cuba, finland, swedend, the UK, germany, france, canada, israel, australia... what's the difference between their healthcare systems and ours? around 300 million people.
why does finland's work so well? because there are only 5 million people involved, very little immigration, and besides the 2 factions of natives vs islamic immigrants, they are much a homogeneous population.
ours: 304 million and about as heterogeneous as it gets... you can't have a uniform program for that many people.
the idea that HMOs will work for everyone is stupid. why will universal healthcare be any better? it's a false promise of a better system that you're going for.