Don't panic! UK - style health care will not kill you.

ER care is not the same as screening tests or cancer treatment or treatment for other long term serious illnesses. I too work at an ER 9social Worker) and I also work for the largest non-profit cancer organization in the country. The ER where I work supplies the vast majority of care for low income and inunsured people in my area (and will make appropriate referrals for those diagnosed with something serious), but not all areas have access to that kind of care.  At my cancer related job I talk to people every single day who simply cannot get care in their area without insurance.
I doubt we'll ever have a true single payer system like you see in Europe (which works better in some european countries than others, certainly), but we seriously need SOMETHING. I think we need something that folks without insurance can opt into at reasonable cost and something that can cover those who cannot even afford that, not necessarily one program that covers every single person.
I mean, the girl who does my hair (I say girl, but she's about 30) cannot afford health insurance herself because to cover her under her husband's insurance through his employer would be $700 A MONTH. She can purchase a private policy, but none that she has been able to find would cover any costs related to pregnancy should she decide to have a child. They make too much money to qualify for medicaid or any of the state or country based programs we have access to. It's just ridiculous.

Oh i agree with you i really do..There is no one that should go with out care ever in this Country...The one thing we do offer is in our State Ms health for children and dental for them if parents are not working or fall below a certain income.....That is why so many people go to the Er ..so they can get treated..For minor things that is or not long term like a cancer....We need some thing to change for sure but what?...Just don't want them to rush in to some thing with out thinking it out and not have good planning....and it takes the Goverment alot of $$$ to run a plan like this...do we have it??....wish we had more information on it which seems to be lacking....

PS....We have ins but i cannot even think about the day we would not.....We could never afford to have the test we have had through our ins plan which is through my Husbands job...If we lost that, well i don't know so i agree we need some thing in this Country for sure.....

I think we have the money, we're just spending a lot of it on useless crap. Waste runs rampant and I think it's going to take a long time to clean it up (and I'm sure it'll never be cleaned up). Sadly, I don't think we'll truly see a major healthcare overhaul anytime soon, other than wars, our government doesn't rush into much of anything, rather the grinding slowness is more of an issue. I think a lot of info is lacking because right now there isn't any kind of solid plan in place yet. I think we'll all have to settle for incremental change, and hope it gets better over time.
Even programs we have in place don't always work that well. For example, I think all states have a federally funded breast and cervical cancer early detection program that helps screen women (if they meet age and income guidelines). If you happen to be diagnosed with a cancer through the program you become eligible for a special version of medicaid to treat the cancer. Sounds great right? It is, unless you didn't know the program was available and had a mammogram outside of the program that found the abnormality...then you're no longer eligible. You have to be asymptomatic and diagnosed through the program to access the medical care.  ARRRRGHHHH!

Thank you for all that information which most of us don't know about...The more i hear the more i do what your doing....ARRRRGHHHH!