This article claims — and I don't see anyone rushing to correct it — that as many as 45,000 people die each year in this country due to a lack of health insurance. I would think that number's low…and of course, it doesn't take into account people who have health insurance but it doesn't sufficiently cover the treatment they need. It also probably doesn't measure folks who don't directly die from not being insured but whose lives merely get wiped out by hospital bills.
I've had to post a lot of obits on this site for folks I know. I can think of several where I could have listed the cause of death as "couldn't afford to see a doctor." Seriously. If you want to know why I'm so militant on this topic, there you go.