European Insurance

Sorry for the lack of updates...it turns out that a thesis can keep you quite busy! haha Anyways, I have had quite the experience with insurance here, and I thought it was worth sharing my thoughts. (Please note these are my opinions, and you are welcome to have yours as well!)
As everyone knows, I broke my leg before I left. I had no insurance here for the first month and a half or so, but the total for all doctors visits, x-rays, casts, etc (without insurance) was about $1,000. I joked with the doctors (they thought it was expensive) that at home in the USA, without insurance, I'd be paying on that one accident for the rest of my life.
Anyways, fast forward a few months. In the past month or so I've been to 3 different emergency rooms (without a primary doctor you go here first-AND-the wait time in an emergency room? About an hour!). I've seen 3 specialists. I have a dentist appointment and orthopedic surgeon appointment next week. Tonight I pick up my $5,000/month medicine. How much did all of this cost? Free! If you want to get into the technicalities of course, I will let you know that I pay 50 euros a month for health insurance and 10 euros for my expensive medicine.
Basically, I feel absolutely lucky that I am here at this point. And I love how everyone really does their job. Last night I had to visit the hospital for my stomach disease. My wait time was approximately less than an hour, they immediately knew which tests to run. At this point it was "after-hours" but a doctor was called off his floor to come run my tests, and not only was he nice, but I didn't have to wait hours for him, he came direct. (And there really was no sense of urgency.) Its just nice to not have to worry about how much will this cost at the end. They run what they need to, and there is no second questions.

So do I love this universal healthcare? Absolutely. I could not recommend it more. It is a really great program.

Would I ever vote for it at home, or recommend it at home? Absolutely not. In my opinion, the greatest problem we'd run into is the mindset of everyone. I feel like the gross majority don't take as much pride in their work at home, and for those getting treated, I feel like there would be way too many people taking advantage of the system. If I were to erase the sentences above, my simplest conclusion would be: I honestly could never see it working at home. If you were to experience it yourself, I think you would well agree with me.

In the USA, I think we do need a large overhaul on our healthcare system, but I honestly feel that overhauling ourselves into a universal healthcare system would be an epic fail, face palm moment. Feel free to leave questions/comments!