There is reason to believe that the public option will be coming in the future --- landmark legislation often starts smaller than it finishes a decade or so later.
But right now, today, I have a brother in the hospital with a blood sugar level of 1180, who may not live. He's never been able to work enough to get social security, and is without insurance to help him with his diabetes, pancreatitis, obsessive compulsiveness, and panic disorder.
Help him.
Allen is 46 and he's been close to death many times since his 20s. He lost his live-in girlfriend of seven years to a brain tumor, when a hospital insisted on releasing her and gave her a number for a specialist, even as she fainted while visiting my brother, who was in the hospital at the same time. The specialist never returned her calls. She died about 6 months later.
Allen's never seen a specialist about any of his problems. Specialists don't want to see people who can't pay.
He's got about 3 teeth left and he can generally only bear to leave his home to go to the hospital or purchase blackmarket pain killers and panic meds. He's managed to quit the alcohol, but is too confused to know if he's taken his meds or checked his blood sugar. He spends his hours watching Netflix and listening to taped lectures about Classical Greece and Rome --- his major in college. Mom says his eyes have gotten too bad to read. Sometimes, when he's having hallucinations as he goes cold turkey off some medicine that he can't get resupplied, he stays at my parents' house, talking to people who aren't there.
Help him.
Don't get on your high horse and leave people dying who you can help, just because you'd rather help more. Some people can't wait.