[quote]Democratic Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom is drafting a health care plan for California that he plans to unveil as a core component of his gubernatorial run, based in part on the universal health care program he signed into law when he was mayor of San Francisco. Newsom, seen as a strong contender in the increasingly crowded field of candidates vying to succeed Gov. Jerry Brown in 2018, is staking out an ambitious plan to rein in rising health care costs, expand universal access to people across the state regardless of income or immigration status, and preserve coverage for the estimated 5 million Californians who risk losing their insurance under President Donald Trump’s changes. “I think we can learn a lot for the state of California from what we did with Healthy San Francisco,” Newsom said in an interview. “We had the resourcefulness, the resources, and the boldness and audacity to try something new. It’s not necessarily something that can be adopted in all 58 counties, but it can be adopted .... where the majority of California’s population is.” The idea would likely require substantial state and federal funding. Newsom has enlisted health experts to begin working on a blueprint for a universal health care system for California that seeks to improve on the Affordable Care Act, as well as prevent millions from potentially losing health care access under the Republican proposal now under consideration. The Republican proposal, called the American Health Care Act and championed by House Speaker Paul Ryan, would remove the individual mandate requiring people to have insurance and replace it with financial incentives for people to retain continuous health insurance. It would also gradually eliminate funding for Medi-Cal, the state low-income health care program that covers about 14 million Californians, and provide tax incentives to people based on age rather than income level. State Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones and health advocates warn that millions of people would lose health insurance and premiums would skyrocket under the plan. Newsom also characterized it as disastrous, but said regardless of Republican efforts to repeal and replace Obamacare, California should seek reforms that build on the federal law. [...] Patients can use their coverage at the city’s network of primary care clinics, as well as at public and private hospitals.[/quote] This could be interesting. To my knowledge, this has been working well for San Francisco. If there's anyone who can show that universal healthcare can work, it would be California - a state with more residents than all of Canada.