Measuring Health Care in Microcosms

For John, BLUF:  It isn't so much the average as it is the variations from the average that gives us trouble.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Sandro Galea, MD, DrPH Dean and Professor, Boston University School of Public Health, in a note from 29 March, points out that we have problems of health inequities—"Health Inequalities in Boston by T-Stops:  A Pictorial Essay"

In the overall statistics Massachusetts is well off health care wise.  We have less than half as many uninsured people as the national average.  Our physician density, thanks to Boston, is the best in the nation.  Even so, by comparing T-Stops we can see differences in health, life expectancy and also health knowledge.  Not every problem is amenable to universal health care insurance and money.  Some of it is life style.  If your Mother didn't teach you to wash your hands and to walk around the block once in a while, you are likely to be not so well off, health wise.

More needs to be done, but we are at the point where money, per se, is not the solution.  Education and change in life style is what is needed.  Can we do that without impinging on individual freedom, without saying that this or that culture is deficient in some way?  I am open to ideas.

Regards  —  Cliff