“I’m not fond of Sen. Obama’s plan … I’m really not fond of Sen. McCain’s plan,” Edwards, who is suffering from cancer and has become an influential voice on the issue, said at a forum on the issue in Washington.

Edwards reserved her harshest criticism for Sen. McCain’s (R-Ariz.) plan, saying that his proposals make everybody a “tax loser," "knock the doctor out of the [decision-making] process” and hurt people with preexisting conditions.

Edwards also criticized GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin, saying the Alaska governor was “not particularly well-informed about [McCain’s healthcare plan] and said it was budget-neutral.” Edwards claimed that the McCain campaign is now “scrambling to make it budget neutral … costing $1.3 trillion, much more than he previously estimated on the plan.”

Edwards, at the event held at George Washington University on Monday night, said the healthcare debate has taken an unnecessary back seat during the financial crisis, but that the two are correlated, adding that “even if the subprime crisis was solved, half of those houses would still be in trouble because they’re linked to healthcare.”

Edwards stated that, although many industries can thrive under a free-market system, “healthcare is not one of them. This is not a refrigerator, this is not a television set … we can’t look at the picture and say, ‘I like that picture and it’ll fit in my house, I want that TV set.'”

She pleaded with her college-aged audience to engage in the healthcare policy debate, saying it is a “moral imperative” to move toward universal healthcare because “it’s immoral to know that [the current] system is disadvantaging good people and not do anything about it.”