You asked, I answered, but like I said, anecdotes =/= evidence.
And you really should read up on medical tourism. The numbers flow the opposite way you're depicting them, with at least 10 times more Americans traveling abroad than come here, including for some very major surgeries (including heart procedures, transplants, etc.) than the reverse. The CDC estimates about
1 million travel FROM the U.S. for care overseas.
And the reason is simple - there are extremely skilled physicians everywhere, and the cost overseas is a fraction of here. We might have more of the the top 1/10,000 of specialists (the elite of the elite), but in the big picture that's likely more a function of size than of some inherent advantage to our system, although the fact that specialists are paid multiples of the pay rec'd elsewhere plays a role. Fine. Can we afford to pay 5 times Europe for a heart surgeon to keep or attract a handful that serve a couple hundred patients a year, including heads of state?
Finally, I'm not in favor of a 'one size fits all' system. The ACA isn't a 'one size fits all' system - each state has its own marketplace, with multiple insurers on the marketplace, many more insurers off it, and thousands or 10s of thousands of private providers, all competing for patients and healthcare dollars. Any state can, right now, get off it's lazy dang rear end and design an alternative to the ACA. In Vermont they're working on single payer. If Texas wants a 'free market' model, write them and tell them to get to work. They need to so something as Texas is #1 in the uninsured rate! 25%! Helluva job Texas.
