11/91Percentage of Lithuanians who say that their country’s health-care system should be run mainly by the government: 33
Percentage of Americans who say that their country’s health-care system should be: 69
6/91Number of U.S. city governments that have extended employee health benefits to unmarried “domestic partners”: 6
4/92Number of FBI agents who will be reassigned this year from counter-intelligence to investigations of health-care fraud: 50
1/93Ratio of the number of health-care lobbying groups in Washington to members of Congress: 3:2
12/93Number of times President Clinton used the word “security” in his health-care speech before Congress in September: 12
Number of times he used the word “security” in his speech before the United Nations a week later: 7
3/93Percentage of Americans who say that middle age begins when you start worrying about health-care costs: 41
Percentage who say that it begins when you don’t recognize the names of the music groups on the radio: 46
5/93Percentage of Americans who would accept a new 50¢ tax on a six-pack of beer to help finance health-care reform: 87
7/93Chances that an adult Medicaid patient under the age of 65 has been turned away by a doctor or hospital: 1 in 5
8/93Percentage change, since 1990, in contributions to congressional campaigns made by health-care industry PACs: +36
9/93Amount the Health Insurance Association of America spent last spring on health-care-policy ads: $4,000,000
9/93Number of TV stations that have refused to air a consumer group’s ad advocating a Canadian-style health-care system: 8
9/93Ratio of the number of Canadians who favor a U.S.-style health-care system to those who believe Elvis is alive: 1:2
11/94Ratio of spending on campaign ads by Bill Clinton in 1992 to total spending on all health-care-policy ads this year: 2:3
6/94Chances that an American knows the position of his or her senators on health-care reform: 1 in 3
6/94Ratio of network evening-news time devoted to health-care reform this year to the time devoted to Whitewater: 1:3
Percentage of U.S. pediatricians who do not accept Medicaid: 23
3/95Average amount of his Social Security and Medicare taxes a single 30-year-old man will never receive in benefits: $37,200
Average amount in excess of his Social Security and Medicare taxes a single 65-year-old man will receive: $35,200
4/96Ratio of congressional hearings devoted to Whitewater since last July to those devoted to Medicaid or Medicare: 6:1
11/99Change since 1987 in a U.S. household’s average annual spending on health insurance: +$323.28
Change since then in a household’s annual spending on medical services, supplies, and drugs: -$99.69
11/99Percentage of American ER viewers who say they learn important health-care information from the program: 53
11/99Percentage change since 1996 in the number of American adults using the Internet to obtain health-care information: +218
3/00Percentage change since 1997 in the number of Britons waiting to get on the National Health Service’s waiting list: +100
4/00Chance that an American without health insurance would be covered under Al Gore’s proposed health-care plan: 1 in 2
9/00Rank of France, Italy, and Germany, respectively, among countries with the best overall health-care systems: 1,2,25
1/01Ratio of Britain’s per capita health-care spending to that of Cuba: 11:1
1/02Number of biological materials with military potential sent to Iraq by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control in the 1980s: 14
3/03Factor by which the percentage increase in the cost of a U.S. employee health plan since 2001 has exceeded inflation: 7
2/04Rank of the U.S. health-care system among the most efficient in the world, according to the World Health Organization: 37
2/04Estimated value of Senate majority leader Bill Frist’s household’s stake in HCA, his family’s hospital chain: $26,000,000
Months before Bush signed the Medicare bill in December that the New York Times last mentioned Frist’s holdings: 4
2/04Percentage by which health-care spending by an obese American exceeds that by an American of normal weight: 36
Percentage by which health-care spending by a daily smoker exceeds that by a nonsmoker: 21
3/04Rank of Texas among states in which the largest percentage of citizens lack health insurance: 1
3/04Years of insurance that the money lost annually to health-care fraud and overbilling could buy every uninsured U.S. child: 3
7/05Number of Americans who spend more than a quarter of their income on health care: 14,300,000
9/05Minimum number of prescription drugs currently under investigation for Medicaid price-gouging or marketing fraud: 500
11/06Chances that a Californian lives in an area whose air pollution exceeds that state’s legal limit: 9 in 10
Estimated amount that smog costs California in extra health-care expenses each year: $71,000,000,000
4/07Estimated amount that U.S. adults who grew up poor cost the economy each year through increased crime: $170,000,000,000
Estimated amount they cost the economy through higher health care costs: $160,000,000,000
1/08Minimum number of U.S. deaths from food allergies each year, according to the Food Allergy & Anaphylaxis Network: 150
6/08Number of poor Oregonians who have entered the state’s health-care lottery system: 91,675
9/08Estimated annual sales-tax revenue that California receives each year from medical-marijuana sales: $100,000,000