be at position 100. Germany appears to be in the upper 90s.

Edit: they mislead me too. Check mnc's reply.

Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#29

Post by jnordwick »

pmontra wrote: post #26
jnordwick wrote: post #22

I'm so sick of these articles: 1- poverty is defined differently in each country 2- so is infant mortality 3- so is life expectancy (who gets included isn't the same) 4- social justice issues have no clear definition 5- some of these stats aren't even quantifyable, such as hygiene. ... How much is a percentage of obesity worth? As much as percent of GDP? Or why isn't the number of top 100 universities accounted for?…

Some indicators could be subjective but how can infant mortality and life expectancy be defined differently in different countries?

Who is "born" is defined different depending on which country. E.g., most European countries will not count premature babies if they don't make certain weight or other metrics and no attempt to intervene, so this sets up some really perverse incentives. These can make up more than 3 out of every 4 premature births so it can significantly tilt the stats:

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/276952/infant-mortalit...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infant_mortality

Re: America Is Not the Greatest Country on Earth. It’s No. 28

#30

Post by napoleoncomplex »

jnordwick wrote: post #25
tonyedgecombe wrote: post #4

"The U.S. is No. 64 in the rate of mothers dying for every 100,000 births, and No. 40 when it comes to the rate children under age five die." That is shameful for the tenth richest country in the world (per capita).

The real shame in that number is that other countries literally let premature babies die without intervention so they can keep their health costs down and infant mortality numbers down too while the US aggressively intervenes and reports all births massively inflating our infant mortality numbers. Basically, if you are going to be a premature baby, you would much rather be born in the US than any other country in the…

The first of the numbers (rate of mothers dying) would not be affected at all by what you mention, and the second (rate of children under age of 5 dying), while affected by infant mortality (number of deaths of infants under 1 year old), is a much wider metric, so the effect is also relatively small.

Either way, I'd be interested in seeing some sources for those claims, as it's the first I've heard of it happening, at least in the developed world. And I mean it sincerely, since it's a topic of interest to me.

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