Gallup: People in Wisconsin Losing Their Insurance; People More Confident in Universal Coverage

Wisconsin has always bragged about the high percentage insured citizens in the state. Republicans used that statistic to successfully argue against a proposed Democratic plan called Healthy Wisconsin.

The flaw in the Republican argument is their intentional discounting of the increasing number of the uninsured; people losing their jobs or are priced out of the market, a trend we're seeing nationwide. According to Gallup:

Wisconsin saw their uninsured citizens increase from 2008 to Jan. through June 2009 from 10.9 percent to 12.6 percent.

While I'm at it, Gallup had this interesting piece of the universal health care debate:

Gallup compared Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries that offer universal health coverage with countries that do not offer it and found that respondents in countries with universal coverage are somewhat more likely to express confidence in their national health systems and satisfaction with the availability of quality healthcare in their communities.