Staff at Crossroads Urban Center, the state's largest food pantry, are circulating a petition in support of an amendment to the Utah Constitution to mandate basic health care for all.

That is, "health care that will keep people alive and out of emergency rooms," explained Bill Tibbetts, who is heading up the signature-gathering effort.

He launched the campaign at a barbecue last week, and volunteers began canvassing neighborhoods.

"We want more than signatures. We need to get people talking about this, and to do that we have to reach out to communities," said Tibbetts.

Changing the state constitution may be a long shot. Very rarely do lawmakers tinker with the document thought by some to be sacred. The bar is set high, requiring two-thirds approval in the House and Senate.

But by mobilizing the public, Tibbetts hopes to shame policymakers into action, though he acknowledged the tactic hasn't always worked. Ignoring the vox populi, Republican leaders recently refused to debate paying for emergency dental care for adults on Medicaid.

"In our experience, it doesn't really matter where you go in this state. People believe the government should have a role in providing health care to its citizens - everywhere but our current state Legislature," said Tibbetts.

Indeed, scores of national polls show Americans - young and old, rich and poor, Republican or Democrat - overwhelmingly support universal health coverage.

But, as Senate President John Valentine notes, support wanes when people are presented with the cost and asked how to pay for it.

"Most people are comfortable with the government providing a basic safety net. But full 'cradle to the grave' medical coverage, they don't," said the Orem Republican.

So what do Americans really think about the current state of health care?

Years of polling and research show opinions are more nuanced than either Tibbetts or Valentine suggests.

Here's what's known:

l More adults worry about health care spending than about losing their job, paying their rent or mortgage, or losing money in the stock market, a 2005 Kaiser Family Foundation poll showed.

l People want the government to act. By a 2-1 margin - 62 percent to 32 percent - Americans said they prefer a universal health insurance program over the current employer-based system, in a 2003 Washington Post/ABC poll.

That support, however, falls to fewer than four in 10 if it means a limited choice of doctors, or waiting lists for non-emergency treatments.

l On the subject of who pays, a 2005 Kaiser poll shows Americans are divided, with 51 percent saying they would not be willing to pay higher taxes or insurance premiums and 45 percent saying they would.

"For many years now, Americans have been saying the right thing would be for all citizens to have medically necessary care," said Joe Jarvis, president of a think tank, the Utah Health Policy Project. "Whether or not we call it a right is a different question. You're talking about moving from popular opinion to something we must legally strive toward."

Health care for all is often branded socialized medicine. But Jarvis, a Republican who is running for a seat in the state Senate this year, says there is a plurality of approaches to universal health care.

"I personally like to call it infrastructure for the 21st century," said Jarvis. "We have roads that any of us can get on and drive to virtually any location in the country. But we don't refer to it as a socialized road system."

Just as roads are financed with public money and built by private contractors, Jarvis dreams of a day when health care financing or insurance is run through a nonprofit trust, such as the Public Employee Health Program (PEHP), and medicine is delivered by private hospitals and doctors.

Far-fetched?

Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. has expressed support for a proposal to allow small businesses to buy into PEHP.

Also, Jarvis said roughly 60 percent of the nation's health care is already publicly funded through programs such as Medicaid and Medicare.

"It will happen ultimately, because businesses in the U.S. won't continue to be fleeced by insurance companies," said Jarvis. "They are competing in global economy with businesses in countries that cover workers."

kstewart@sltrib.com