If the future of ACC and various reforms in health care delivery are on the agenda in New Zealand, the accompanying contretemps might seem insignificant compared to the storm gathered around mooted changes in the United States.
And if the lot of 46 million people in the United States who do not have health insurance - and thus access to medical care - can be a desperate one, the struggle to remedy that situation has, thus far, been a political life-and-death battle.
President Barack Obama and the Democrats won the first round last Monday after a bruising, drawn-out encounter marked by entrenched positions and partisan hyperbole.
But they won the House of Representatives vote only by the knife-edge margin of 220-215 - and not without difficult-to-swallow compromises and desertion from the cause by a tranche of Democrats.
While the President's supporters hailed the victory as the first major step on the road to the most significant US health care reform since the enactment of the Medicare and Medicaid Act of 1965, which provided medical coverage for senior citizens, and glum Republicans lamented it as an attack on private enterprise and the insurance industry and a licence for the growth of "government" in the lives of citizens, commentators suggested it was a solid but critical victory for an increasingly embattled president.
With his vaunted health reforms in a mire of bitter rhetoric, questions over his resolve on the unpopular war in Afghanistan, and with unemployment reaching 10%, Mr Obama needed a win, however qualified.
This is a win, but it is certainly qualified: the Senate now has to act on its own, different reform proposal which must then be reconciled with the almost 2000-page Affordable Health Care for America Act, which is likely to require further horse-trading.
And in the process the Democrats must hold on to their slim majority if the Bill is ultimately to pass and set the seal on a health reform programme that has been on the Democrat agenda for decades and which has eluded various administrations, including that of the Clintons in the early '90s.
As it was, 39 Democrats joined 176 Republicans in voting against the reforms, some of these from conservative swing electorates and some - the "medicare for all" lobby - who felt the proposed reforms did not go far enough.
A vitriolic debate on abortion coverage under the plan threatened to derail the entire programme until an 11th-hour compromise was reached which pro-choice Democrats have castigated as a retrograde step.
In promoting the scheme, the Obama Administration has listed among its aims: the reduction of long-term growth of health care costs - currently running at $2 trillion a year - for businesses and government; protection of families from bankruptcy or debt because of health care costs; choice of doctors and health plans; investment in prevention and wellness, improvement in patient safety and quality of care, and quality health care coverage for all Americans.
It also aimed to help people keep coverage when changing jobs, remove barriers to coverage for those with pre-existing conditions and prevent the removal of people from coverage when struck ill - an accusation made against some insurance providers.
Commonly, objections from the Republicans have centred on cost - estimated at $1.1 trillion over 10 years - and described as a "wrecking ball to the entire economy", and more generally on the plan as a vaguely specified assault on "American values".
For example, parts of the proposed legislation requiring all citizens to acquire health insurance - whether from private providers or a mooted government scheme to be established in competition - or face penalties, has been described as "government oppression".
And there are fears among wealthy conservatives of the kinds of new taxes that might be imposed to meet the costs of the scheme.
Democrats have argued that Republicans have been largely motivated by a desire to protect the status quo in health care, including the powerful insurance industry lobby, and that the reforms will assist ordinary Americans to obtain and retain health insurance, but also, eventually, improve the economy by bringing spiralling health care costs under control.
There is hope final legislation agreed on by the House of Representatives and the Senate might be enacted before the end of the year.
Which arguments prevail, and to what extent, is yet to be seen - and will be watched keenly by those with an interest in New Zealand's own health care politics.
