Reforming America's health-care system

(...) Democratic candidates, for instance, and none of the Republicans, are proposing some version of universal health coverage in an attempt to end the anomaly whereby some 47m people, a sixth of the population of the world's most powerful nation, have no health insurance. A YouGov/Polimetrix poll for The Economist this week shows that half of all voters would like to see everyone get coverage, even if that means a tax increase, with only 36% opposed (see chart). On the campaign trail in New Hampshire recently John Edwards, a Democrat, won waves of applause every time he threatened to take away the health insurance of members of Congress if they did not provide something similar for all Americans.link