Jon,
Back to the case I mentioned. I believe the treatment was to be performed in Italy but the UK wouldn't release the baby from the hospital. It's hard to tell what the real situation actually was and you might have gotten different "news" than we got here. The press has forgotten their prime directive to deliver news NOT opinion.
Regarding Obamacare,
Lobbyists write most laws that Congress passes which is a direct violation of what our Constitution says and means that legislation favors business whenever possible. That means most bills are thousands of pages long (The Constitution was ~ 20 pages to put this in perspective), no Senator or Representative ever reads them before they vote, and all the public ever hears is talking points. Nancy Pelosi's famous statement leading up to the ObamaCare vote - "you have to pass the bill to find out what's in it" should clarify the situation given the bill was released about 2 days before the vote was called. Who can read and UNDERSTAND 2+ thousand pages in that amount of time. ObamaCare addressed the wrong issues and gave subsidies to the insurance companies so they all bought in. Since the public only heard sound bytes which always sound wonderful, way too many people were sucked into supporting it. In the olden days when people could actually afford insurance, we had two types. Short term and excess coverage. Short term covered stuff like injuries and emergency room visits and short hospital stays. Long term was for debilitating illnesses such as cancer. Insurance did not pay for regular doctor visits except perhaps for an annual checkup. Now, insurance covers everything (once you get past your deductible) and no one actually knows what anything costs so they don't care. The insurance companies work on a cost + basis. They need to collect enough in premiums to cover what they pay out + enough to cover their profit. So, look at it from the insurance company's perspective. If their profit is 10% (round numbers) and the doctor charges $100 for a visit, their share is $10. However, if the doctor charges $150, their share is $15 dollars. Where is their incentive to control prices? There is none and that's one of the reasons that the cost of medical care has grown significantly more than inflation since the 70's when the insurance model changed. Rather than trying to control prices by making all providers publish their rates for common services so people could shop around for non-emergency care, ObamaCare created rigid plan definitions, to the point where even I would have maternity coverage. If I had a baby at my age, it would be a miracle and should probably be hailed as the next coming.
Also, think about the business model of an insurance company. Collect as much in premiums as possible, pay as little in benefits as possible. And the insurance companies have the edge because they have the actuaries. It's like going to the casino. You loose. What people have to come to grips with is that insurance is a hedge against catastrophe. No one plans on having a heart attack or getting cancer but that is what insurance is intended to protect against.
Going back to the short term and catastrophic coverage models would go a long way toward getting insurance costs underway and once people pay their own doctor bills and drug costs, those costs will begin to come down due to competition. Government has a place in high risk coverage. In insurance terms, the government can offer reinsurance as a stopgap to keep people from having to declare bankruptcy due to some catastrophe.