Of course....but culturally the US is a long way away from accepting single payer healthcare.

The country is very divided into groups and it's just the reality that republicans don't want to pay the health costs of the poor....even when we know it's the better overall system.

It's the same cultural problem they have with guns.....though I have a little more sympathy with them on the guns issue because giving up your guns now....in a country with an estimated 270 million to 310 million guns in it is a bit tough.

Criminals would have a serious advantage for an interim period.

I would prefer them to have our system but the reality is that isn't going to happen.

Edited by Stirlingsays (28 Jul 2017 4.42am)

'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

Exactly. the problem is that the US healthcare system is layered with private business interests from top to bottom, to whom this business is very profitable. They spend millions of dollars on lobbying and campaign donations to make sure that their business isn't rolled up into a single-payer system that would operate without the need for profit.

Because people live here in a state of perpetual uncertainty and anxiety about access to healthcare, they are very easily spooked into voting against change by the interests who are keeping them in such flux. Before the ACA, losing your job meant losing health insurance and getting a new job did not guarantee insurance for any pre-existing condition. That's a terrifying position to be in for anyone.

But then look at the passage of the ACA. Flawed as it is, it allowed 20 million people to get health insurance who previously were unable, and removed for everyone many of the bad, customary limitations such as pre-existing condition exclusions and lifetime benefit caps. For that, Democrats got absolutely spanked in the 2010 midterms - a red wave that coincided with a census year that allowed the Republican majorities up and down the country to gerrymander themselves into a position that remains all-but unassailable. The debate around "Obamacare" in that midterm was every bit as sensationalist and dishonest as Brexit. Remember "Death Panels"?

This is why we can't have nice things.

We don't do possession; we do defense and attack. Everything else is just wa**ing with a football.

Oh yes it is!

I have prepared one of my own time capsules. I have placed some rather large samples of dynamite, gunpowder and nitroglycerin. My time capsule is set to go off in the year 3000. It will show them what we are really like.

Its also staggeringly more expensive to get private health care in the US than the UK

"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
[Link]

Trumps fired so many people. I reckon he still thinks he's on the apprentice.

Personally I am really enjoying the Trump presidency, its like watching an insane reality TV show or comedy. Its certainly been the most 'absurdly amusing' that US politics has ever been.

"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
[Link]