Late stage capitalism is hitting the US harder than the rest of industrialized world. There are many reasons for this (disinformation, unwalkable built environment, educational & consumer debt, wages kept low through government intervention, insurance attached to employment, union-busting, skyrocketing rents, etc) but a big one is the greedy oldsters keeping all the socialized medicine for themselves.
People in what is by far the poorest, most deprived, and most drug-plagued area of England (Blackpool) now have the same life expectancy as the average American, and vastly better health than people in West Virginia
…The most startling aspect of all this is the extent to which these astonishing gaps are not COVID-driven, but rather a product of an epidemic of drug overdose deaths, gun violence, suicide, and alcohol-abuse related maladies, i.e., what Anne Case and Angus Deaton identified as “deaths of despair” a decade ago.
…These are the symptoms of very serious social breakdown. And it’s hardly a coincidence that the one American age cohort subjected to the horrors of socialized medicine — the elderly — is the only cohort that has health outcomes that are as good as those found in countries that don’t have Freedom ™.