PrintOctober 19, 2009
Graph of the Day for October 19, 2009
"The United States currently spends more than any other nation on health care - 16.5 percent of GDP - yet we still experience poorer health than most other developed nations and even some developing countries."
Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions.
Cancer Survival Rates: US and Europe
Source: National Center for Policy Analysis.
Hoven's Index for October 19, 2009
Number of Nobel Prizes in Medicine given to US researchers in the last 12 years: 9 (1998-2004, 2006, 2007, 2009).
Percentage of globally used drugs produced between 1993 and 2003 which were introduced by US firms:
68% of "first in class" drug launches,
45% of biotech launches,
69% of orphan drug launches.
(Source: Henry G. Grabowski and Y. Richard Wang, "The Quantity and Quality of Worldwide New Drug Introductions, 1982-2003", Health Affairs.)
