It can hardly be contested or denied that the other industrialized countries have health care systems that are far better at delivering care than the US.  Not that I've ever wanted to agree with Michael Moore on too much (he makes excellent points - I will never say anything to the contrary - but he does twist things to make his point, as evidenced by that incident with the newspaper in Florida, and other bits in his films which I won't go into) but it is certainly time for a change. However, if we were to institute a system akin to the British NHS, in order for us to pay for it, there are some serious changes that would have to occur.  First of all, Medicare and Medicaid would obviously be absorbed into a government run single payer health care system - thereby taking care of some of those programs problems.  (Or maybe not.) Second, and this is an issue that a lot of people agree with, and a lot of people fervently disagree with also, we have the single largest defense budget on earth.  Out of the top 10 military spenders, the US defense budget is larger than the other 9 combined, over 10 times the country in second place.  (That being China.) Therefore, in order to pay for health care for our citizens (and if we are, it should be our legal resident citizens only) we would have to make a drastic cut in our defense spending.  In all reality, the only war in living memory that had a single thing to do with the national security of the United States is the war in Afghanistan, in seeking to quash Al Qaeda and Bin Laden.  That is most definitely a worthy effort, and the need is definitive at this point.  However, Iraq 1 and 2, Korea, Vietnam, all were unnecessary, and in the end did more harm than good, both to the citizens of the countries we invaded (most illegally - the War Powers Acts were grants of Presidential authority to declare war, which only Congress is supposed to do) of which millions have died, our own troops, our economy, and also the grave threat that response to dissenters has brought against our civil liberties.  At this point in history, it is no longer justifiable to continue with America as the world's police - in fact, the effect it has had is that it's made us less safe.  (Esp. with the so called "PATRIOT" Act.")That's where we could find the money.  Stop the useless, pointless wars that benefit no one.  But then again, not everyone agrees with that viewpoint.  That said, the logistical problems that present with having a single payer health care system for 300 million (the US) vs. only 30 million (Canada) are also daunting.