I don't have concrete metrics/sources to give right now, but my general perception from reading the news is that there's been staffing issues pushing healthcare systems in the US towards increasing workloads in individual providers, leading to less time/attention given to individual patients, lower availability of appointment slots, and offloading of patients onto alternative app-based telehealth platforms, which have been trending up alongside aquisition/consolidation of independent private practices.

Staffing problems are absolutely everywhere, regardless of the particular healthcare system or even political system. Czechia, the UK, China, Japan. It seems to be a global trend, much like falling birthrates.

I mean, yeah, that was the point of my original reply: health care, education and housing have been getting less accessible in general, not just that poster's country. (Or wherever they're from. I checked the comment history and it seems to be 90% talking back to people criticizing capitalism/markets. Wouldn't be my preferred hobby of choice, personally.)

Not a hobby, but a duty. I lived under both systems and I do not wish the horrors I’ve seen in my youth onto my children. Although at this point, it’s probably unavoidable. It seems that some lessons can only be learned by experiencing them, no warning is ever enough: Russia, communism.

Yes, now ask someone from a nordic country about how best to balance capitalism with regulation and social safety nets. I think you'd get a very different answer.

Step 1: start with a vast reservoir of oil revenue and a culturally-homogeneous population

I must have missed the fact that sweden, denmark, and finland had vast oil reserves. Also Sweden's population is now ~ 20% immigrants.

You mean the country that immediately asked for help from a country with vast oil reserves and a famously heterogeneous population (Iraq)?

If you can afford less (lesser treatment, drugs, procedures, quality of doctors and hospitals you can pay for), then your chances of survival also got WAY worse.

Doesn't matter if the 1% has now access to better versions.

Sure, if actual availability of healthcare to an average American has grown worse, that would be a bad result. But that is something you should demonstrate with data instead of just asserting it.

I mean one can go look at the health outcomes of the average american vs other developed nations, and see that we do not get much for the amount of money we spend. I won't bother to argue this with you. If you're genuinely operating in good faith, you're just as capable of finding the studies as I am, and if not, there's really no point

When comparing average Americans and their health to average, say, Spaniards, we should not ignore the 400 lb gorilla in the room named "obesity".

Even Europeans are getting bigger, but America is way, way worse. Seeing those extreme landwhale-type people who cannot even walk around the mall and navigate it using a motorized cart, throwing bulk packages of horrible shitty ultraprocessed food and drinks into said cart, always makes me wonder how the hell is your healthcare system even capable of keeping them alive.

That is nothing short of a miracle, and should be taken into account in all international comparisons.

Uhuh, That's why we're #1 in the world in conditions uncorrelated with obesity like infant mortality right?

Does this concern an average American, or mostly the poorest quintile of the population?

We're not discussing whether your healthcare system is friendly to the poor; everyone knows that the US is not particularly kind to its poor, in any aspect.

The original topic was if its overall quality declined in the last decade for the average American, who is not poor.

If it's bad enough 'for the poor' that it's pulling down the average for everyone that's a pretty damning indictment of the system overall is it not?

I'll be honest. I really tire of the mental gymnastics people put themselves through to make excuses for the American system. I don't think we have anything more to discuss here.