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Earlier this month, I spent a day at a temporary free clinic in Appalachia trying to understand why the U.S. is the only wealthy country in the world without universal healthcare. Photos by @parkermb theglobeandmail.com/world/us-polit…
Nearly every patient I spoke with was in favour of universal healthcare, and most were well aware that all of the U.S.'s peer countries have some version of it. But only a handful actually vote for candidates that are trying to make it happen
Some were Trump supporters. Like this woman who supports Medicare-for-All but cares more about opposing abortion than voting for her economic self-interest 
(The way that the President and other xenophobes pit people like her against unauthorised immigrants is neither surprising nor a new tactic, but is very telling)
But most of the patients I met were just deeply disengaged politically. Almost all of them thought government-run healthcare was a good idea. Some volunteered positive impressions of Canada, and joked about moving there. But most told me they don't vote or follow politics
There are huge structural barriers to universal healthcare in the U.S., from massively profitable companies heavily invested in the status-quo, to deeply-rooted small-government values, to a complicated political system that makes it difficult to pass major reforms
But intertwined with all of those things is a cohort of voters that wants things to change, but isn't voting to make it happen
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More on this, via Le Monde
