Sanders says U.S. doubles every other country in per capita health spending

"We spend twice as much per capita on health care as any other nation on Earth."
Bernie Sanders on Wednesday, August 19th, 2009 in an appearance on the Rachel Maddow Show

Condensed story from 2009 Pulitzer prize winner, Politifact.com Click here for Full Story.

Bernie Sanders is a Senator from Vermont who is an independent but who caucuses with Democrats.

On the Aug. 19, 2009, Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC, Sanders responded to a question about corporate interests' role in the health care reform debate by saying, "We spend twice as much per capita on health care as any other nation on Earth. And there is a reason why the insurance companies, year after year, make huge profits and pay their CEOs tens and tens of millions of dollars in compensation salaries. And the reason for that is that these guys exert enormous influence over the political process in Washington."

Using statistics from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a group that represents 30 wealthier, industrialized countries, most of them in Europe and North America. In 2007, the OECD said that the United States spent $7,290 per capita on health care, ranking it first among the 30 countries studied. Five other nations spent more than $3,645 per capita, the point at which the United States no longer doubles their spending. The highest is the Netherlands at $4,417. The other four were Austria, Canada, Norway and Switzerland.

Sanders would have been on completely firm ground had he simply said, "We spend more per capita on health care than any other nation on Earth." But instead he said "twice as much."

So Bernie Sanders --- Are you Kidding?