Skip to Content


Center for Bioethics, Harvard Medical School
October 27, 2016

Learn More and Register for the Event!

Lauren A. Taylor, MPH, MDiv will discuss her book, The American Health Care Paradox: Why Spending More is Getting Us Less.

Commentator: John E. McDonough, DrPH, MPA, Professor of the Practice of Public Health, Director of the Center for Executive and Continuing Professional Education, Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health

Thursday, October 27, 2016

TMEC 227 Mini Amphitheatre
Harvard Medical School
260 Longwood Ave
Boston, MA 02115

For decades, experts have puzzled over why the US spends more on health care but suffers poorer outcomes than other industrialized nations. Now Elizabeth H. Bradley and Lauren A. Taylor marshal extensive research, including a comparative study of health care data from thirty countries, and get to the root of this paradox: We've left out of our tally the most impactful expenditures countries make to improve the health of their populations-investments in social services.

In The American Health Care Paradox, Bradley and Taylor illuminate how narrow definitions of "health care," archaic divisions in the distribution of health and social services, and our allergy to government programs combine to create needless suffering in individual lives, even as health care spending continues to soar. They show us how and why the US health care "system" developed as it did; examine the constraints on, and possibilities for, reform; and profile inspiring new initiatives from around the world.

Offering a unique and clarifying perspective on the problems the Affordable Care Act won't solve, this book also points a new way forward.

About the Author

Lauren A Taylor, MPH, MDiv is a doctoral student in the management track of the Health Policy program at Harvard University. Prior to joining HBS, she graduated as a Presidential Scholar from Harvard's Divinity School in 2015, where she served as the Research and Development Director in the Science, Religion and Culture program. While completing her Master of Divinity, Lauren was a fellow at the Harvard Global Health Institute and a Student Fellow at the Petrie Flom Center for Health Law, Policy and Biotechnology at Harvard Law School.

In 2013, Lauren and Elizabeth H. Bradley, PhD, jointly authored The American Health Care Paradox, which has been reviewed and featured in media outlets such as CSPAN, MSNBC, The New York Times and The New Yorker. She has also published peer-reviewed articles on grand strategy in global health, scale up of public health innovations and the relationship between health and social service spending in the United States.

This event is free and open to the public. Members of the community with a Harvard/Affiliate ID do not need to register.

Not affiliated with Harvard? Please register online!

Sponsored by the Center for Bioethics at Harvard Medical School.

Learn More and Register for the Event!

Tags

bioethics   global health   health care finance   health care reform   health law policy   insurance   international   medicare-medicaid   public health