Sen. Bernie Sanders has been saying for a full decade that Americans spend twice as much per person on health care as do the people of any other country, though fact checkers have repeatedly pointed out that this is an exaggeration.

Sanders said it at the last Democratic debate in January. And he said it again at the debate on Friday: “We are spending twice as much per capita on health care as do the people of any other country.” 

Facts First: Again, Sanders is exaggerating. The US does not spend twice as much per capita as “any” other country on health care, though it does spend more than twice the average for the members of the Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development, a group of 36 countries with large market economies.

Switzerland, at $7,317 per capita, and Norway, at $6,187 per capita, were well above half the US level, $10,586 per capita, in 2018, the last year for which international data is available. Germany ($5,986), Sweden ($5,447), Austria ($5,395) and Denmark ($5,299) were also above half though more narrowly.

The OECD average for 2018 was $3,992 per capita, so Sanders would be correct if he had said the US spends more than twice the average for wealthy countries. But he has been using his incorrect wording since at least 2009, when fact-checkers at PolitiFact first noted that it wasn’t true.

It is possible that the health spending numbers were different in 2019 than they were in 2018 and in years prior, but that data is not yet available.

You can read a longer version of this fact check here.