Wealthy Americans Have Death Rates On Par With Poor Europeans (arstechnica.com)
- Reference: 0176919617
- News link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/04/04/0153232/wealthy-americans-have-death-rates-on-par-with-poor-europeans
- Source link: https://arstechnica.com/health/2025/04/wealthy-americans-have-death-rates-on-par-with-poor-europeans/
> [...] The study, led by researchers at Brown University, found that the wealthiest Americans [1]lived shorter lives than the wealthiest Europeans . In fact, wealthy Northern and Western Europeans had death rates 35 percent lower than the wealthiest Americans, whose lifespans were more like the poorest in Northern and Western Europe -- which includes countries such as France, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. "The findings are a stark reminder that even the wealthiest Americans are not shielded from the systemic issues in the US contributing to lower life expectancy, such as economic inequality or risk factors like stress, diet or environmental hazards," lead study author Irene Papanicolas, a professor of health services, policy and practice at Brown, said in a news release.
>
> The study looked at health and wealth data of more than 73,000 adults across the US and Europe who were 50 to 85 years old in 2010. There were more than 19,000 from the US, nearly 27,000 from Northern and Western Europe, nearly 19,000 from Eastern Europe, and nearly 9,000 from Southern Europe. For each region, participants were divided into wealth quartiles, with the first being the poorest and the fourth being the richest. The researchers then followed participants until 2022, tracking deaths. The US had the largest gap in survival between the poorest and wealthiest quartiles compared to European countries. America's poorest quartile also had the lowest survival rate of all groups, including the poorest quartiles in all three European regions.
>
> While less access to health care and weaker social structures can explain the gap between the wealthy and poor in the US, it doesn't explain the differences between the wealthy in the US and the wealthy in Europe, the researchers note. There may be other systemic factors at play that make Americans uniquely short-lived, such as diet, environment, behaviors, and cultural and social differences. "If we want to improve health in the US, we need to better understand the underlying factors that contribute to these differences -- particularly amongst similar socioeconomic groups -- and why they translate to different health outcomes across nations," Papanicolas said.
The findings have been [2]published in the New England Journal of Medicine .
[1] https://arstechnica.com/health/2025/04/wealthy-americans-have-death-rates-on-par-with-poor-europeans/
[2] https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsa2408259
I don't know about wealthy Europeans (Score:1)
but there's definitely a work hard/play hard vibe at play in the upper income brackets in the US.
Maybe drinking yourself sick on a Friday night works for you when you're 22 and blowing off steam after a hard week pushing around excel spreadsheets on Wall Street but it's not surprising it takes some time off your life each time you do it.
Socialized medicine is a good thing (Score:2)
All American doctors have profit motives. They want to heal people, but they have incredible incentives to make other choices, like seeing more patients for less time each and choosing procedures over prevention. They're mostly good people in a system that makes them not as good as they should be.
Seriously thinking of moving to a country with socialized medicine once I retire. If that will ever happen is a question, of course, since Trump is destroying the stock market.
Looking forward to the spin (Score:2)
For those always defending the American system I'm looking forward to how they spin this. My guess they will start by attacking the research study methods.
Unpossible that. (Score:2)
We've heard so much about the outstanding healthcare that the rich in the US are getting vs. the soshulism of Europe... Also so much hate against the regulation for safe food and environment in the EU. Eco-Fascism, really.
How come they are ahead?!!!?
But the real news here is in the second paragraph, that old US adage "better be rich and healthy than poor and sick" is still very true 200 years on. So much social "progress", that it seems it is only right it is getting curbed by the day, LOL.