Generally the more that people get healthcare, the longer they live. The longer they live, the longer and more productive members of society they are.

As far as human health care is concerned, there are only two 'blocks' of people identified (A) by how much they produce and (B) by how much health care they consume. Block 1 is age 17 to 64 which produces the bulk of a nation's GDP, and consumes (on average) low amounts of health care. Block 2 is the very young and the very old which produce low amounts of wealth, and consume the bulk of the nation's health care. The claim 'the longer you live the more productive you are' is untrue. As far as a socialized medical system is concerned, it would be ideal if human beings died the second they stopped working so they wouldn't be freeloading off the system.

Generally when someone goes to the hospital when they don't have healthcare, it's because it's do or die.

In a word - baloney. Here's a story about a guy that calls the ambulance rides for every little tiny thing.
http://www.wgrz.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=69029&catid=37&provider=email
And his story is NOT all that unusual. Sure, he takes it to the furthest extreme perhaps, but everyone runs to the doctor for every little cough, ache, or twinge. That includes poor people with no insurance who end up getting free doctor visits on the tab of the honest paying citizens who play by the rules. When you have no insurance you don't just 'not go' to the doctor in the U.S. You go anyway and it's free. Sure, the office tries to get you to pay. But if you can't pay they just make it up off the insurance compaines.

All I'm saying is that there's not any real evidence that a social system is going to result in one red cent of savings. It is also NOT a given that it will result in 'more people being covered'. The devil is in the details, and Obama's plan is being rushed through pell-mell without due dilligence by the media, the Congress, or anyone else who should be putting the brakes on this mess. The 'stimulus' plan was rammed through with no watchdog, and look what a fiasco that has been. Government should never be allowed to do things in haste (ahem Iraq War ahem!). When goverment acts hastily, the people should stand up and shout NO. Haste is the enemy of sensible policy.

who are these people who want a public option to assuage their guilt

Quite simply, anyone who wants to vote for a health care plan with no testing, no fact checking, no peer reviews of efficacy, and no attempt to apply the rigor of science, analysis, and cost effectiveness - AND IT MUST BE DONE THIS YEAR OMG OH NOS! Though I will have to ammend my statement that there is only ONE kind of person who'd do this... There are really TWO kinds of people... 1. Is the guilt-addled neoliberal (like you perhaps?) who votes for any socialist system that comes down the pike. 2. Is the brain-dead Obama-zombie neoliberal lemming who just dutifully follows the wash of "Me too!" propoganda that gives him his marching orders. Obama sent out his orders this week to his army of lemmings. Guess the community agitator didn't like it very much when the community was agitating against HIS plans...