Private healthcare or private medicine is healthcare and medicine provided by entities other than the government. The term is generally used more in Europe and other countries which have publicly funded health care, to differentiate the arrangement from the usual system.
Ethical issues relating to private healthcare primarily concerns the argument that the seriously ill be entitled to spend money on saving their lives. On the other hand, private healthcare can sometimes be more efficient than public sector provision. Private operators may be more innovative in areas such as telemedicine. Due to the profit motive, they can be more productive. Public healthcare tends to be limited by the amount of tax that individuals are willing to pay.
Some would argue that private healthcare needs to be more carefully regulated to ensure that it achieves standards set by the state, predominantly regarding safety, value, and efficiency.
Famous quotes containing the word private:
“To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men,—that is genius.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)