Most importantly it provides a “minimum bar” that everyone has access to. Nothing prevents people from getting additional private insurance, say as a benefit from a job, but there’s a humane minimum level of coverage and benefits people can get without going bankrupt.

How do you "simply" remove the corruption of insurance? The sole purpose of insurance is to take in as much money as possible and pay out as little as possible. I would argue that it's not corruption, it's greed but that is by design. Government already provides plenty of other services that aren't profit driven. The roads that the government builds using tax payer money isn't generating profit. The public school that the government runs using tax payer money isn't generating profit. Social security, medicare, medicaid, fire department, VA, public libraries, all run using our tax dollars. Even the army that the government runs isn't profit driven but there are other companies that have propped up to take advantage of it and have bought lawmakers to be able to easily take advantage (toilet seat that costs 10k anyone?) My argument is that the government inherently isn't bad or inefficient, it's the lawmakers that we vote for and don't vote out that are the problem. Because it's the government for the people by the people we can vote them out but we can't vote out a CEO of an insurance company or board of directors of military contractor company.