In considering the current and projected dental health of the U.S. population, a brief assessment of the general health of the population is necessary.
General Health. The general health of the U.S. population is good. The ability to prevent or cure infectious disease has led to an increase in life expectancy, and the ability to control (partially or fully) some chronic diseases is resulting in a larger proportion of older adults in the population.
Life expectancy rates in 1991 were 80 years for men and 84 years for women , 9 compared to 1776 when the Declaration of Independence was signed and life expectancy was only 35 years . 53 In 1994, Americans spent $949 billion on health care . More recent projections indicate that the projected total U.S. health care expenditures of $1.1 trillion (13.5% of the GDP) in 1997 will increase to $2.2 trillion (16.2% of the GDP) by 2008.
However, access to and financial resources for health care are problems for some segments of society.
More than 30 million Americans do not have health insurance;4 and older adults (those over the age of 65) are responsible for four fifths of nursing home costs and one third of all health expenditures and physician fees Dental Health.
Americans generally have good dental health. Most understand the benefits of good dental health and practice good oral homecare. Except for some of current older adults, most Americans do not believe that the eventual loss of teeth is inevitable. Consequently, they are willing to invest their resources for dental health care. In 1994, $42.2 billion were spent on dental care in the United States this represented 4.4% of all health care costs for that year. Private patients paid about half of dental costs from their out-of-pocket funds. The government paid only $1.8 billion of dental costs, representing only 4.3% of dental spending for 1994. Thus the public share of dental costs was very low, while taxpayers paid 44% of the total health care costs for that year.
However, it is projected that dental spending will more than double between 1994 and 2008, reaching $93.1 billion by 2008.