What Kills 5 Million People A Year? It's Not Just Disease
In the global health world, giving people access to health care — even if they're just basic services — has long been a top priority.
But what if that approach is wrong?
A new report published in The Lancet on Wednesday finds that when it comes to health, quality — not quantity — seems to be more important.
The study estimates that 5 million people die every year because of poor-quality health care in low- and middle-income countries. That's significantly more than the 3.6 million people in those countries who die from not having access to care.
It's also five times more than annual deaths from HIV/AIDS (1 million) and three times more than diabetes (1.4 million) in the same countries — although, of course, poor health care for these conditions can also be fatal.
"For a very long time in global health, we have been really mandating and supporting and pushing access to care, without really thinking about what happens when people get to the clinic," says, the co-commissioner of this study and a professor at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health.
