The Commonwealth Fund, a private American foundation, has published a ranking of the countries with the best healthcare systems. Surprisingly, the USA did not make the top ten — even though the country spends more on healthcare than any other in the world.
The Fund analysed the state of medicine in 11 developed countries and, based on more than 72 metrics, named the best countries for treatment. The research covered five broad categories: the care process, access to care, administrative efficiency, equity and healthcare outcomes.
The top ten included the countries of Western Europe, Australia, Canada and New Zealand.
The best countries for treatment in Western Europe
France took tenth place. The French healthcare system is partly financed by compulsory social insurance contributions — the sécurité sociale. This fixed percentage is deducted from French salaries. In 2016, employees paid around 8% and employers 13% of total wages towards the country’s healthcare costs. The French healthcare system is also partly financed by the government. Each patient pays a small contribution towards the development of public medicine too. All of this keeps the standard of medical care high.
France has both public and private clinics. Notably, many private clinics are part of the public healthcare system.
Ranked higher among the best European countries for treatment are Germany, Sweden, the Netherlands, Norway and Switzerland.
Swiss medicine leads in the categories of equity and healthcare outcomes. The country invests heavily in medical research and development, with a particular focus on oncology. Switzerland is introducing personalised medicine: scientists are developing tumour vaccines specific to each individual patient’s tumour. Switzerland makes full use of the achievements of digital medicine, introducing robots in surgery, 3D technology in dentistry and augmented reality in orthopaedic medicine.
Medical travel is well developed in the country. CorSwiss organises treatment at the best private clinics in Switzerland for medical travellers from every country in the world.
The best countries for treatment outside Europe
Canada, Australia and New Zealand also ranked highly in the Commonwealth Fund’s list.
Canadian medicine is less generously funded than in the USA. There are some minor issues with access to medical services for the population and with healthcare outcomes.
Australia, by contrast, performed strongly in categories such as healthcare outcomes, the care process and access to care. Australia came third in the Commonwealth Fund’s ranking of the best countries for treatment, scoring low only in the equity category.
The American foundation named the United Kingdom the best country for treatment in 2017. The UK was recognised as the country with the best medicine for the third year running, despite cuts to healthcare funding in 2017 and problems with equipment in public hospitals.
The UK nevertheless received high scores in the categories of preventive medicine, the care process and access to care.
