How does insurance claim works?

If private healthcare insurance works as well as the right in the US claim, why was the US government spending 8.5% of GDP on healthcare for seniors and veterans even before the ACA?

• Just a note. Canada spends about 9.4% (7.7% government, 1.7% private) of a smaller per-capita GDP to provide universal health insurance with no fees to a population which on average lives longer than in the US.

• Answer:

  US spends 17% of GDP on healthcare, of which about 6% goes to seniors. The reason we spend 1.7 times (170%) what Canada does per capita, is that private health care does NOT work in the US. Nor does government health care, at either state or federal level. We have a fee for service system, and that simply encouraged a lot of extra "service." Really expensive, specialist-controlled service (our specialists make about 3 times what Canadian ones do). All this didn't do all that much extra good. I can give you the figures, but that's basically it.