Rwanda has better health insurance- Mutuelle de Sante - than the United States where citizens live in constant, birth-to-death risk of catastrophic health expenditure. Yes, America, we're talking about you. In this episode, Suzy, Lauri and honorary Sister Professor Mark Shrime ponder healthcare financial risk across the international spectrum, where Rwanda's Mutuelle lies in close proximity to the UK's National Health Service and Canadian Medicare, while the U.S., with it's debacle of racial/ethnic inequity in maternal health safety, decreasing life expectancy and expanding healthcare deserts, seems incapable of expanding either Medicaid or Medicare into guaranteed lifetime coverage for citizens of the "best nation on Earth". 

Professor Mark G. Shrime, MD, MPH, PhD, FACSis O’Brien Chair of Global Surgery at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland and Lecturer in Global Health and Social Medicine at the Harvard Medical School. He previously served as the founder and Director of the Center for Global Surgery Evaluation at the Massachusetts Eye and Ear Infirmary and as Research Director for the Program in Global Surgery and Social Change at Harvard. 

His academic pursuits focus on surgical delivery in low- and middle-income countries, where he has a specific interest in the intersection of health, impoverishment, and inequity. His work aims to determine optimal policies and platforms for surgical delivery that maximize health benefits while simultaneously minimizing the risk of financial catastrophe faced by patients. In 2018, he was awarded the Arnold P. Gold Humanism in Medicine Award by the American Academy of Otolaryngology—Head and Neck Surgery. His research has been supported by the Damon Runyon Cancer Foundation and by an anonymous donation to the Center for Global Surgery Evaluation; he has previously received research support from the GE Foundation’s Safe Surgery 2020 project and the Steven C. and Carmella Kletjian Foundation. 

He is currently the Principal Investigator on a randomized controlled trial of financial incentives for surgical patients in Guinea and the Principal Investigator on a prospective extended cost-effectiveness analysis of maxillofacial surgery in West Africa. 

When not working, Mark is an avid photographer and rock climber and has competed on Seasons 8, 9, and 11 of American Ninja Warrior.

Prof Mark Shrime on Twitter

Medical Deserts in the United States - on Wiki!

Nowhere to Go: Maternity Care Deserts Across the U.S.  - March of Dimes 2020 report on USA maternal healthcare

The 3-Delays model as adapted by the Lancet Commission on Global Surgery (LCoGS)

World Health Organization initiatives for Universal Health Coverage (#UHC)