Level the hospital playing field

So, public hospitals are on the decline.  Private hospitals steal the medicare/medicaid/SCHIP patients, because they, in a round-a-bout way, actually result in some money for the hospitals who take care of them.  Which leaves public hospitals as the only option for the uninsured, and actually, leaves the uninsured as the main option for the public hospitals to exist.

What is wrong with this picture?  The fact that there isn't the freedom in the health care system in this country for patients to receive care wherever they choose.  There is all this underlying "you have these options for hospitals that this insurance company contracts with, and if you don't have insurance, then you better go here, because they will actually treat you, and oh wait, if you go to the ER at said public hospital, they can't turn you away" mentality that is driving the country's hospitals in between a rock and a hard place.

Any decline in public hospitals means a decline in what little availability to health care that the uninsured and lower SES patients have.  Any decline in health care availability is a bad thing for the state of this county, state, and country.  Something has to change.  Probably the change needs to start at the very top, otherwise nothing will come of it.  This change needs to somehow level the playing field between public and private hospitals, perhaps by enacting a universal health care plan.  Whatever happens, the path the hospitals are on right now is not the best for the people they are (supposedly) trying to serve.