On April 2, the Olean Times Herald published a column by Jay Ambrose, in which he writes, in reference to The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, "The enactment of this law was based on misconceptions about inferior health care and terribly low longevity that turns out to be the highest in the world when one subtracts deaths due to homicide and accidents.

How's that? Our problems with homicide and accidents somehow explain away our embarrassing health care statistics, and thereby obviate the need for health care reform?

Mr. Ambrose offers no source or reference for his claims, nor does he address why death by homicide or accident is less concerning than death from inadequate health care. He is an illusionist using misdirection to distract us from unpleasant realities.

Sources as varied as the World Health Organization, the Institute of Medicine, the New England Journal of Medicine, and the CIA (yes, the Central Intelligence Agency) list statistics that very much support the assertion that we have inferior health care and that we do indeed die earlier than people in many other countries.

Let us start with the CIA, an agency that describes itself as being responsible for providing national security intelligence to senior U.S. policymakers. This quote and the data that follow are taken from their World Fact Book, accessed online at the CIA web site. Their tables rank some metrics best to worst and others as worst to best. I have converted those below to best to worst, i.e. where we rank compared to the best in the world.

The CIA ranks the U.S. 51st best in maternal mortality (121st of 172 countries listed worst to best). Maternal mortality reports deaths due to pregnancy and childbirth, and excludes accidents and homicide. Per 100,000 births, for every one woman who dies as a result of pregnancy and childbirth in countries like Italy or Greece, five to 10 women die in the U.S.

How about infant mortality? This measures deaths in the first year of life, from all causes, of babies who were born alive. This does include homicide and accidents. The CIA ranks us 48th best (174 out of 222 listed worst to best). Nearly six out of 1,000 live born babies die here in their first year. In Japan it is 2.21 babies out of 1,000. In Cuba it is 4.83. Cuba?

The CIA says that a baby has a better chance of surviving its first year if born in Cuba instead of the United States? Well, better dead than red. ...

And, as for life expectancy at birth, the CIA ranks us 50th (yes, number 50) out of 221.

You can find similar data in other sources. They are quite uniform, and show us to be uniformly inferior across all measures but one: cost. We win, by a large margin, on money spent per person. In U.S. health care we are paying for prime steak and getting a hot dog. Ah, says Mr. Ambrose, that is a tube steak, the best in the world.

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Numbers speak volumes in assessing US health care