Healthcare Expenditure Comparison: Colombia and the United States
Today, healthcare expenditures in the United States and Colombia provide a study in contrasts, reflecting their differing economic situations, political systems, and historical development. One of the more notable differences between these two countries is the quality, accessibility and costs of the healthcare services provided, with Colombia succeeding in wringing every last pennys worth of value from their investments while the United States has historically failed to realize enough bang for its massive healthcare bucks. As a result, despite spending far more on healthcare than Colombia, the United States still struggles to provide universal health care coverage for its citizens and far too many Americans fail to receive the medical services they need. To determine the antecedents of this situation, the purpose of this paper is to provide a comparison of healthcare expenditures in the United States and Colombia, including GDP percentages and the impact of these investments on the quality and accessibility of healthcare in these two nations. Finally, the paper summarizes the research findings and presents key findings in the conclusion.
Review and Discussion
The United States
As a highly developed and industrialized nation, the United States enjoys a technologically advanced and nationwide healthcare network. Indeed, the U.S. boasts an elaborate array of tertiary medical centers, community-based outpatient clinics, and a host of specialty care facilities and many of them feature the latest in healthcare technologies. Likewise, the U.S. spends an inordinate amount of this network, with nearly 19% of the nations GDP being spent on these resources (U.S. People, 2024).
In addition, the U.S. has a significant ratio of healthcare professionals to the American population (U.S. People, 2024), but much of the nations healthcare network is privatized, resulting in substantially higher costs to consumers compared to other nations such as Colombia (Mitchell, 2020). The current situation in the U.S. means that lacking universal healthcare, many lower-income and/or unemployed Americans are...
…types of challenges that face healthcare networks around the world, but it does mean that Colombia is clearly doing something right. By prioritizing universal healthcare coverage, Colombia has demonstrated that it is possible to provide high-quality, modern healthcare services to millions of consumers for far less than the U.S. spends on the same need.
Conclusion
The research showed that while both the United States and Colombia have made significant investments in their healthcare infrastructure, they face starkly different challenges. While the healthcare system in the U.S. is technologically advanced, it still struggles with accessibility and the high costs of care. Conversely, although Colombia has made major strides in the provision of universal healthcare coverage, this nation also faces challenges in balancing the quality and availability of care between rural and urban regions. In sum, both the U.S. and Colombia continue to work on improving their healthcare systems to better serve their respective populations, and there are valuable lessons to be learned…
