Brazil & Taiwan the last in the series

"Survival for all cancers in Taiwan is half the rate in the U.S."

Yes, but many of those cancers are harder to treat. The leading two types of cancer are liver cancer (which my father-in-law died of)and lung cancer. Part of this is due to air pollution in places like Taipei and Kaohsiung (but that is getting better) as well as the habit of smoling in Taiwan (which I am guilty of as well). Liver cancers are due to unclear water and food and thus getting Hep and heavy drinking Taiwanese engage in. Don't blame the cancer deaths on UHI.

Overall, I have never seen a problem with care while in Taiwan, but I doubt the US could run a decent UHI program like Taiwan does.

The monthy fees are about 40$ USD and a co-pay of under $2 (50 NT).

It wasn't my stat and I see my footnotes didn't make it.

This is the link to the report.
http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/content/full/22/3/61

The report said "survival for all cancers in Taiwan " not just liver. I am very aware of liver cancer because I have seen several of my friends die from it. I've had hep two times in my life which raises my risk of liver cancer. Plus I do like to have some wine at night.

Sorry but this one is just a matter of technology and protocol...."deaths from anesthesia is eight times that of the U.S"

And this one is preventable by using standard protocol.."antibiotic resistance in streptococci [sic] pneumonia is the highest in the world"

A monthly $40 fee is low but I know of people in their twenties that wouldn't and don't want to pay $40.

My 87 year old father recently died from cancer but he also suffered for 8 years with emphysema. Anyone that watched that suffering would quit smoking.

On the good point, Taiwan looks like a very pretty country. My neighbors wife (don't know them well) is from Taiwan. All I know about her is that she makes great cookies!

Comparing Taiwan to the US has other flaws.

If you want to blame UHI for the disparity between the US and Taiwan, you need to see the rates in Taiwan BEFORE UHI took effect in the mid 1990s. What was the death rate in Taiwan from anesthesia in the early 1990s? Was it still 8x higher than the US or 10x or 20x? Then this has NOTHING to do with UHI but technology, training, and protocol used in Taiwan.

While mostly I favor Taiwan over the US, let's be clear that Taiwan until very recently was a poor country. In the late 1960s and 1970s some people (in a major city I might add) were living in shanity towns made up of scraps of wood and things. In the mid-1970s, Taiwan had a per capita income of only $500 USD. Today it is around $30,000 and 40th in the world but still far behind the US at $47,000 and 10th in the world. The US is a fully developed country and Taiwan is still considered to be a NIC.

Instead of comparing Taiwan to the US, it would be better to compare Taiwan to a country with a similar level of economic development that doesn't have a UHI system.

Taiwan's UHI is basically based on America's Medicare only it is offered to everyone not just those over 65.

As for the cancer rates, while your data covered all cancers, the fact remains that Taiwan's most common cancers are much harder to detect and thus treat. The most common cancer in the US is skin cancer followed by lung (also #2 on the Taiwan list) and then breast cancer followed by prostate and colon. Aside from lung cancer, these cancers are easily detected and easily treated. Not so with liver cancer.

Again you are using a flawed comparison. What were the cancer survival rates before UHI in comparison with the US? If you want to indite UHI, you need to find out what the rates were in the early 1990s and compare them to now, not compare them to the US.

The US should have higher survival rates, it should have less deaths from medical proceedures. It is richer, its doctors are better trained and it spends far far more on health care than Taiwan does. If this was not the case, it would be a scandal.

In closing I don't support a Taiwan-like UHI for the US because I doubt the US could pull it off. First, the Taiwan government is far far far more competent than the US government is. Second, to be fair, Taiwan has 23 million people. In the mid-1990s it had to cover an additional 9 million people who were uninsured, the US has 304 million and would have to cover more additional people than Taiwan has people.

I smoke, but cigars. But there is still throat and oral cancer to worry about. The top brand of cigarettes in Taiwan is called Long Life ironically enough. A good many men in Taiwan smoke (women not so much due to the message that sends as in being "easy") since you are required to do military service and as in the US at a time you pick up smoking in the army. At wedding banquets, it is traditional to give out cigarettes to your male guests as they leave. So smoking is a large part of Taiwanese culture (something the DOH is trying to change with PSA, etc).

Much of Taiwan is very pretty especially the central mountains like Yushan, the Aili Shan Mountains, and the east coast like Taroko (Tailuge) National Park and Sun Moon Lake in central Taiwan.

But on the west coast losts of big cities and like any big city not so pretty--like Taipei and Kaohsiung.