[elmerfud]

I would say it's more of a value choice. I value freedom to make choices and make my own risk vs reward decisions. I want to be in a society where others are encouraged to think critically about their choices (yes I know it largely doesn't happen). Others like to just be taken care of, without having to consider different choices. So any view of "better" will be subjective.

[Scrapemist]

When it comes to risk-reward decisions, I think humans are pretty bad at this. Individual circumstances often influence decisions more than statistical reasoning. The chance that a human will need the expertise of a health professional at some point in their life is close to 100%, but it’s impossible to predict when and in what capacity.

I baffled that you think a society is better off leaving it up to individual choice whether to have any healthcare at all. That’s actually one of the main reasons why healthcare is so expensive and out of reach for many people in the US: leaving healthcare decisions to individuals leads to fragmented risk pools, higher administrative costs, and generally worse outcomes.