With respect, you are 100% against universal health care on the basis of your impressions of the situation in one society (out of scores) which employ this system? Are you familiar with the situation in France, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium, Holland, Germany, Austria, the UK, Ireland, or Australia?

And all civilised health care systems employ triage, which means giving priority to life threatening conditions, such as cancer. I do not see why you mention it as a fault within the Canadian system.

Secondly, the population of a given society has little, if any, effect upon systems of funding such as UHC. Of far greater significance is the physical size of a land and its population distribution. The delivery of health care is much more difficult in huge, sparsely populated nations such as Canada and Australia, for obvious reasons. In fact, as far as funding is concerned, especially if this is done via progressive taxation, the larger the population, the larger the funding base, and the better funded the system.

Your proposal of a state based universal health care plan (similar to the one operating in Alaska for people up to 18) is an excellent one (but it should not be limited to people under 18). This is in fact similar to the situation in Australia.

Each Australian state is obliged under the act to provide a system of universal health care for all its citizens, and for citizens of participating foreign countries (such as Canadians, Brits, and the Europeans) who are in Australia. The funding is via something called the Medicare Levy (which is 1.5% of assessable income) and must be paid by all Australians who earn over a certain minimal amount (about $15,000, I think).  This is collected by the taxation department and distributed by the federal government to the states on a per capita/needs basis. The state concerned provides much infrastructure and pays the private practitioners who supply the actual health care services.

Choice is maintained, as you may go to whatever doctor or hospital you choose, and the state government pays the bill. There are a small minority of doctors and hospitals who are 'private' in the sense that they charge over the scheduled fees, but you have the choice to use them or not. If you do, you have to pay the difference between the fee they choose to charge and the scheduled fee. But the vast majority of health care providers are content to charge the scheduled fees, and you pay nothing.

The World Health Organisation ranks France as the best health care service in the world, and even poor old Britain's NHS is ranked 12th, as against the private insurance system in the US which is ranked 37th.

So an universal health care system does not have to be a creaky old Soviet style system, with long waiting lists, and rusty instruments.  And a country as rich as the United States only has to want an excellent system of UHC (and ignore the bogeyman of Socialism), in order to get it.